Book Description

Waiting until the end of a project to identify “lessons learned” is too late. By that time, the project may be ready for the scrap heap. But if your projects and programs include multi-level learning, you’ll not only be fostering continuous improvements for the future, you’ll be well-equipped to reduce the risk of failure while projects are “in-flight” so you can deliver maximum value to your client organization. Facilitating Project Performance Improvement helps any organization:

• Reduce time to market for new products, systems, processes and technologies

• Improve customer and end-user satisfaction with project outcomes

• Reduce risk of failure, wasted investment, and project runaway

• Improve productivity, quality and teamwork

• Continuously improve delivery both within and across projects.

Organizations simply cannot afford to leave learning to chance on their mission-critical investments. Facilitating Project Performance Improvement provides a practical approach to structured learning and reflection that enables teams to innovate and improve, ensuring both immediate and long-term project success.

if(window.uet){uet("be")}if(window.onLdEnd){if(window.addEventListener){window.addEventListener("load",window.onLdEnd,false)}else{if(window.attachEvent){window.attachEvent("onload",window.onLdEnd)}}}if(window.ueh){ueh(0,window,"load",window.onLd,1)}if(window.ue_pr&&(window.ue_pr==3||window.ue_pr==4)){window.ue._uep()};

function updateCsmHit(c){var a=new Date();a.setTime(a.getTime()+(30*60*1000));var d="; expires="+a.toGMTString();var b=(window.ue&&window.ue.t.be)?(ue.t.be-ue_t0):(new Date().getTime()-ue_t0);if(b!=0){document.cookie="csm-hit="+(c/b).toFixed(2)+d+"; path=/"}};
updateCsmHit(236511);

From the Inside Flap

In project management, doing “lessons learned” at the end is simply too late. By that time, there’s nothing that can be done to improve your results.

The key to maximizing the return on any project is multi-level learning, a continuous improvement approach that draws on lean concepts and tools to optimize communication, establish repeatable processes, and leverage cross-team innovations while projects, programs, and strategies are “in-flight.”

The results of this approach, as the author has found in studying countless project scenarios, are astounding. Organizations are getting new products into the market faster; processes, software, and technologies deliver value sooner; wasted resources are drastically reduced as quality increases; and (no surprise) customer and end-user satisfaction reach peak levels.

Facilitating Project Performance Improvement is based on in-depth studies of 20 project organizations, and combines cutting-edge practices in lean and agile software development with practical multi-level learning tools to help any project-based organization realize drastic and consistent improvements within and across projects.

Emphasizing the need for reflection as a continuous process, the book describes learning opportunities throughout the strategic, process, and project levels of your organization’s portfolio. The multi-level approach empowers teams at each of these three levels, providing a framework for real-time problem solving and continuous improvement while initiatives are in-flight, rather than relying on project postmortems or “lessons learned“ databases that go unused or forgotten.

Specifically, the book explains how to deploy multi-level learning to:

• Accelerate the delivery of value, eliminate waste, and reduce risk at the project, program, and strategy levels

• Migrate from the traditional “red light learning” cycle—a mode that leads to continued surprises and blowups—to a continuous learning environment, without having to fully rebuild your existing project methodology

• Improve group processes to incorporate new insights, resolve conflicts, and make better cross-functional decisions

• Avoid the pitfalls associated with conventional project management approaches

• Capture and implement action items that improve team performance

• Deliver cross-project improvements that create a “multiplier” effect across the project portfolio

By assessing and learning from project developments in-flight, you will see immediate benefits with direct bottom-line impact, including:

• Reduced time to market for new products, systems, processes, and technologies

• Better and more predictable project outcomes

• Improved customer and end-user satisfaction

• Reduced risks of failure, wasted investment, and project runaway

• Improved productivity, teamwork, and product and service quality

• Continuous improvement in delivery and execution from one process, phase, or project to the next

If your projects and programs include multi-level learning, you can stay on top of unexpected challenges, take better-informed risks, and seed continuous improvements that bring maximum value to your organization or your client—today and well into the future.

Jerry Julian is an operations and technology performance improvement strategist and the President & CEO of Julian Advisory Group. His clients have included JPMorgan Chase, GE Capital, Johnson & Johnson, and many others. He was previously with Accenture and global management consultants Rath & Strong. Dr. Julian lives in New York City.