OMS Consulting Partners, LLC

(Part of the "Adventures in Consulting" series, please see previous posts for more info). So you think you want to be a freelancer...? Don't get me wrong -- there are some great advantages of being a self-employed consultant. I've been doing it for more than 15 years now, so I can assure you of that. However, besides the more obvious risks like not having an assured paycheck, having to pay your own health insurance, losing 15% to employee matching, etc., here's another risk you might not have thought about... What about if you want to eventually return to full-time work? You might end up with (as they said in the movie 'Office Space') a case of the "Muundays" Take a long and hard look at this issue before making the jump to freelancing. Once you make that jump, then a few years later go and talk to a company about returning to full time work, expect to answer multiple questions about why in the world you'd want to come back to the full-tim...

The Project Management Institute suggests 12 ways to earn PDU's... http://www.pmi.org/Pages/Ten_Ways_to_Earn_PDUs.aspx Their suggestions are pretty general and generic. Submit a comment to this blog and let me know how YOU like to earn your PDU's, and then I'll take the results and create a new reference on OMS' Project Management Resources page. Until next time...

If your a freelancer, chances are you'll have to work on a 'time and materials' basis on occasion. For me, that is my preferred method, because it gives me some assurance that my client won't take a fix-bid quote and 'scope creep' me into the poor house. Of course, if you can give your client a clear set of requirements and some sort of a 'cap' (not to exceed hours) then everyone has a stake in the game and it's fair for everyone. Some of the work I do requires me to be on-site. Sometimes that's just because the customer wants to see what they're paying for, but also because co-location can really help communication and project progress. If the customer is willing to pay my hourly rate + travel, then I just invoice them for actual travel costs, and they reimburse me. (Don't forget to add the per diem cost for ' meals and incidental expenses ' from the IRS.) But a little more tricky issue is what to do when the customer wants to...

Thanks to friend of the blog, Constantine Kortesis, for this contribution. It sure made me think... The following excerpt is from http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Usa/Med/Med.html "Despite its official founding in August, the Manhattan Project really began on September 17, 1942 when Col. Leslie Richard Groves was notified at 10:30 a.m. by Gen. Brehon Somervell that his assignment overseas had been cancelled. Groves, an experienced manager who had just overseen the collosal construction of the Pentagon, seized immediate and decisive control. In just two days he resolved issues that had dragged on for months under Compton. On September 18 Groves ordered the purchase of 1250 tons of high quality Belgian Congo uranium ore stored on Staten Island, and the next day purchased 52000 acres of land to be the future site of Oak Ridge. Groves was promoted to Brigadier General on September 23. By September 26 Groves had secured access to the highest emergency procurement priority then in exi...

At the heart of every large project is a small project trying to get out.

There's an old saying. "Never discuss politics, sex or religion in polite company." On the other hand, we all agree on many things. The earth is round (well, slightly spherical, actually), the sun rises in the east and sets in the west (actually the earth revolves around the sun), and the sky is blue (it really only appears blue to us). Well... you get the idea. Many aspects of project management do not seem to fit into the 'earth is round' category. What is the evidence? Here's just a few casual observations: 1. A PM on a popular professional networking site recently asked the question, " Does anyone really know what project management actually is? " Simple question, right? Nope! This has been the most popular 'discussion' (read: debate) on that networking site since it was launched about a month ago. This discussion/debate has more than 3x the comments then the #2 debate. And to add to the point, the #2 discussion is "There ...

"Right answers to wrong questions are just as wrong as wrong answers to right questions."