Author: Philip Springuel, PMP

Dear members, volunteers and friends,

Your May 2022 Newsletter is here!  In Agniezska Skalska’s Message from the Board (uniquely delivered this month by video!), we’re motivated to focus on innovation. We’re reminded that our Swiss Chapter has much to offer in its role as an influencer to shape the project management experience of its members and beyond. Watch her video message, engage with our social media and join us for a growing number of events, both in person and online.

We’re pleased this month to welcome Marc Lahmann, Partner and Leader Transformation Assurance, PwC, who describes what you can expect at the June 9 event in Basel “Can agile enable a full scope transformation approach and realise expected benefits more successfully?” Similarly, we propose another teaser to encourage you to join an upcoming event: “Design Thinking toolbox for project managers.” Other articles this month bring you highlights of past events related to tailoring projects; using data to drive decision-making; and leading a dynamic people centered transformation. As we propose each month, take a moment to discover profiles of new Swiss Chapter members. 

We hope you will be motivated to participate, learn, grow and share with your peers, and perhaps even become a volunteer at PMI Switzerland.

Philip SPRINGUEL, PMI Switzerland Newsletter Copy Editor

Author: Marc Lahmann

Partner and Leader Transformation Assurance, PwC

Nowadays everyone is talking about agile and its great potential for quickly delivering value to organisations and customers. Anyone following this discussion might get the impression that agile is a silver bullet. While some organisations have demonstrated success in agile project or programme delivery, others have been seriously struggling to quickly deliver the expected benefits – or to deliver anything at all. Why is that?

Have these organisations suffered a lack of agile education and experience or made inappropriate use of agile methods and tools; did they encounter resistance to cultural change, or was there just a lack of discipline? Was it maybe a combination of all these factors? In our presentation we will answer these questions and more:

1. Why agile projects, and especially large-scale agile programmes, often struggle, and
2. How the challenges and risks of agile delivery can be overcome to ensure smooth and continuous delivery of value and realize the expected benefits.

Structure of the presentation

• Agile delivery – the pervasive solution for maximising transformation benefits? 
• Scaling agile in order to comprehensively realize business objectives 
• Embedding agile in a full scope transformation approach
• When to act – common risk areas and early warning indicators 
• Our point of view

Link to the full article: https://pmi-switzerland.ch/index.php/files/41/Public-Files/37/can-agile-enable-a-full-scope-transformation-approach.pdf

Blog link:

https://www.pwc.ch/en/insights/risk/can-agile-enable-a-full-scope-transformation-approach-and-realise-expected-benefits-more-successfully.html

Author: Johana ten Hove, PMP

Enhancing your Project Management skills by boosting ideation and collaboration

Do you feel like you're juggling competing expectations, priorities, and people?

Join the interactive session to learn and experiment in Design Thinking, and which simple tools can support you with delivering a project where your stakeholders feel engaged from start to end. The session is designed to teach you about the principles of human-centric problem finding and iterative solution creation. Sign up and walk away with concrete tips and tricks to bring back to your project work (both online and on-site)!

This will be the agenda for the day:

• Introduction to Design Thinking principles
• The 4 Key questions: Why, When, What, and How to use Design Thinking while managing and delivering your projects
• Design Thinking in action: Let’s get practical and use some methods to experience and understand the benefits of Design Thinking
• Experience Sharing and Key take aways
• Apéro and networking time

Are you wondering if the topic is for you? 

Here are some additional insights that might help:

Design thinking methods originated from observing the way designers go about understanding their client's needs and creating products they truly love. As project managers, we deliver solutions and innovation to our clients or stakeholders hoping they value the results as much as the project team who designed them.

How do we make sure we understand needs and create something truly valuable?

There are many design thinking principles, methods and tools that can enhance your project delivery - be it classic or agile. Here are a few of the topics which will be covered by your speakers and facilitators both from theory and practice perspectives:

🡪 Breaking the ice and connecting

• Facilitating open conversations about project objectives, scope and outcomes
• Amplifying voices and sharing ideas in a safe space
• Diffusing tension or disagreements

🡪 Improving Transparency and Alignment:

• Reaching alignment and prioritization across stakeholders
• Democratic and simple decision making
• Running great project meetings and retrospectives

🡪 Problem finding and target framing:

• Observing beyond the obvious
• Identifying and agreeing on the right problems and objectives
• Understanding the needs and goals of clients and stakeholders

🡪 Ideation and iterative solution generation:

• Creative thinking and prototyping
• User testing
• Evaluation and improvements

The team of certified facilitators is looking forward to taking you on a Design Thinking journey around human-centered methods and, after the event, there will be an apéro and the opportunity to network with other Design Thinkers to share your perspectives. 

Join us on May 17th!

Author: Eric Jelenje, PMP

In the March 2022 newsletter, we read how the launch of the PMBOK7 has heralded a revised approach to project management as a discipline, particularly in emphasizing the indispensability of “Tailoring” to projects and directing practitioners towards value delivery as the ultimate yardstick of project success.

These issues were at the heart of the conversation during the Chapter’s recent live event, “How to Tailor Your Project Based on PMBOK7 (An Opening to Hybridization)” held on April 7th, 2022 at the Hotel Montbrillant in Geneva.

Setting the backdrop for the discussions with his keynote presentation, hybridization expert Stéphane Derouin introduced PMBOK7’s “new vision”, a perspective driven by the view that projects, programmes and portfolios are part of an organisation’s ecosystem and their importance goes beyond the deliverables they initially create.

Referencing the shift in content to the Project Management Principles and Project Performance Domains, Stéphane directed the audience to the night’s primary theme of Tailoring. 

The presentation extended to defining and justifying tailoring, outlining the tailoring process, and the Waterfall, Agile and Hybrid approaches as the primary Tailoring options.

Using examples from past consulting assignments, Stéphane demonstrated how organisations use decision matrices to make tailoring choices; this helps bring clarity to an otherwise deep and quite complex process. 

The key takeaways of the night?

In a world filled with uncertainty, ambiguity, complexity, volatility and risk, Tailoring can provide the flexibility and agility organisations need to consistently deliver value through projects. 

Tailoring requires competent project leaders adept at both agile and waterfall methodologies, thus requiring priority within organizational learning and development planning. 

Concluding the discussions with a Q+A session, participants were then treated to a networking apéro. This was the perfect conclusion to what was a wonderful evening of food, drinks and memorable conversations.

If you are interested in any of PMI Switzerland Chapter events, please access the events listing page on the Chapter website and register for the event of your choice.