project management

Mike Meikle March 27, 2017 Leave a Comment

Contract on Project Managers

I blame you. Now let’s get started…

Over the last twenty years or so the Project Management discipline has risen obscurity to an integral part of corporate life. If you are reading this from the cubicle farm chances are gaggles of contract project managers are generating countless spreadsheets that dutifully filled out with carefully curated data. This data may or may not be plugged into a vast, unwieldy PMO tool. That data will flow to the various managers and directors who vaguely review the information in status reports. From there it fall into the great bitbucket never to be seen again. Unless a project is heading toward failure, then it will be used to clobber parties who lack the right political protection. That is usually the sad contract project manager who originally created the spreadsheet. Of course the PM is supposed to be part of a project team that should include project coordinators, business analysts, approved budgets, PMO resources etc. Instead, the PM is usually the only management resource assigned to the project. They’ve come in two or three months into the execution phase, there aren’t any requirements, the last PM was fired or left and by the way you have six other projects like this that you are responsible for.

So how did the project management role become the fallguy/girl for the corporate world? If the above statements hold up, how is the project they are assigned to going to be a success? How did the profession get to this point and what can be done to reverse the trend?

[Read more…]

Mike Meikle August 9, 2013 Leave a Comment

Hazards on the HIE Road – A Map for Project Managers

Quite a few pitfalls await the Project Manager

Health Information Exchanges are at the forefront of information security and general news these days. Since HIEs play an important role within the overall state and federal Health Insurance Marketplaces and the security controls within these marketplaces are looking a bit dubious; the overall discussion of HIEs and how they impact healthcare project managers is a timely topic.

With that in mind my latest AtTask Work Management blog post is up. I cover the HIE technical, regulatory and process backgrounds and how it impacts healthcare project managers.

Here’s a bit of the post and then follow the link for the remainder of the article:

In my last post, “Healthcare’s Creative Destruction & the Project Manager” I mentioned that I would outline Health Information Exchanges and what a project manager should know about the current state of this local, state and federal initiatives. Why is this topic so important? In the scale of software development and database integration, few projects like the Nationwide Health Information Network (NwHIN) have been so sweeping in scope; no matter the industry.

One facet that defines the scope of this massive effort is the dollars spent. The Affordable Care Act mandates (Meaningful Use) that healthcare providers shift to Electronic Medical Records (EMR). Without EMRs, a NwHIN would not be possible. In order to facilitate this, the Federal government has doled out $12.6 billion in subsidies to providers since 2012. For the first two months of 2013, $425 million has been handed out for EMR meaningful use. These large numbers do not take into account the vast sums that will be spent on local, state and federal HIE/HIX promotions, setup and operations (currently estimated at $5 billion).

– See more at: Hazards on the HIE Road – A Map for Project Managers

Mike Meikle July 3, 2013 Leave a Comment

Healthcare’s Creative Destruction and the Project Manager

My latest AtTask Work Management blog post is up. I cover the current creative destruction that is ongoing in healthcare and how this is impacting the project manager and the discipline as a whole.

Here’s a snippet and then follow the link for the remainder of the article:

“It’s already here; the churn of healthcare change. Small physician practices are being swallowed up by large healthcare organizations. Older practitioners are retiring sooner, rather than slog through the tremendous business process and regulatory changes that are buffeting healthcare. Local, state and the federal government are embarking on a massive data sharing project with Health Information Exchanges.

These issues all lead to a tremendous amount of risk for the healthcare project manager. To combat this, a PM in healthcare will have to have contract, technology, regulatory, and business savvy when piloting an outreach or new clinic project.”

– See more at: Healthcare’s Creative Destruction & the Project Manager

Mike Meikle July 3, 2013 Leave a Comment

Navigating the Churn of Healthcare Project and Work Management

Joining AtTask’s Work Management Blog as a Guest Author

I have done some work in the past for AtTask such as Podcasts and Webinars. They recently invited me to become a guest blogger for their Work Management blog. I will be writing on the topics of healthcare, project management and cybersecurity.

My first article was recently posted. Here is a snippet with a link to the remaining piece:

So, back to the healthcare priorities, what are they? Well, that’s part of the problem. There are so many priorities at the moment in the healthcare space, it’s almost impossible to get a clear direction. There is an alphabet soup of healthcare initiatives that are pressing down on the industry (HIPAA, HITECH, ARRA, ACA, HIE, HIX, ICD-10, Meaningful Use) that, like a tsunami, has engulfed all resources available in many organizations. – See more at: Navigating the Churn of Healthcare

Mike Meikle May 26, 2011 Leave a Comment

Publicity and the Geek

I am not Recommending This Haircut as a Promotional Strategy.

It’s tough out there for techies. Not only is their profession one of the most difficult, but they are one of the first in line to the chopping block when corporate wants a short term stock boost.

I have written before on the subject of personal branding and marketing as a hedge against the ever-present threat of downsizing. But I can distill all those articles down to a few key points:

Point One, your certifications and education are nice, but tens of thousands of other professionals have the same letters after their name.

Point Two, your experience is valuable, but tens of thousands of other professionals have similar backgrounds.

Point Three, if you want to stand out from the crowd you have to promote yourself, period.

The concept of self-promotion for many professionals and especially IT folks is very daunting. Nearly all maintain that if they get yet another certification then they will be rewarded by a better job. Unfortunately those days are gone. With the impact Great Recession still reverberating in the job market and with the zeal corporate-cost cutters are targeting IT, you need a Plan B.

As a professional you need to remember that ultimately you work for yourself. It matters not if you are a full-time or contract employee. The social contract between employer and employee is severed and no matter how well you perform in the end it will be a dollars and cents decision that will get you terminated. This applies even if you ate lunch at your desk, never took your vacation and worked 80 hours a week.

With that rant out of the way and all these pixels dedicated to the subject, I wanted to provide a quick update on my own path toward establishing my “personal brand”.

I’ve been asked if I have a life…

In recent years I have heavily invested my time in writing or contributing to articles on a variety of pertinent topics. Also, I have appeared in a variety of podcasts and hosted several webinars. If you click over to my Media Mentions and Appearances pages, you can see a comprehensive list of my latest writing and speaking engagements.

I am particularly proud of contributing to two articles that appeared in the Chicago Tribune, one on the topic of endpoint security and the other on the Gawker/ WalGreens data breach. Another article I am proud of appeared in InfoWorld and CIO magazine on the topic of dirty consulting tricks and how to avoid them. There are quite a few more for a total of eleven articles this year to which I have provided content.

On the multimedia side, I have done podcasts for TalkingWork and Medical Practice Trends. Also, I have worked with ExecSense to develop webinars on Risk Management and Mobile Device Security. I have several other webinars planned for the future with ExecSense on the topics of Consulting, Risk Management and Chief Operating Officer (COO) skills.

Of course I have also been writing my own articles that are published here on my blog, The Phoenix Principle or Infosec Island. These articles are then cross-posted on a variety of other websites or used in print publications.

Finally, I continue to submit papers, reply to calls for presentations, comment on industry blogs and network locally and via social media. For the future I am planning on delving into video blogging (vlogging), writing a book(s), additional public speaking and pro bono engagements.

Marcia Yudkin’s Excellent Book on Marketing and Publicity.

All of these efforts are to establish my personal brand and provide a body of work for interested clients to review. For example, I can not only say that I have successfully worked with a clients on disaster recovery and business continuity projects, but I have contributed to three articles on the topic and have provided executive education on the subject. You gain credibility due to the fact that a potential client can review your work immediately, not through a vague third-hand reference over the phone from someone they don’t know or quotation on your website.

Based on the extensive research I have done over the years on marketing, selling and promotional strategies, I have pursued what I and others believe are the most effective techniques. If you need a reference book, the best one I have found so far is Marcia Yudkin’s 6 Steps to Free Publicity. The book is packed with tips on the topics I just mentioned, plus a host of others I have yet to tackle. There are skyscrapers full of marketing books, but Ms. Yudkin breaks it down in a clear and concise format without any hint of condescension or hype.

So there you have it. My quest for self-promotion and developing a personal brand is an on-going enterprise. I have a long, long way to go but I believe I have taken the first steps in the right direction.

Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!

Mike Meikle May 9, 2011 Leave a Comment

Skip the Sexy

I need my iPad to display real-time network data post-haste!

Cloud computing, virtual desktops, online collaboration via social media, slick hardware and hipsters with fauxhawks may look and sound cool. However, like a hot tub outside a single-wide trailer on an overgrown lot, they are all flash with little substance. If your foundational IT infrastructure and practices have been ignored or are termite-ridden then slapping an ultra-cool coat of techno-wizardry on your organization will just add to your problems.

Like any IT pro who has done time in the bowels of an organization’s infrastructure I have seen executives cheer-leading the latest pet rock technology that has been showcased in the trade rags. Yet mission critical IT and business components like disaster recovery, business continuity, asset management, vendor management and standard policies and procedures are either nonexistent or half-baked and have been for years.

So who is at fault? Well, information technology executives are partially to blame. They have not communicated the value of having foundational policies and procedures in place to key decision makers in the organization. That’s their job and they aren’t doing it.

Senior executives are at also to blame. They may have relegated the CIO to the leadership “kid’s table” and that person doesn’t have any say strategy or final decision making. What is the point of having a Chief Information Officer if they have little to no executive authority? IT may not even be a part of the organization’s strategic plan. So IT is inundated with wave upon wave of executive sponsored projects that have never been vetted for Return on Investment (ROI), have a Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) or even seen if needed resources are available. I’ve seriously heard senior leadership say that “company X has this technology so we need to move on this now”. Meanwhile, they have never tested their disaster recovery plan, patch their servers in a timely fashion or have service level agreements with their vendors. [Read more…]

Mike Meikle April 25, 2011 Leave a Comment

Local Interest: Smart Grid in the Old Dominion

A Glimpse of a Smart Grid Future

Life may move at a slower pace here in Richmond as we sip our mint juleps and leisurely discuss the finer points of the local cuisine. However, we are not as behind the times as our northern cousins are lead to believe; with the added benefit of being able to go to and fro without the grinding delays of Northern Virginia traffic.

Honestly, I’ve never had a mint julep but I did have the opportunity to attend a panel on Smart Grids hosted by the Association of Information Technology Professional (AITP) earlier in April; an example of our enlightened technological state.

The panel consisted several local luminaries of the Smart Grid scene, so some brief introductions are in order. Scott Muench of Tridium was on hand. Mr. Muech is a Senior Applications Engineer and Smart Grid Evangelist who has a passion about Smart Homes. Another was Dan Hermes, President and General Manager of Grid 2020. Mr. Hermes’ firm promotes energy management systems from residential and electrical utilities customers. Engagement Director for OPower, Rick Juneja, came to discuss his companies approach to energy efficiency and smart grid software. Dominion’s CIO, Lyn McDermid was in attendance. Dominion is one the of the nation’s leading utilities companies.

There were several themes that were covered by the panel. One was to discuss the rise of Smart Grid technologies and their impact on the consumer. These impacts could take the form of privacy concerns, regulatory mandates, security risks and technological hurdles. Second, what would the increase in Smart Grid adoption mean for Information technology professionals? What skills will be in demand and how to plan to take advantage of this trend? Finally, what will the industry look like in the near term? What technologies will propel Smart Grids toward acceptance by the consumer?

To kick off the discussion, Scott Muench stated that Smart Grids currently aren’t “smart”. The data being collected by smart meters is generally not being fed back to the consumer so they can make informed decisions about their power usage. Another issue pointed out by Lynn McDermid is that the industry is accustomed to having an analog device that is read once a month. Now with smart meters, they are receiving usage data every fifteen minutes. Dominion only has over 100,000 smart meters in place and how that data be stored, interpreted and used is still to be effectively addressed. [Read more…]

Mike Meikle January 28, 2011 Leave a Comment

Dr. House, EHR and Consulting: The Case of the Unpopular Mandate

EHR, HIPAA, HITECH and its Impact on Successful Implementations

At a high level, information technology professionals are like physicians. They recommend new treatments (EHR software) to address conditions (HIPAA). Unfortunately IT pros don’t get paid nearly as well, but at least we both worry about outsourcing to some degree.

The stereotype of the IT professional can also be compared to a doctor, or at least a fictional one, Dr. Gregory House. Sullen, anti-social, with a high regard for his own knowledge, Dr. House avoids all contact with his customers (patients). He only swoops in to provide a solution to a problem (condition) before he retreats once more to his solitude. [Read more…]

Mike Meikle January 21, 2011 Leave a Comment

Consultant’s Angle: The Three P’s of Project Management

As a consultant charged with a project at a new client, you don’t know what is going to clobber you as walk through the door that first day. You may find your project team is exceedingly hostile, you sit three feet from the train tracks and rats will steal your lunch (a true client story). But you can always rely on the fact that any project will encompass these three basic principles, Process, People and Prerequisites. [Read more…]

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