June 2009 Newsletter




	June 2009 Newsletter Information and insights for the Program & Project Management Community

Featured Articles

   -  Are you managing your   benefits?

   -  Setting the scene

   - Featured case study

Hints and Tips

Tell us what you think

Annoucements

Improving organisation effectiveness through Innovative procurement & contracting

As a partner, MetaPM is proud to support Human Systems Improving Organisation Effectiveness through Innovation Procurement & Contracting Event, held in Sydney on 14th of July 2009. Read more...

AIPM Project Management Achievement Awards

The Australian Institute of Project Management has established the Project Management Achievement Awards (PMAA) to recognise honour and promote outstanding achievements in program and project management. Read more...

PMOZ 2009

PMOZ is the leading Project Management Conference in Australia. Read more...

Upcoming Training Calendar

Rational Management, a MetaPM business, offering PRINCE2^® Foundation or Practitioner courses. Follow the link to view our public training calendar Read more...

Welcome to the MetaPM June Newsletter

In this months newsletter we explore the difficult topic of ‘benefits management’ and hopefully give you some idea’s, tips & tricks which can deliver immediate value back to your organisation.

“CIOs reported that an average of 40% of total IT spending brought no return to their organizations” - Source: IBM Strategy & Change, Survey of Fortune 1000 CIO’s.

Whilst assisting our clients with conducting their post project reviews, one interesting question we ask is “What proportion of benefits were delivered against the original business case?”. It might come as no surprise to read that many fall well short in their response.

It would seem that even though we’re getting better at defining “why” we’re doing the projects (business case), we’re not getting any better at managing and measuring these benefits through the project lifecycle and beyond.

If you have any queries regarding any of the information contained in this newsletter, please do not hesitate to contact us

Featured Articles

Are you managing benefits optimally on your projects?

How about trying out the following simple test:

Answer Yes / No to the following 5 questions:

Are benefits and costs misaligned, such that benefits cannot be achieved without incurring additional costs?
Is your project struggling to get real commitment (and funding) from stakeholders to help you overcome the inevitable hurdles to delivery?
Are you discovering that expected project benefits have vanished once you re-look at them after project delivery?
Are you finding it difficult to pinpoint accountability for project success, especially on projects where benefits can only be measured long after project completion?
Is benefit realization too difficult to measure on many of your projects?

If you answered "YES" to any of these questions, then adopting the PRINCE2® method to defining, allocating and measuring benefits will not only help you overcome these problems, it will provide you with a clear view of the value chain flowing through RESOURCES – ACTIVITIES – PRODUCTS – SOLUTIONS – BENEFITS. If you have any questions please contact us at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

Setting the scene for Benefits Management

One of our business partners, Human Systems (www.humansystems.com.au), recently conducted a workshop in Sydney on the topic of Benefits Management. One of their presentations on “setting the scene for benefits management” provides a good perspective on what benefits mean, how they are managed in both the public & private industry and suggested areas to help manage benefits. Read More...

Recent Case Study

MetaPM has been working with the public sector for a number of years, providing a diverse range of project management services and training solutions.

One of the common mistakes we have observed is that projects which failed, typically were poorly planned from the beginning.

The enclosed case study, provides a good example of the typical challenges faced by many organisations when commencing a large and complex project and the way in which MetaPM helps to ensure that it is set up for success. Read more...

Hints and Tips

We have attached the following simple “Benefits Register Template” which can be used on some projects to ensure that the defined benefits are recorded, tracked and managed throughout the project lifecycle.

Benefits Register - Benefits Register Excel Worksheet

For more hints and tips please visit our website. Read more....

Tell us what you think

We’d like to hear what you think of this issue. Please send your comments, questions, and ideas for upcoming issues to us at: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it . Your feedback matters to us!

'Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious, and adding the meaningful' - John Maeda

'Simplicity is about subtracting
the obvious, and adding the
meaningful' - John Maeda

THE BUSINESS OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT