Are there too many project management standards?

The recent release of a comparison of the PMI’s PMBOK 5^th edition and ISO 21500:2012 standard by Swiss-based STS Sauter Training & Simulation Inc set off an interesting discussion in the Psoda office. The debate centred around whether there are too many project management standards now and should there be a move towards reducing this.

We took a quick and dirty straw poll in the office around the number of Project Management standards we could name and came up with 5. This doesn’t include methodologies such as extreme project management, lean project management, PRiSM etc. This is purely internationally recognised standards that individuals can be trained and certified in.

I’m surprised at how many Project Management standards there are, given that the whole premise of standards generally is to provide a consistent, repeatable, auditable method of working. I can’t think of another industry where this is the norm and personally believe that too many standards is a bad thing as you often end up in a situation where thinking and methodologies clash.

I’ve worked in organisations where differing Project Management standards were used at the same time on the same project and the result was not pretty.

Differing standards and certification programmes make it harder for Project Managers to move between organisations or industries as they are likely to have a preference for a particular standard and getting a job without certification in that standard is nigh on impossible. For example, the telecommunications industry expects Project Managers to hold PMI certification, yet the public sector expects PRINCE2.

Having looked at the STS comparison there doesn’t appear to be any fundamental differences in the 2 standards. Similarly, I’ve noticed convergence between PMI and PRINCE2. Surely it makes more sense to look at a way of combining the various standards into one, making it simpler and easier for all concerned.

All interesting food for thought for the team at Psoda. Luckily our software solutions are standards agnostic and the current different approaches are easily catered for with the customisable workflows and other user configurable features.

Service, not Software

Calendar views
Advanced Resource Estimates
Calculations
Reporting
Custom Fields
New Columns
Bug Fix

Calendar Views

We’ve added calendar views for projects and users which quickly shows you the tasks, milestones and actions for the selected month:

Advanced Resource Estimates

We’ve implemented phase 1 of advanced task estimation. You can now enter per resource, per week estimates for tasks. Look for the advanced estimates tab on projects and programmes.

Calculations

We’ve changed the calculation of fixed duration tasks to set estimated effort = duration if the task is not allocated to any resources. Previously, the estimated effort defaulted to zero if the task was not allocated to any roles/users.
We’ve also changed the taskgroup progress calculation to use the average of the task/sub-group progress if there is zero estimated effort. Previously, the taskgroup defaulted to zero progress if there was zero estimated effort across all the tasks/sub-group.

Reporting

We’ve added a number of new report methods to the report templates:

• To retrieve preferences, e.g. $asset.getPrefence(‘name’,'default’)
• To retrieve the task/group/milestone overdue status and string:
  • $task.getOverdue()
  • $task.getOverdueString()
• To retrieve timesheet attendance details.
• To retrieve the attendance excess.
• To retrieve the previous/next timesheets.

We’ve updated the timesheet report to run at the organisation, role, line manager or individual levels.

We’ve added the Attendance report to show totals and exceptions from the attendance details. This report can be run at the organisation, role, line manager or individual levels.

Custom Fields

We’ve increased the custom field string length from 4000 to 8000 characters. We’ve also added support for custom fields on tasks and milestones.

New Columns

We’ve added a new column on the Tasks&Milestones table to show when the task/group/milestone is overdue.

We’ve also added RAG and RAG change columns to the portfolio members dashletand the programme members dashlet.

Bug Fix

We’ve fixed the display of the default state on the workflow history tab.

In about the year 2000, people inside the department noticed that the department cupboard had become quite untidy.  People outside of the department also noticed this!

So, the decision was made to get a brand new cupboard. 

It was a fairly standard cupboard, 2 by 3 meters with 6 shelves. It couldn’t fit everything in but people got by with a bit of creativity.  Those who understood how the old cupboard got messy, spent a lot of time trying to ensure the new cupboard remained tidy.  They put in labels, gave instructions as to what was to be filed where, changed the 2 doors to 6 doors, varied the height of the shelves and gave keys to different people for different parts of the cupboard.  Inside the cupboard, things became much tidier and people could find what they needed when they needed it.

But, some people within the department grew a little frustrated with the daily routines needed to keep the cupboard tidy.  It took time out of a busy day when there were more important things to do!  So, it came to pass that a number of smaller cupboards were purchased to make their lives easier.

Then there were people from other departments who wondered what on earth was in the cupboard.  They had no use for the cupboard and decided that the space could be put to far better use.  So the decision was made to get rid of the cupboard, and also to say goodbye to those who were tasked with keeping it tidy.

This was very confusing for those in the department, particularly for those whose ‘important’ role it was to keep the cupboard tidy!  They wondered how this important role had so quickly become unimportant.  They also wondered why no one had asked them what was in the cupboard!

Now, getting rid of the cupboard and those who had to keep it tidy, started to have some negative effects.  Things once again became quite untidy – not overnight, ever so slowly, but most definitely the mess was getting worse.

Those from other departments started to be affected by the mess, and complained about the people in the other department.  “What a mess”, they said.  They had forgotten about the cupboard they had gotten rid of, and they had forgotten about the people who knew what used to be inside the cupboard.

Those in charge of the department wanted to solve the problem.  They reminded others about the old cupboard and about those who had kept it tidy.  The problem was that the cupboard space had been used up!

People from other departments told their ‘colleagues’ in the department that they just needed to work harder to keep things tidy.  They commented that there was no reason why they could not get along quite well without a cupboard.  It felt really good to give advice to those with the untidy cupboard.  .

So the people in the department tried their best to make do.  They really wanted to please – but they kept on getting into trouble as more and more mess appeared.  So they tried a little bit harder!  At times they did wonder why no one spoke to them about the cause of the mess.

Some big mistakes started to appear, with questions being asked of the department.  Some, who had never had a look at the inside of the old cupboard, had ‘good ideas’ about how to fix things.  After all, these people were experienced managers, good at fixing things.  They were particularly good at demonstrating how others could do things better!

So, many more small cupboards started to appear, with many more cupboard cleaners, with many different cupboard designs, but with each cupboard having much the same contents.  It seemed really important to the people outside the department that they had their own cupboard!

Then, a really big mistake happened which caused the big boss to look inside one of the small cupboards.  What a shock!  There was a lot of stuff missing that should have been there, and also a lot of stuff there that should not have been there!  This resulted in a good look at the other cupboards.  What a shock!

And so it happened that those outside the department decided to put another cupboard in the department – to keep things tidy.

It was a fairly standard cupboard, 2 by 3 meters with 6 shelves. It couldn’t fit everything in but people got by with a bit of creativity.  Those who understood how the old cupboard got messy, spent a lot of time trying to ensure the new cupboard remained tidy.  They put in labels, gave instructions as to what was to be filed where, changed the 2 doors to 6 doors, varied the height of the shelves and gave keys to different people for different parts of the cupboard.  Inside the cupboard, things became much tidier and people could find what they needed when they needed it.

BUT ………………………………………………

Reposition’s purpose is to assist business leaders ‘reposition’ aspects of their business for enhanced performance.  The ‘Story of the Cupboard’ was written by John Reed, who incorporated Reposition in late 2009.  It captures, in the form of a metaphor, the damaging impact of ill-conceived business initiatives.  Reposition sets out to assist leaders develop and implement well conceived business initiatives that favourably impact morale and performance.

“Reflect on the past, reposition for what lies ahead”

Service, not Software

Change Requests

AJAX

Report Templates

Task Management

Importing Large Files

Attachment Size Warning

User Preferences

Timesheets

Change Requests

We’ve added a category field to change requests. You can also set the default list of categories at the organisational level.

AJAX

You can now enable/disable the use of AJAX when selecting another tab. We’ve also fixed the problems some users were having when switching between tabs using AJAX.

Report Templates

We’ve added a few new options to the report templates:

• Insert tables within other tables
• Set custom properties in the MS word export
• Assign a VALUE or an EXPRESSION
• Add a page border to a section

Task Management

We’ve changed the default effort for a task to 1 day.

When you add or edit a task the fixed end date now points 23:59 of the day selected instead of 00:00. 

Importing Large Files

We’ve improved the performance of Psoda so that you can import large MS Project XML files.

Attachment Size Warning

We’ve added a warning when uploading attachments or MS Project files to remind you that the maximum file size that can be uploaded is 8MB.

User Preferences

We’ve added a couple of new options to the user tasks tab:

• Show/hide tasks that are 100% complete
• Show the date and time or just the date

Timesheets

All of the following enhancements are configurable, so you don’t need to see/use them if you don’t want to.

We’ve added a number of new settings at the organisational level. This is particularly useful if you work in a unionised environment:

• Maximum working hours per day
• Maximum working hours per fortnight
• Maximum excess hours per fortnight
• Reset accrued TOIL hours every quarter?
• Maximum TOIL per annum
• Maximum TOIL per quarter

We’ve added a field to the Selected details box on the timesheet view to show the week number relative to the start of the financial year.

We’ve added an extra row on the timesheet view showing the excess hours per day and the total for the week or fortnight.

This release of Psoda has focused on enhancing the scheduling functionality.

We’ve added an option to mass archive tasks to the programme, project, change request and task group views.

You can now add tasks directly from the user view. New tasks are added to the organisation and allocated to the user by default.

We’ve also added an option to add tasks directly from a role. New tasks are created under the parent of the role and are automatically allocated to the role.

You can now set your task list to only show tasks with no start/end dates. This makes it easier for you to find tasks that still need to be scheduled.

As part of the ongoing beautification of Psoda we’ve moved the Mass approve tasks and Mass complete tasks options from the toolbar to the bottom of the Tasks&Milestone table and added groupings of the options below the Tasks&Milestones table on the Task group and Change request views.

Finally we’ve made the transition from one tab to another a little faster by using AJAX to load the next tab.

Quality assurance. One of those necessary evils of project management. Yet in most instances there are simple, yet very effective ways to check quality without making a huge production of it. Instead of checking every single item, decide where there is a critical control point and check something there.

An excellent example is the infamous Van Halen concert tour contract rider that specified that a bowl of M&Ms must be available in their dressing room – with all the brown M&Ms removed. Failure to meet that specified requirement could lead to cancellation of the show with full compensation.

To some it seemed like a diva-esque move by a band at the height of their fame, but it turned out to be a pretty slick way of performing quality assurance on the concert venues’ work.

Put simply, if there were brown M&Ms in the bowl it gave the band a heads up that their production needed to be thoroughly checked, as it was likely that some technical requirements would have been overlooked.

In David Lee Roth’s autobiography he explained it: “Van Halen was the first band to take huge productions into tertiary, third-level markets. We’d pull up with nine eighteen-wheeler trucks, full of gear, where the standard was three trucks, max. And there were many, many technical errors; whether it was the girders couldn’t support the weight, or the flooring would sink in, or the doors weren’t big enough to move the gear through.

The contract rider read like a version of the Chinese Yellow Pages because there was so much equipment, and so many human beings to make it function. So just as a little test, in the technical aspect of the rider, it would say “Article 148: There will be fifteen amperage voltage sockets at twenty-foot spaces, evenly, providing nineteen amperes. This kind of thing. And article number 126, in the middle of nowhere, was: “There will be no brown M&M’s in the backstage area, upon pain of forfeiture of the show, with full compensation.”

So, when I would walk backstage, if I saw a brown M&M in that bowl . . .well, line-check the entire production. Guaranteed you’re going to arrive at a technical error.  They didn’t read the contract. Guaranteed you’d run into a problem. Sometimes it would threaten to just destroy the whole show. Something like, literally, life-threatening.”

Not bad for diva-esque rockstars.

What’s your quality plan?