Special Report: Project Management

It probably won't surprise anyone who refers to a Gantt chart on a regular basis, but projects are business. “Not many people realize that about 20 percent of the world's GDP is project driven, and in fact if you look at the US alone, about 12 trillion dollars is spent annually on projects,” says Oracle's Guy Barlow, industry strategist for the project-intensive oil, gas and utilities sectors. “So being able to help companies successfully execute their projects and portfolios within this framework of risk is something that's imperative, especially given the economic downturn.”

Project management was certainly a focus at October's Oracle OpenWorld conference, at which the company hosted a special two-day, 70 session Primavera Program. The focus made sense, reported CIO Magazine since “Forrester Research expects what it defines as the 'project based solutions' market to reach US$6.5 billion by 2010, up from $4.25 billion in 2007. That growth is being fueled by a number of factors, such as the general march toward service-based economies around the world.”

Find out more about how Oracle and Oracle Primavera can help you plan projects and manage risk, and then get tips from other business leaders about how to make your deadlines —and meet expectations.

Public Sector Project Management
While the basic procedural processes remain consistent, the road to success for public sector project managers is littered with challenges not found in the private sector. Profit discussed the differences with David Wirick, Project Management Professional and visiting scholar at the John Glenn School of Public Affairs at Ohio State University and author of the Managing Public Sector Projects.

Primavera and Oracle Join Together to Improve Enterprise Visibility into Projects
Oracle has long offered robust solutions for global project management, including contracting, project planning, budgeting, forecasting, resource management, collaboration, risk monitoring, and project accounting. Recently, the company extended its offerings when it acquired Primavera, a 25-year-old leading provider of project portfolio management solutions for project-intensive industries. Profit spoke with Joel Koppelman, Oracle senior vice president and general manager, Enterprise Project Portfolio Management, about what Oracle customers can expect to gain from the purchase of Primavera.

Podcast: Proactive Project Decision Making
Hear how Oracle Primavera enables you to track project status in real-time, calculate ongoing project performance metrics, and forecast project completion metrics so that you no longer react to changing project needs, but instead avoid surprises and proactively manage projects to successful conclusion.

Podcast: Managing Risk in an Economic Downturn
“What companies are needing to these days is frankly find innovative ways to do more with less,” says Guy Barlow, industry strategist for the oil and gas and utilities industries with Oracle. “This is very challenging because the size, scale and scope of their projects continue to increase and unfortunately mistakes in these projects are generating huge cost overruns, which frankly are lost revenue. And this is in the order of hundreds of millions of dollars. So we're encouraging companies to take a more diligent approach to their project management, especially within the context of the risk elements and their projects.”

Two Tips to Quickly Improve Stimulus Funds Tracking
There’s one catch with the billions of dollars in stimulus funds that could pour into government agencies throughout the world this year: the onus will be on state, regional, and local governments to adequately track and take responsibility for how the funds are being spent.

Ten Tips For Aligning Business With IT
Many companies use “program management” or “portfolio management” to indicate oversight of IT projects. Whatever you call it, creating a go-between team really can improve IT/business alignment. Here are some tips from IT leaders who've been there and IT experts who've seen it done right—and wrong.

Five Ideas: Primavera and Enterprise Project Portfolio Management
With the acquisition of PPM leader Primavera, Oracle was able to provide the first comprehensive enterprise project portfolio management solution, helping companies allocate the best resources, reduce costs, meet delivery dates and ultimately make better decisions, all by using real-time data. Now, nearly one year months later, hear what experts are saying about the future of the Primavera Global Business Unit.