The concept of focusing more on the concept of value is the hot topic right now in PMI and other project management organizations - and books on the subject have sold very well. Berman has an active speaking schedule and is a prominent expert in the field.
What good is a project that's on time...on budget...and ends up providing your organization with no bottom-line results whatsoever? Whether it falls short of expectations, fails to ultimately be embraced by the people in the company meant to be using it, or simply lands with a thud in the marketplace, a project that doesn't truly deliver value is worthless at best. It's great to be on time and under budget, but to achieve positive results, project managers have to embrace an all-new philosophy of what it is they do for their organizations. Maximizing Project Value shows you how to put the emphasis on value when managing a project, from the project's initial inception, all the way through its completion, and even farther down the road to determine whether it's of continuous worth to the company. This valuable guide offers a step-by-step plan you can use to establish the value of a project, identify value drivers and key performance metrics and then track and report them, organize a team for accountability, and much more. You'll get the tools and information you need to: * Generate accurate value estimates in the proposal stage. * Create a clear plan that identifies measurable and ongoing value. * Establish buy-in from key players in your organization. * Develop and use a process for managing the people responsible for implementing the plan. * Adapt your project to meet changing business objectives. Far too many projects lose sight of their original purpose due to shifting resources, changing organizational objectives, and other unexpected developments. Maximizing Project Value provides a clear, immediately usable blueprint for ensuring the kind of project success that truly provides value to your organization.
Increase Project Value = Attain the Goal Maximizing project value is about optimizing the tradeoff between project value and business value, two values that are constantly in tension between the project manager and the project sponsor. In this book the author brings his wealth of experience in project management to demonstrate how to increase a project's value and ultimately contribute to the attainment of business goals From exploring the nature of “value,” as tangible resources and moral or ethical attributes, to how best to approach decision-making, the book offers thorough coverage of this essential aspect of project management. The tools and methods the author describes include: • Building the business case • Using a project balance sheet • Employing earned value • Introducing game theory for optimizing strategies This valuable reference should be on the desk of every project sponsor, business stakeholder, project manager, portfolio manager, project practitioner, and functional manager.
Blueprint 4 continues the theme of Blueprint 2 in looking at the opportunities for using market forces for environmental ends. It assesses a range of possible imaginative 'global bargains', which give all parties a self-interested incentive to improve the global environment. The book begins by reviewing the principle global issues to be addressed, and then explains the mechanisms of resource degradation: how economic systems fail, the operation of trade on the environment and the effects of population growth and consumption patterns. It then shows how environmental value can be captured, and the basis, means and institutions for doing so.
With the majority of IT projects being delivered late, over budget, or cancelled altogether, it is clear that traditional project management methodologies do not provide an effective framework for today's IT projects. It is evident that a new Return-on-Investment (ROI) oriented approach is required that focuses on the ROI of a project fro
Business leaders are frequently faced with investment decisions on new and ongoing projects. The challenge lies in deciding what projects to choose, expand, contract, defer, or abandon, and which method of valuation to use is the key tool in the process. This title presents a step-by-step, practical approach to real options valuation to make it easily understandable by practitioners as well as senior management. This systematic approach to project valuation helps you minimize upfront investment risks, exercise flexibility in decision making, and maximize the returns. Whereas the traditional decision tools such as discounted cash flow/net present value (DCF/NPV) analysis assume a “fixed” path ahead, real options analysis offers more flexible strategies. Considered one of the greatest innovations of modern finance, the real options approach is based on Nobel-prize winning work by three MIT economists, Fischer Black, Robert Merton, and Myron Scholes.
Whether to continue using traditional cost and benefit analysis methods such as systems and software engineering standards or to use a relatively new family of software development processes known as Agile methods is one of most prevalent questions within the information technology field today. Since each family of methods has its strengths and weaknesses, the question being raised by a growing number of executives and practitioners is: Which family of methods provides the greater business value and return on investment (ROI)? Whereas traditional methods have been in use for many decades, Agile methods are still a new phenomenon and, until now, very little literature has existed on how to quantify the business value of Agile methods in economic terms, such as ROI and net present value (NPV). Using cost of quality, total cost of ownership, and total life cycle cost parameters, The Business Value of Agile Software Methods offers a comprehensive methodology and introduces the industry's initial top-down parametric models for quantifying the costs and benefits of using Agile methods to create innovative software products. Based on real-world data, it illustrates the first simple-to-use parametric models of Real Options for estimating the business value of Agile methods since the inception of the Nobel prize winning Black-Scholes formulas. Numerous examples on how to estimate the costs, benefits, ROI, NPV, and real options of the major types of Agile methods such as Scrum, Extreme Programming and Crystal Methods are also included. In addition, this reference provides the first comprehensive compilation of cost and benefit data on Agile methods from an analysis of hundreds of research studies.The Business Value of Agile Software Methods shatters key myths and misconceptions surrounding the modern-day phenomenon of Agile methods for creating innovative software products. It provides a complete business value comparison between traditional and Agile methods. The keys to maximizing the business value of any method are low costs and high benefits and the business value of Agile methods, when compared to traditional methods, proves to be very impressive. Agile methods are a new model of project management that can be used to improve the success, business value, and ROI of high-risk and highly complex IT projects in today's dynamic, turbulent, and highly uncertain marketplace. If you are an executive, manager, scholar, student, consultant or practitioner currently on the fence, you need to read this book!
Using empirical data from their research study, Thomas Lechler and John Byrne demonstrate that the success of a project strongly depends on the specific attitude of the project manager and the project management decision-making process. They also address: • Limiting effects of the Triple Constraints Paradigm • Role of uncertainty in projects. Leaders within organizations will find the results useful to emphasize and encourage entrepreneurial behaviors of project managers in a way that influences project performance beyond the simple application of tools and techniques. The book addresses several stakeholders, including who are responsible for implementing projects, those who suffer the consequences if things go wrong, and those who are responsible for the selection and development of project managers. The Mindset for Creating Project Value provides insight into how a different perspective is necessary to better understand the limitations of project management in order to better explain the many phenomena that are related to the management of projects and, consequently, to improve the practical outcome.
Cost and Value Management in Projects Project manager's guide to achieving cost efficiency and value optimization—thoroughly updated with new cases, examples, and problem sets The newly revised and updated Second Edition of Cost and Value Management in Projects provides project managers with a thorough understanding of the various dimensions of cost and value in projects, along with the factors that impact them and the managerial approaches for achieving cost efficiency and value optimization. Whereas most cost management books discuss the topic from a tactical perspective, such as through the use of simple budgeting or Earned Value Analysis, this Second Edition addresses cost from a strategic perspective, examining project management decision areas that have the potential to enhance value and providing an integrated framework for managing cost. The Second Edition includes updates to key topic areas such as project benefits realization, updated end-of-chapter exercises such as discussion questions and problem sets, updated case studies, and new spreadsheet analytic techniques and examples. Written by two highly qualified authors with significant experience in the field, Cost and Value Management in Projects includes information on: Value management through value planning, engineering, and analysis from the perspective of projects, and best practices on how to avoid common pitfalls in managing cost and value Organization strategy and project selection, organization structure and culture, project definition (and contracts), and estimating project times and cost Developing project plans and schedules, managing risk, scheduling resources and cost, reducing project duration, leadership, performance measurement, and project closure Attainment of value in complex environmental settings and benefits of effective project management Cost and Value Management in Projects is an essential resource on the subject for stakeholders at all corporate and government levels, including executives measuring performance, middle level corporate managers, project and team managers, engineers, project team members, and business consultants, along with students in related programs of study.