Before Starting Any Agile Journey, Know Your Destination

Posted by in IT Management, IT Projects, IT Services

The promise of Agile is speed to market for delivering incremental value to the customer, but why is the adoption of Agile in organizations so difficult and slow? As addressed in my recent blog post, “Are you Using, Doing, or Being Agile?” Agile adoption takes more than just checking boxes, but rather is a complex, multi-phase journey. And any unfamiliar journey requires the navigator to know the destination. Have you tried using GPS without entering an address? Understanding where you are headed is a key component of any successful endeavor. (more…)

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Don't wag the dog, lead with strategy

Don’t Wag the Dog: Digital Transformation Starts with Company Strategy

Posted by in IT Management, IT Projects, IT Services

Today, headlines about digital transformation dominate blogs and journals. IT leaders feel that they should have already started their organization’s transition into the digital age. But the amount of buzz around this trend shouldn’t force you into a hasty decision.

For years you’ve been told to avoid technology for technology’s sake – yet the same trap is catching CIOs pushing for digital transformation because everyone else is doing it. Like any IT initiative, digital transformation only makes sense if it supports your organization’s overall strategy.

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Abraic presenting at SIM Connect Live 2018

Abraic Presenting at SIM Connect Live

Posted by in Events

We at Abraic often hear from CIOs about their struggle to define “digital transformation” for their organization and develop strategies for real change.

We will be addressing these challenges at our upcoming SIM Connect Live Conference seminar: Digital Transformation Reality Check: How Does Your Company Measure Up?  (Thurs 4/12, 11am). This session will tackle how to define, manage, troubleshoot, and communicate goals and outcomes during an organization-wide transformation—digital or otherwise. (more…)

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Launching a Center of Excellence | Downloadable Executive Field Guide

Posted by in IT Management, IT Services

A Center of Excellence—such as an OSM (Office of Strategy Management), PMO (Project Management Office), IT Governance, Continuous Improvement, or similar task force—is usually established to achieve one or more of the following core objectives within an organization:

  • Implement and popularize a best practice
  • Add a new capability, function, or technology
  • Improve utilization of (or return on) an asset
  • Upgrade employees’ skillsets

Download this Executive Field Guide as a .pdf

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Risk-taking

The Risk-Taker CIO Paradox

Posted by in IT Management, IT Projects, IT Services

Leadership requires taking risks. But technology must work reliably. How do IT leaders square these two realities?

CIOs are driving organizational strategies now more than ever. The more a CIO’s success is tied to business outcomes, the more risk they assume. Traditionally, CIOs have been responsible for KPIs like uptime and system availability to support internal productivity and operational efficiency. But suddenly—now that all industries are becoming digital—there is much more at stake.

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Conquering the UAT Process: Before, During & After

Posted by in IT Projects

User Acceptance Testing can be a daunting and frustrating experience. Too often, the exercise becomes an ordeal of tight deadlines, stress, and system issues. While UAT will always be a high-effort activity, good preparation, responsiveness, and follow-up will multiply your chances of success.

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Who Cares About Your IT Initiative?

Who Cares About Your IT Initiative?

Posted by in IT Projects

Sure, we all want our IT initiatives to succeed. We regularly evaluate our projects, in-flight or upon completion, looking for tangible lessons to learn. We apply these strategic and tactical takeaways in hopes of increasing the chances of success for each subsequent initiative. We seek approaches that work for different industries, organizations, teams, and technologies.

But looking back at the many IT projects I’ve been a part of in my career, I can’t help but notice a common theme associated with success: people who genuinely care tend to find a way to get it done.

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PM Pointers: 3 Ways to Maximize Success with Inter-Team Dependencies

Posted by in IT Projects

Managing an IT project often requires working with resources across other teams—not just those fully allocated to your initiative. Supporting resources and teams can be important to the success of your project. (Ideally, all the resources you need are fully dedicated to your project. In reality, this isn’t always possible.)

How do you ensure your team can deliver results if you’re dependent on these partially allocated supporting teams?

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The Fallacy of Multi-Project Resource Allocation

Posted by in IT Projects

Organizations tend to divide the same resources over multiple, simultaneous projects and still expect the same level of productivity as if each person were dedicated to just one project.

PMOs, project managers, and resource managers need to reexamine this practice of assigning the same person to two or more projects at once. A project with many or all resources allocated to multiple projects usually run late, creating a ripple effect on all other projects.

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