 What's new in project management? What's being said about project management and it's role in cybersecurity, AI, machine learning, business analysis, strategy and leading project clients?
Check out This Week in PM 7.1.2019 for all the best project management articles the world has to offer...
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 Does your organization handle large, complex technical projects? Do you have diversely skilled project teams assigned to those projects? How about overloaded project managers? Are they juggling several projects at once? This sounds like every organization I've managed projects in and every company that I've consulted for along the way. If this is your organization, too, then you likely need the best of the best in terms of a business analyst on each project being led and executed on for the project customers your organization is serving.  If you do need the “best of the best”, then what skills or characteristics are you looking for? What defines the best for your organization's project needs?...
 This is scary, but all too likely - possibly as early as 2050. Do we need to slow AI progress as Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking warned, but to what extent? And is it too late? Watch - do you agree? Why or why not? Click on the image above or the link below.
https://www.facebook.com/What.If.science/videos/2831103493571844/ PMBOK 7th Edition.
The clock's ticking... I know, I know... It seems like only yesterday that we got the 6th Edition with all the changes it introduced, and the companion Agile Practice Guide. But, hot on the heels of PMI's recent change in examination partner, we discover that the 7th Edition is underway. I got the tip-off from Dave Gordon's excellent weekly round-up of new PM articles. In his round-up, he notes that Mike Griffiths has been named co-lead for the 7th Edition of the PMBOK Guide. Mike was involved in the creation of the Agile method, DSDM, and has over 20 years of experience in Agile methods. He's an Agilist through and through. A Radical Departure What that tells me - and his short article confirms it - is that we can expect the 7th Edtion to be a BIG change from recent editions. Rather than an incremental change, I suspect Mike will want to shake things up. He says: 'this will not be just an update, instead a radical departure from all previous editions aligned with PMI’s new digital transformation strategy.' If PMI, PMP, CAPM, and the PMBoK Guide are not familiar concepts to you, the links in this sentence will give you primers. When Can We Expect Publication? All I can tell you is that:
The Clock's Ticking... If you want to pass PMP or CAPM without mastering the deeper integration of Agile that I suspect is coming, you have been warned. By the way... If you want to study for PMP or CAPM, we offer a choice of two industry-leading programs, both are exceptionally good value, and both with full exam simulators. To learn more, check out our guide: 'I Want to Study for Project Management Professional'. , for guidance and both paid and not paid resources. You know I can't put the F word in an email, in case it gets filtered! from Dr. Mike Clayton, Online PM Courses I once worked on a Scrum team that seemed to be doing well, based on all the things we measured. Our burndown chart showed good progress. Our velocity was good. Yet we had little to show at the sprint review. The work that wasn’t done was related to deployment or integration, so while work was finished, it was not easy to demonstrate value. This can happen when the team loses sight of the idea that the goal of a sprint is not simply to complete work, but to deliver a useful product increment. Article by Steve Berczuk for Techwell   Everyone! Do I have your attention? Ok, can I have your attention... please? After almost 10 years of just writing about tech and project management related topics, I am venturing out into tips for doing things differently and perhaps more wisely around the house and yard. The goal is to save money as much as possible... or at least not waste money, save time, save effort, use what you have and get things done so you can give yourself a break.
As a stay at home, self-employed IT consultant and dad of 11 (six little ones still at home), it's important for me to work productively and efficiently. I fail a lot, but at least that is my goal. Thankfully, my wife is organized, wise and quick to help me out to fine tune things and be a more effective parent and home worker. So stay tuned if you're interested. Questions and suggestions and feedback are almost always welcome... just be nice. And we're not going the political route... I'm not really anti- or pro- much and hopefully you'll see that reflected in my content. Thanks for your readership so far, and you won't see a decrease in the tech and project management content at all. Not sure long term if this new content will stay on the same blog... probably not, but maybe for now. Thanks! 60% of small businesses close shop six months after a cyber-attack. No, the problem is not that most haven’t been investing in cyber security tools. The issue comes in how they prepare for the grey areas that come with business growth and shifts in the threat landscape.
For some of these businesses, cyber-attacks come as a shock. Ideally, the only way you can build a sustainable future for your business would be through getting ready for what the future holds. While it can be borderline impossible to cater to all grey areas security-wise, it pays to try your best to face your future threat landscape with some confidence. Here is how to future proof your business against ever-evolving cyber threats: Establish an Effective Risk Management Plan A risk management plan helps to improve the visibility you have into your threat landscape. It points out the number of risks that you face, the best ways to cater to them, and whether the risk treatment options you chose are working. To start, you will create a list of your current and future cyber-security threats. Next, measure the potential impact that they can have on your business and use a risk assessment matrix to rank the different risks. Not only will this help you in prioritizing the risks, but in also identifying the best treatment options for them in line with your scarce business resources. However, a risk assessment plan is not a one-time project; you will need to keep on monitoring it from time to time. In case your business’ orientations towards certain risk factors changes or new threats arise, you should be ready to update it accordingly. Additionally, everyone in your organization should understand the role they play in managing the risks. With a top-down approach towards cyber-security, it becomes easy to eliminate the chances of human error. Why Risk Assessment Matters 1. Improve Your PR Approach. Going through a cyber-attack can be a PR nightmare. Other than reducing customer’s trust in your business, it can lead to the loss of critical investors. It might also make it tough for your business to proceed with working with security-conscious vendors. With a risk management plan by your side, it becomes easy to identify the risks you face and prevent them from causing any PR issues down the line. 2. Using Resources Effectively. When building a robust cyber-security framework, huge budgets aren’t always synonymous to a great security posture. Ideally, you need to invest in the right tools for the right purpose, especially when resources are scarce. For instance, a small organization of twenty employees might not benefit from an access control system as much as a larger organization would. The trick is identifying security assets that will generate the best ROI and use them effectively. 3. Improve Internal Communication. When cyber-calamities occur, chaos will ensue in your organization. Without the right preparation, it might be possible to make the situation worse through poor communication. The individuals in IT should communicate with the executives and PR teams to help deal with the threat. On the other hand, executives need to understand their roles and know when something needs to be done. A risk management plan helps you to choose risk treatment options that communicate the best way to deal with threats. As a result, when disasters occur, everyone can commit to their roles entirely. It also becomes easier to pass on messages on the progress of dealing with the threat at hand, which can be crucial in protecting your business. 4. Improve Employee Awareness. With 90% of cyber-threats coming to life due to human error, lack of awareness is a massive part of the problem. An employee that doesn’t know how to differentiate between phishing attacks and genuine emails is likely to open the former. The trick lies in your entire IT governance and how you train employees. When you have a risk management plan by your side, it becomes easy to identify the key training areas and how to go about it. Be Ready to Follow Regulations Rules such as the GDPR are slowly changing the cyber-security landscape. They challenge how businesses deal with their data and have the interest of key stakeholders at heart. Since more regulations are bound to come up in the future, it is ideal to ensure that your business is compliant. Of course, most of these regulations only outline the threshold security requirements, something that a company that has an effective cyber-security framework can comply with quickly. However, it still counts to have an elaborate plan on how to handle compliance. For instance, having a specific department for dealing with it can save you from the hefty fines of being non-compliant. Even better, complying with the changing regulations makes your business more attractive to work within the eyes of both clients and investors. Invest in Data Analytics Tools Business data is a cyber-security gold mine. It can portray patterns that cannot be identified by merely brainstorming the security issues that your business faces. For instance, access control data can help you unearth any insider threats that might occur right under your nose. Additionally, monitoring log data can help identify security loopholes in your applications, which would otherwise be quite costly. Invest in data monitoring, and analytics tools to be steps ahead of any security threats. Remember, each second counts when looking to protect your business’ reputation. You should also consider hiring professionals in the field of cyber data analytics to improve your chances of success. Invest In the Cloud Although cloud computing has gone mainstream in the business world, some businesses are still skeptical about using it to run their business. For some, the fact that they already have well-established data centers in-house makes cloud migration tough. However, the security risk that lies in these in-house data centers is quite high, from system breakdowns to insider threats. Even worse, it costs a lot to run them with most businesses needing to invest in cooling systems as well as renting spaces for their servers. The good thing about the cloud is that you can access your data from anywhere at any given time. Even better, you can beef up your security concerning who can access your sensitive data. As for business growth, cloud systems are entirely scalable; you can upgrade or rollback subscriptions with regard to your business needs. Lastly, you can always embrace the hybrid cloud to enjoy the best of both in-house server and cloud environments. Focus On Employee Training Investing in state-of-the-art security tools will mean nothing as long as you haven’t adequately trained your employees. When all hands are on deck, cyber-security becomes a walk in the park. However, how you train your employees is equally as important as the content of the training sessions. It will be counter-productive to take your workforce through long and mundane PowerPoint sessions. Instead, improve the learning experience through utilizing gamification, micro-learning, and e-learning, among other advances in employee training. You should also diversify your sources of training content to improve the quality of the training sessions. The security posture of your business will determine its sustainability. As more threats are thrown at it, you should be ready to circumvent them. Consider the tips above to fortify your cyber-security posture.  What can Monty Python and the Holy Grail teach us about project management? There are 5... no 3... no 6 things to be exact. I will tell you what they are in an upcoming article on the APM site. Stay tuned for a go-live link posted here...   For their sixth annual survey on the state of application development, OutSystems connected with over 3,300 IT professionals. Their extensive research report is now available, and you should find this a valuable resource for benchmarking how your organization’s app dev approach compares to others in your industry. You’ll learn the answers to these five critical questions:
 The decision by U.S. President Trump to pull back from a retaliatory strike against Iran for the downing of a surveillance drone because there would be “too many deaths for a proportionate response” has been painted as a backtrack. Instead, “President Trump approved an offensive cyber strike that disabled computer systems used by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to control rocket and missile launches.” “Though crippling to Iran’s military command and control systems,” reported the Washington Post, “the operation did not involve a loss of life or civilian casualties—a contrast to conventional strikes, which the president said he called back Thursday because they would not be ‘proportionate’.” That is not a backtrack, it’s a game changer.  A physical missile strike against military targets in Iran would generate headlines and newsworthy images. It would kill scores of people. But in the end, it would make little difference to the standoff between Washington and Teheran. If, however, the reports are true and the U.S. has compromised Iran’s networks to the extent that Teheran’s core command and control systems are now vulnerable, that changes the dynamics completely...
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Brad Egeland
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