Community IT Innovators. Established 1993. Serving social mission organizations with integrated technology services you can trust.

Project success undoubtedly has different meanings to different people. In the Project Management Institute (PMI) recent issue (Dec 2009) of the Project Management Journal, it is suggested that the criteria for project success is a “group of principles or standards used to determine or judge project success.”

We’ve all heard the classic answer for how to measure project success: time, cost and quality. However this approach has been criticized because quality is ambiguous to the beholder. Quality is a subjective matter that can be interpreted in different ways depending on each project stakeholder’s perspective.

To improve upon the time/cost/quality model there is the project success hexagon model, which includes the following six project success criteria:

• Time
• Cost
• Quality
• The realization of the strategic objectives of the organization that initiated the project
• The satisfaction of the people using the resulting service and/or product
• The satisfaction of other stakeholders

These may not necessarily be in the order of importance. In actuality the ranking of importance for each criteria differs from project to project, and organization to organization.

Considering these six factors at the start of a project, ranking each one and defining what would success look like for each, could be a healthy exercise for any project of significant investment. Revisiting these criteria halfway through the project to re-rank or re-define them may provide a clearer picture of project success as the project process proceeds.

The project success hexagon model is interesting to us in that it widens the criteria to be more than just time or cost and includes in addition the deeper aspects of the purpose behind the project itself – achievement of strategic objectives and satisfaction of the people who are affected by the project outcomes.

Are technology projects a source of frustration, confusion, or excessive cost within your organization? Are you curious about whether you’re following best practices and selecting the best tools as you apply technology in your programs and operations? Would you like to meet others solving similar problems and facing similar challenges?

Managing Nonprofit Technology Projects is an event series designed to help you better manage technology projects in your nonprofit or as a consultant to nonprofits.

Aspiration and Community IT Innovators are hosting the fourth Nonprofit Technology Project Management event in Washington, DC on Monday and Tuesday, February 8th and 9th, 2010.

Complete details are at http://www.aspirationtech.org/events/mntp-dc/2010

And you can register directly at http://bit.ly/4q1AgC

A detailed agenda for the event is also available at http://mntp.aspirationtech.org/index.php/Event_Agenda.

The agenda will continue to evolve up to and during the event, as we dialog with participants and strive to meet specific needs in the domain of technology project management for nonprofits. We invite participants to both request and propose sessions.

Informal, information-rich, discussion-based sessions will allow participants to compare processes, tools, successes, and lessons learned. We will discuss areas such as team collaboration, project planning, software selection, migration, and project roll-out, and map out the software tools – from project management packages to collaborative communication to issue tracking and more – that support successful technology projects.

We look forward to seeing you there!

There are a lot of interesting nonprofit technology events coming up in DC in the next few weeks:

• Wednesday, Jan. 27, InsideNGO Technology Update: Inside NGO will be presenting a full day course detailing four technologies. CITI’s Matthew Eshleman will be presenting on Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).  Virtual collaboration and training, Windows 7 deployment, and WAN optimization will also be covered.

• Wednesday, Feb. 3, CITIzens’ Forum: The Value of a CIO Perspective: The second forum in our series asks, who is managing technology at your organization? Do you have one person  who takes a big picture view, or are different people responsible for managing your network, website, databases and applications?  What’s the difference between a CIO and a CTO? Join in an open discussion to share what you’re doing and how other organizations address similar challenges.

• Monday-Tuesday, Feb. 8 – 9, Managing Nonprofit Technology Projects: Our second conference partnering with Aspiration to help you better manage technology projects in your nonprofit.  See this post for additional details

• Wednesday, Feb. 10, NTEN Webinar: Greening Your Nonprofit’s IT: Find out what all the green IT buzz is about and get practical information for greening your IT infrastructure.  Matthew Eshleman will be presenting with Peter Campbell on virtualization; other breakout sessions will cover green IT strategy, hardware and software, case studies, and sustainable design and printing.

• Friday, Feb. 12, Nonprofit 2.0: This unconference will let participants shape the agenda around how nonprofits use the latest technology to communicate, fundraise, and organize and advocate for their issues.  The event is already sold out, but there is a waiting list, and there may be a conversation or two to follow on Twitter…

• Wednesday, Feb. 17, CITIzens’ Forum: Salesforce: Learn how organizations are using Salesforce as a powerful CRM to manage contacts, campaigns, and related data; find out how Salesforce could be helpful for your organization, and share your story if you’re already using it.

People are an organization’s most important asset. We’ve all heard these words before. How is this translated really? Some leaders might say it’s the staff’s talents and special gifts, as well as experience, which are the asset. For some leaders, they appreciate that team members have the ability to learn and/or just simply follow instructions (which actually can go a long way to bringing about results).

In our interactions with various clients, whether they are local, national or international, and regardless of their mission, the value and reliance on highly talented people – and people who like to learn – is evident. It doesn’t stop there. There are some organizations which value their staff’s wisdom and find ways to draw on it authentically. This is something we highly support and encourage in our project approach.

Figuratively speaking, 90 – 95% of the answer to an organization’s problems, or desired innovations, is in the midst of the collective you – where the creativity and intelligence of multiple people across disciplines come together and do the hard work to find the answers. It sometimes requires having someone from the outside function as a source of creative tension and creative support for the group, and simultaneously provides a vital piece of missing expertise that helps complete the picture.

A lot of collective internal intelligence, with a little desire to ask for outside help, equates to the right synergy to find major answers. We know the synergy happens when we join with our clients in this way, and we have found ourselves in this place as well (we ask for outside help when we need it too).

Managing 3rd-party software implementations, including a new Constituent Relationship Management (CRM) system, fundraising system, member management system, or any software that your organization is paying big dollars to a vendor for, is an opportunity for creative tension and creative solutions. You’ll find that the vendor’s implementation schedule provides the activities that they as a vendor need done for the product to be implemented. However, from your organization’s perspective, the system is part of an overall new way of operating as an organization, including redesigning your business processes and changing the way people work for the desired outcomes your organization is expecting for investing in such systems.

You have probably heard the 80/20 rule on these projects:  80% of a project’s success will depend on how effectively staff and key stakeholders adopt the new systems and processes, and 20% depends on the actually technology. Intentional approaches to planning and change-for people and processes-are crucial to the success of any technology project.

Such projects are also an opportunity for organizational development. Changes in behavior, which means changes in the way people think, are required because the way people work is going to change (regardless of how much folks like the change or not). There are a host of implementation activities to plan for and engage people in, including data conversion and validation, integration with other systems, case scenarios, testing (with gumption and friendly accountability), training that incorporates the new system and new processes, and preparing for the transition.

During transition, people might doubt the usefulness of process changes in conjunction with the new system, and there may be some confusion and a tendency to hold on to the former ways of thinking and doing things – old spreadsheets, the previous database, etc. During those first few days (and weeks) of using the new system, help ease the transition by talking about the way things were before, including inefficiencies and stress points, and by emphasizing the benefits of the new processes and systems.

Most importantly, persevere with moving forward to the new way of working and thinking and let go of those side spreadsheets and Access databases. When everyone is sharing responsibility and there is accountability for data integrity, the value of such changes can result in the ROI your organization is seeking – to achieve operational and reporting needs that the organization sought by implementing the new system. Everyone investing in the integrity of the data in the new system means everyone can trust the data, especially when you get that phone call requesting a report and you click a few buttons, have the report and can trust it is correct – such trust becomes priceless.

The energy level was high and the expertise and experience level in the room at the Managing Nonprofit Technology Projects (MNTP) event was varied.  Some participants facilitated sessions on specialized web development project topics, while other participants relatively new to the project management field participated in interactive discussions geared towards the “accidental project manager” and talked about web redesign project tips and processes with more experienced project managers.

Some key basic takeaways for effective project management:

• Defining Scope & Goals and Managing Budget & Timetable are the primary responsibilities of the PM.  Execution is the responsibility of the technical project team members.
• Communication & Transparency are key to a smooth project where everyone is on the same page and stays abreast of inevitable changes and challenges that occur.  The project manager and team should agree right off the bat on what communication tools they will consistently use, whether simply email and shared documents, a project management tool such as Basecamp, or even a private project blog or wiki for longer and more complex projects.
• Managing Laterally and working well with colleagues starts first with being a resource for them and finding out how you can help them, then they will be ready to reciprocate when something is needed from them.  (Good advice whether you’re managing a specific project or not!)
• A Project Manager plays the role of Facilitator & Community Organizer, facilitating communication and creating a needs-driven dialogue to draw out and articulate the top common priorities and goals of all the stakeholders and users involved in a technology project.
• Connecting and Managing Resources is more important than the ability to solve and do every problem and step of the process.  Delegate tasks and facilitate conversations that lead to solutions.
• Manage Expectations: Find out up front what’s most important to key stakeholders.  Is it functionality? Budget? Timeline? If compromises have to be made to meet the most important expectations, what’s flexible? What’s the definition of a successful project from top management or the client’s perspective?

Besides some good advice for managing a successful nonprofit technology project, being at MNTP gave participants a sense of camaraderie and a network of others in the nonprofit technology management field to reach out to for support.  More notes and tips from the discussions can be found on the event wiki.  Save the date on your calendar: due to the success of this event, there will be another similar event in DC on January 11th and 12th, 2010.

Update: The 2010 event is now scheduled for February 8th and 9th, view details and register here.

I’ve been understandably obsessed the last two weeks with the final push to go live with the new site, which for me has meant not letting the perfect get in the way of the good – over and over again.  And even though this is my third go round after YouthVote.org (now defunct – not because of my website redesign!) and Ashoka, the process doesn’t get easier, although I do keep learning a lot.

I wonder if it is the same or worse in the for-profit web world – a commonality in the nonprofit side is how there is the process you know you should be doing – building consensus, driving the process with thoughtful goals, building an online strategy that is integral to the site, not getting distracted by geewhiz new cool stuff but really keeping your readers and users’ needs in mind.  But then what really happens is very different from what you know you should take the time to do.  And the results are very … public.  Which is probably what leads to the obsession over getting the little things right, when I probably should have been paying a lot closer attention to the big things back in the kick off meetings.

One thing that has evolved since this project started, however, is the incorporation of the theme “home” into our work at CITI, as we look for new office.  Yes, we finally have to admit we are too big for our space, and in characteristically CITI fashion we are learning all about ourselves as we make choices on the new one.  Natural light being high on the list of must haves, along with commutable location, things to do locally (especially lunch), and above all, a place that reflects our values.  A home.

recycled birdhouse, emily montgomery, used with permission