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    Simmer Down! How to Deliver Great Projects Despite Impossible Deadlines and Unrealistic Budgets
    Simmer Down! How to Deliver Great Projects Despite Impossible Deadlines and Unrealistic Budgets
    Simmer Down! How to Deliver Great Projects Despite Impossible Deadlines and Unrealistic Budgets
    Ebook151 pages1 hour

    Simmer Down! How to Deliver Great Projects Despite Impossible Deadlines and Unrealistic Budgets

    By Douglas Brown

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    About this ebook

    Unrealistic? Perhaps. Impossible? Probably not. Either way, that's all you're getting. What's a project manager to do?

    One of the most frequent complaints among project managers is that best practices such as PMBoK and PRINCE say that you should work out what a project is about first, then estimate the work needed to do it, then determine the likely cost and schedule.

    In reality, it often happens that project managers are nominated to their roles and told what the deadline is and how much money is available, and that's the end of that. Many go through the best practice processes they have learned, and discover that you simply can't get there from here: there simply isn't any way to deliver what's required in the allotted time and budget. But their program managers or executives won't budge an inch: the budget is formulated, the shareholder or stakeholder promises have been made. Suck it up. Do more with less. That's why we hired a great PM like you, to make things happen, get it done ... We've heard it all before. No wonder project failure rates are what they are. Is there no end to the madness?

    Well, yes, there is. Simmer Down explains what a project manager can do when faced with such a situation so as to end up satisfying both the customer and the constraints. It's also going to be useful to help program managers explain to the project managers that sometimes the world does not revolve around them. Let's face it, there can only be one project that is priority A-1. Everything else has to revolve around that fact, and managing that thought process is the way to make sense out of all the impossible contradictions.

    This book explains how a project gets on the board in the first place, and provides many tips on how a project manager can influence the action in the early stages, the planning stages and even after work begins to obtain and maintain the most reasonable possible expectations for cost, schedule and scope.

    Dr. Brown shares the lessons of over 20 years of experience in project and program planning and execution in both commercial and government settings. In all that time, more money up front has seldom been an option; better understanding of what the stakeholders can get for the money that they do have is the way yo go.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDouglas Brown
    Release dateApr 22, 2017
    ISBN9781370797219
    Simmer Down! How to Deliver Great Projects Despite Impossible Deadlines and Unrealistic Budgets

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      Book preview

      Simmer Down! How to Deliver Great Projects Despite Impossible Deadlines and Unrealistic Budgets - Douglas Brown

      SIMMER DOWN!

      How to Deliver Great Projects Despite Impossible Deadlines and Unrealistic Budgets

      Copyright 2017 Douglas Brown

      Published by Caltrop Press, via Smashwords

      This book is also available in physical form from most online retailers

      Smashwords Edition License Notes

      Thank you for downloading this ebook. This book remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be redistributed to others for commercial or non-commercial purposes.

      Even if you obtained it at no cost, there is value in the total number of people who actually download it. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy from their favorite authorized retailer. Thank you for your support..

      Get Even More Value

      As a thank-you for being interested enough to download this book, please enjoy another free resource: Seven Ways Organizations Resist Change and How to Get Around Them

      Starting up project management (or program management, enterprise architecture, process engineering, quality management, etc. etc.) is a change. Of course, for the better: more efficient, faster, better quality, and so on. Even so, not everyone is going to be on board with the change. Some will be working to make sure you don't succeed.

      You and I won't change human nature. But we can be prepared for how others might interpret our well-meaning efforts, and we can tailor our approaches to the situation.

      Send it to me!!

      (You'll be getting it from www.decisionintegration.com, where you'll find other free resources too).

      What People Are Saying ...

      Before getting into the very nice things that people said about the book, I'd like to thank some wonderful people who gave it the ultimate endorsement: spending many hours, even during personal and business travel, to provide detailed edits and broad insights to help me make sure this book was up to the professional and editorial standard you have a right to expect (even at this price!).

      Bob Hutchinson, President of RAH Consulting (https://www.linkedin.com/in/robert-hutchinson-89392748/) provides subject matter expertise and consulting services covering all aspects of business development and operational management improvement to small businesses.

      Sheila Proudfoot is a career professional project and program manager.

      Brian Hobbs is a business development executive with BAE Systems.

      Frank Greco, the President of Greco Consulting (http://www.GrecoInc.com), whose quote is cited further just below.

      *******

      Now, about all those nice things people had to say: thank you for your support!

      *******

      Nice job. Not a book that you can do in one sitting, but good information. One important area that is touched upon throughout the book, and is hammered home … stakeholder communication starts early and is done often. A PM must identify and know the project stakeholders to understand what the project really is. … The PM must strive to manage within the bounds of the Iron Triangle, but must be objective enough to accept that many projects die, for numerous reasons: changing requirements, obsolescence, or money is diverted to other priorities. If a project dies of natural causes, move on and go to the next project.

      Greg Gephart, Program Manager, US Customs and Border Patrol.

      This book needs a second edition that is twice the size!

      Randy Luten, CEO, Advanced Systems Design

      Just by reading the title you can tell that the author knows a lot about project management. 60% of a project's success is in the planning. Read the book today and learn how to avoid boiling your projects.

      Patrick Gallagher, LinkedIn Author, http://mybook.to/LinkedInSecurity

      Simmer Down offers tips for junior project as well as senior program managers.  A quick read that boils down the basics, dispels the myths, and offers perspective on the methods employed by both industry and government project and program management.  If you've ever had a project or program that's been stuck in a rut, this book is a MUST READ!

      Sheila Proudfoot, Program Manager

      Doug packs much insight, wisdom, and sound advice into this book, and peppers it with amusing but serious observations of large-enterprise reality – making it a quick and enjoyable read. You will be a better project manager after absorbing it.

      Peter Gordon, PMP, Program Manager, Hewlett-Packard, https://www.linkedin.com/in/petergordon4/

      Dr Brown understands how to change attitudes, put a new paradigm in place, and turn an organization around by letting it simmer. After reading his book, you will as well.

      Jim O'Connor, Ph.D., Program manager, Booz Allen Hamilton.

      As I read through this book, I kept being reminded of any number of events in the past year, three years, ten years. This is exactly how it happens. I need to get some more copies of this for my staff so they can learn about how things really work and deal with it, before having to figure it out the hard way.

      Dade Bridgeman, Programme Manager, Vodafone

      Another of Dr. Brown's books that share a career's worth of organizational realities and how to navigate them in a way that is easily understood. More importantly, it is easy to go out and do the things he suggests. PMPs need to pass their exams on the theory of PM, but then after that they need to get this book to find out how projects really work in organizations. On top of that, it's an easy read!

      Lynn Padgett, Vice President, medical education association

      Enjoyed it, good job! It's logical, it's easy to understand, and it's worth reading the book just to get to a couple of gems like these: you need to understand the context within which you have to operate, and how to maneuver within that space to get the best result you can out of the resources that are or may become available. And, 'don't get caught out now being just another complainer with no real solutions. Be prepared with a realistic plan for getting the job done properly'. There are plenty more where that came from.

      Dr. Frank Greco, President, Greco Research Engineering

      Engineering, program management business development, and consulting services

      http://www.GrecoInc.com.

      Simmer Down! continues beyond where the formal standards for program and project management leave off. This book provides the project manager (PM) with real-world guidelines for managing projects and dealing with stakeholders from the Board of Directors to the Program Office to the eventual customers. An important and useful addition to every PM’s tool chest.

      Harold Hunt, PMP, Principal Consultant, Grantonomics LLC

      Table of Contents

      Who Is This Book For?

      What Will You Get From This Book?

      Chapter 1. We've Been There Too

      The Theory According to Practice Standards

      Theory Meets Reality

      Where Do Projects Come From?

      So Many Cooks

      Business Rule Number One

      Chapter 2. Seeing The Big Picture

      The Big Picture

      Corporate Context

      Vision

      Environment

      Strategy

      Capability

      Programs

      Chapter 3: Show Me the Money

      Slicing the Pie

      Key Tips for Fitting into the Strategy

      Chapter 4. The Rack and Stack Illusion

      How We Don't Do It: Decisions by Spreadsheet

      Rack and Stack Case Study

      How Your Broker Really Does It

      How Some People Do It: The Grab Bag

      Salami Is Baloney

      How Organizations Actually Do It: Don't Look

      Chapter 5: It's Your Turn

      Introducing The Project

      The Clock Keeps Ticking

      Key Tips for Getting Your Investment Selected

      Chapter 6. Tweak Those Baselines

      It Depends on the Meaning of It

      The Iron Triangle Again

      The Obvious Solution: Adjust Scope

      Bending The Iron: A Case Study

      Not So Likely: Adjust Schedule

      There's No More Money, But It Always Appears

      Dealing with Impossible Constraints

      Chapter 7. Learning to Love your Baselines

      Executive Reviews and Redirection

      Dependency Reviews

      Technical Reviews

      Change Control

      Key Tips for the Control Phase

      Chapter 8. Closing Out

      The Big Picture

      Pay It Forward

      About The Author

      Get Even More Value

      One Last Thing...

      Acknowledgements

      Who Is This Book For?

      Bottom line up front: this book is about why projects don't start out the way some book told you to do it, and how to succeed anyway. If you already know, then give it to someone who doesn't, so they don't have to learn the hard way.

      If you think that every project runs by the book, then maybe it's not for you. But please do contact me! There are thousands of professionals in this space who would really like to get a look at that book. Let's get it out to them.

      For the newly-trained project manager (PM), your certification cram course instructor told you to suspend the reality you know if you want to pass the exam. Simmer Down brings you back from exam world to the real world. You can't change reality, but you can manage it.

      Simmer Down is not just for newbies. After your early projects succeed, you'll end up managing other PMs. What you know best is doing PM. In your higher role, you

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