Cost Effective Product and Project Management

Webinar

Scope

In a time of economic recovery, there is no bottomless well of resources. Managers must look closely at the budgetary requirements for delivering cost-effective projects and products. What is the best way to build your case as it goes before the decision-makers? If you’re working under the pressures of agile development, how can you plan for changes and budget appropriately? How can product and project managers get the resources they need when every expenditure is under scrutiny? How can you prepare for the unexpected? This roundtable discussion will feature experienced product and project managers, sharing the useful tips and practices they’ve learned during their own careers. 

Confirmed participants in this Roundtable include Maureen Adamson, Principal, Maureen Adamson & Associates; Judson Dunham, Senior Director, Product Management, Elsevier; Paul Shannon, Head of Technology, eLife; and Donna Shaw, Director of Product Management, EBSCO.

 

Event Sessions

Roundtable Discussion

Speakers

The discussion by participants touched on the following:

Please provide the NISO audience with a brief description of your organization or institution and the community that you serve.  (Please be prepared to speak for two or two-and-a-half minutes about who you are, what you do, and the focus of your organization with regard to product or project management..)

For the sake of clarity, it would be useful to hear from each of you about how you define and/or categorize the work of product and project management. Are the two roles distinctly different in nature? Are the roles somewhat adjacent or is one nested within another? What might be some of the nuances?

 Where within your organization does responsibility for product management sit? What is the rationale for its placement in that setting? Are the functions such that the role can be spread across multiple individuals on staff?

How do you explain the value of the role to senior management or other decision-makers and colleagues? What do you think may be misunderstood about the role?

What skills, educational degree, or expertise do you look for when you’re hiring a product or project manager? Are there particular characteristics or personalities that tend to lend themselves to greater success in the role? 

How has the pandemic of the past 22 months affected the process of product management for your organizations? (Note: This is an opportunity to talk about aspects of working from home, Zoom meetings, etc.) Has that experience caused you to rethink aspects of the role or the associated workflow?  Or on how you build a team? What has elicited the best results for your specific organization?

What resources are critical to successful product management? If a smaller organization were to be starting out with limited resources or expertise, how would you advise them to structure the job or build the function for greatest effectiveness? How central to implementation is reliable project management? 

How do you use project management principles to interface with different organizations using the different approaches to project management?

What do you see with regard to emerging technologies, such as AI, for those working with research and scholarly outputs? What capabilities do you think users are most anxious to see in information products or resources?

In what areas might standards or recommended practices be useful in successful product and project management?

Resources shared by our panel:

Shared by speaker, Maureen Adamson: Agile Practice Guide, Project Management Institute

Additional Information

NISO assumes organizations register as a group. The model assumes that an unlimited number of staff will be watching the live broadcast in a single location, but also includes access to an archived recording of the event for those who may have timing conflicts. 

NISO understands that, during the current pandemic, staff at a number of organizations may be practicing safe social distancing or working remotely. To accommodate those workers, we are allowing registrants to share the sign-on instructions with all colleagues so that they may join the broadcast directly. 

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Links to the archived recording of the broadcast are distributed to registrants 24-48 hours following the close of the live event. Access to that recording is intended for internal use of fellow staff at the registrant’s organization or institution. Speaker presentations are posted to the NISO event page.

Broadcast Platform

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