IT Governance Blog on IT governance, risk management, compliance and information security.

Project Governance: The Essentials (eBook) There are many excellent books on project governance and project management, but most tend to assume that an organisation is capable of implementing the structures and procedures they recommend. In this little book the author focuses on practical steps that any organisation can take to improve the performance of its projects. This excellent pocket guide will help you to understand and effectively manage and plan your project.

Find out how you can achieve effective project governance for maximum ROI with “Project Governance: The Essentials” >>

What is Project Governance?

Project Governance extends the principle of Governance into both the management of individual projects via Governance structures, and the management of projects at the business level, for example via Business Reviews of Projects. Today, many organisations are developing models for ‘Project Governance Structures’, which can be different to a traditional Organisation Structure in that it defines accountabilities and responsibilities for strategic decision-making across the project. This can be particularly useful to project management processes such as change control and strategic (project) decision-making. When implemented well, it can have a significantly positive effect on the quality and speed of decision making on significant issues on projects.

It is a fundamental truth of project governance that projects will come in on time and on budget if they are managed by a competent individual reporting to a Steering Committee armed with full powers. They will invariably not come in on time and on budget if the notional Project Manager is constrained by ad hoc committees, advisory boards and numbers of operational stakeholders with competing agendas functioning outside the formal governance structure.

Plan the project, not the outcome of the project

A project is a delivery mechanism. It is a way of taking your organisation, or some part of your organisation, from its current state to a preferred state. In their eagerness to reach the destination, organisations can neglect the means of transport.

Contemporary organisations are permeated at every level with information technology. Changing any part of that technology, or implementing new technology, will have far-reaching effects on the organisation as w hole, including effects on the organisation as a whole, including indirect effects that can be uncovered only through patient investigation and analysis.

As a senior manager you do not want – quite rightly – to be bothered with such details. Nor do you need to be specifically aware of them. But it is very important you understand that this is why projects can seem to take a long time before getting anywhere, and that the longer and the more exhaustive the analysis and planning, the more likely that the project will result in a successful outcome with no significant time or cost overruns.

Planning doesn’t take time, it saves time.

Planning does cost money. But failed projects cost vastly greater amounts of money!

Coming soon:

Currently all of our ITGP eBooks are available in their downloadable PDF formats. We will, however, be expanding our catalogue with printed versions of these products in August. Please keep an eye on the website for updates.

We look forward to welcoming you back on our website soon!

IT Governance Asia has listed this unique guide to the IT governance standard, ISO/IEC 38500 on the ITG Asia website.

“ISO/IEC 38500 the IT Governance Standard: Pocket Guide is a unique book,” explained author and CEO, Alan Calder. “This guide distils the key issues in ISO38500 and delivers them in a way that makes it easy to identify the steps that should be taken to implement the standard. With the growing importance of ISO38500 and IT Governance generally in India and around the world, I hope that this guide will help organisations and managers quickly and efficiently get to grips with the standard.”

Supported by a specific ISO38500 IT Governance Framework Toolkit, these publications are particularly useful to organisations seeking to comply with official and governmental requirements for Indian organisations to implement ISO38500-compliant frameworks. Data security and business continuity activity can all be addressed from within an appropriate IT Governance framework.

ISO/IEC38500 the IT Governance Standard: Pocket Guide

This unique pocket guide is available for immediate download. The price is $US5 or just INR 220! Purchasing can be carried out online through the website with download immediately on completion of checkout.

Take advantage of this fantastic price and download your copy today!

	ISO/IEC 38500 the IT Governance Standard: Pocket Guide Buy now! Key features of this pocket guide include: An overview of the ISO/IEC 38500 standard Framework for good IT governance Project governance The Calder-Moir Framework

ORDER YOUR COPY OF THIS ESSENTIAL POCKET GUIDE TODAY!

Leadership skills, such as critical thinking, organisational change management and crucially, communication, will be strategically imperative project management competencies to master. 2011’s project management landscape will feature more complex projects and greater use of virtual teams – being on time and on budget will require not just a laser-like focus on the triple constraints, but on the requisite leadership skills necessary for an individual PM’s success. The challenge for organisations will be to clearly define what “leadership” means in the project and program management context. 

	People Skills – Books and Pocket Guides People skills, sometimes known as ‘soft skills,’ are personal attributes that enhance an individual’s interactions, job performance and career prospects. Unlike hard skills, which tend to be specific to a certain type of task or activity, soft skills are broadly applicable. This range of ITGP books will help you improve your skills, and are of particular relevance to those dealing with people in the IT field. Browse the range and order your books today!

Three books which will prove particularly useful for Project Manager’s are:

1. Leading for Success
2. Presentation Skills for Technical Professionals
3. Changing How You Manage and Communicate Change.

Master the essential Project Management competencies which will be the critical success factor in 2011.

Browse the range and order your books today!

Shopping at our PRINCE2 Bookshop is unique. One of the reasons people come back, time and again, is because of the special bundles we create. Our bundles save our customers time and money and are tailored to their specific needs.

If, for example, you are studying for the PRINCE2 2009 Foundation or Practitioner exam, our PRINCE2 2009 Study and Review Package contains the books and guides that give you the relevant knowledge and confidence to pass the exams first time. We remove the risk of you purchasing additional and unnecessary resources – saving you money!

Visit the PRINCE2 Bookshop -
See unique bundles below:

(more…)

PRINCE2™ is a process-based approach to project management. It is capable of tailoring and scaling to suit specific projects types and sizes. In this methodology, each process – complete with its inputs and outputs – is defined, as are the specific objectives that have to be achieved and the activities that are to be carried out.

The official Prince2 Manual has been designed to be a role-specific handbook for project managers, team managers and project support.

(more…)

Whatever your business, your capacity to supply products and services to your customers depends on your IT. Yet, all too often, companies and government departments fail to take effective control of their IT systems. Instead, organisations rely on a confused mish-mash of different technologies and ad hoc working practices.

To avoid this fate, your organisation needs to adopt an IT Service Management System (ITSMS). Employing an ITSMS will enable your organisation to identify how to enhance the quality of service you deliver to your customers. The standard for an ITSMS is ISO/IEC 20000.
(more…)

Businesses are increasingly choosing to outsource their IT function. The attraction of outsourcing IT is that it enables a company to obtain an efficient and responsive IT system, while at the same time allowing the company to focus on its core strengths.

The current economic climate is also putting companies under increasing pressure to find new ways of cutting costs. However, all too often IT outsourcing projects fail because companies have not applied appropriate governance processes to the project.

This book and pocket guide duo complement each other very well and will guide you through the outsourcing process. This duo will help you avoid the many pitfalls organisations face when outsourcing their IT.
(more…)

This suite includes all five of the Key Element Guide series of publications. Each one of these pocket guides supports a particular one of the core ITIL V3 titles, providing a handy quick reference no-nonsense guide to the key information.

Key Element Guides Included: ITIL: Service Strategy; ITIL: Service Design; ITIL: Service Transition; ITIL: Service Operation; ITIL: Continual Service Improvement.

Key Features:

• Contains one copy of each of the Key Element Guide series of pocket guides, enabling you to purchase all the guides in one complete set.
• Quick reference guides to the core ITIL V3 books contained in the ITIL Lifecycle Publication Suite.
• Written in conjunction with, and endorsed by, itSMF International.
• Save money over buying these guides individually from other suppliers.
• Written by the original team who worked on the ITIL V3 core titles.

The main objective of these guides is to convey the best practice information contained in the core ITIL V3 Lifecycle Publication Suite books in an easy-to-read format and it forms an ideal support tool for the main ITILv3 Lifecycle Publication Suite.

Order your set of these essential pocket guides today. Simplify the ITIL V3 implementation process today using this set of pocket guides.

Ten Rules of Information Security for the Smaller Business

This highly-informative pocket guide presents in business, not techie, language the basic commonsense precautions smaller firms need to take to protect themselves from computer disaster, describing how to apply ten easy-to-follow rules that will ensure peace of mind and, more importantly, protect future cash flow. Every business needs to take appropriate steps to protect and store its mission-critical data. And with even the smallest of ‘one man band’ companies now connected to the Internet, and with many SMEs running their own computer networks and websites, business owners need to take cost-effective, practical precautions to take in order to defend themselves against cyber threats.

(more…)