This month's CBR is the second half of our close look at project management. In the February issue (Part I), we focused on the "hard" factors that play into project success or failure (methods, tools, etc.). Now in Part II, we turn to the intangible, elusive, and extremely important "soft" factors. Leadership and interpersonal communication skills, levels of morale and training, and that ultimate intangible -- trust -- are usually presumed to matter greatly in managing projects.
March 2004
March 2004
Vol. 17, No. 3, March 2004 In this issue:- Cutter IT Journal: March 2004: Killing IT Projects: Part II
- Opening Statement
- Failing Successfully
- Terminating Failing IT Projects: An IT Portfolio Management Approach
- "Is Your Project Cheating on You?": The Project Probability of Success Indicator
- When Dr. Kevorkian Makes a House Call
- Doomed from the Start: What Everyone but Senior Management Seems to Know
February 2004
Vol. 17, No. 2, February 2004
Printer Friendly PDF versionUsability = Methods You can't achieve usable software without good methods. User-centered methods include personas, model-driven prototyping, and usability testing.
In this issue:- Cutter IT Journal: Software Usability, Part II: What, How, and Who
- Balancing the 5Es of Usability
- Balancing the 5Es of Usability
- Are You Making the Product Right or Making the Right Product?
- Beyond User-Centered Design and User Experience: Designing for User Performance
- Organizing for Usability
- What Makes a Good Usability Engineer?
February 2004
This month, CBR begins a two-part series on a subject of great importance in IT management: the management of projects. This month, we'll focus on methods, models, and practices -- the "hard" stuff. Next month, we'll turn to the "soft" stuff -- staffing, morale, team management, and relationship management. If you are a longtime reader of CBR , you'll recall that we dealt with project management two years ago, and you'll recognize Cutter Consortium Fellow Robert Charette's "husbandry" approach to the subject.
In this issue:- Project Management: Part I -- Methods, Models, and Practices
- Project Management Husbandry Redux: Part I
- Project Management Husbandry Redux: Part II
- Ten Cheap Actions to Improve Your IT Performance
- Improving ROI by Valuing Features
- Radical Requirements
- February 2004 Cutter Benchmark Review: Coaching and Team Building
January 2004
What managers really need to know -- as always -- is how to separate fads and transitory tendencies from the real and permanent changes. This month's CBR examines the question through the lens of IT spending. Cutter Consortium Senior Consultant George Westerman offers careful analysis of the results of a survey of intended 2004 IT spending patterns among 97 firms. He finds that, overall, IT spending will be flat in 2004. But he does more than report facts.
In this issue:- Trends in Corporate IT Spending: A Permanent Change Or a Pause to Digest?
- Corporate IT Spending Outlook for 2004 -- Part I
- Corporate IT Spending Outlook for 2004 -- Part II: Cutting Costs, Boosting Service Top 2004 IT Budget Plans
- Corporate IT Spending Outlook for 2004 -- Part III: Where Companies Are Putting Their Money
- Maximizing the Effectiveness of IT
- IT Must Focus On Business Value, Not IT Cost Cutting