Managing Projects with SharePoint (Recorded Webcasts)

Date Held: August 5th 2010
Presenter: James Ewing, President, Enterprise Leadership Consultants

For the last few years, the City of McKinney’s IT department worked diligently on concurrent IT projects. However, while the IT department was working hard at meeting the needs of their departments (their customers), they were falling prey to a common misperception throughout so many organizations, “IT isn’t doing what I need for my department.”   They decided to commission James Ewing (from Enterprise Leadership Consulting) to examine their project management processes.  James recommended implementing a SharePoint for Project Management Solution and customizing it to meet their specific needs.

“We now have deep insight into resource utilization, project cost and overrun, and accurately predict (and show to the City Manager) when we're tasked with more than we can handle, when projects can be added to the pipeline, as well as predict an actual finish date.  This implementation has greatly improved our ability to communicate project dependencies across departments and has even contributed to a positive change in our corporate culture.” 

This webcast will cover:

• Challenge
• Management Solution
• Cultural Shift
• Technology Solution
• Outcome

There will also be a 13 page whitepaper for all attendees.

Date Held: 27th July 2010

Last September, BrightWork showed an early beta of pmPoint managing work and projects of different types and sizes on the SharePoint 2010 platform integrating with Project 2010.  Now the wait is finally over…the pmPoint for SharePoint 2010 TrialZone Sandbox has launched!  This short webcast will demonstrate pmPoint working on SharePoint 2010 and will also demonstrate the optional integration with Microsoft Project 2010.   

This webcast will be very informative and beneficial to anyone who wants to know more about what SharePoint 2010, Microsoft 2010 and BrightWork pmPoint have to offer for work and project management.

Date Held: 15th July 2010

Some people take to project management likes ducks to water. They may or may not have had formal training (for example, PMI’s PMBOK or PRINCE2) but these lucky souls instinctively know how to setup, manage and close projects to success. The rest of us mere mortals are often not so lucky. Many of us are PMBAs (project managers by accident) thrown in at the deep end with little or no training.

At BrightWork we believe we can assist such project managers with a step-by-step, how-to guide. The intention is to deliver an easy to follow and simple to use guide for Project Managers who are not yet formally trained in Collaborative Project Management and who may not yet have the time or budget to get trained.

The guide describes the typical stages, steps and sub-steps involved in starting, setting up, managing and closing a typical project. The guide also has a section on Project Management Leadership style.

Note, whilst experienced project managers may find the guide to be introductory in nature, they may learn something from it and might find it an especially useful starting point for creating internal training for their new project managers.

Please register and get access to:

• The Guide – downloadable as a document and a set of slides
• A webcast recording – explaining the guide
• A set of links to provide feedback and participate in a conversation on the guide

Date Held: 24th June 2010

The next generation of Microsoft’s SharePoint Server and Project Desktop are now available and many of the features required for managing work and projects of varying degrees of complexity, structure and process can now be found out-of-the-box – unlike previous generations.

In September 2009 we showed an early beta of pmPoint working on SharePoint 2010 that integrated with Project 2010. In a few weeks, we will unveil a version for SharePoint 2010.  The 2010 release of pmPoint will use the new Microsoft Project 2010 synchronize-to-Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 feature.  pmPoint customers will now be able to fully synchronize Project 2010 tasks into pmPoint project sites in SharePoint 2010.  These Microsoft Project tasks will be fully available in all pmPoint reports on the single project and cross project dashboards.

Join Éamonn McGuinness of BrightWork, as he walks through the new features of pmPoint for SharePoint 2010, which when deployed will lead to exceptional project and portfolio management throughout any organization.

Date Held: 15th June 2010

A Prescription for Success!

Healthcare organizations at every level are facing greater demands for demonstrable improvements in the quality, safety and efficiency of patient care. To meet these challenges, many healthcare organizations are striving to improve how they manage their enterprise project portfolio in a consistent way and in accordance with best practices. Maintaining success requires finding a platform that is easy to use and provides project and portfolio management capabilities. 

Join presenters Chris Bryan of Group Health Cooperative and John Gootee of Aspect and Éamonn McGuinness of BrightWork, as they walk through a 4 stage project management implementation plan utilizing SharePoint, which when deployed will lead to exceptional performance for Healthcare organizations.

Stage 1:   Fast Start.  Move those Excel files into SharePoint dashboards.
Stage 2:   Implement a strategy for managing different types of single projects under one or more project offices.
Stage 3:   Apply a pragmatic approach for new project request/portfolio management.
Stage 4:   Ensure critical non-project work is managed and under control.

This webinar will present customizable templates for each stage that enable a fast start to project and portfolio management on the SharePoint platform.

Date Held: 19th & 20th May

What to Use When for Work and Project Management?

The next generation of Microsoft’s SharePoint Server, Project Desktop and Project Server are to be launched tomorrow, May 12th  and many of the features required for managing work and projects of varying degrees of complexity, structure and process can now be found out-of-the-box – unlike previous generations.  With so much on offer, it begs the question: How do project teams decide what Microsoft product or mix of products to use and when? 

This webcast will answer this question and present the scenarios and criteria that make it easy for project teams to make the right choice at the right time.

Date Held: 5th & 6th May

Rome wasn’t built in a day and ‘best in class’ project management cannot be implemented in a day either!  Join this webcast and walk through a 3 stage project management implementation plan, which when deployed will lead to exceptional performance.

1. Get your projects and project office strategy implemented
2. Get your non-project work under control and included
3. Implement new project request review and approval / portfolio management

This session will also present customizable templates for each stage that enable a fast start to best in class project management on the SharePoint platform.

Date Held: 21st & 22nd April

The Future is NOW!

The launch of the next generation of Microsoft's SharePoint Server is scheduled for May 12th and many of the features that can benefit project teams directly and indirectly have been redesigned and improved.  With SharePoint Server 2010, several of the necessities required for basic project management can now be had out-of-the-box.

This webcast takes a close look at these features and the upcoming SharePoint to Microsoft Project integration.  With SharePoint being the collaborative application development platform of choice for many, this session also looks at how these new features can be extended to provide an even more robust project and portfolio management solution.

Finally, this webcast also presents a simple management model that can help organizations gradually introduce a project and portfolio management application using SharePoint that is practical yet implementable.

Date Held: 7th & 8th April

The Practical Approach to Real Life Project Management

This webcast will demonstrate how SharePoint has been customized and extended with 5 templates for managing different project types and also for managing across many projects – providing a fast yet practical starting point for real life project management.  Attendees at this webcast will receive a copy of the session recording afterwards and access to an online sandbox to take the project management templates for a test drive!

“We are amazed at how easy it is to customize SharePoint for Project Management using pmPoint. Templates can be customized and extended to give the necessary flexible structure and the required reporting for work, project and cross-project management. pmPoint is the best solution around for Practical Work and Project Management! ”  Baker Hostetler

Date Held: 25th March

The launch of the next generation of Microsoft’s SharePoint Server is now scheduled for May 12th and many of the features that can benefit project teams directly and indirectly have been redesigned and improved. With SharePoint Server 2010, many of the necessities required for basic project management can now be had out-of-the-box, unlike previous generations.  With SharePoint being the collaborative application development platform of choice for many, we will also take some time to look at how these new features can then be extended to provide an even more robust project and portfolio management solution.

With this web seminar we would like to demonstrate many of SharePoint's project management capabilities and improvements, including:

• A review of SharePoint's basic feature set, including: sites, lists, libraries, and web parts
• Explore SharePoint's newly overhauled user interface
• Working offline with project data
• Working with external project data
• the new and exciting social aspects of SharePoint
• Integrating Microsoft Project 2010 and SharePoint sites
• Extending SharePoint 2010's out-of-the-box feature set
  And more…

Date Held: 9th March

Most of us will agree that a software application is essential to support the successful implementation of project management.  Anyone involved in the execution of real world projects knows that they differ in size, type, and complexity – ranging from the loosely structured to semi-structured to extremely structured projects.  These varying projects require varying degrees of process and collaboration.

This webcast is a must for those of us – the mere mortals – that are involved with the execution of work and projects – large, medium or small - regardless of industry or product.

“Reality dictates that one size does not fit all - that work and projects need and get differing amounts of process, structure and management – even in the same organization. pmPoint has helped us with our level of process, structure and management, especially with individual work items and projects.”  Benesys, Inc.

Date Held: 23rd February

This 30 minute webcast will demonstrate a SharePoint based solution that addresses the most common challenges faced by healthcare organizations in managing project portfolios: managing resource allocation, ensuring sufficient transparency to track project progress on a timely basis, and knowing where to find additional detail on specific projects.

Join Lynda Powers of Wentworth-Douglass Hospital, Andrew Spoffard of EMC, and Eamonn McGuinness of BrightWork as they walk you through the challenges, a solution and a real-life demo showing how SharePoint with pmPoint can extend and empower your project portfolio management with a customizable, easy to deploy application.

Presenters:

• Lynda Powers, Director of Information Systems, Wentworth-Douglass Hospital
• Andrew Spofford, Client Solutions Director, EMC Consulting
• Eamonn McGuinness, CEO, BrightWork

Date Held: 17th February

This webcast will present and demonstrate how SharePoint and pmPoint can be deployed to create and manage multiple portfolios of projects through customizable project portfolio templates and cross project reporting. Attendees at this session will receive access to an online Sandbox where they can test drive new SharePoint based Project Office Portfolio Templates using pmPoint from BrightWork.

"BrightWork provided us with an economical, scalable solution for managing our project portfolio. We now have better standards for collecting project data and a intuitive tool that makes the work visible and accessible."  GroupHealth

Date Held: 3rd & 11th February

One size does not fit all when it comes to project management.  Even in the same organization work and projects need and get differing amounts of process, structure and management. 

This webcast will show how SharePoint using pmPoint can be customized and extended with templates that give the flexible structure and reporting required for work, project and cross-project management.

“pmPoint delivers customizable SharePoint templates for managing different project types and also for managing across many projects. This gave us a very fast yet flexible starting point.”  Northamptonshire County Council"

Date Held: January 14th & 27th, 2010

Learn how you can build your first project office on SharePoint using pmPoint in just 30 minutes! See how you will be able to quickly create and assign work items, generate reports and complete the typical tasks associated with managing a project office on the SharePoint platform.

“The excitement and energy from our users has confirmed that we made the best choice in purchasing BrightWork pmPoint.” University of Chicago

Date Held: January 13th, 2010

One of the world’s oldest and largest insurers, Allianz Insurance plc runs a number of distinct IT programs dedicated to providing the highest level of customer care and service. Allianz needed a comprehensive project management tool to keep these programs on track. Allianz also needed detailed Risk, Issue and Task Reporting across all Projects within these programs.

Tasked with finding an affordable, adoptable, and highly customizable solution, Chris McNicholas and his team turned to SharePoint and pmPoint.  Join Chris on January 13th to see a demonstration of the SharePoint based solution deployed in the IT department of Allianz Insurance to manage their dynamic project portfolio.

Attendees at this webcast will receive a copy of the webcast recording and access to an online Sandbox to take this solution for a test drive!

Date Held: December 9th, 2009

Join this live webcast and learn how you can build your first project office on SharePoint using pmPoint in just 30 minutes! See how you will be able to quickly create and assign work items, generate reports and complete the typical tasks associated with managing a project office on the SharePoint platform.

Attend this webcast and you will receive a free training guide and access to an online sandbox where you can roll up your sleeves and do it yourself.  You will also receive a copy of the webcast recording and associated slide deck. (The project office being built will make use of base SharePoint and some of the BrightWork extensions for work and project management.)

“BrightWork pmPoint is hands down the best integrated Project Management product for SharePoint." Parker Drilling Company

Date Held: November 18th & 19th, 2009

Presenters: Andrea Waxler, Allscripts and Éamonn McGuinness, BrightWork

Projects successfully move forward when all stakeholders have visibility to tasks, deliverables and risks. However, the healthcare industry in the USA is the “last bastion” of non-electronic means of accomplishing work!

Allscripts are focused on delivering innovative, effective, easy-to-use solutions to stakeholders across the continuum of care. They decided to implement a project management solution to help manage a high volume of their projects concurrently. This user-friendly solution saved the organization time, money and increased customer, employee and management satisfaction.

The presenters in this webcast will show how SharePoint can be used to create a simple yet highly effective way of conducting project management in a customer-facing, collaborative environment.

Date Held: November 12th, 2009

pmPoint Version 8.0 is released! Ideal for work and projects of varying structure and types, version 8.0 is highlighted by significant enhancements to its Gantt reporting, a new end user report editing capability, additional work and project management templates, enhanced scheduling, improved Microsoft Project integration and considerable productivity improvements.

Current pmPoint customers have been test driving version 8.0 and sharing their feedback.

Chris McNicholas, Senior PMO Analyst at Allianz Insurance comments, "The ability to customize the Gantt chart in pmPoint version 8.0 is a real bonus and combined with the new report editor makes this a great choice as a Portfolio Management tool."

Date Held: October 28th, 2009

For three years now the Microsoft SharePoint team in Redmond have been developing new and very exciting functionality for the SharePoint platform.  SharePoint 2010 will essentially be the fourth major version of the platform since the first version shipped in 2001.  SharePoint Server is the fastest growing server product Microsoft has ever developed, with over $1Bn in revenue and over 100 million users and growing! 

What are the coolest new capabilities?  What are the most exciting developments? What are the biggest changes? What does this all mean for your SharePoint plans? What will the new 2010 platform enable you to do with ease that you can not do today? 

Come to this webcast and find out the answers to these and more questions.

Date Held: October 14th, 2009

Featuring Customer Case Studies from BeneSys, Inc. and Baker Hostetler.

The Practical Approach to Work and Project Management!

Reality dictates that one size does not fit all - that work and projects need and get differing amounts of process, structure and management – even in the same organization.  The level of process, structure and management required depends on the organization’s maturity and on the particular needs of the individual work items and projects.  The presenters in this webcast will show how SharePoint can be customized and extended with templates that give the necessary flexible structure and the required reporting for work, project and cross-project management.

Presenters:
Steve Kokotovich, BeneSys, Inc.
Doug Ewing, Baker Hostetler
Eamonn McGuinness, BrightWork, Inc.

Date Held: September 22nd, 2009

The Microsoft Project teams have been busy developing new and very exciting versions of their flagship products, Project Desktop 2010 and Project Server 2010. Some of the pre-announced key investment areas include: (i) Enhance user experience and appeal; (ii) Improve execution with effective collaboration; (iii) Unify project and portfolio management; (iv) Simplify deployment and extend interoperability. 

But what does all that mean in practice?! What are the coolest new capabilities?  What are the most exciting developments? What are the biggest changes? What does this all mean for your work and project management plans? What will the new 2010 platform enable you to do with ease that you can not do today? 

Watch this webcast and find out the answers to these and more questions!

Date Held: September 10th, 2009

It is clear that SharePoint as a platform is really suitable for the collaborative management of work and projects – but there are some challenges!

• How do you balance the conflicting needs for structure and flexibility? 
• How can a solution be architected to meet the differing needs of work and project management in one overall solution? 
• How can the resulting solution be deployed successfully, so people adapt to new practices? 

This webcast will:

• Detail a six-phase plan that will help you to architect and deploy a SharePoint solution from the ground up for work and project management.
• Provide you with good practice guidelines.
• Give you links to further materials for each phase.

Watch this webcast and find out how your organization can architect and deploy a SharePoint solution for work and project management. 

Date Held: September 2nd, 2009

Today most every healthcare organization strives to execute a portfolio of initiatives that address strategic objectives, compliance needs and continuous improvement in every part of the organization.  This 30 minute seminar will present solutions to address three of the challenges reported most commonly by healthcare organizations in managing project portfolios: managing resource allocation, ensuring sufficient transparency to track project progress on a timely basis and knowing where additional detail on specific projects. 

Join PMO experts Douglas Coutts and Jerry Tonkovich from OTB Solutions as they walk you through real-life scenarios showing how BrightWork pmPoint with SharePoint can extend and enhance the depth and breadth of your existing project management methods with customizable, easy to deploy tools and processes.

Date Held: September 19th, 2009

This webcast will present and demonstrate new SharePoint based templates for work and projects management that include templates for Work Tracking, Small Projects’ Management, Project Requests Approval, Scrum Project Management and much more!

Join BrightWork and see how these new out-of-the-box templates provide a very fast yet flexible starting point for managing different project types of all sizes on the SharePoint platform.

Date Held: August 6th 2009

The PMI (Project Management Institute) have released  A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK®Guide) – Fourth Edition. The PMBOK®Guide is a global standard in project management practices and can be applied to all industries in all regions of the world.  The PMBOK® Guide–Fourth Edition certainly continues the tradition of excellence in project management with a standard that is even easier to understand and implement, with improved consistency and greater clarification.  This webcast will:

1. Very briefly explain the origins and history of the PMBOK®Guide
2. Introduce the PMBOK®Guide Fourth Edition
3. Explain some of the major differences from the Third Edition
4. Give a sample of how you can use SharePoint to manage both large and small projects that use the approaches advocated in the PMBOK®Guide

Presenters:

Brent Ohman is an executive in the technology industry working with product, program, and marketing leaders to help them maximize business value. Brent’s focus is always to insure corporate strategic objectives are solidly linked to implementation, and vice versa. Brent has worked at Sybase, New Era of Networks, Evolving systems and various startups.  Brent is a PMI Certified PMP.

Fintan Manning has been VP of Engineering at BrightWork since April 1997 and has managed more significant projects than most of us have had birthdays!  Fintan has experience with defined approaches to project management such as Scrum, MSF Agile, Sure Step, SEI S/W CMM, ISO 9001/TickIT and Prince 2. Prior to working at BrightWork Fintan was a projects manager at Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC).

Date Held: July 29th  2009

Scrum is an agile and iterative approach to product development which encourages the breakdown of ‘projects’ into finite periods called Sprints of the same length (normally 20-30 days but it can vary) with a defined deliverable due at the end of the Sprint. This webcast will:

1. Explain what Scrum is all about, so you will understand sprints, stories, backlogs, tasks, burn down charts, etc.
2. Walk you through a Scrum Template built in SharePoint, based on the Scrum Alliance Scrum Guide that has all the features necessary to run a Scrum project

Presenters:
Tyson Prescott, a Software Development Manager at School-Link Technologies, has proven project/resource management abilities that ensure that teams complete projects that meet the needs of the business/customer in a timely and efficient manner.  Tyson’s areas of technical leadership include coaching and mentoring teams. Tyson has worked at Neudesic, Cox Communications, Cable One, InternetNow and Computer Weasels.  Tyson is a Certified Scrum Master.

Fintan Manning has been VP of Engineering at BrightWork since April 1997 and has managed more significant projects than most of us have had birthdays!  Fintan has experience with defined approaches to project management such as Scrum, MSF Agile, CMM, ISO 9001 and PRINCE2.  Prior to working at BrightWork Fintan was a projects manager at Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC).

Date Held: June 25th 2009

The Dilemma!

• The customers we meet are at pains to tell us that they do not have the time or the budget to train people in formal project management – but yet they need project management discipline.  They want an approach so simple that it is obvious. 

A Simple Solution

• Over the years we have been helping customers develop such a simple approach.  More recently we have been working on a process that can be described and always decomposed into three steps.  Why three steps every time?  Why not?  Three is an easy number to work with.  It is a bit quirky and fun.  It is easier to remember and manage.  It forces us all to be concise rather than long-winded.

This Webcast:

• Will present a simple 1-2-3 process that can be used for project management
• Show how this simple 1-2-3 process can be implemented on the SharePoint platform

Date Held: June 18th 2009

The Dilemma!

Business Applications like ERP and CRM solutions are critical to drive customer productivity and efficiencies in organizations.  However, the fear of long drawn implementations and the perceived risks associated with them have often discouraged customers from making the right investment in solutions or partners to help implement.  They want an approach so simple that it is obvious. The approach also needs to facilitate open collaboration with all project team members including the customer.

A Simple Solution:

In these times of increased fiscal scrutiny and rapid return on investment to stay competitive in the market, Rapid project type in Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step provides guidance to partners on implementing Microsoft Dynamics solutions in 20 activities or less.  Join us for this webinar to learn more about this simple approach; and how you can implement, within reduced timeframes, without the perceived overhead of project management and with more consistency – all within fixed customer budgets. 

This webcast will present both a simple process and an example of how such a process can be implemented in collaborative SharePoint project sites.

Presenters:

Aditya Mohan, Director Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step and Éamonn McGuinness, BrightWork

Date Held: June 17th, 2009
Presenter: Bob Kreha, PMP, Principal, Fifth Discipline, LLC.

The Challenge

Traditional, heavy-handed project management techniques that work well in construction and other industries don’t lend themselves well to the more collaborative world of technology and business process improvement projects, where multiple stakeholders, vendors and virtual workers often comprise the project team.

A New Approach

Collaborative technologies like SharePoint are changing the way people work together to accomplish organizational goals. Through an innovative product called pmPoint and a more team-oriented approach to your program and project management methodologies, organizations that we work with are finding there’s a kinder, gentler way to plan and execute projects successfully, while keeping all your stakeholders informed at the same time.

This Webcast:

• Will present a novel approach to quickly adopting a collaborative project strategy.
• Show how simple this approach can be implemented on the SharePoint platform.

Date Held: June 10th 2009

SharePoint is a revolutionary platform for collaboration and information sharing.  However, it can be challenging trying to manage one or more projects in SharePoint if you do not know all of the functionality that is available right out-of-the-box.

This webcast will explain and demonstrate the 4 main feature sets you get with base SharePoint to manage projects.

Date Held: June 4th 2009

Cloud computing infrastructures are winning over decision makers in companies of all sizes across the globe.  They realize the power cloud computing technology offers, including significant savings in administrative costs.

pmPoint Online frees companies from software and its hidden costs, high failure rates, and prolonged implementations. All while providing a complete SharePoint project management solution that meets the varying project management needs of businesses of every size, everywhere.

By taking SharePoint project management into the cloud, pmPoint Online offers a pay-as-you-go model so users can forget about buying servers and software. It’s all rolled up into a predictable monthly subscription, so you only pay for what you actually use.  Better still, deployment and adoption is lightening fast and upgrades are painless.

Join us for a live presentation and demonstration of pmPoint Online.

• Date Held: April 17th, 2007
• Presented by: Eamonn McGuinness, CEO, BrightWork      

With the advent of SharePoint 2007 as a stronger platform to build collaborative applications, more and more information will find itself stored in SharePoint with an obvious growing need for reporting. This webcast will explain and show the out-of-box reporting capabilities that come native with SharePoint 2007. This webcast will also explain what reporting capabilities are not available in SharePoint 2007 and will present BrightWork Reporter capabilities that can fill these gaps, i.e. support for cross-site and cross-list reporting, pre-built reports, flexible report building, easy report sharing via scheduled email, dynamic reporting links with Excel, and rich data analysis with Excel and SQL Server Reporting Services.

View the Recording