Seminar 07F - Project Management: Conference within a Conference 2014 (separate registration is...

8/10/2019 Seminar 07F - Project Management: Conference within a Conference 2014 (separate registration is required) (243…

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10/21/20

Project Management: Conference within a Conference

Randall Alberts

Dale Driver

Clay Fulton

Deborah Whitten

Overview of Agenda

Reviewed Feedback from last year’s session

• Less listening to speakers and more interaction

• More focus on PM skills/activities

New this Year:

• PM Exercises throughout the day

• Fast Facts about Individuals

• More Discussion Time

Today’s Agenda

Session Topics Time

Session 1 Introductions

Fast Facts

Project Management Exercise

8:00am – 9:30am

Break Morning Break 9:30am – 10:00am

Session 2 Communication Exercise

Rapid Round Table Discussion

10:00am – 11:30am

Break Lunch 11:30am – 12:30am

Session 3 Thinking Roles Exercise

Project/Portfolio Governance Tips

12:30am – 2:00pm

Break Afternoon Break 2:00pm – 2:30pm

Session 4 E st im at in g Exercise

Open Discussion Topics

2:30pm – 4:00pm



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Open Discussion Topics

• During the morning add possible discussion topics to

flip chart

• By the end of the afternoon break, vote on topics you

are most interested in by placing a gold star next to

the topic

• Afternoon discussion will focus on topics with the

most interest

PDU Credits for Certification

• See the back of your program handout for instructions

on counting today’s session toward your PMI

requirements for PMP/CAPM

certification/recertification

Randall Alberts▪ Assistant Director, Project

Management

▪ PMP, Six Sigma Black Belt, ITIL

▪ Masters in Management

▪ EDUCAUSE, PMI▪ EDUCAUSE Project Management

CG Leader

▪ “Project Management Goes to

College”



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Dale Driver ▪ Lead IT Project Manager of the ITS

Project Management Office

▪ PMP, M.Ed.

▪ 23 years in Education, 19 years in

Higher Ed

▪ EDUCAUSE, PMI

▪ Presenter at PMI Global Congress,

Annual EDUCAUSE, SE EDUCAUSE,

USG Annual Computing Conference,

Georgia Summit

Clay Fulton▪ Senior Application System Analyst

with the Planning & Project

Management Office

▪ ITIL Foundations Certification

▪ Educause

▪ itSMF Higher Ed Sig

▪ Over 25 years in Technology and

support services, with the last 11

in Higher Education

Deborah Whitten

Assistant Vice President for IT Planning and

Program Management, University Technology Office

Education: PMP, ITIL, CGCIO, M.Ed.

24 years in higher education IT

Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN

• Information Technology at Purdue

Clemson University, Clemson, SC

• Clemson Computing and Information Technology

Active in Educause, PMI



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Session 1: Fast Facts

Project Management Exercise

Fast Facts about PMO’s

Fast Facts Wheel



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Dale Driver – Fast Facts

Randall Alberts – Fast Facts

Clay Fulton – Fast Facts



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Item Answer

Institution Arizona State University

# of

Students 82,600

# of IT Staff 400+

# of PMs 20

# of Projects/PM 1‐12

# of Projects/Year 200+

PMO Reports To CIO

Centralized/Decentralized Centralized

Deborah Whitten – Fast Facts

Your Fast Facts

• Complete your Fast Facts Wheel

• Attach to the bottom of your ID/lanyard

• Share your information with those at your

table

• What do you have in common/different?

LEGO Project Management



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I Have a Project for

You!

Great Ideas?

Project Charter

• Contract for the Project

• Describes Scope

• Requires Customer sign-off

• Gives information so that a project

can be prioritized



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Priority?

Target:

Project

Manager



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Budget

• People

• Finances• Time

• Priority

• Triple Constraint

Pick any two … the third will automatically calculate!

Project

StakeholderEducation?



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Session 1 Wrap Up

Morning Break

Session 2 – Communication SkillsRapid Roundtable # 1



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Do You Want to Build a Snowman

Airplane?

CommunicationExercise

Build a Paper Airplane – (5 minutes)

Directions

• Print name on ‘Designer Name’ line of envelope

• Use blue color paper in the envelope

• Build a paper airplane with the following

requirements:

• At least 5 folds (5 crease lines in paper)

• On the exterior of the plane there must be:

• A number

• Two designs

• A project management term

• When finished, fold airplane, place inside

envelope and clasp shut

Get Directions – (10 minutes)

• Pair up with an individual from an adjacent table

(not your own table) and swap envelopes

• Each person has five minutes to interview the

other person on how to build/design his/her plane.

• Interviewee can only answer questions

• Interviewee can’t write, draw, or use electronic

device or images to aid interviewer

• Interviewer must write building instructions on

exterior of envelope given to them

• Interviewer prints name on the ‘Interviewer Name’

line of envelope



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Rebuild the Airplane – (5 minutes)

• Remaining as a pair, find another pair in the

overall group and join with them

• Swap envelopes so that each person has an

envelope that does NOT have his/her name in the

Builder or Interviewer lines.

• Using a white sheet of paper found on the tables,

build a new airplane following the instructions on

the envelope

• Print your name on the ‘Builder Name’ line of the

envelope

Check the Results– (3 minutes)

• Open the envelope to reveal the prototype

airplane (blue)

• Compare the as-built airplane to the prototype

• From your group of four, select the most accurate

and inaccurate as-built to prototype airplane to

show to the whole group

Follow-up Questions

• During this exercise what issues did you face while

• Interviewing the Designer?

• Writing the Directions?

• Following the Directions?

• Where did communication break down in this exercise?Why?

• Where did communication succeed in this exercise? Why?

• What were the keys to producing successful as-built

airplanes?

• What could be done in each step of the process to ensure a

successful end-product?



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Rapid Round Table – Topic 1

Topic 1

What are the issues associated with this

topic?

What are possible solutions to address the

topic?

Rapid Round Table – Topic 2

Topic 1

What are the issues associated with this

topic?

What are possible solutions to address the

topic?

Lunch



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Session 3 – Thinking Roles Skills

Project Portfolio Governance

• It is a simple and effective system that increases productivity by utilizing teamwork,

collaboration and consensus-building.

• There are six metaphorical hats and each defines a certain type of thinking.

• You can put on or take off one of these hats to indicate the type of thinking you are

using.

• This putting on and taking off is essential, because it allows you to switch from onetype of thinking to another.

• When done in a group, everybody should wear the same hat at the same time.

• The principle behind the 'Six Thinking Hats' is parallel thinking which ensures thatall the people in a meeting are focused on and thinking about the same subject at

the same t ime.

• Six hats can lessen the likelihood of groupthink, when preserving group harmony ismore important than reaching a good decision.

The white hat

Calls for information known or needed ‐ gathering just the facts

The white hat covers facts, figures, data and information. Too often

facts and figures are embedded in an argument or belief.

Wearing

your

white

hat

allows

you

to

present

information

in

a

neutral and objective way.

Questions you might ask while wearing your white hat include:

• What information do we have here?

• What information is missing?

• What information would we like to have?

• How are we going to get the information?

When you put on your white hat, you focus directly on the

information ‐ what is available, what is needed, and how it might be

obtained. Proposals, opinions, beliefs and arguments should be put

aside.



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The yellow hat

Calls for optimism, positive aspects

The yellow hat is for optimism and the logical positive

view of things. Wearing the yellow hat allows you to look

for benefits, feasibility and how something can be done.

Questions you might ask while wearing the yellow hat

include:

• What are the benefits of this option?

• Why is this proposal preferable?

• What are the positive assets of this design?

• How can we make this work?

Yellow hat thinking is a deliberate search for the positive.

Benefits are not always immediately obvious and you

might have to search for them. Every creative idea

deserves some yellow hat attention

The black hat

Judgment, caution and evaluation

Wearing the black hat allows you to consider your proposals critically

and logically. The black hat is used to reflect on why a suggestion

does not fit the facts, the available experience, or the system in use.

The black hat will play the role of “devil’s advocate”.

Wearing your black hat you might consider the following:

• Costs. (This proposal would be too expensive.)

• Regulations. (I don't think that the regulations would allow ... )

• Design. (This design might look nice, but it is not practical.)

• Materials. (Thjs material would mean high maintenance.)

• Safety issues. (What about handrails?)

Mistakes can be disastrous. So the black hat is very valuable. It is the

most used hat and possibly the most useful hat. However, it is very

easy to overuse the black hat. Caution, used too early in the problem

solving process, can easily kill creative ideas with early negativity.

The red hat

The red hat covers intuition, feelings, hunches and emotions.

Usually, feelings and intuition can only be introduced into a

discussion if they are supported by logic.

Often, the feeling is genuine but the logic is spurious. Wearing the

red hat allows you to put forward your

feelings and

intuitions

without

the

need

for

justification,explanation or apology.

Putting on the red hat, you express what you feel about the project.

Examples:

• My gut‐feeling is that this will not work.

• I don't like the way this is being done.

• This proposal is terrible.

• My intuition tells me that prices will fall soon.

The red hat allows feelings to come into the discussion without

pretending to be anything else. It is always valuable to get feelings out

into the open.



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The green hat

The green hat is specifically concerned with creating new ideas and

new

ways

of looking

at

things:

• Creative thinking

• Additional alternatives

• Putting forward possibilities and hypotheses

• Interesting proposals

• New approaches

• Provocations and changes

The green hat makes time and space ava ilable to focus on creative

thinking. Even if no creative ideas are forthcoming, the green hat asks

for the creative effort. Often green hat thinking is difficult because it

goes against our habits of recognition, judgment and criticism.

Typical questions include:

• Are there any other ideas here?

• Are there any additional alternatives?

• Could we do this in a different way?

• Could there be another explanation?

The blue hat

Controlling the sequence of thinking

The blue hat is the overview or process control. It is for

organizing and controlling the thinking process so that it

becomes more productive. The blue hat is for “thinking

about thinking”. Typically the blue hat will open and close

the discussion. They may map the sequence of the other

hats in the discussion.

Wearing your blue hat, you might:

• Look not at the subject itself but at the 'thinking'

about the subject.

• Set the agenda for thinking

• Suggest the next step in the thinking, " I suggest we try

some green hat thinking to get some new ideas"

• Ask for a summary, conclusion, or decision, "Could we

have a summary of your views?"

Exercise 1: Which hat am I?

Exercise 2: Which hat is called for when…..

Exercise 3: Role Play Exercise



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Exercise 1: Which hat am I?“What is the agenda for today’s discussion?




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“What is the agenda for today’s discussion?

“It will take 2 weeks for the vendor to finish their work”





“We could offer 2 for the price of one”



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“It will improve student awareness”







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“Adoption of the service will be minimal”











“I am concerned with staff morale”



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“What are the next steps we need to do?”







“What are the next steps we need to do?”



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Exercise 2: Which hat is called for when….


There is no meeting agenda





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We need to understand why projects aren’t being

completed




completed




completed

The same old ideas keep coming up



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completed

The same old ideas keep coming up


there is no meeting agenda

we need to understand why projects aren’t being

completed

the same old ideas keep coming up

an idea is perceived negatively




completed





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completed



everyone is overly enthusiastic about an idea




completed







completed




no one expresses their true feelings about an idea



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we need to understand why projects aren’t being completed












the meeting moves to a controversial subject








the meeting moves to a controversial subject



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Sample sequence

1. Blue Hat: Decide agenda and sequence

2. White hat: State Facts

3. Green Hat: Brainstorm

4. Yellow Hat: List Advantages

5. Black hat: List Pitfalls and Disadvantages

6. Red Hat: See how people feel

7. Blue Hat: Note final decision, assign action

items

Observations and Reflections

• Were there any conflicts?

• What sequence or speaking order waschosen?

• How was the discussion you had using the SixHats different from your typical discussions?

• How might it help you discuss difficult topics ormake decisions?

• Which hat or hats do you most commonlywear?

• Which hat is the least comfortable for you?

• Benefits of the Six Thinking Hats• Experience and intelligence of each person

• Acknowledgement of different factors involved in criticalthinking and decision making

• Diversity of thought / different perspectives

• Exercise our brains• Allows emotion to meld with rationality

• Reduce confrontation / increase collaboration

• Gives everyone a voice

• Team focus on problem solving

• Use of the hats• Problem Solving• Strategic Planning

• Meeting facilitation



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Focus

Project Intake / Portfolio Management (past)

Had developed a comprehensive nine-step process which providedgovernance for all projects that met a minimum threshold

+ Users developed excellent project charters+ Division had awareness, visibility, communication

- Users felt it was too burdensome- Users attempted to circumvent or avoid process

•Averaged 25-30 active projects each month•Utilized a PPM tool to manage projects•PMs required to update project status in tool

Focus

Project Intake / Portfolio (current)

• SharePoint site to provide disclosure

• Projects not needing funds approved by service owner and sponsor

• Projects requesting funding move to “tactical projects” for Vice Provost approval

+ Streamlined approach

+ K ey team members already meet so no need for separate project review meeting

+ Still ask the project sponsor to ask for comment from leadership team

– No process in place to remove completed or projects not approved

– Expectation to see the SME’s and resource managers even if it is not a formal step in a process

– Less visibility into project status

– Upper‐management would like to take a look again at developing a process and supporting tool (not as complicated as our last but not as simple as the current)

• Over 150 “2015 WorkPlans” submitted as one line on a spreadsheet

• These will be entered to SharePoint when the project is due to commence

• PM’s required to update their leadership on project status

Key Success Indicators

• Executive sponsorship

• Priorities aligned to institutional goals

• Demonstrated value through metrics

• Visibility

• Involved stakeholders



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What other success indicators do

you use?

Afternoon Break

Session 4: Estimating ExerciseOpen Discussion Topics



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The Art of Estimating

“The best we can do is si ze up the chances, calculate the risksinvolved, estimate our ability to deal with them, and then make

our plans with confidence.”

- Henry Ford (American industrialist and pioneer of the

assembly-line production method)

Estimate #1

• How many green M&Ms are in your bag?

Estimate #2

• The average medium 12 oz. bag of M&Ms

has approximately 550 M&Ms



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Estimate #3

• The vending machine size bag (small) has

about 56 M&Ms and 7 of them are green

Estimate #4

Estimate #5

• We were told by a Product Manager from

M&M Mars Company that the green ones

have a reputation of being an aphrodisiac,

and Mars wants to capitalize on thatperception, and wants the green ones to

appear rare. Therefore, they are putting

less green M&Ms in each bag.



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Final Count

• Open the bag and count green M&Ms.

• No eating them please!

What happened with each iteration?

• A: quick guess with little or no info

• B: meta data

• C: small sampling

• D: historical data

• E: rumor/anecdotal

• F: actuals

How should we estimate?

• Right person provides the estimates

• Break down the task

• Estimate in context

• Use ranges, 3-point estimating, or other

methods

Other ideas and suggestions?



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Open Discussion

Presenter Contact Information

Randall Alberts Assistant Director, Project Management

Office of Institutional TechnologyRingling College of Art and Design, Sarasota, FL

[email protected]

Dale Driver Lead IT Project Manager

Project Management Office,Information Technology Services

University of West Georgia, Carrollton, [email protected]

Presenter Contact Information

Clay FultonSenior Application System Analyst

Planning and Project Management Office,Computing Services

Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, [email protected]

Deb Whitten Assistant Vice President, IT Planning and Programs

Arizona State University, Tempe, [email protected]



10/21/20

Thank you for Attending!

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