Project Management 101

Getting started with Microsoft Project... Lesson 1: nothing works really like it should. Lesson 2: there must be a reason for this.

I was offered an interesting opportunity at work where I get to maintain the Gantt chart for one of our releases (track resources, update deadlines, and so on). My boss knows that I am interested in project management and assigned me small PM tasks so I could get acquainted with some of the duties within a project. This is very exciting, but at the same time, quite frustrating. I'm learning Microsoft Project which, in itself, is not complicated. It's just complicated when you want it to do something it was not designed to do. Knowing your tools is all about understanding their limitations. I learned that early on for Word.

Also cool is the exercise of writing a business case that my coworker and I are going through to request funds for a pilot content management project. Effective business writing is not necessarily a given, and again our boss is coaching us through the process. This is an amazing way to gain experience. It's also good for my MBA courses, as I am discovering that teachers are interesting in having us develop convincing answers, supported by data. It's easy to push a conclusion without backing it up.