This short post gives some context for what is an MOU or SLA and a basic structure or template for what could go into a MOU. This is focused more on an internal MOU between two departments within a corporation rather than a contractual MOU between a customer and supplier. You can get the template here.
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This blog post is focused on how to plan and scope out a disaster recovery plan. It looks at the objectives, work packages or deliverables and the acceptance criteria. It is more focused on how a client might engage a vendor to conduct a disaster recovery plan. The structure outlined could be used for inclusion in a statement of work. This is a business focused post and not technical.
A disaster recovery plan (DRP) is a documented process or set of procedures to recover and protect a business IT infrastructure in the event of a disaster. Planning and testing a disaster recovery plan is a prudent part of business continuity planning.
This post explores the structure of a good template for a business functional specification or template for a detailed functional specification. It looks at the contents and template of a good functional specification, how to work with users and the process of creation of a good functional specification.
I have provided a template of a business functional specification in a simple to follow 10-step way that can be used by a business analyst to walk through with users and collect the business functional specifications for the development of a new or modified application. In addition there are helpful hints and tips on developing the business functional specification that you can use as you develop the document. This was a specific request via feedback from one of my blog followers. A big thank you to Heather in Colorado, USA, really appreciate the feedback and I hope that you find this useful. This post is part of a number of articles on projects, you can read more here.
The Statement of Work (SOW) is a document, which describes the scope of work required to complete a specific project. It is a formal document and must be agreed upon by all parties involved.
In order to be effective, the SOW must contain an appropriate level of detail so all parties clearly understand what work is required, the duration of the work involved, what the deliverables are, and what is acceptable. Writing a good Statement of Work. What goes into a good SOW (Statement of Work)? In this post there is a basic outline of the structure of a good SOW. In addition there are some real world examples and templates that you can use right away of SOWs that you can use for either a project or consulting engagement
Recently I saw an interesting question posted on reddit about Remote Project Management.
With more and more business being managed as projects there will be increasing need to use and therefore work effectively with remote project teams. Contents of this blog post. How to work with remote teams
This post is part of a number of articles on projects, you can read more here.
There is also lots of useful stuff on project management methodologies and how to start a project and checklists that you can use. There are also some useful templates that you can use to start a project including a statement of work template. Also the most popular product, a simple to use template to price your project so that you can actually see if you will make or lose money. Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this email to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews. The future of work and Remote Project Management There are several macro trends that are driving changes to the how the work place of the future will be. These include • More collaboration, in particular with the community of interest that surrounds the business or project • Non hierarchical organizations with flat structures that ebb and flow and come together for projects and then disperse. • A borderless workforce, no longer will you just go to the talent pool in your company, office, state or country. You will seek out and engage with the best resources and at the best price. • The sharing economy continues to drive business to come together to solve problems and the inputs and actions of resources to work on these projects will not always be co located. These macro forces or waves of change mean that project managers must have the skills and experience to work with remote teams and drive the project and collaboration of people who are often not often located in the same country or even in the same time zone or even sharing a common language. Fun and challenging times. Preparing a Statement of Work (SOW) is a balancing act between defining the project, estimating the costs, allowing some flexibility, taking account of risk, due diligence checks and speed in actually issuing the quote to the customer.
There will probably be a sales person demanding the fast turnaround to keep the customer happy and the delivery manager wanting to make sure that all risks and due diligence checks have been completed. The perfect statement of work (SOW) is somewhere in between. Assuming that you have all of the elements and a template then you can spend more time on the scope and defining how granular the technical piece should be. Project scope is the part of project planning that involves determining and documenting a list of specific project goals, deliverables, features, functions, tasks, deadlines, and ultimately costs. As a project manager, you'll need to define project scope no matter what methodology you choose to use. The work and resources that go into the creation of the product or service are essentially the things that frame the scope of the project. The scope of the project outlines the objectives of the project. In other words, it is what needs to be achieved and the work that must be done to deliver a project. Why is Scope important? It is important to pin down the scope early in a project’s life cycle as it can greatly impact the schedule or cost (or both) of the project down the track. Anyone who has ever done a project will have tales of how scope changes caused grief.Scope is bound to change, and this is to be expected. As the detail becomes clearer, more complications creep in. These are not foreseeable at the start and hopefully we build in a contingency for what we cannot see. The scope changes that usually cause problems are those where the perception of what was in and out of scope was different between various parties. The Project Manager assumed there would only be four or five reports, and the business assumed ten to twenty. Nobody felt it was worth talking about because they assumed the other person thought the same way they did. In terms of technical detail it can be useful to define the business use cases or business functions that will be delivered as it is often possible to provide a solution using different technical componets. For example a business use case may be: “The solution will allow ad hoc queries of data held within the system” However the solution could be built with many different types of databases and front end query tools, each will have advantages and disadvantages and costs. It is often easier to specify the use case in business terms rather than technical terms and allow the developers to prototype during the build phase. It is important to look at the full project scope. To scope a project you need to look at several key areas: • Project Objectives • Product Requirements • Process Requirements • Basic reference information • Tasks • Resources • Stakeholders • Deliverables or Work Packages • Involve correct stake holders • Identify Limitations • Change Management • Other cost inputs • Costs • Margin • Sell Once you've established these things, you'll then need to clarify the limitations orparameters of the project and clearly identify any aspects that are not to be included. In specifying what will and will not be included, the project scope must make clear to the stakeholders, senior management and team members involved, what product or service will be delivered. Alongside of this, the project scope should have a tangible and measurable objective for the organisation that is undertaking the project. The purpose may be to create a better product for a company to sell, upgrade a company's internal software so that they can deliver better service to their customers or to create a new service model for an organisation. These things are integral to defining the project scope, because they will play a part in how project methodologies are applied to the project to bring it to completion. In addition it is important to understand the business drivers behind a project. These are used to fund and justify the project. They are usually one of the following • Cost saving through reduction of process, overhead, legacy solution • Revenue increase through the introduction of new products or services • Compliance introduced through new legislation or standards. The business drivers will also be used as part of the business benefits realisation phase where the costs of the projects are measured by the business benefits achived by executing the projects. These can be either tangible or intangible business benefits. Top Tip Include the business benefits realisation activity as part of the project early on so that you can track and measure the benefits as they are realised. It is much harder to measure the benefits after the fact. For more resources check out our store and for more articles on projects, check out the blog. Thanks for reading Andrew Everett Recently I saw an interesting question posted on reddit about How do you organise your PMO?
The PMO should seek to add value to the project delivery process by providing a suite of standard tools and templates for projects to use as well as providing a review process through various stages of the project to help keep projects within agreed tolerances in terms of scope, time, cost and quality. This post is part of a number of articles on how to set up your project, you can read more here.
There is also lots of useful stuff on project management methodologies and how to start a project and checklists that you can use. There are also some useful templates that you can use to start a project including a statement of work template. Also the most popular product, a simple to use template to price your project so that you can actually see if you will make or lose money. Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this email to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews to help get it done ! How do you organise your PMO?
Objective of the PMO The objective of the Project Management Office (PMO) is to provide a good framework for the delivery of projects. It should provide project managers with the tools and processes to run projects in a standard way. The PMO should also help set up the governance framework for tracking and reporting of projects. The PMO should also set up guard rails that assist projects managers keep their projects on track for example by scheduling regular reviews or audits. Functions of the PMO
Work products of the PMO The PMO should provide a number of templates that all project managers can use quickly and easily to ensure that projects are delivered and managed in a standard way. These work products include
Things that the PMO check See blog post here of the PMO Checklist for good project governance. Thanks for reading. Andrew Everett #helpgetitdone Last week I saw this post on reddit about one of the challenges of project management and freelancing.
After posting a brief response I thought the topic deserved some more detail. The situation is common. A client has a project in mind but has not got the scope fully defined. The features and functions have not been defined. But they know they need to get going. In addition the client needs to know the cost of the project. The challenge with quoting with this type of project is that the scope, time to deliver and cost is unknown. But business being business you need to move ahead. Several options exist and each has pros and cons. You can read more about how to price your project in these other articles.
There is also lots of useful stuff on project management methodologies and how to start a project and checklists that you can use. There are also some useful templates that you can use to start a project including a statement of work template. Also the most popular product, a simple to use template to price your project so that you can actually see if you will make or lose money. Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this email to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews to help get it done ! Option #1-Provide a Time and Materials (T&M) rate for your time. This is usually expressed as a daily or hourly rate. A low risk approach for you but very hard for the client to understand the total cost of the project. Pros
Cons
A time and materials engagement can be a quick way to start a project but is not usually suitable for a longer-term engagement. Top tip If a client does not know their requirements then suggest that you can start on a time and materials basis and work with them to define the requirements or complete the design phase of the project. At the end of the design phase you will then know the scope of the project and can quote more accurately. "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." — Robert Heinlein, Time Enough for Love[1][2] In addition a human being should be able to scope and quote for a new piece of business. This short video focuses on how to scope and quote for a technology or Information Technology project, however the basic concepts are the same for most projects. People who should watch this video....
Enjoy and thanks for watching. Topics Covered in the video
The complete e-guide on how to price a project and roll out quotes is available FREE when you subscribe. You can subscribe here. The project quote tool, which is our most popular product is also available in our store. You can download it here, which you can use over and over again to quote for your projects. Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews to help get it done !
This checklist contains a series of questions aimed at finding if the project has been completed as planned, proposed and as agreed.
Key words
Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews to help get it done ! You may also find some of the tools and templates that I have used to deliver projects for startups here, including the most popular item in the store, a project quote tool that helps you build a fully costed project commercial model. You can find it here. All products are offered with a money back guarantee. Thanks for reading..... Project close checklist
Thanks for reading Innovation Delivery Checklist A short post on how to deliver innovation. I often get asked how to deliver innovation and end up responding that innovation is not a product, you can not build 10 units of innovation. Instead it is a framework that you set up that allows innovation to flourish and creative ideas to evolve. Setting up that framework can be hard, you need a checklist. Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews to help get it done ! Thanks for reading..... Innovation Delivery Checklist Key words
Define Innovation Innovation generally refers to changing or creating more effective processes, products and ideas, and can increase the likelihood of a business succeeding. Businesses that innovate create more efficient work processes and have better productivity and performance. For businesses, this could mean implementing new ideas, creating dynamic products or improving existing services. Innovation can be a catalyst for the growth and success of business, and help you adapt and grow in the marketplace. Being innovative does not mean inventing; innovation can mean changing your business model and adapting to changes in your environment to deliver better products or services. Successful innovation should be an in-built part of your business strategy, where you create a culture of innovation and lead the way in innovative thinking and creative problem solving. Businesses that innovate create more efficient work processes and have better productivity and performance. Innovation is not so much as structuring a process but more about creating enough freedom to see differently, act differently, and aim higher. Delivering the Innovation Process A useful technique can be to breakdown the process into a series of steps so that the process of seeking and implementing new and innovative ideas can be controlled and structured to a certain extent. I have used the acronym DEAL to summarise the innovation delivery checklist process. I have used this process to successfully deliver innovation for a number of technology projects. To see more resources that you can use, check out the resources page, here. DEAL
Step #1- Define With any project it is important to define what you are after. This can be in terms of objective or might be a process improvement. As part of this process it is often useful to benchmark your starting point so that you have data to compare against. I did a project for a client to improve the quote turnaround process. We started with benchmarking the full cycle of the quote process which started with receiving the request from the client, validating and seeking approval of that request, analyzing and preparing the quote, getting the quote approved the internal due diligence process, issuing the quote, responding to customer queries on the quote and finally closing and getting sign off on the quote. We needed to benchmark each of the steps in the process in terms of days to be able to understand and see whether any changes made would improve the process. Define what you are after. Once we had the steps defined and benchmarked we could see where improvements were reducing the turnaround time. Step # 2 Eliminate Overhead and legacy are natural barriers to innovation. Just because something has always been done a particular way does not mean that it cannot be improved or enhanced. To drive innovation you need to remove this legacy thinking and strip back what you are trying to innovate and improve and focus on the core of what you are doing. At a client that I worked with there was a legacy of management reporting in the process by which sales orders were called out. The result was that the poor sales person was required to enter and maintain his forecast in 4 different systems. There was constant pressure to keep the systems in sync, as they were being used and tracked by different back office teams. The overhead meant of course that the sales people were spending more and more of their time updating four different systems rather than working on new leads and closing sales. Step #3 Action Innovation will not magically appear; it needs to be worked on. People and teams tasked with delivering innovation and process improvements need to take action. This can start with a lean canvas method used by many start-ups to paint out how the delivery maps to what the vision and values of the project or business relates to. This forces everyone to review what they are striving for and creates feedback loops. Once the lean canvas is mapped out then a process of iterative testing and validation can be used to enhance the process. The feedback loops, data created and testing ensure that the process improvements keep lining up with what the vision/value/ objective of the project was. Unless the project keeps checking back there is a risk that process improvements may be made but which do not relate to the initial project objective. This is a process of action, test, validate, innovation, win. For example I did a cloud-based project in the early days of SAAS (Software as a service). We started with a prototype offering where customers started with a 2 CPU offering for their virtual machines. The expectation was that almost 80% of customers would like the service and upgrade to the next level and use more computing power. At the end of the 1st month, there had been no upgrades or upsells. However we noticed that most customers were using 90% of their CPU capacity, for most of the month. Using this data we did an email update to the customers offering a free upgrade to a higher number of CPUs as we had noticed their utilization was running so high. The offer was free for a month and then they could choose to downgrade or continue and pay the increased service price. The result was a 100% conversion and upsell at the end of the 2nd month. Step #4 Liberate Finally enough creative thinking time needs to be allocated to allow staff and teams to deliver innovation. Like Atlassian and the Nobel Prize winners this needs to be baked in as a regular activity so that it is continual process and not just a once off. People need to feel that they own the innovation and creativity process. They just need to be given the time to do so. Key Words
• Strategic planning • Strategic planning process • Business plan template The following post is focused on the strategic planning process. This is a process that many oganisations go through but also large projects will undertake as part of their governance process. You may also find some of the tools and templates that I have used to deliver projects,here, including the most popular item in the store, a project quote tool that helps you build a fully priced project commercial model. You can find it here. All products are offered with a money back guarantee. Also please check out the resources page for more useful resources to make your life easier. Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews to help get it done! Thanks for reading. Andrew Everett This week I was asked to pull together a summary of a deal that we had won a few weeks back and to share some highlights of the deal with some visiting executives to give them insight into the deal and hopefully allow their teams to learn and profit from our experience.
You may also find some of the tools and templates that I have used to deliver projects for startups here, including the most popular item in the store, a project quote tool that helps you build a fully costed project commercial model. You can find it here. All products are offered with a money back guarantee. Are you enjoying this blog? If so, please forward this to a friend or colleague and suggest that they sign up here. It is free and you will receive a coupon code to allow a free download from our store + regular updates on tools, templates and interviews to help get it done ! Thanks for reading. Andrew Everett Below is the summary of the headings and is useful way to structure a presentation on a deal. Suggested contents
****Stop Press**** This has been the most popular blog post I have ever done. Thank you !! The checklist of 120 items have been added to a simple and easy to use tool that any project manager or delivery manager can use to check on the health of their project at any stage of the project lifecycle. Simple to use and very very effective.....make you look like a boss ! You can get it here for the price of a cup of coffee. The following is a project checklist, which can be used by project managers, program managers, delivery managers, pre sales consultants and anyone who is focused on ensuring that all areas of a project are being managed to ensure successful delivery. It is organised around the lifecycle of a project from initiation through delivery and close out. It is part of a series of longer articles on projects. You can read the others in the series here and here. Project managers will find this checklist useful so that they know what governance and oversight the PMO (Project Management Office) expects when managing a project.
This list is useful from the Project Management Office (PMO) perspective. The PMO should seek to add value to the project delivery process by providing a suite of standard tools and templates for projects to use as well as providing a review process through various stages of the project to help keep projects within agreed tolerances in terms of scope, time, cost and quality. For more details on setting up a project please check out the other blog post here Scope Management 1. When a change request is initiated, is there a process to evaluate the impacts on scope, schedule, cost and contractual compliance? 2. Are approved changes reflected in the Schedule and Project Management Plan? 3. Has customer reviewed, verified, and signed-off the Statement of Work (SOW)? 4. Is there a requirements matrix, which links the contract, functional specification and deliverables? Scope Change Control 5. Is a documented change control process in place? 6. Are subcontractor or 3rd party change control processes also in place? This can be important to know as often 3rd party contractors will start work with out the necessary change control and then seek amendments or variations to the contract which can make commercial management tricky under a fixed price arrangement. 7. Have all know changes been managed via change requests? 8. Is each change request evaluated in terms of scope, cost, and schedule impact? 9. Have all changes been done with a formal change order and approved and signed by the customer? 10. Is a change log maintained? 11. Has a change control board been established? Check what are the project managers Project Managers Plan (PMP). “Hardly any faculty is more important for the intellectual progress of Man than ATTENTION. Animals clearly manifest this power, as when a cat watches by a hole and prepares to spring on its prey..."
Charles Darwin, ON THE DESCENT OF MAN, 1871 Introduction Below is a list of items to think about when starting up a project. There is an assumption that the project has been sold and now the focus is on setting up the project to deliver against what was in the contract and reducing the execution risk during the project. Start up 1. Did the pre-sales team do a handover to the delivery team? 2. Did they follow any checklists 3. Were any issues identified? 4. Is the delivery team ready? 5. Is the customer ready? Governance 6. Is the project big enough or is it high risk, that would justify setting up and an internal steering team? 7. Have the meetings been booked with the right stakeholders? 8. Is the delivery team going to follow a standard delivery methodology? 9. Has it been used before, does the team have experience in using the methodology? 10. Has a shared work space been set up to store the documents used during the bid phase. For example the signed Statement of Work (SOW), the project plan, any business requirements from the customer, the budget estimates or templates that were used to price the project. For an SOW template go here. 11. Is there a Project Management Plan (PMP) created which will describe how the project will be delivered? Has this been reviewed with the customer? Basically the PMP is the playbook that describes how the various teams involved in the project will work together. 12. Have the key stakeholders been identified. This should include project stakeholders who will be involved in the delivery of the project as well as customer stakeholders who will approve and accept the project deliverables. In addition it is often prudent to engage with the end customer stakeholders or the business as these are the people who will accept the solution and who have often providing the funding for the project. Business stakeholders will often delegate to the IT department to manage and deliver the project but they should be kept close to ensure alignment between business and project objectives. |
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For the project office to use. A list of things to check off in managing a project grouped into sections from scope, time, budget, quality and management. Instantly check the health of any project by scoring against these 117 questions.
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The following is a project checklist, which can be used by project managers, program managers, delivery managers, pre sales consultants and anyone who is focused on ensuring that all areas of a project are being managed to ensure successful delivery. It is organised around the lifecycle of a project from initiation through delivery and close out.
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