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Robert McMurray has a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois and has worked in information technology strategy and management for a variety of companies such as Learning Curve International, AM&G, Vought Corporation, and EDS. Most recently, he was the CIO of Learning Curve, a toy development, manufacturing and distribution company. During his tenure, he managed over 1500 new development projects including an ERP implementation. While at Learning Curve, Bob developed and honed many of the methodologies built into 3 Olive Solutions, LLC, software.
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Steve Chamberlin has a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois and an MBA from the University of Chicago, Graduate School of Business. Steve has held a variety of management positions in the commercial software development operations of companies such as Clubessential, Inc., SAP America, IBM and McDonnell Douglas. Most recently, Steve was the President of ClubSource, a company that marketed and sold membership service solutions to the private club and leisure industry. Prior to that, Steve was the VP of Marketing and Sales for Clubessential, a commercial application development company that marketed a variety of hosted solutions. Steve is a cofounder of 3 Olive Solutions, LLC.
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Introduction
Despite most of the industry hype and notoriety surrounding failed projects over the last 10-15 years, getting a project completed is not where the real project portfolio management challenge lies. Armies of professionals are dedicating their every waking hour to executing tasks with their eyes fixed on the completion of the whole. Rather, experienced executives and managers know that the most difficult obstacles to overcome are choosing the right projects in the first place and getting them started while positioning them for success.
Successful leaders know that their key driving force should be bringing more value to their organizations. They make it their focus to understand the value their departments deliver and make decisions with the objective of increasing this value. Successful leaders also realize time is a precious commodity and it should not be wasted on administrative tasks that do not add value. In the end, they integrate making value-based decisions into all aspects of their portfolio management activities including project prioritization, understanding resource availability and creating project schedules.
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