Practical Project Management

Our Practical Project Management course  is a great introduction to the Project Management discipline. Long time practitioners of Project Management methodologies use a lot of acronyms and industry specific jargon. We break down these arcane terms and show you how you can use the principles that they represent to improve your productivity and management success.

The methods we teach are well established and are based on the best practices standards from the Project Management Institute’s Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (aka, PMI’s PMBOK).

In this course, we will break up into small groups to take a project from cradle to grave. We supply you with a good deal of open tools and templates to assist you in managing projects which you can take with you, fine-tune to fit your specific needs, and put them to work for delivering immediate ROI.

This course serves as an excellent lead-in to the concepts covered in our Mastering Requirements Gathering course.

SharePoint 2010 for Effective Project Management

SharePoint is a fantastic tool for document management and team communication, but that’s not all there is to it. While SharePoint’s friendly user interface lends itself exceptionally well to standard Project Management practices, SharePoint can be an integral part of any team collaboration – not just project teams. In this hands-on course, we walk you through building sites and exploring SharePoint’s out-of-the box features.

You don’t have to be a Project Manager to find SharePoint a positive influence on your processes. Whatever term you use to describe your role in your organization (Project Manager, Team Member, Executive, Employee, Grunt), SharePoint can help you get your job done.

By the end of this course you will have a strong familiarity with the SharePoint platform and solid knowledge of its application for getting projects done.

Managing Projects with Microsoft Project (2007 & 2010)

We have two versions of the Managing Projects with Microsoft Project course. One is optimized for using Microsoft Project 2010 and the other for using Microsoft Project 2007. The intent of both courses is the same however: to get you inside the mind of the Microsoft scheduling engine.

To do this, we cover in-depth the power of the flexible scheduling approach in Microsoft Project. If you’ve ever been frustrated by Project, you’ve probably found yourself hammering away, trying to force Project to suit a static schedule. We’ll show you how to work with Project to build well formed, dynamic schedules.

With our Mobile Lab, you’ll be able to use Project over the length of this course even if you don’t own it yourself!

Mastering Requirements Gathering

In our Practical Project Management course we’ll introduce you to the concept of requirements gathering,  but this course is where you really get to the meat of it.

Often, a successful project is defined as a project that is on time, within scope, and on budget. We take a slightly different perspective. While the standard definition can certainly indicate the potential for a successful project, we define project success as a satisfied customer. And there is only one sure way to get a satisfied customer: requirements gathering.

Learn how to define and document your customers’ needs, prevent scope creep, and ensure project success.

We provide you with tools and templates for your own professional use and walk you through the requirements gathering process and life cycle with a full hands-on simulation.

PMP Prep

If you are preparing to get your Project Management Professional (PMP) certification, this is the course for you.

We walk you through a long list of tips and tricks for taking the exam and passing all of the other necessary requirements. We provide you with an overview of the application process, a tool for collecting the requisite hours, and guidelines for getting certified.

When you leave this class you’ll have a good idea about what to expect from the test, tools to help you get there, and two books in your hands (The PMP Exam: How to Pass on Your First Try by Andy Crowe and PMI’s PMBOK 4th Edition).

Stay up to date!

Remember, you can always find our most up-to-date public course listing on our public class schedule.

Pictured here is Eric Jennett receiving the Jim O-Brien Lifetime Achievement Award from Jim himself. The Award is given annually by the PMI Scheduling Community for significant lifetime contribution to the scheduling profession.

I first met Eric Jennett at the 5th Annual PMI College of Scheduling conference in Chicago in 2008. Eric was the recipient of the Jim O’Brien Lifetime Achievement award.

I had heard of PMP #1, however I was now talking to the man, sitting in awe with Eric following the award dinner. Not only was I talking to the man that started it all, but everything he was now saying to me still made sense, some 40 years later. Eric was a key driving force behind the growth of an organization that 40 year later grew more than 350 times their wildest expectations (that red-line on the chart below is an exponential curve overlaid on 40 years of membership growth at PMI) … Project Managers can sometimes be extremely conservative in their estimates.

This graphic illustrates the exponential growth of PMI over the past 4 decades. This growth was largely fueled by the PMP certification, for which Eric Jennett was officially the first… PMP #1.

Sure there have been thousands of others along the way that have contributed to the growth and development of PMI, however I believe that Eric Jennett is the Project Management equivalent of Henry Ford …. Eric set the wheels in motion and we all got in our cars and followed ….

Doc Dochtermann is a Vice President at Advisicon. Doc is currently the Marketing & Communications Lead for the PMI Scheduling Community of Practice (SCoP). You can learn more about the Scheduling Community by visiting http://scheduling.vc.pmi.org/.

In Project Server 2007 the default permissions allows Team Member to view the project and its details. It is important for a team member to be able to see the details of all the tasks for the projects where they are involved. They might have to work on tasks that depend on tasks to be done by other resources. In this way they can also see whether these tasks are progressing as planned and thereby give the team members an overall picture without having to consult the project manager every time they need to know.

However, in Project Server 2010 there is a slight change in the way permissions are managed, especially because of Demand Management and Governance Workflow.

Thus, by default Team Members in Project 2010 are NOT allowed to view Project Details as opposed to Project Server 2007. To be able to view project schedule in PWA, a user needs “Open project” in group-category permission AND “New Project” in global permissions. Or “Open project” and “Edit project summary fields”.

To enable these permissions:

1. In the PWA, under the quick launch bar click on Server Settings.
2. On the Server Settings page, under Security click on Manage Groups.
3. On Manage Groups page click on Team Members.
4. Under Categories section, click on My Tasks. Under Permission for My tasks Allow “Open Project” permission.
5. Under Global Permission ensure “New Project” is enabled.
6. Click Save button.

Enabling such permission can give additional privileges to the Team member. Thus Microsoft has released a hotfix which can fix this issue.

The hotfix is available at

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2459112/

Thanks Meeta!

Regards,  

Tim

Tim Cermak, MBA, PMP

Advisicon 
| 
Senior V.P. of Business Development

O 1+248.529.6326  |  C 1+248.410.1322 | tim.cermak@advisicon.com
| www.Advisicon.com

Are You
Project 2010
Ready?                  Are You SharePoint
2010 Ready?

Review Advisicon’s Strategic Project Controls Solutions for Individuals, Teams, and your Enterprise

SharePoint Technical Consultant

Advisicon, Inc., a professional services consulting company based in Portland, Oregon seeks candidates for a SharePoint Consultant position.

Position Description Summary

The SharePoint Consultant position entails the following tasks, activities, and responsibilities:

• Help lead and build Advisicon’s growing SharePoint consulting practice
  
• Deliver SharePoint Server 2010 (SPS), Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007 and SharePoint Foundation 2010 (SPF), Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) 3.0 implementation consulting services to clients
  
• Manage SharePoint implementations, development teams, and projects
  
• Lead planning and architecting for SharePoint implementations
  
• Provide system administration for internal SharePoint instances
  
• Lead internal knowledge transfer and training for SharePoint resources
  
• Support other Advisicon consultants in delivering SharePoint consulting services
  
• Facilitate and/or participate in meetings with clients, colleagues, and other stakeholders
  
• Develop and present project reports
  
• Conduct and support proof of concepts, pilot projects, testing and evaluating SharePoint-based solutions
  
• Develop and deliver SharePoint training, demos, educational presentations, and proposals to prospects, clients, partners, and groups.
  

Professional Experience

• 2 years experience in planning and architecting SharePoint Server (SPS) implementations; at least one year experience with MOSS 2007 and WSS 3.0
  
• Experience in planning, architecting, and implementing SharePoint Server and SPF 2010
  
• Architecting and deploying production systems on the SharePoint 2010 platform
  
• SharePoint Server (SPS) 2007/2010 certification preferred (not required)
  
• Experienced with configuring, customizing, and integrating SPS and SPF
  
• Experienced with gathering business and technical requirements for SPS and SPF
  
• 4+ years IT experience
  
• 4+ years experience in developing web-based solutions
  
• Strong knowledge of the Microsoft platform
  
• Knowledge of a full range of SharePoint-related technologies; experience with Project Server preferred (not required)
  
• Experience working with development teams
  
• .NET development experience preferred (not required)
  

Core Professional Skills

• Problem-solver / solution provider
  
• Strong consulting skills
  
• Strong technical aptitude
  
• Professional appearance and manners
  
• Reliable and diligent
  
• Approachable and teachable
  
• Team player and leader
  
• Organized, systematic
  
• Good follow-through
  
• Excellent written, electronic, and interpersonal communication skills
  
• Strong professional references
  
• Proficient in Microsoft Office Excel, Word, Outlook
  
• Able to follow instructions/orders
  
• Effective manager of both technical and non-technical resources and teams
  
• Effective trainer
  

Additional Attributes (preferred and valued, but not required)

• Consulting experience
  
• Project management experience
  
• PMP certification preferred (not required initially)
  
• Experienced with implementing, supporting, and using Microsoft Office Project Server 2007/2010
  
• Application architecture and portfolio management experience
  
• Application or system development consulting experience
  
• MCP certifications
  
• Web development experience
  
• Proficiency in Microsoft Visio, Access, Performance Point Server preferred (not required)
  
• Experienced with non-Microsoft collaboration and document management applications
  

Personal Qualifications

2. Friendly, outgoing, sociable
   
3. Teachable; autodidact
   
4. Alert and observant
   
5. Self-motivated, takes initiative
   
6. Honest
   
7. Tactful and respectful
   
8. Passionate about profession
   
9. Healthy sense of humor
   

Contact

Please send your resume to: employment@Advisicon.com

Learn more about Advisicon at: www.Advisicon.com

PROBLEM: The problem is that Microsoft has not provided users with a way to insert any tracking fields in the Project Server 2010 Approval Center view (see screen shot below). The tracking fields are not available to add to the view through Configure Columns (in the view).

Figure A. PWA does not allow users to add baseline (tracking) fields to the Approval Center view.

Neither is there a way to modify the Approval Center view (and thus, those fields) through Server Settings/Look and Feel/Manage Views either, so it cannot be added to any Categories or modified.

SOLUTION: Our team at Advisicon has identified a method for viewing that information quickly and easily, without leaving PWA.

Someone with administrator permissions can add the baseline (tracking) fields to the Tasks Tracking view through Server Settings/Look and Feel/Manage Views. This will make those tracking fields available in the Preview Updates view, which you access from the Approvals Center view.

Figure B. Add baseline fields to the Tasks Tracking view through Server Settings/Look and Feel/Manage Views.

Figure C. Preview Updates impact on Project schedule

In the Approvals Center view, a PM can select a task, click on the Preview Updates button, and select the Tasks Tracking view. (See Figure C.)

A PM can use this customized view to compare submitted actuals with their baseline values. (See Figure D.)

Figure D. Compare baseline, actual, variance, and other values in the Tasks Tracking view.

This is better than methods that require the PM use Project client. This way keeps the PM in PWA and in the Update Center area, allowing the PM to decide which task updates to accept/approve or reject.

-Kevin Williamson, MCTS, PMP