1. The importance of project management

2. Your job as a leader The MOI Model
Motivation. The ability to encourage (by “push or pull”) technical people to produce to their best ability.
Organization. The ability to mold existing processes (or invent new ones) that will enable the initial concept to be translated into a final product.
Ideas or innovation. The ability to encourage people to create and feel creative even when they must work within bounds established for a particular software product or application.
Pushing uses the stick, pulling uses the carrot…carrot is better, but the stick is sometimes required
Basis is problem solving

3. Why IT Projects Fail Let’s start with why projects fail.
ASK the AUDIENCE! Why do project fails? (GIVE CANDY)
REMEMBER:
Failure is an event, never a person!
Failure is not delivering the project on time, within budget, and according to scope.
We’re going to review some of the project management reasons why IT projects fail. The combination of one or more of these can easily introduce enough RISK into the project for it to become no longer viable.

4. Why IT Projects Fail
Lack of senior management commitment. Senior management commitment is vital – these are the decision-makers and hold the purse strings. You have to have their buy-in or else you set yourself up for failure.
Inadequate project planning (budget, schedule, scope, etc.). Inadequate project planning will always present problems. You have to know what you are doing, why you are doing it, who’s doing what, when it needs to be done and how much it will cost.

5. Why IT Projects Fail
Absence of user involvement. Absence of user involvement is a showstopper. The users will be the staff who are going to live and breath the system once its implemented. You need their expertise and their buy-in to make the project a success. Leave them out and be ready to meet resistance to any change you try to implement.

6. Why IT Projects Fail
New or unfamiliar technology. New or unfamiliar technology is always a risk. It raises risks and fears. You always need to manage risks. So, do your homework in your planning phase to make sure the chosen solution will work for you! You may want to perform a proof of concept and test it before deciding to move forward into full blown design and development. Recognize that even if it does work, there are other implications that need to be closely scrutinized and planned for accordingly – such as training and support. A lot of us here probably remember moving from DOS to Windows – that was scary at the time! What a learning curve – moving from character-based to graphical interface! I can remember in my past life at DOD moving from mainframes to client/server – change is always scary! It’s just human nature!
Lack of defined, clear, or concise requirements

7. Why IT Projects Succeed

8. Why IT Projects Succeed
Sound project management processes
Project tied to the organization’s business goals
Senior management commitment
Here’s our Top 10 list based on our experience and it pretty much mirrors the industry trends we see.
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9. Why IT Projects Succeed
Good change management
Detailed requirements
Realistic schedule
Good stakeholder relationships
CLICK – READ #4
Change management process has to be defined upfront at the beginning of the project! It should be written and agreed upon. Once you finish your risk management plan, you need to focus on change management! It will happen!
How are you going to deal with change – it can affect scope, time, and budget. Changes can be things that you realize must be part of the core requirements or to your core requirements. Or they may be the start of your enhancement list! They can also be hardware changes.
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Realistic schedule is not just about our review time. It’s about giving yourself enough time to review deliverables. You’re going to have some large, maybe daunting technical documents to review. Make sure you allow yourself enough time – not only to comment but also to consolidate the comments from all reviewers, to resolve any conflicting comments, and then to deliver the comments in a professional manner to the developer!

10. Why IT Projects Succeed
Empowered project manager
Skilled and appropriate team members with defined roles and responsibilities
Availability of funding
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Availability of funding is critical – you guys use grants and entitlement funding – these are not bottomless pits of money. You have to estimate well and manage your budget carefully!
As I mentioned, our Top 10 list closely mirrors industry’s but…
Industry experts would add a few more to this list that I just want to mention –
risk management – active risk management – don’t just write your plan and let it collect dust, risks change and need to be managed
using a formal development methodology - adds structure and formalizes your process
using standard tools and infrastructure
using an iterative process - if this meets your needs. It does help provide a product faster and to consistently improve the product as the project advances.

11. What makes this all work?
A good, solid professional project manager