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--></style><title>Re: SOCIAL: PM software (free)
recomms?</title></head><body>
<div>Hi, SOCIAL</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>I am a project manager, and I love the analog brainstorming
technique that Brian described in great detail.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>The one extra bit I would throw in is for all those people in the
room or their exec sponsor to put together a flexibility matrix on
what they can vary in the way of scope, schedule or resources.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Does it have to, have to ship on September 8?</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Could we wait until Q4 2015 to release just the right
thing?</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Is there any wiggle room in the budget? Can we throw money
at the problem or do we have to jettison features instead?</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>You could also vary quality to achieve your goal, but that's not
usually the best option.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>The Project Management Institute deems that scope is the variable
that informs the rest of the project. But in the real world, I
have found it to only ever be schedule.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Cheers,</div>
<div>Grace</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<div>At 10:50 AM -0700 5/22/12, Brian Rice wrote:</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Full disclosure: I didn't design that
project-design methodology. It's just what I was trained to do. This
company in San Mateo called IPS offers a 2-day onsite class that
teaches the basics of project management. They've been around for a
whileŠ I first took their course in 1998 or so! I had the good
fortune to do it again in 2005.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>If anybody's building out a team of
project managers, or trying to infect a team with
project-management-think, this training would be a good arrow to have
in your quiver. Check 'em out. <a
href="http://www.ipslearning.com/">http://www.ipslearning.com/</a></blockquote
>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Brian</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>On May 21, 2012, at 9:35 PM, Ellisa
Feinstein wrote:</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Wow...that's quite the brainstorm/PM
session you designed there. Fortunately something that I don't have to
do right now (my project is very well-defined) but something to use
for future non-defined projects.<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>
<hr size="1"></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1"><b>From:</b>
Brian Rice <</font><a href="mailto:brice@bigloops.com"><font
face="Arial" size="-1">brice@bigloops.com</font></a><font
face="Arial" size="-1">><br>
<b>To:</b> Ellisa Feinstein <</font><a
href="mailto:ellisafeinstein@yahoo.com"><font face="Arial"
size="-1">ellisafeinstein@yahoo.com</font></a><font face="Arial"
size="-1">><br>
<b>Cc:</b> Mike Kosim <</font><a
href="mailto:mike.kosim@mac.com"><font face="Arial"
size="-1">mike.kosim@mac.com</font></a><font face="Arial"
size="-1">>; Social Social <</font><a
href="mailto:social@deeptrouble.com"><font face="Arial"
size="-1">social@deeptrouble.com</font></a><font face="Arial"
size="-1">><br>
<b>Sent:</b> Monday, May 21, 2012 5:59 PM<br>
<b>Subject:</b> Re: SOCIAL: PM software (free) recomms?</font><br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><soapbox></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>In my humble opinion, the choice of
project-management software is not nearly as important as the
project-management methodology. Project-management tools are great for
MANAGING projects, but they are terrible for designing and scoping
projects. The best tool for the latter task isŠ the sticky
note. I am serious. Here is my project-management
approach:</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>1. Get everybody who will be contributing
(work, requirements, or expectations) into a room.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>2. Give each person a stack of sticky
notes.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>3. Everybody brainstorms all the tasks
they can think of and puts them on the whiteboard. One task per
sticky. Should be total chaos.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>4. Everybody winnows the tasks,
consolidating duplicates and roughly organizing them into general
phases.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>5. People with an interest in each phase
identify dependencies (especially, finish-to-start dependencies).
These get marked on the whiteboard with an arrow between
stickies.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>6. People who will be doing the work
write rough estimates of effort and duration on each
sticky.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>7. A walkthrough review occurs (in which
everybody can SEE the long pole).</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>8. People take lots of cellphone camera
pictures of the whiteboard.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>9. Pizza and beer are
consumed.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>NOW, at last, one is ready to type stuff
into a project-management tool and track the tasks'
completion.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>It is commonplace to bash Microsoft
Project, but frankly the people I know who most hate it are those who
tried to do their project design in it. However, designing a project
in any software tool* risks the one worst thing that can happen to any
project: lack of buy-in. Getting everybody into a room as I suggest
above gets the human beings on board with the project from the get-go.
"Yes, we are gonna finish this by September 8, because I
helped write that plan."</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>*Any software tool, that is, that's less
interactive than sticky notes and a whiteboard.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite></sorry for the rant></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Brian</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>On May 21, 2012, at 2:16 PM, Ellisa
Feinstein wrote:</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Thanks, Mike. And this is the
problem - so many choices! Hard to tell which ones are good.<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>
<hr size="1"></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><font face="Arial" size="-1"><b>From:</b>
Mike Kosim <</font><a href="mailto:mike.kosim@mac.com"><font
face="Arial" size="-1">mike.kosim@mac.com</font></a><font
face="Arial" size="-1">><br>
<b>To:</b> Ellisa Feinstein <</font><a
href="mailto:ellisafeinstein@yahoo.com"><font face="Arial"
size="-1">ellisafeinstein@yahoo.com</font></a><font face="Arial"
size="-1">><br>
<b>Cc:</b> Social Social <</font><a
href="mailto:social@deeptrouble.com"><font face="Arial"
size="-1">social@deeptrouble.com</font></a><font face="Arial"
size="-1">><br>
<b>Sent:</b> Monday, May 21, 2012 12:58 PM<br>
<b>Subject:</b> Re: SOCIAL: PM software (free) recomms?</font><br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>I just saw this page with a bunch of them
-- looks like there's an immense choice of free/ donation based
project management software.<br>
<a
href=
"http://mastersinprojectmanagement.org/top-25-open-source-project-management-apps.html"><span
></span
>http://mastersinprojectmanagement.org/top-25-open-source-project-man<span
></span>agement-apps.html</a><br>
<br>
Let me know what you end up going with. I'd like to use one
myself.<br>
mike<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
On May 21, 2012, at 12:48 PM, Ellisa Feinstein <<a
href="mailto:ellisafeinstein@yahoo.com">ellisafeinstein@yahoo.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Hi - Does anyone have recommendations for
free project management software or online app?</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Thanks,</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>Ellisa<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"
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<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
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</blockquote>
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</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
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</blockquote>
</blockquote>
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