Keynote Speaker Randy Englund, presenting at the PMI Silicon Valley Chapter MATURITY FORUM 2007,
together with event chair Jim Sloane (above)
Randy Englund facilitating seminar on "Creating Excellence in Project Management" for PMI Global Congress EMEA 2007 in Budapest
Randy Englund, co-author Alfonso Bucero, US Counsel General to Italy Deborah Graze, and book chapter contributor Gary LaGassey conducting panel discussion at MIB School of Business in Trieste, Italy on "Project Management for Executives," May 2007
Creating an Environment for Successful Projects
Randall L. Englund,
NPDP, CBM, MBA, BSEEExecutive Consultant, Englund Project Management Consultancy
Project work is fast becoming a majority of the work performed in modern organizations. Development and launch of successful new products and services hinges on forming a thoroughly integrated "project-based organization" (PBO). The objective is to achieve greater results from projects selected and underway in the organization. This requires that key stakeholders understand the what, how and why of developing project management as an organizational competency. Upper managers have a great deal to do with project success. However, many organizational systems that guide management behavior, both East and West, are not consistent with success in the current business environment.
This multimedia presentation/workshop covers essential components—the pieces of a large puzzle—drawn from experience, that are necessary to create an environment for successful projects.
Important steps include:
 | clear goals and upper management support for a PBO |
| developing an upper management team to oversee the project management effort |
| linking each project to organizational strategy [Do it all video] |
| understanding sources of anxiety that inhibit getting results |
| organizing to reward project management |
| supporting core teams |
| aligning projects with customers |
| developing a project management information system |
| selecting and developing project managers |
| installing a project review process to learn from project experiences |
| supporting an ongoing project management initiative in the organization |
Managers are more effective when they learn best practices in project management and how to support those practices. Innovation thrives in an organic organization that stresses accountability for the success of the whole, authenticity and integrity in action, and an internal market model for deploying resources.
Randy Englund draws from years of personal experience as a high tech project manager to demonstrate how these practices are accomplished in major corporations such as Hewlett-Packard Company. His collaboration with cultural anthropologist Dr. Robert J. Graham resulted in a book that documents steps, pitfalls, and success stories for Creating an Environment for Successful Projects: the Quest to Manage Project Management.
Former HP CEO Lew Platt provides impetus to
manage project management by stating "Crisp execution of projects is
critical to the survival of today’s organizations...An imperative facing HP
managers as well as our partners is to create an environment where the projects
that we choose are successful. This book [Graham and Englund’s Creating an
Environment for Successful Projects: the Quest to Manage Project Management]
provides important guideposts for that quest."