SharePoint for Project Management – How to Create a Project Management Information System (PMIS) with SharePoint (Book Review)

by Dux Raymond Sy, O’Reilly Media Inc, 232 pages, £25 RRP
Pragmatic PMO Rating: ****

This book is intended as a “how to” guide for setting up a Project Management Information System, aimed at the practising Project Manager (PM) or Project Management Office (PMO) Manager. In this it is completely successful. The book (safely in my view) assumes a reasonable level of familiarity with both standard office use of computers, and a reasonable level of familiarity with PM principles and techniques, taking this to build a PMIS, so often referred to in PM textbooks as an essential resource but rarely explained or explored in any depth.

Chapter 1 deals with what SharePoint is (a system that enables individuals in an organisation to easily create and manage their own collaborative websites), what a PMIS is (a standardised set of PM tools available within an organisation and integrated into a system), and whether you need one (if you are running anything more than the smallest and simplest projects then you probably do).

Chapter 2 deals with the structure and hierarchy of SharePoint sites, and takes the reader through the creation and customisation of the most basic elements of a SharePoint site (as a practical exercise if you have the necessary resources handy).

Chapter 3 builds on this foundation by adding PMIS elements such as a shared calendar, contacts list, risk list, and document library, using these as opportunities to explain how these SharePoint features work.

Chapter 4 covers the introduction of stakeholders, managing their access to information using groups with varying permissions.

Chapter 5 gets into the use of SharePoint’s document and collaboration features, with a good description of how document check out / check in saves us from playing “whoever saves last keeps their content”, and an overview of SharePoint’s native version controlling approach and whether you need it (you probably do!). This chapter also covers wikis, document workspaces, and discussion boards (with examples you can try out), all of which are intended to promote team collaboration.

Chapter 6 goes into the use of SharePoint’s built-in features to track project progress, with a warning against using the too-basic Project Task list as your only Gantt chart tool. There is a good detailed section on customising lists to use as fairly well-featured Risks and Issues Registers, and a section showing how to manage the items in these lists with SharePoint’s built-in Workflow capabilities. This chapter even goes so far as to show you how to build a pretty serviceable Change Control system using the workflow feature with a customised list.

Chapter 7 takes a look at the Reporting options available. This chapter helps the reader to learn how to set up special views and web parts to create a Project Dashboard, and how to set up alerts to stay informed about what’s happening in the PMIS.

Chapter 8 deals with the integration of Excel with SharePoint, showing how to achieve bidirectional information exchange. Unfortunately direct synchronisation with MS-Project is not possible, but the book suggests an alternative approach to minimise the pain (keeping the management of the MSP plan in the hands of the PM, but allowing the Project team to report updates using a task list).

Chapter 9 rounds off the book by explaining how to shut down a project and its associated SharePoint site, even capitalising on what you have learned from your experience by saving your site as a template.

The issue of how to get users to interact with and properly use a SharePoint site is dealt with in just two pages right at the end of the book. I guess that is not surprising in a book that is really aimed at the technical rather than people aspects of creating a PMIS in SharePoint, but I still found it a little disappointing as this is crucial to adoption and uptake.

Overall, if you implement all the practical exercises in this book then you will end up with a very usable PMIS for very little outlay. You will still need to convince your team members that this is a Good Thing and that using the PMIS facilities is better than storing copies of documents on their Desktop before emailing them to multiple reviewers for comment, but you will have the tools for them to pick up and use.

In a PMO role on a Programme of over 100 team members that uses SharePoint as its document repository, I have referred to this book as my SharePoint “Bible” most days; as a result it has quickly become well-thumbed! I would recommend this guide to anyone wanting to set up a low-cost, practical PMIS and who wants guidance on how to do this without getting bogged down in technical minutiae.

If you would like to have the benefits of an approach like this but prefer not to have to worry about this sort of techy stuff, Pragmatic PMO can help. Why not take a look at our “Tools for Teamwork” service, and if that looks interesting, schedule a free 30-minute consultation to discuss how we can help you?

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Author: Ken Burrell

Ken Burrell is a Programme and Portfolio Office (PMO) Professional, who through his company Pragmatic PMO makes targeted improvements to PMO practices to add value to Projects, Programmes and Portfolios. He provides senior management with the analysis they need to make decisions, and gives project and programme managers the support they need to deliver solutions.

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