I have not got time right now!

by jed simms on November 11, 2008

One of my favourite cartoons is of a leader fighting a war with swords and bows and arrows not having time to meet with a salesman who is selling a machine gun because he’s “too busy fighting a war”. When (…)

Read the rest of this entry »

Why you should not try to improve how you do projects!

by jed simms on November 5, 2008

Many organizations are wanting to ‘improve how they do projects’ so as to get better results, more consistent results or even some results. The task is then handed to a special team, IT or a PMO to ‘fix’. They, understandably, (…)

Read the rest of this entry »

Survival of the fittest

by jed simms on October 22, 2008

When the last economic downturn hit, companies responded by ‘downsizing’, ‘rightsizing’ or some other euphemism for reducing staff numbers. This time, this option is not so readily available as the ‘surplus’ staff is no longer there. Companies are going to (…)

Read the rest of this entry »

Is ‘avoided loss’ a benefit?

by jed simms on September 23, 2008

“If we don’t do this project, we’ll lose market share/customers/opportunities and that’ll be worth $XXm in lost revenue/profit!” I’ve seen a number of projects justified with ‘avoidance of loss’ cited as the major (sometimes only) benefit. The argument can be (…)

Read the rest of this entry »

Am I being unreasonable?

by jed simms on September 16, 2008

When recently reviewing a project that had a projected benefits value of $32m we found that the true available value was over $100m. So, if the project delivered the $32m is this true success? Or, is it a failure for (…)

Read the rest of this entry »