Project Raise Slow Ride – Preparing to Do the Thing

In our last several Project Raise Slow Ride videos, Mike has  pretty meticulously planned the raising of Slow Ride from the water. Good planning, risk assessment and mitigation, and preparation for a project are all critical to managing a successful project.

Time is of the essence, though – being submerged for so long is damaging Slow Ride, and the longer it takes to pull her out, the worse the damage will get. After putting together a solid plan, it’s time to actually do the thing.

In our next video in this series, Mike talks a little bit about the prepwork for actually pumping the water out of Slow Ride. Notice in the video that Mike pulls up Microsoft Project on his phone to make some tweaks to the project on the go. With mobile access to Microsoft Project, you can manage projects about a boat, near a boat, or on a boat!

The moment of truth is nearly upon us – will Mike be able to save Slow Ride? Stay tuned to see if he’s able to get the boat out of the water, and if he’s able to get the water out of the boat.

Playing catch-up? Here are the other videos:

• Can Project Management Raise a Boat?
• Project Raise Slow Ride Whiteboard Session
• Project Raise Slow Ride Using Microsoft Project and PS+
• Project Raise Slow Ride – Risk Mitigation and Simulation

 

Project Raising Slow Ride – Risks, Mitigation, and Simulation

In our last installment of “Project Raise Slow Ride,” Mike began planning the whole thing out in Microsoft Project, with PS+ overlaying even more functionality to the already robust capabilities of Project.

One of the biggest pieces in planning a big project is the risk assessment. Once you determine what the potential risks are, you need to figure out how to mitigate them. In our latest video, Mike discusses some of the risks of raising the boat out of the water, and how to mitigate those risks. In the case of raising Slow Ride, electrical shock is a very real consideration, so Mike talks about some of the specific measures he’s taking to ensure nobody gets hurt.

Another risk of raising the boat is that, when Mike pumps the water out of the boat, the boat could roll over in the water, which, because Slow Ride is a pretty big boat, would be disastrous.

Mike runs a highly detailed (and really cool) simulation of how he thinks the boat sank, and then simulates the pumping process to see how the boat is likely to behave once the water is being pumped out of it. Once Mike has projected how he thinks the boat will move when the water is being pumped out of it, he’s able to mitigate the risk of the boat rolling over  in the real world with measures that will stabilize it as he pumps.

Thorough and specific planning for the likeliest risks in any given project is essential, and knowing exactly how you’re going to minimize or address those risks is critical to the success of the overall project.

Will all this planning help Mike get Slow Ride out of the water? Keep watching to find out!

Though attention has shifted to Puerto Rico’s damage from Hurricane Maria, folks in Texas and Florida are also still in the recovery process from this brutal hurricane season. Here are some resources if you’d like to help.

• American Red Cross
• Global Giving
• Direct Relief

Using Microsoft Project & PS+ to Plan “Project Raising Slow Ride”

You’ve seen the boat and you’ve seen the whiteboard.  Now it’s time to crunch some numbers and leverage Microsoft Project and PS+ to plan at a whole-project (but still granular) level. Good planning is critical in making a project successful!

In this video, Mike creates “Project Raise Slow Ride” using Microsoft Project and PS+ (soon to be renamed Edison365 Projects, with added functionality to help you see your project through from ideation through execution).

The start of the video may look familiar to you: creating a new project in Microsoft Project. But then Mike demos some super-neat stuff that PS+ can do in tandem with Microsoft Project to help assess project risks and escalate them to issues with one easy click.

Mike also shows off the project benefits page – it’s important to know the WHY of the project you’re mounting to help you stay focused on what matters through the course of the project.

• What’s the business value of Microsoft Project?
• How does PS+ enhance Microsoft Project?

With all this planning, will Mike be able to raise Slow Ride? Stay tuned…

Project “Raise Slow Ride” – The Whiteboard Session

In our last post, following the submersion of houseboat Slow Ride during Hurricane Irma, we wondered if project management can raise a boat. The next step after wondering if something can be done?

Planning how it should be done.

In this installment of Project “Raise Slow Ride,” Mike sciences his way to some estimates for pumping out the water that has infiltrated Slow Ride and plans how to raise the boat above the waterline. Watch the short video of the whiteboard session here.

Stay tuned to find out if applying project management manages to get Slow Ride out of the drink…

Can project management raise a boat?

When Hurricane Irma set its sights on Florida, the Innovative-e team was on high-alert, since Innovative-e President Mike Taylor lives on the east coast of Florida. Mike and his family weathered the storm – though not without some difficulties, like days without running water – but the family houseboat, Slow Ride, didn’t fare so well.

Because Irma ravaged pretty much the whole of Florida, pro boat salvagers are, as you can imagine, a little busy these days. But if Slow Ride or any of her parts are to be saved, she has to be raised out of the water soon. Mike decided that he’ll try to raise the boat himself instead of waiting for the schedules of professional salvagers to clear weeks from now.

Mike is tackling this boat salvaging project as, well, a project. He’s using Microsoft Project and PS+ to help him plan, assess the risks and identify issues, establish and maintain a budget, track his resources, and otherwise manage this project as he would manage a work project from behind his desk.

Will it work?

We don’t know yet. This project is still in process. Follow along  in this video series as Mike documents his attempt to save Slow Ride.

Want to help victims of Hurricane Irma, many of whom lost far more than a boat? Here are some resources:

• American Red Cross
• Global Giving
• Direct Relief

 

Time to Take a New Look at Today’s PPM Solutions – Extending Microsoft Project Online, Part 2

In our last blog post, about using market-leading Microsoft-aligned products to enhance the OOTB functionality of Project Online, we talked about the benefits of using these products, and spotlighted a few of such products that your organization might be able touse, or might already be using.

We wanted to mention at greater length another solution that can vastly improve your OOTB Project Online experience to give you #AmazingPM: PS+.

PS+ is a pre-configured, best-practice solution to enhance Project Online by improving visibility and transparency into projects and portfolios for decisionmakers, and improving ease-of-use for users. The folks who made PS+ won the 2016 Microsoft Partner of the Year award for this solution, which seamlessly integrates with Project Online to bring better navigation, clearer data for better reporting and analysis, preconfigured templates, and other productivity-boosting features.

Innovative-e is the premier US partner for PS+, which you can test drive for free and with no risk or obligation (drop us an email if you want to know more!).

• Comparison of Microsoft PPM alone and Microsoft PPM with PS+
• Blog post: Why Innovative-e Loves PS+
• Blog post: 5 Gifts PS+ Gives Project Managers
• Webinar recording: Accelerate Your PM with PS+
• Case studies

When examining the PPM solution you have in place, consider PS+ to augment Microsoft Project Online to accelerate your PM, make it easier for stakeholders to look at the big picture, and make it easier for users to use.

Watch the 3-minute video about for a quick overview of what’s now possible with PPM solutions.

Time to Take a New Look at Today’s PPM Solutions – Extending Microsoft Project Online, Part 1

In his most recent video, “Time to Take a New Look at Today’s PPM Solutions,” Mike Taylor, President of Innovative-e, talks a little about how using Microsoft Project Online can accelerate your project and portfolio management and free up resources that can then be used elsewhere in your organization. Straight out of the box, Project Online will boost your PPM.

But Project Online can be extended to make your PPM solution even more amazing.

Microsoft-approved and -aligned add-in products can further reduce cost and time to implement and maintain Project Portfolio Management solutions. Core platform capabilities are enhanced with automated best-in-class products that provide a vast array of benefits…

These benefits include:

• Enhanced user experiences for PMs and users
• Features like best practice templates based on PMI or Prince2
• One-click access to all info
• Simplified organization of projects
• Utility time-savers like one-click status reports
• Enhanced data-visualization reporting
• Improved financial management with near-real-time data mart and trending info and time-phased information

If your PPM integration needs are more advanced, the Project Online platform works with other mature tools and market-leading products, like Oracle, SAP, and others. Integration with other Microsoft products, such as Office 365, is seamless.

 

Regardless of the platform you’re using now to manage your projects and portfolio, Microsoft Project Online – with or without add-ins – can make your project management more efficient and give you a measurable return on your investment.

Watch the video, and reach out to us at info@innovative-e.com to find out more!

 

Easy OOTB Lessons Learned #AmazingPM

Most organizations that conduct projects repeat the same general steps to manage that work, steps some might call a workflow.  Ideally, a project initiation or proposal workflow includes a risk review (to the company, to the customer, to the project etc) as well as a benefit forecast so organizations can decide how to best allocate their scarce resources efficiently and productively.  Microsoft Project Online can easily help manage risks and issues as lessons learned.

Use built-in Project Online functionality to define workflows and project detail pages (PDPs) where you can define the data that users must provide as they navigate a workflow.  It is not difficult to use in terms of programming or engineering skills needed.  You will need to take the time to think through, and document, how you want your workflows to work before setting out on the journey to modify your PPM environment this way.

Add-ins such as PS+ automate methods of capturing data needed from workflows out of the box (OOTB).  Again, this technique is not difficult.  It does require PS+ (click here  for more information on PS+ or to set up a free trial).  Your simplest answer is to create a plain and simple #AmazingPM OOTB workflow in Project Online using this checklist:

1. Define workflow discrete steps followed

• Determine what must be included and which parts happen sometimes
• Decompose steps into data points – determine when data needs collecting (inputs) and when it needs disbursal (outputs)
• Put pieces into phases and stages – for more defined modelling and potential interaction with other work flows

2. Define custom PWA entities such as data content type and format
3. Build, test, and deploy in PWA – modify existing objects to leverage Project Online’s power

Use the OOTB issues management capability from Project Online to create a lessons-learned database.  A workflow analysis shows three major phases of leveraging lessons, learning lessons, and listing lessons.  After we modify the OOTB issue category list to accommodate a “lessons learned” category, we can use the OOTB filter on the Issues page to create a view or report of the lessons learned.

So, in effect, only change two OOTB features slightly and get a powerful tool to improve an organization’s project and program management by actually learning from previous project issues.

To revise the OOTB settings needed, follow these steps:

1. On the project site issues page, click the List Settings icon in Settings section of the List ribbon.
2. Click Category and then, on the category column settings page, in the Type each choice on a separate line: field, enter the label you wish to use for lessons learned and click the OK button.
3. When closing out projects (or at whatever frequency you think useful) identify lessons learned on the Issues page of the project site by setting the Category to the lessons learned choice.

Use the Category field to sort or to filter and you can easily find actual things that happened on projects that you’d like to pay attention to when planning activities that could be impacted by new, similar issues or by issues that repeat themselves.  Project Online is a powerful tool that can help you build #amazingPM and even more powerful tools to improve your PPM success.

Innovative-e shares its PM solutions for healthcare professionals at HIMSS event in Atlantic City, NJ

The New Jersey and Delaware Valley chapters of HIMSS (Healthcare Information & Management Systems Society) are holding their 9th Annual Event, “The Essential Role of Technology in Population Health,” at Harrah’s Resort Hotel and Casino October 19-21. Innovative-e is happy to be a sponsor at the event, at Booth 110. We have a proven history of helping healthcare organizations implement industry-specific solutions to solve the complex set of project, process, and change management challenges project managers in healthcare organizations face.

Innovative-e’s Eoin Callan is ready to see you at the 9th Annual HIMSS event in Atlantic City! We’re at Booth 110.

Innovative-e is pleased to be the premier US partner of  PS+, an award-winning, pre-configured, best-practices solution for Project Online. PS+ is a key component of our solutions to help customers extend the out-of-the-box capabilities of Microsoft Project Online and transform their project management into amazing experiences that support executive buy-in, sustained user adoption, and wider visibility and transparency for decision-makers into projects and portfolios.

Innovative-e’s solutions are tailor-made for customers across a variety of industry verticals. We have proven experience and success helping customers in healthcare, manufacturing, and government transform their project management into continuously amazing project management experiences with exceptional insight, agility, and value.