tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-72059295491924399102026-05-12T03:59:10.980-07:00Become a Certified Project ManagerAnand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.comBlogger349125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-263247218363188832019-02-04T18:47:00.000-08:002019-02-04T18:47:22.083-08:00The 8 Steps of the PMO Value Ring Methodology
In the previous article, I talked about what makes the Value Ring Methodology Unique. In this article, we will be talking about the 8 Steps of the Value Ring Methodology that would help you as a PMO Leader to transform your PMO.
The 8 Steps of PMO Value Ring Methodology (Source: PMOGA)
Step 1: Find out the most important & appropriate functions for your PMO, according to the Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-60589276247038493622018-12-08T16:31:00.000-08:002019-02-04T18:47:57.437-08:00What makes the PMO Value Ring Methodology Unique?
In the previous article, I wrote about what the PMO Value Ring Certified Practitioner credential was and also gave you guys a sneak peek at the methodology itself. In this article, we will talk about what this methodology is and how it is different from the traditional methods to set-up or run PMOs
Why existing PMO Methodologies are not “Sufficient”?
Even though most Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-57516448562630323952018-12-07T04:11:00.004-08:002018-12-08T16:31:59.432-08:00About the PMO-CP Certification
Unlike the world of Project Management where we have multiple institutions offering many certifications & courses for individuals to pursue, the world of PMO doesn't have many such options. This is in-spite of the fact that, the concept of having a Project or Program or Portfolio Management office to support initiatives in the company is very popular.
The PMO-CP stands for PMO Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-66842861711585358402017-05-29T20:02:00.000-07:002017-05-29T20:02:16.200-07:00Does a Scrum Project Need Sprint 0?
One of the
most debatable topics in Agile especially Scrum is whether a team can actually
deliver something potentially shippable in the first Iteration or Sprint. Some
folks suggest a Sprint 0 while some oppose it as they feel it is against scrum
principles.
The purpose
of this article is to help you understand whether a Sprint 0 really makes sense
or not…
What is
Sprint 0?
Sprint 0Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-5226820431529052012017-05-28T18:39:00.000-07:002017-05-28T18:39:11.180-07:00Can Product Owner also be the Scrum Master?
One of the most common
points of stress in a scrum project is when the same individual gets assigned
more than one role in a scrum team. As you may have seen in the article titled “Participants
in Scrum” each role has its own responsibilities and often times the roles
clash with one another. In this article am gonna highlight why I think the
roles of a scrum master and product owner should not Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-55372903896612969162017-03-20T03:57:00.000-07:002017-03-20T03:57:00.868-07:00Organizational Influence on Project Management
If you are someone who has played the role of a Project Manager in more than one company you would know that the organization has a direct influence on how projects are managed. I have worked as a Project/Program manager in a few companies and I can vouch for this fact.
In the PMP Exam series there were 3 articles that covered this topic and I have explained in great detail about how Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-29178624898340009752017-03-18T03:52:00.000-07:002017-03-18T03:52:03.346-07:00Project Stakeholders
A stakeholder is a person, a group, or an organization that is actively involved in the project or whose interests may be positively or negatively affected by the results achieved by or the completion of the project. As I have extensively covered this topic in my previous article in the PMP Exam prep series we will keep this article short.
Please do refer to the article to Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-45260127003184897922017-03-17T03:49:00.000-07:002017-05-29T22:33:13.638-07:00Project Program and Portfolio Management
Even though the PMI ACP is focused at managing projects the agile way, as a project manager we would still need to know the difference between a Project, Program and a Portfolio to be able to do our jobs better. Most people have a misconception that they are one and the same. Hopefully by the end of this article you would understand that they are not the same.
In the Series on PMP ExamAnand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-34302849498000262612017-03-16T03:43:00.000-07:002017-03-17T16:56:06.780-07:00Project Life Cycle
The life cycle is the Key factor that uniquely distinguishes projects from non-projects. The project life cycle defines the beginning and the end of a project and the various milestones associated with it. Although every project has definite planned start and end dates, the deliverables vary across projects.
As part of the PMP Exam Prep series, I had published an article on Project LifecycleAnand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-50696757799985611942017-03-15T16:48:00.000-07:002017-03-17T16:55:17.842-07:00What is a Project?
Before getting into details of how you would manage an Agile Project, its essential that we first understand what a Project is…
In my previous series on PMP Certification I had published a couple of articles about Projects. They are very much relevant to the ACP Certification also so, it would be good if you could refer them and learn more about Projects.
Introduction to Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-35556961209872241932017-03-14T16:44:00.000-07:002017-05-29T22:17:27.128-07:00Project Management Basics – The PMBOK
If you had read the article on Tips & Tricks to pass the PMI ACP exam in the first attempt, you would’ve noticed that, one of the tips there was to review the PMBOK guide. We all know that this series of articles is about the Agile Certified Practitioner (ACP) so, you are probably wondering why I put up that point – right?
Does Agile Project Management need the PMBOK?
Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-81169900510018784212017-03-13T16:36:00.000-07:002017-05-29T22:30:37.977-07:00Tips and Tricks to Crack the PMI-ACP Exam in your First Attempt
The title of the post might sound ironic, coming from someone who isn’t certified yet and is also preparing to take up the exam – right?
Yes, its true that I am not PMI ACP Certified Yet but I do have 4 other certifications (two from PMI) in the area of Project Management that we all cracked successfully in the first attempt. So, the tips and tricks you see in this article are based onAnand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-38924459808781797162017-03-11T16:34:00.000-08:002017-03-17T16:51:50.644-07:00The PMI ACP Exam Pattern and Type of Questions
In the previous article we reviewed the contents of the PMI ACP Exam. So the next logic thing to find out is about the Examination Pattern as well as the type of questions you might encounter in the exam.
PMI ACP Exam Pattern
You have 3 hours (180 Mins) to finish answering all the questions
The Exam has 120 multiple choice questions, each having four choices
You can alsoAnand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-28928694768079600932017-03-10T16:32:00.000-08:002017-05-29T22:24:24.735-07:00Contents of the PMI ACP Exam
In the Previous Article we saw the Step by Step Process to attain the PMI ACP Certification. Lets look at the contents of the ACP Exam next.
The Web site of project management institute, contains the ‘PMI-Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP) Examination Content Outline’ which describes the topics covered in the exam.
Like I mentioned before, the exam has 120 multiple-choice Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-12651057556250832042017-03-09T16:27:00.002-08:002017-03-12T01:52:54.547-08:00A Simple Step by step Process to become PMI ACP Certified
If you are someone who already has a PMI Certification, this article may sound redundant to you. You are free to skip this one and move on to the next one in the series but I would recommend you spend a few mins to refresh your memory.
The prerequisite here is the decision that you want to take up the PMI ACP certification…
Step 1: Attend the Mandatory PMI ACP Training
It is Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-89969273773231774982017-03-09T16:22:00.002-08:002017-05-29T22:37:33.525-07:00About the PMI ACP Certification
Certifications are widely used by individuals to demonstrate and show-off their expertise in any particular field. With fierce competition in the job markets, the go-to first level filtering criteria for most jobs is to choose candidates who have the relevant certifications. The field of Software Project Management has always recognized (and continues to value) the PMP Credential but with the Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-88830397927663236362017-03-08T10:00:00.000-08:002017-03-08T10:00:20.336-08:00Does a Scrum Project Need Iteration 0?
We all know that scrum projects work in
Sprints or Iterations and continue to deliver incremental features on the
product at the end of each Iteration. In real life, how many of us have worked
on a sprint project where the team was actually able to deliver something
shippable at the end of the 1st Iteration? The answer to this
question would be very small for a very simple reason. During the Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-76994051624553047452017-03-06T09:00:00.000-08:002017-03-06T09:00:00.719-08:00Can the Product Owner also be the Scrum Master?
In one of our earlier articles about the
key scrum participants, we had talked about both the Scrum Master Role and the
Product Owner Role. In organisations that want to adopt Scrum, one of the
common mistakes they do is to club the role of Scrum Master and Product Owner.
We multi-task all the time and it shouldn't be a big deal for a guy to take up
both of those roles, isn’t it?
Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-60625944155518656092017-03-04T04:32:00.002-08:002017-03-04T04:32:53.372-08:00Should Teams set a Target Scope during Sprint Planning?
As you are aware by now, the Sprint
Planning meeting helps the team identify the backlog of user stories they are
going to work on during the Sprint or Iteration. Ideally, the team would review
the top priority user stories and choose the stories they are confident about
finishing within the Sprint. So far so good, right?
But, every team has a different approach
towards capacity usage duringAnand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-29098777327336506662017-03-01T10:30:00.000-08:002017-03-01T10:30:01.160-08:00Do We Need a Complicated Story Hierarchy?
One of the vital parts of any Agile or
Scrum project is the User Story. A user story represents a piece of product
functionality that needs to be built by the team. There was an article a few
weeks back about “How to Write a Good User Story”. One of the
questions new scrum teams have is about the relationship stories are supposed
to have. In an ideal world every user story is independent but inAnand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-2791835735144929562017-02-27T10:30:00.000-08:002017-02-27T10:30:10.696-08:00Is Change Free in Agile?
The underlying purpose or motivating factor
behind the whole Agile development methodology was to allow teams the
flexibility to inspect and adapt to changes. This was something the
practitioners of traditional waterfall methodology were longing for after scope
creep ruined almost every project they worked on so, they jumped headfirst into
the Agile pool so that they can “Embrace Change”. So Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-39656462224769873342017-02-24T10:30:00.000-08:002017-02-24T10:30:09.426-08:00Is Iterative Software Development Really Agile?
A few years back, I was asked to take over
as the Scrum Master for a team that was already familiar with Agile/Scrum
concepts. I was quite excited because, for a change, I was joining a team that
already knew what Scrum was and I did not need to train the team in Scrum
Methodology. After a few days with the team, one thing became very clear – they
were doing Iterative Waterfall and not Scrum.
Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-74352109630180391702017-02-22T10:30:00.000-08:002017-02-22T10:30:00.206-08:00The Golden Triangle in Scrum – Scope vs Time vs Cost Trade-off
Anyone who
has had any formal project management training would be familiar with the
golden triangle concept. In one of my articles on the PMP Exam prep series we
had reviewed the topic of controlling the project Scope, Cost and Schedule. Click here
A project
usually has competing demands from these 3 aspects - Scope, Time and Cost. When
there is change in one aspect the other two sides of Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-67807986582493576542017-02-20T10:30:00.000-08:002017-02-20T10:30:24.140-08:00Running Effective Retrospective Meetings
In the last article we talked about why
it's a good idea to do a retrospective regularly – right? I had mentioned in
that article that we will be having a separate article to talk about how to
conduct effective Retrospective meetings that are productive and add value to
the scrum team/project.
The Basics:
Before we get into conducting or running a
retrospective, there are a couple of Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7205929549192439910.post-18565600185606264932017-02-18T11:00:00.000-08:002017-02-18T11:00:17.521-08:00Do We Need Retrospective Meetings Every Sprint?
If you go
back to the article on Scrum Meetings one of the regular meetings that
is expected to happen every Iteration or Sprint is the Retrospective Meeting.
However, in real life scrum projects, many people actually skip the regular
retrospective meetings for a variety of reasons (we will get to that in a bit)
and just continue working on the project. The purpose of this article is to
Anand Vijayakumarhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04069290912727901147noreply@blogger.com0