Customer Reviews

Strategic Project Management Made Simple: Practical Tools for Leaders and Teams

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I am the inventor of the Logical Framework tool Terry featured in his book. As a physicist, I saw the need for a more scientific approach to help the USAID (US Agency for International Development) do a better job of planning, implementing, and evaluating their multi-billion dollar project portfolio in developing countries. My team installed this method in USAID missions in 50 countries, and many organizations around the world have adopted it as a way of doing business.

Terry was one of the most creative consultants and trainers in my company Practical Concepts Incorporated: it was my pleasure to mentor him and work together on projects in Bangladesh, Thailand and elsewhere.

Then we lost contact until recently when, voila, he sent his book. I am pleased that it makes available some powerful and practical concepts for leaders at all levels, private and public sector.

Terry has taken my original work to another level, adding strategic questions and other features to make this approach easier to understand and use. This publication adapts the Logical Framework to a mainstream business and technical audience.

My hope is that knowledge workers of all types will recognize the power of this approach and put it to use. STRATEGIC PROJECT MANAGEMENT MADE SIMPLE: PRACTICAL TOOLS FOR LEADERS AND TEAMS can help address the problems and opportunities you face.

Leon J. Rosenberg

Terry takes a novel look at project management and delivers a book that provides a comprehensive approach to applying the principles of project theory across many industries. The importance of addressing projects from a strategic perspective, something most organizations fail to consider, is clearly demonstrated. The author does an excellent job in detailing a proven approach to completing simple and complex projects, along with showing the importance of managing the strategic action cycle and people dynamics. The Logical Framework, Systems Thinking Theory, the Four Critical Questions, and the Cycle-Logical Approach are clearly described and laid out in a manner that executives, functional management, and project managers at all maturity levels can find immediately useful. Terry provides a very structured yet practical and flexible way to improve project portfolio management. If you follow the steps outlined in this text, your ability to align project activities with higher-level goals and objectives will increase substantially. A wealth of tips, tools, resources, and helpful case studies are given throughout the book. If you see the need for a more structured project management approach, one that will reflect the mission of your organization, department, or personal life, then this book needs to be one of your most often referenced resources.

Terry presents a tool and a way of thinking that is widely adaptable to the planning and execution needs of the organization, regardless of where you are on the Org-Chart. Terry demonstrates how to clearly walk through the logical connections that tie the highest level strategic objective to the lowest level activity; an essential exercise to effectively and efficiently deploy ever scarce resources. Perhaps most importantly, Terry's model provides a common platform, a foundation, for organizational leadership and staff to understand how their work contributes to the organization's success, and aligning their efforts toward those ends.

In sea of jargon and ad hoc tools, Terry presents a simple, natural, way of tying it all together. Regardless if you or your organization are just starting down the road of strategic management, or you have a well-established process in place for making strategic decisions, Terry's book provides insight; identifies the right questions to ask; and gives a framework for organizing and prioritizing the steps for your success.

Have you ever been part of a project that seemed to be an empty exercise in chart maintenance? Terry Schmidt shows you how to avoid that pitfall by designing your project to provide real strategic value to your company. He also provides excellent tools you can use on every project to make sure that its work is meaningful, that your logical design for the project is sound and that you have organized its work in purposeful chunks. Since project management depends on people, Schmidt shows you how to involve your colleagues, team members and stakeholders. He organizes his chapters for clarity and ends them with summaries of the main points. He provides the forms you need, and explains how to adapt and use them. Schmidt illustrates his principles with real-world examples drawn from his long experience consulting with companies and governments. He even throws in some nice humor and a few quite funny cartoons. getAbstract recommends this helpful, thoughtful look at project management. Schmidt goes beyond explaining the right techniques to focus on doing projects in a way that provides strategic value.

As a systems engineer, I found Terry Schmidt's application of a systems thinking approach to project management to make excellent sense. I've uncovered important insights about my projects while applying the strategic planning processes described in this book. Highly recommended!

As a leader, I'm constantly having to initiate projects of all scales, both in my professional work and in the nonprofit work that I do.

Regardless of your education and career level, this book will break down project management into bite sized pieces so you can you plan and build your project one piece at a time. Terry Schmidt first breaks things down to four initial questions you MUST ask yourself before you move any further on planning. Then, with his Logical Framework, he enables you to 'see' the project. This is vitally important because it's an unbelievably simple way to allow others to 'see' your project, rather than having them guess what's in your head.

I finished this book on the plane... in a 13 hour trip there, and 11 hour trip back. Don't forget to take two highlighters. And get started on your next project immediately! And if you think about it, life is just made up of a bunch of projects. From walking to your car to producing a film, there's input, outcomes, purpose, and goals involved in each one.

Good luck!

Terry has created a very well written collection of material, examples and templates that any organization can put to work to improve their situation. So much is written these days about strategy, strategic planning and scorecards that miss the point of engagement at the project level. Not so with this book. Terry has provided a solid basis for action in this book by combining interesting stories, examples, charts, graphs and tables that illustrate his concepts well and make them useful to many levels of reader.

See also Executing Your Strategy: How to Break It Down and Get It Done

The Strategic Project Management Made Simple book by Terry Schmidt is a very orchestrated cadre of practical tools that help you to understand and to apply strategic thinking in planning, developing and executing a job, which could be a very simple task, such as to organize a family trip to San Diego Zoo; or a very laborious project to design and build the most fuel-efficient and environment-friendly large-body aircraft in the world.

As you go through the chapters, the book enriches you with the foundation of effective planning and then walks you through how to transform this knowledge into actions; moreover, each single passage of every single chapter brings us real life examples and tangible applications.

A strong characteristic of this book is that it guides you how to create performance measures to evaluate successes and to stay on course, and at same time keeping your work aligned with your organization vision.

The important values are presented in different ways for sake of clarity, making them naturally incorporated in your day to day work. This is a very important aspect, as key points are easily understood and assimilated by a non-experienced project manager up to the most knowledgeable one.

I have had the privilege to attend Terry's classes at California University of Los Angeles and after experiencing his teaching, it became clear to me that such a great book had to match his worldly experience.

As the Assistant Division Manager of IT infrastructure Division I'll find plenty of ways to apply these practical and powerful tools.

Homero Bosso

This book is an essential account of an excellent tool for strategic planning. The wide variety of example cases Terry uses throughout make certain the reader can understand how it is applicable for their usage. The only (and very minor) caveat I have is that one should know how to manage a project before using this system to do so, as the book portrays a higher level view than what a general project management text might.

As the author of a very successful book on project management, The Fast Forward MBA in Project Management , I really appreciate Terry Schmidt's book. Project management is a well-developed discipline, yet in this book, Terry shows us an incredibly valuable tool that has proved its worth around the world, yet is virtually unknown in corporate America.
The Logical Framework approach connects the STRATEGIC RESULTS of a project to the nuts and bolts of execution. This is the most important issue in project management today.
We've all gotten a lot better at planning and execution, but we fall short when the entire team is not laser focused on achieving the strategic project results.
In addition, Terry writes well, provides excellent examples, and has even more resources on his website.
I'd recommend this book to every project sponsor and project manager.