1st Edition

Optimizing Human Capital with a Strategic Project Office Select, Train, Measure,and Reward People for Organization Success

    404 Pages 11 B/W Illustrations
    by Auerbach Publications

    Optimizing Human Capital with a Strategic Project Office explores the SPO’s potential to transform an enterprise by making the most of people within an organization. This volume provides an exhaustive review of topics such as the hiring, retention, measurement, training, and professional development of knowledge workers in project management. This book’s chapters summarize the latest thinking regarding these issues and offer a model of how the best aspirations of workers can become reality through the medium of the SPO.

    The authors explore the best practices of project-savvy organizations and offer detailed information on proven models for assessing and developing competency, building inspired teams, and creating a working environment in which motivation thrives. The book includes a set of model role descriptions for staffing the project office--on a divisional or enterprise level--based on original research by the authors.

    The book opens by focusing on the business case for reorganizing companies around the managing-by-projects model, the roles of executives in implementing project management change initiatives, and the nuts-and-bolts topics of project personnel management, such as competency, recruiting, and rewards. The final section reviews current developments and trends, identifying the “people management” issues that generate the greatest organizational changes. Appendices provide examples of tools for establishing project-friendly HR practices under the auspices of a Strategic Project Office.

    SECTION I: THE NEW PROJECT MANAGEMENT


    The Strategic Project Office: A Catalyst for
    Organizational Change
    Failure: Wake-Up Call and Teacher
    Integrating Strategy and Action: Managing the Project Portfolio
    People on Projects: A New Look at Project Roles and
    Responsibilities
    Why Is This So Important?
    The Executive Role
    SECTION II: MANAGING PEOPLE AS THOUGH
    PROJECTS REALLY MATTER: BEST PRACTICES
    FOR CAPITALIZING ON PROJECT PERSONNEL

    The Right Stuff: Competency-Based Employment


    What Is Competence?
    Assessing Competence
    Developing Competence

    Why Project Managers Fail … and How to Help Them


    Succeed
    Project Manager and Team Member Competencies
    What Does a Project Manager Do?
    The Emergence of the Project Planner Role
    Other Roles and Their Areas of Competence

    The Turnover Solution


    Recruitment and Retention Practices for the Project-Based Company
    Recruitment
    Retention
    Culture
    Graceful Exits
    The Care and Feeding of Project Management
    Personnel
    Career Pathing and Professional Development
    Professional Development: Training, Coaching, and Mentoring
    Performance Management on Projects: More Carrot,
    Less Stick
    What Is Wrong with Performance Management?
    Best-Practice Performance Management
    Aligning Individual and Organizational Performance
    SECTION III: THE FUTURE — WHAT IS NEXT
    FOR PROJECTS AND PEOPLE?
    On the Horizon: New Organizational Themes
    and Structures
    New Themes in Project Management Staffing
    Beyond the Team: Community of Practice
    Outsourcing: Project Management Expertise as a Commodity
    New Opportunities and Visibility for Project Managers

    SECTION IV: APPENDICES


    Sample Role Descriptions for Project Office
    Personnel and Other Project-Management-Related

    Positions

    Excerpt from Project Management Maturity Model

    Sample Career Path

    Sample Questions from Knowledge Assessment Instrument


    Sample Questions from Multi-Rater Project Manager
                Competency Evaluation

    Sample Questions from the Caliper Profile


    PM Solutions Career Planning and Development
                Program Artifacts

    Value of Project Management Training Research Study Results

    Project Manager Support Survey

    Project Management Mentor’s Competency Scorecard


    PM Coaching Guidelines: Assisting Project Managers
    and Their Projects

    Project Management Performance Appraisal Form

    Service Level Agreement Tips for Better Outsourcing


                Relationships

    Biography

    J. Kent Crawford, Jeannette Cabanis-Brewin