Project Management Latest, August 2020
Project management skills and training are key for growth in SMEs - new APM study reveals
David Thompson of APM, writing in BDaily, gives an insight into the needs of the SME "sector" highlighted into their latest Golden Thread report. The article highlights 3 challenges (skills gap, uncertainty and revenue flows) and suggests a way forward with 3 elements (supply chain opportunities, uptake in new industries, and digital).
For me, the biggest challenge is understanding. APM shows that 2.1m FTEs work in the project profession in the UK, with something like 1.3m (62%) FTEs working in SMEs. Many of these do not consider themselves to be project professionals, instead they have a day job where one of the responsibilities is managing projects. If you don't identify as a project manager, you won't necessarily be looking for project manager training. However the pressures on this hidden majority is greater than that on their counterparts in bigger organisations:
as the sensitivity to failure is far greater, and
the demand to be entrepreneurial is far greater too.
Clearly APM and the profession need to do so much more than offer training on a "pull" basis.
3 Competencies You Need to Ride Today’s Project Economy Wave
Within the context of the next wave of digital transformation projects, Bruce Harpham advises 3 competencies a PM will need to develop to be able to ride the wave:
support new ways of working,
improve your talent approach, and
renew you focus on risk management.
I would observe that 1. should be broadened beyond remote working, to encompass embracing the technologies coming from the fourth industrial revolution.
3 Must-Have Project Management Tools for Startups
Of course John Leo Weber is selling their tool, but there is some good advice here, not least the collaboration proverb - top go further, go together. The 3 must-have tools are:
Work Management Software,
Kanban Boards for Workflows, and
Dashboards.
I know it's not "trendy", but I'd add timelines or Gantt charts which are always needed for good communication. Interestingly, this leads me this next article from TechRadar.
Best Gantt chart software 2020
Richard Sutherland runs through his favourites:
Instagantt
Smartsheet
Microsoft Project
TeamGantt
ProofHub
This is a good list. I would wave a flag of caution to 2. though. Often when recommending PM tools it's right to lead users away from storing data in spreadsheets, and Smartsheet leans into making those Excel devotees comfortable with staying in their world.
Changing Company Culture For Agile Project Management: Avoiding The “Can’t Ban”
Steve Tengler looks at 4 cultural hurdles and suggests some useful strategies for handling them:
The urgent trumps the important,
If they can’t figure out, the adults will step-in,
Interruption vs. intraruption, and finally
Fear of failure becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
The Perfect Storm for The Project Economy
Mike Griffiths looks at how Covid-19 has accelerated the inevitable, and created a perfect storm of disruption. He suggests the impact on project management will be:
Less of the old,
More power skills,
Technology Quotient (TQ), and
Different lifecycles.