97 Things Every Project Manager Should Know: Collective Wisdom from the Experts

If the projects you manage don't go as smoothly as you'd like, 97 Things Every Project Manager Should Know offers knowledge that's priceless, gained through years of trial and error. This illuminating book contains 97 short and extremely practical tips -- whether you're dealing with software or non-IT projects -- from some of the world's most experienced project managers and software developers. You'll learn how these professionals have dealt with everything from managing teams to handling project stakeholders to runaway meetings and more.

While this book highlights software projects, its wise axioms contain project management principles applicable to projects of all types in any industry. You can read the book end to end or browse to find topics that are of particular relevance to you. 97 Things Every Project Manager Should Know is both a useful reference and a source of inspiration.

Among the 97 practical tips:

• Clever Code Is Hard to Maintain...and Maintenance Is Everything -- David Wood, Partner, Zepheira
• Every Project Manager Is a Contract Administrator -- Fabio Teixeira de Melo, Planning Manager, Construtora Norberto Odebrecht
• Can Earned Value and Velocity Coexist on Reports? -- Barbee Davis, President, Davis Consulting
• How Do You Define 'Finished'? -- Brian Sam-Bodden, author, software architect
• The Best People to Create the Estimates Are the Ones Who Do the Work -- Joe Zenevitch, Senior Project Manager, ThoughtWorks
• How to Spot a Good IT Developer -- James Graham, independent management consultant
• One Deliverable, One Person -- Alan Greenblatt, CEO, Sciova

Barbee Davis, PMP, PHR, writes a semi-monthly feature for the Project Management Institute (PMI) international publication, Community Post, in which she guides project managers to more successful projects. She is also an international reviewer for the PMI Registered Educational Provider (R.E.P.) program.

Experienced in training and consulting, Barbee has written and facilitated technical training for IBM Corporation and other large customers. She has designed and implemented projects in varied industries, and managed large project rollouts for many national corporations.

As co-owner of ExecuTrain of Nebraska, Barbee provided technical training for solution developers and systems engineers, as well as offering end-user training on all platforms. She came to ExecuTrain from Wilson Learning, where she was an accredited facilitator for their Management Development, Sales, Customer Service, Time Management workshops, and automated personnel selection tools.

Currently, Barbee owns Davis Consulting, formed to provide Training and Development workshops, customized training materials, and Project Management consulting services. She has been on staff with the University of Nebraska at Omaha, Nebraska Wesleyan, and Bellevue University and is proficient in online learning instructional design, having both written for and taught on Blackboard for universities and corporate clients. Ms. Davis holds a degree in Education, a Master's, a Project Management Professional (PMP) certification, a Professional in Human Resources (PHR) accreditation, and a black belt in Microsoft Project.