Category: Project Management

Best technology Careers for The Near Future

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Education and skill development will never really come to an end when it comes to Information and Technology. Therefore, providing an updated account for the state of the technology industry is quite difficult. The rapid rise in technology has generated a boom in the career opportunities and job profiles across the IT industry. With the use of technology in our everyday life, the IT industry experienced a major spotlight in the past few years. This has led to many job opportunities in the field of analysis, design and IT Architecture. Some of the prominent technology based careers that are growing:

SOFTWARE ARCHITECT:

An architect maintains control over the architectural life cycle parallel to the software development of the project. A software architect’s most prominent work is during the requirements and design stages of a project, but also an architect proactively monitors the adherence of the implementation of the chosen architecture during all its iterations.

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UX DESIGNER:

A UX designer is someone who designs the look and feel of a software. He decides how will the user interact and use the application and is responsible to design the best interface to make the application more usable.
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SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT MANAGER:

The job of a Software Development Manager is a bit tricky as it involves keeping his or her team on track for the project. Other than managing the team under him, he has to deliver the right project, the right time to the customer. And to achieve this goal, he has to make sure everyone knows their both short and long term goals and know how to achieve them.
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ANALYTICS MANAGER:

An analytics manager’s work id to analyze customer and operational data. He or she also produces analysis, which is accurate and can be relied on to a high level of confidence.

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QA MANAGER:

Once the project is developed, it needs to be tested for functionality and quality. The primary job of a Quality Manager is to test that the project is up to the mark and meets all requirements of the clients maintaining proper functionality and quality of the product.
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DATA SCIENTIST:

A data scientist is someone who advocates, evangelizes and build data-fuelled products that helps the customers to improve the overall outcomes. This professional will provide insights into leading analytic practices, design and lead iterative learning and development cycles, ultimately producing new and creative analytic solutions that will become an important part of the core deliverable.

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SOFTWARE ENGINEER:

Software Development and Engineering will be another vibrant career in the near future. A software developer is a person who carries out development of any software by writing well designed, efficient and testable code. He tailors and deploy software tools, processes and metrics.

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MOBILE DEVELOPER:

With the world gone mobile, every industry from Hospitality, to Medical to Travel eCommerce, every business now has their own mobile applications. Almost every functionality that a website is capable of, is now present right inside your pocket. And thus, increased the demand of mobile apps. Mobile development, has therefore become one of the most prominent career options in the development sector.
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SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT:

A solution architect can be said as the leader of the development team. The primary responsibility of this person is to help in converting the requirements of the customers into the architecture and design of the real project.

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PRODUCT MANAGER:

Product manager is also someone who works above the product development team. He is the responsible person for the entire life cycle and development of the product. This professional determines the market requirements of the project and delivers a product that the market requires.
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On becoming an effective project manager

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Are you good at getting things done? Then a career as a project manager/leader is waiting for you. But, what does it take to be a great project manager?

may_14_bWhatever our work is, it might involve dealing primarily with one of the three items: things, data, and people. Someone who is interested to work with things becomes a mechanic or engineer. if a person likes to deal with data, he or she may excel in accountancy or cost estimator. And, the person who is interested working with people may turn out to be a great sales person.

Irrespective of what we deal with, we get things done. But the question is: are we getting it done, sitting and doing everything ourselves or by delegating the work to people. a manager is someone who gets things done by delegating jobs to people.

Then who is a project manager? This question takes us to the definition of project. a project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to achieve a unique result: a product, service or some other value. It is temporary because it has a start date and end date.

Routine or repetitive work where deadlines are not crucial is production work or operations. Book keeping is a good example for operations, while designing a new product, can be considered as a project.

Managing such a project entails things like defining the project in terms of goals, requirements; writing down tasks; scheduling; arriving at hr and cost estimates, and so on. A project manager is someone who is responsible for all these things.

Project management probably about dealing with data (predominantly, that is) – as he or she sets out to achieve a quantifiable goal or measurable object, under a deadline, and cost. Project management is a growth industry. The discipline of project management can be the important competence that improves performance of an organization. Hence, the demand for project managers and leaders is on the rise.

Project management is taught in many universities, colleges, and of course, at CADD centre, we provide a number of courses on PPM using Primavera, MS Project, and also Asta Powerproject software tools. In addition to learning traditional concepts and comprehensive software tools, one is expected to be familiar with, to go by surveys done in the recent years, some of the following aspects of project management:

Agile management:

Agile as an English word refers to the ability “to move quickly and easily” (example: “as agile as a monkey”; “an agile mind”). at the heart of agile management is, the agile manifesto and 12 agile principles.

Agile development is based on an iterative, incremental method, and the entire approach to structuring work and reporting progress is completely different. Its highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of value.

Extreme management:

Extreme project management differs from traditional project management mainly in its open, elastic and undeterministic approach. But it is not entirely new. The methodology gets its name because it takes good old “best practices” to extreme levels.

The main focus of XPM is on the human side of project management (e.g. managing the stakeholders of the project), rather than on intricate scheduling techniques and heavy formalism.

Note: while the traditional “water fall” method of project management can prove to be adequate for simple projects, agile and extreme management concepts are suitable for managing especially uncertain and complex projects.

PMI’s Portfolio Management Professional (PFMP)sm

If you’re a portfolio manager looking to demonstrate a proven ability to manage and align a portfolio of projects and programs to realize organizational strategy and objectives; increase your visibility and value with your organization; and separate yourself in the eyes of employers, the PFMP credential, offered by project management institute, is right for you.

PFMPsm credential recognizes the advanced experience and skill of portfolio managers. The PFMPsm demonstrates your proven ability in the coordinated management of one or more portfolios to achieve organizational objectives.

PFMPsm credential holders are responsible for the execution of the portfolio management process, communication around portfolio progress, and recommendations for action. Where project and program managers are responsible for “doing work right,” this is an ideal credential if you are responsible for ensuring your organization is “doing the right work.”

Emergent leadership:

There’s a never-ending quest to find the right leadership model for projects. Many organizations have long-abandoned the old command and control model. They, instead, go for more collaborative – if not let go – approaches. Many project managers find emergent leadership as a perfect fit.

Because, emergent leadership accommodates both “command” and “let go”. anyone in the team can step in when there is something to contribute (“command”), and step out when there is nothing to contribute (“let go”). Both a philosophy and a set of leadership practices, emergent leadership is about democratized leadership based on participatory approach.

Benchmarking/key performance indicators:

Every organization wants to know how its pm practice compares with others in the same industry. Just calling yourself “world class” doesn’t make you so unless you’ve got some data to back it up. Benchmarking is now placed into the forefront for many organizations, as it provides them with an opportunity to see just how really “good” they are.

Changes in the PMBOK 5th Edition – An important note for PMP Credential holders and PMP Aspirants:

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What is New in the PMBOK 5th Edition?

The fifth edition of A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge: (PMBOK® Guide) was published in December of 2012. It is the latest edition of the global project management standard published by the Project Management Institute (PMI)®. The release of this new edition has consequences for anyone who is preparing for the Project Management Professional (PMP) ® exam.

In the 4th Edition of the PMBOK Guide there were 5 process groups and 42 processes. And in the 5th Edition, the number of process groups is same but the processes have been increased to 47.

The major change in this new edition of the PMBOK Guide is an addition of a new Knowledge Area –“Project Stakeholder Management”. In the fourth edition of the PMBOK Guide, this was a part of the Communication Management knowledge area. This new knowledge area has four processes in it.

This change shows that PMI gives importance to stakeholder management and it is very imperative for you to manage them if you want to complete your project successfully.

Five additional processes are as follows:

Four planning processes are added to different knowledge areas (plan scope management, plan schedule management, plan cost management, and plan stakeholder management). These four planning processes bring a consistency to the Project Management knowledge areas. Now, the knowledge areas (that make the Project Management plan) start with a concerned subsidiary plan.

Two communication processes are merged into one process (Distribute Information and Report Performance to Manage Communications).

Two new controlling processes are added (Control Communications and Control Stakeholder Management).

Two processes are relocated to the Stakeholder Management knowledge area.

Some additional changes are as follows:

Verify Scope is changed to Validate Scope.

Administer Procurement is changed to Control Procurement.

Direct and Manage Project Execution is changed to Direct and Manage Project Work.

 

Primavera P6V8.2 key Features

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Primavera P6V8.2 is the world’s leading solution for prioritizing, planning, and executing projects, programs and portfolios. It is an integrated Project Portfolio Management (PPM) solution comprising role-specific functionality to match each team member’s needs and responsibilities.

P6 Web client

This tool eliminates the need to load software on to a PC.It is used to manage the EPPM database, functions such as adding users and user access etc. P6 Progress reporter is a time sheet application accessed through a web browser. P6 Team member is a progress update application accessed through a web browser and was extended to provide the ability to update progress via iphone application or email.

New Exclusive Mode You can now open one or more projects exclusively. This enables you to prevent others from updating a project while you run reports, schedule projects, level resources, or take other actions while ensuring the project data do change.

New Location Data

New global enterprise data for locations enable you to create a list of locations, including the street address and the longitude and latitude. If you do not know the longitude and latitude, you can find them if you have geolocation\service connected to P6. You can also find an address based on the longitude and latitude. You can assign locations to projects, resources and activities, and you can report on data by location in P6 Analytics. You can also group, sort, and filter by location in various views. You can also import new locations into P6 from a Microsoft Excel (.xls) file.

New Import/Export Support for Microsoft Project 2010

You can now export P6 projects as Microsoft Project XML 2010 files, as well as import Microsoft Project 2010 files.

Enhanced Scaling Options when Printing                                                          Three new scaling options are available when printing from the Activities, EPS, and Assignments pages.

New Dissolve Activities Support

When you delete an activity, a chain of logical activities might be broken. You can use the new Dissolve option to delete the activity but join the predecessors and successors and create the appropriate relationships between them. The dissolve option is available from the right click menu, Actions menu, and the toolbar of the Activities view when you select a single activity that has both predecessors and successors.

New Copy Issue Forms Support

When you copy projects, create templates, or create projects from templates, issue forms are also copied.

Additional Fields in Predecessor/Successor Tabs

Additional fields are now available in the Predecessor and Successor tabs of the
Activities page to help Project managers better analyze their project schedule. The
new fields are Driving, Critical, Total Float, Free Float, Early Start, Early Finish, Late Start and Late Finish.

Release 8.2 includes the following major features in the web:

  • All administration is now in the web (and not in the client)
  • Schedule checker that performs the  DCMA 14 -point schedule analysis.
  • One dialog for Baseline Management
  • Email links to specific Activity Views
  • Management of all job services now performed from the web
  • Custom toolbars
  • Multi-project resource assignments view (without needing to open projects)
  • Resource assignments Gantt view
  • Users can update their own Personal Calendars and have an ability to synch with other calendar tools
  • Integrated Project Risk Management
  • Web based reporting (BI Publisher is integrated into P6) – reports can be output in different formats, scheduled and distributed via different methods ( printers, file, email, content repository etc.)
  • Integration with Oracle Business Process Management (BPM) for workflows – replaces old workflow approach

Why Is Project Management Important in Today’s Business

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Most entrepreneurs are already aware of the dynamic nature of business environment. Every organization, big or small, has to take into account the time, resource allocation, scope and budget required for each project. Only when these factors are well accounted in Project Management, the business will boom and bring good results. So, to effectively meet the dynamic nature of projects, Project Management is a must in business.

In today’s competitive world, delivering quality service or a product is seen as imperative for business survival. If a business fails to show this tendency and repeatedly makes a same mistake again and again, it is certain that it needs a more strategic and flexible approach to survive. It is either through a proper Project Management process or through proper Project Management tool that an organization can become effective.

Also, now-a-days, most clients associated with projects, are very keen to know how their projects are being tackled and developed over time. In fact, some even want to monitor the projects, from the beginning to the end, giving feedback or reviewing each stage. In such cases, Project Management in business becomes more important and managing it through well featured Project Management software is a good option.

Finally, the struggle of many organizations to implement and apply Project Management in business has led to many success stories.

Through Project Management application in business, many organizations are now being able to focus more on project needs by categorizing them into various phases of development, such as project initiation, project planning, defining objectives, project execution and delivery to systematize the entire Project Management process.

Earlier, the most common goal was project completion, rather than fulfilment of needs. Very less emphasis was given on quality standards. But now with more advanced Project Management tools and techniques, things have changed. Many organizations want to have an organized and well structured schedule for entire Project Management process. This has helped businesses build robust clients and deliver quality results.

Project Management is a discipline, which ensures effective communication, collaboration, sharing of progress reports, visibility to expected risk factors for stakeholders of projects. So, Project Management is seen as an essential element for any organization to gain focus on priorities, time constraints, budgets, measurement of performances and become more flexible over time to ensure that all risk factors and errors are rectified correctly.