These are field notes from more than 25 years of running high-stakes projects and building the teams behind them. Every post starts with a real problem from a real job: scope that drifted, a vendor lock that held, a handoff that broke, or a schedule that stayed honest. Use them the way I wrote them, as working tools you can bring to your next project meeting.
Looking for a term? See our construction glossary for plain-English definitions built for project owners.
Effective stakeholder management has no one face. For each project, a handful of stakeholder groups have all kinds of requirements at all times. You’ll have those with high levels of power and interest who want to know everything. You’ll have the opposite. Then, you’ll see stakeholders who have very specific needs and reject every attempt at…
Managing stakeholder commitments means getting the people who said yes at kickoff to still act like it when budget or schedule pressure shows up. Most of that work happens early. A commitment nobody revisits slides back into bare compliance, and that is where trust starts to slip. You have a lot going on and barely have…
There is nothing that will make your project function better than accountability. Read that again because it’s true. Without it, you risk everything falling apart. In some settings, it can seem like a rare feature. Everyone is just worried about covering their own backs, never each other. Nothing makes sense. No work ever gets from Point…
Outsourcing is a huge part of the professional landscape these days, and it makes sense. Getting a specialized outside perspective can be great for your project and the bottom line, but when left unchecked, that extra help can cause its fair share of issues when left unchecked. That’s why this “third-party risk management” concept is more…
A risk management consultant is an outside set of eyes who looks at your project plan, finds the gaps that could cost you time or money, and helps you close them before they turn into problems. The work is less about predicting the future and more about thinking through what could go wrong and who handles…
Enterprise risk management is something only some project managers encounter. Generally, we manage risk with whoever is overseeing our project. We report risks (and potential responses), then move on to the next thing calling our name—usually whichever thing is screaming the loudest. But what happens when the company decides to slow down and stop ignoring the…
Communication skills are key in project management. Here are the top 10 and how to improve them all.
Communication to project management is like bones to a body. You aren’t going to get far without it. And as project managers well know, all of the different communication channels need to be organized, categorized, and managed. That’s why we are breaking down communication management, gathering all key components, and helping you develop your communication management…
Projects are primarily complex, with several unexpected challenges. There’s also the challenge of ensuring you have all the resources necessary to complete a task on time and within budget. In this blog post, learn how project resource management (PRM) can help alleviate these difficulties and increase your chances of success. Resource management or project resource management…
As a project manager, you are often faced with the daunting task of estimating and controlling project expenses. The formula for estimating the cost of a project is something that takes into account many factors. Many people may wonder how to estimate the cost of their projects, what factors should be considered in arriving at an…