Are Project Managers a ‘commodity’?

One organization is getting rid of its pool of project managers as “you can just go to the market and buy them as necessary”.
Another organization outsourced its project managers to a major systems implementer on the basis that “we cannot give them a career path in our organization but they can.”
This seems to me to [...]

Solving the non-problem

We recently moved into new offices. Great.
But our mail was being returned to sender. Bad.
We contacted the Post Office and they said that they did not deliver to individual floors and unless there was a post office box or reception on the ground floor, they could not deliver our mail. Even badder.
Being good process consultants [...]

What is the difference between a ‘contractor’ and a ‘consultant’?

Many contractors call themselves ‘consultants’ but are only contractors.
Contractors bring skills, experience and an ability to do the job. You buy them for their knowledge and experience and fit them into a job/role that needs this knowledge and experience. Contractors grow in terms of greater knowledge (hopefully gained through education) and greater experience (gained on [...]

Two critical questions to ask your consultants

There are two questions you should always ask a consultancy, systems implementer or even contractor before you hire them.

1    When and why did you resign a client?
Often consultants are put in a position where they are asked to do something that they believe is the wrong approach, will deliver a substandard solution or, as [...]

A Project Sponsor walked into a bar …

He was upset. His project was off the rails and he could not understand why.
They had defined the problem and found what was supposed to be the best software solution, from the company’s preferred supplier.
They had skipped defining the current state (‘as is’) so as to not waste time on the past.
They had defined the [...]