Customer Reviews

Building Project-Management Centers of Excellence (With CD-ROM)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I was optimistic given everyone's positive comments and since I am, myself, in the process of designing a project management center of excellence, I took a risk and bought it. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find it at my local bookstore to flip through it first and now I know why, nobody would buy it if they could see it first. The material is appropriate only at the most basic level of project management capabilities. If you've been at it for only a year or two, you might find it helpful, but if you are truly implementing one (as the title claims), you better already know all this stuff and a whole lot more. I wasted my money, don't waste yours. This is my first review and I don't usually write them but this purchase disappointed me.

In my opinion Dennis did a great job with this book:
- he proved along he knows all the Project Management (PM) aspects from real life
- on CD, and in the book also, there are a lot of good templates, easy to adjust for other purposes. As he said in introductory part of the CD, they are "some basic tools and templates"
- the steps he figured out are perfect for the ones looking for a way to create Project Management Office (PMO)

If you are:
- a begginer worker in PM, or PMO, I can say this book is enough to give you an idea what to look for, what to do and what to learn in future to improve you skills
- an intermediate Project Manager, this book is great to consolidate your past expertise and to open new dimensions which helps you look into the future, plan your work in a professional way, double check your ideas/thoughts
- an expert Project Manager, do not expect this book will answer all you unanswered questions; it is an opinion, a very good one, tailored in such a way to be valid for a wide range of readers, with different expertise levels from various industries. The book is a good refference, information source and actionable tool.
Thank you Dennis.

Our company was able to use the forms in the back of the book immediately to improve processes. The author did an excellent job of explaining the concepts an organization must follow to be successful. I was happy to learn the author was affiliated with the Project Management Body of Knowledge and the PMI organization which are standards our company strives to follow. Nice job Mr. Bolles.

I hate to say it, but I found this book to be terrible. It has a lot of "practical guidance" but it largely ignores focusing on the tactical and strategic aspects of a project management COE. I was looking for something that was more than a simple "nuts and bolts" guide. Simple nuts and bolts don't help to get business plans approved... My advice, pass over this one and find something that focuses at a high level as well as in the details.

In using the book "Building Project Management Centers of Excellence" I found an extremely valuable resource to use as a proven roadmap to creating a Project or Program Management Office. The book showed a strategy to establish a PMO, challenges that can come up as well as how to deal with them and expectations associated with the creation of a PMO. Also valuable were the CD of templates in the book. This book was used as a reference to help implement a PMO at an $8B US branch of the government. As challenging as a large rollout can be, this book helped with explaining what to do, when to do it and what to expect. A must have for anyone building or managing a PMO.


Tony Johnson, MBA, PMP
President
Crosswind Project Management Training
Author of the PMP® Exam Success Series of Products

Mr. Bolles' years of experience in, and deep topical knowledge of, PM techniques is very evident from the start. It is complete with many sample PM templates and also contains a CD chocked full of relevant and useful documents and templates. A must read for the PM professional!!

As Chief Project Leader for a major bank, I struggled with finding a "cookbook" for setting up a Project Management Center of Excellence over one year ago. Fortunately, Dennis Bolles has written that cookbook so others will have a model to follow. This is an excellent guide for a step-by-step setup with pre-constructed templates in a helpful CD that comes with the book. I highly recommend buying and using this book for creating line of business and enterprise Centers of Excellence.

Over the last few years, the strategic management of corporate projects has been widely written about as a crucial requirement for current and future business success. Limited resources, lack of integration and sub-optimization must be abandoned for a more pragmatic, structured approach to leveraging a multitude of corporate, divisional and departmental projects which often cover research & development, capital expansion, new products/product lines and extensive process improvements. An executive or manager considering any "enterprise-level" project management effort within their company should carefully review Section One of Building PMCOE before undertaking or progressing. Dennis Bolles provides insight on why the strategic PM efforts (via a Center of Excellence) need to be established as a "unique business function" within an organization, rather than being an add-on to an existing function or department. Dennis Bolles provides a consultative approach with appropriate tools to support enterprise-wide project management efforts. This is not, however, a "one-size fits all" solution. The author "describes" key elements and processes needed for success, rather than prescribes them. Although the descriptions are fairly detailed, using the information provided in the book presumes a working knowledge/experience of project management to fully appreciate the important, but loosely integrated points.This book literally has something for everyone in the arena of project management offices:
·Strategic perspective and insight for top managers and executives to ponder,
·Practical tools and techniques to support a sound methodology, and
·Many useful examples to tailor for your organization's needs!

The content of the book are good, practical and I plan to use it in setting up a PMO in my workplace.

Howevere, the book did not come with CD, Amazon shipped it again, without CD. Called up the publisher and was informed it was production issue. They are fixing it and will come up with an alternative arrangement in a short period.

Amazon needs to reflect this on their site. For those buying the book you might have to wait for the CD.

I found the book to have great value to organizations that are serious about successfully implementing project management within their organization. This book not only contains the blueprint for Project Management Centers of Excellence by effectively communicating theory and concepts, but also provides practical tools and templates. The framework of the methodology is flexible to assist organizations at any level of project management maturity. I would consider this publication to be an important part of any organization's management library.