ACT CHAPTER
2006 PMAA

GOLD SPONSOR

ACT COMMUNITY BENEFIT AWARD SPONSOR

SILVER SPONSOR

BRONZE SPONSOR

Farewell and Thank You

As you have all heard by now, the Chapter Council elections are now complete and finalised and I am now delighted to hand over to our new President, Michael Young. I have held the role of Chapter President since 2003 and I am extremely humbled to have been able to work with, and alongside my fellow Councillors. As a team, the Chapter Council has instigated a vast number of initiatives that have helped in the enormous growth of our Chapter, from approximately 250 members when I started, to 1080 members in the region this month.

I would like to wholeheartedly thank the Chapter Council for their support, as without the time and dedication that they give to their honorary roles, the Chapter would not be the leading Chapter in the country presently. Quite a number of the existing Chapter Council will be staying on, however there are a number of new faces, which I would like to welcome. I will be staying on as a Councillor, so I will still be around and accessible, if you would like to contact me.

Best regards,

Paul Black,
Outgoing ACT Chapter President

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AIPM Movers and Shakers

After a number of years at the helm Paul Black has stood down as ACT Chapter President with effect 14th August 2006. As a result, I will take up this position in anticipation of it formally occurring at the Annual General Meeting on 27th September. Paul will continue to be actively involved in the ACT Chapter Council and AIPM. On behalf of the ACT Chapter Council I’d like to thank Paul for his leadership, guidance, energy, enthusiasm and good humour over the past three years.

I’d also like to welcome our newly elected ACT Chapter Councillors:

Pal Sadasivan

John Jacobi

Alan Hunter

Ramesh Chandra

Justin McLaren

Debbie Mazlin

Phil Sealy

Alan Hunter

Lindsay Weatherburn

Meg Smith

Departing the chapter council are:

David Dawson (Treasurer)

Garth Chamberlain (Secretary)

We have a cunning plan!

The ACT Chapter Council is currently reviewing the final draft of the ACT Chapter Strategic Plan for 2006 – 2009. The key strategic foci are:

• Delivering professional services to ACT Chapter members
• Growing the ACT Chapter membership
• Raising the profile of project management and AIPM
• Good governance and administration

More information will be available in the coming weeks.

ProMAC 2006

The AIPM National Conference this year will be held as part of ProMAC 2006 at the Hilton Hotel in Sydney. It promises to be an excellent opportunity to meet and discuss some of the latest development with leading international figures in project management. It will also be great fun, with a busy social and networking calendar. I look forward to seeing you there.

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Silver Sponsor Cheque Presentation

Mike Smith from EDS presented Michael Young, ACT Chapter President Elect, with the cheque for their Silver sponsorship of the ACT Chapter Project Management Achievement Awards. We greatly appreciate the continued support EDS provides the local chapter, noting they are strong supporters at the National level also.

Bookings for Gala Night

It is not to late to still make a booking for the 2006 ACT Chapter PMAA Gala Night, to be held on the 30th August, at the Ballroom of the National Convention Centre. Please complete the attached form and send to the addresses listed at the bottom. This is the 30th Anniversary year for the AIPM, and the theme of the Gala evening will be based on this.

If you have any questions regarding the PMAA or Gala evening, please contact the Chapter Administrator.

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Our monthly Forums are held on the last Wednesday of every month, at the Canberra Club, 45 West Row, Civic, commencing at 5:30pm until 7:30pm. Drinks and cocktail food are served, and members are more than welcome to bring a guest. For all RSVP's please contact the Chapter Administrator.

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ACT Chapter now over 1000 members in the local region!

As noted last newsletter, the local Chapter passed the magic 1000 members. Two years ago we were had 250 members. Continue the great work of spreading the benefits of joining AIPM. Don’t forget you can bring a mate/friend/prospective to the September function to introduce them to local Chapter members.

Book your tickets now, so that I will see you at the PMAA awards night on 30 August.

John Jacobi
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I thought we had a great attendance last month. Well the July Forum topped that with 101 members and guests enjoyed the hospitality and the opportunity to network.

Paul Black introduced the new Chapter office bearers and councillors, who will formally take up duties after the National Conference. Do not forget the next forum is at the National Convention Centre in the form of the ACT Chapter Project Management Achievement Awards.

The guest speaker was Mr Stephen Hayes MBE, who is currently a Director in the Defence Materiel Organisation (DMO) Program Management Office (formerly Directorate of Coaching and Review). Stephen provided an illuminating brief on the “The PMO and Complex Project Management Competencies”. Copies of the framework in the format of the Approved Final Draft – presented to the Defence and Industry Project Management Council in Canberra on 9th June 2006, were provided to members for perusal. A series of questions showed that there is considerable interest in DMO’s initiatives in this arena. Following the presentation, Stephen carried on discussing issues with interested parties.

Should you wish a copy of the PowerPoint presentation, it is posted on the AIPM website here. (This is a members only area, so please have your AIPM Username and password handy). The Standard itself can be accessed on the DMO website. The headings of the presentation are summarised as follows.

DMO Change Agenda has 6 Themes

• Professionalise
• Reprioritise
• Standardise
• Benchmark
• Improve industry relations
• Lead reform in Defence

Coaching for Success covers:

• Enabling identification of systemic problems
• Enabling a learning organisation
• Building networks of expertise
• Designing better processes and policies
• Providing effective help and pragmatic guidance
• Providing perspective
• Assisting with changing perceptions
• Change agents
• Advocacy for projects

Program Management Office

The DMO Program Management Office aims to lead the implementation of Government policy on project management within Defence and provide leadership in project management for Whole of Government, Defence and Industry

• Focus on traditional coaching and modular change initiatives
• Acquisition Categorisation Framework (ACAT) places Defence projects in 1 of 4 categories.

Project Management Certification Framework

Covers the competencies required of individual managers within the ACAT categories

Complex Competencies Views

Look at a problem / issue through the following lenses and define the competencies required in each:

• View 1 – Strategy and Project Management
• View 2 – Business Planning, Lifecycle Management, Reporting and Performance Measurement
• View 3 – Change and Journey
• View 4 – Innovation, Creativity and Working Smarter
• View 5 – Organisational Architecture
• View 6 – Systems Thinking and Integration
• View 7 – Leadership
• View 8 – Culture and Being Human
• View 9 – Probity and Governance
• Special Attributes

Complex Competencies Key Dates

A detailed schedule on the implementation and release is as follows:
• Initial Development – DMO/Dr Dombkins
• Defence and Industry Review (Including UK MoD)
• Defence CEO/DMO Agreement - 09 Jun 06
• Final Draft released at Defence and Industry Conference - 21 Jun 06
• Socialise with Central Agencies - Jul 06
• Establish College and Pilot Standard - Jul/Aug/Sep 06
• Further discussions with UK MoD - Sep 06
• Release to Tier 1 Universities - Aug/Sep 06
• Ministerial or ProMAC Release - Sep/Oct 06?

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I have been the ACT Chapter's Treasurer for over 4 years and in that time I have witnessed some startling changes from a small team of Councillors struggling to develop the Chapter and promote project management in the ACT to a Chapter with growth from 250 to over 1000 in this time. My introduction to the AIPM was through the Chapter's past President Gerry Vassallo who asked me to become Treasurer. That was the extent of the ACT Chapter some 4 odd years ago just the two of us. Gerry and I then had meetings with some of the current Councillors over a chinese luncheon in Dickson, one of whom, Paul Black, decided to leave the table and was promptly voted in as the new President, a mistake Paul has never repeated since. The rest they say is history. My part, to some extent has been simplified each year by the support of our members through attendance at forums and PMAA events. I have watched as the Chapter started with a budget, well I am Treasurer I have to talk about money, of less than $20,000 to an expected annual expenditure of over $100,000. Some of the more innovated ideas such as hosting the forums free to members contributed to the expenditure however the increase in membership and the attendance at these forums has far out weighed the costs. Throughout my time as Treasurer the ACT Chapter's philosophy has been and will continue to be to deliver as many free services to members as possible and to promote project management in the ACT. This simple philosophy has worked well and through the efforts of various Chapter Councillor's project management and accreditation process has now become mainstream for areas such as Defence and various policy areas of the Public Service.

I hope I am delivering the new Treasurer a sound budget and with the support of the Councillors, the highly valued members of the AIPM in the ACT and the various organisations who sponsor our PMAA events that the coming year will see interesting and informative forums and PMAA events.

Hope to catch you at a forum or two or a PMAA event

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Please Note: Hard copy certificates will be sent to those who are listed below, within 2 weeks of the newsletter publication date. If you received your membership or certification in the months listed, and received electronic confirmation from our National office, and your name is not listed below, please contact the Chapter Administrator.

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If there are any errors in the above lists, please notify the Chapter Administrator.

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JOINT ACS & AIPM FORUM

AGILE PROJECT GOVERNANCE

Guest Speaker
Mr Rob Thomsett
Director - The Thomsett Group

For most of its history, computing has experienced a “management lag”. From structured programming in the late 1970’s, through the structured revolution, information engineering, object-oriented and open source models, the consideration and impact of new system development models on management and project management models has always been left until later. The emerging Agile development model has avoided this to some degree with a number of excellent models for Agile or Radical project management being developed and adopted.

However, the impact on and implications for the governance of IT projects and the broader areas of IT governance from adopting Agile Development has been relatively ignored. In this presentation, Rob will explore the challenges that Agile Development present to IT and project governance.

Rob joined computing in 1968 and has been consulting and educating in the area of project management, teams and quality since 1974.

In 1981, Rob was contracted by YOURDON Inc. in New York to present seminars in the U.S. and U.K. based on his book People and Project Management published by YOURDON Press. With YOURDON, he consulted and taught in London, most major U.S. cities, Europe and Canada.

Rob presents workshops and consulting in the areas of senior management I.T. issues, project management and team leadership to most major Australian organisations. His workshops are also presented in Asia and Europe. His client-driven approach to project management, self-managing teams and Software Quality Function Deployment has been adopted by a wide spectrum of Australian organisations.

During his career, Rob has worked with Gerry Weinberg, Larry Constantine, Meiler Page-Jones and Ed Yourdon. These people have influenced much of Rob's work. Rob is also a member of the Editorial Board of the prestigious American Programmer with Ed Yourdon, Tom DeMarco, Bill Curtis, Capers Jones and other leading U.S. information system experts.

His second book "Third Wave Project Management : A Handbook for managing the Complex Information Systems for the 1990s" was published by Prentice Hall, New York in 1993. In 1994, he developed the Accreditation Programme for Project Management for the Australian Computer Society.

Rob's latest book " Radical Project Management", was published by Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle Creek, New Jersey, in 2004.

Rob has presented at many IT and business conferences and has been voted Speaker of the Conference in many of them both within Australia and internationally. Rob was honoured as the Australian Computer Society Lecturer of the Year in 1989/90. In 2001, he was recognized for his outstanding effort in education of business professionals by his peers and was elected a Fellow of the Australian Computer Society.

MEMBERS PLEASE NOTE: There will be NO September Forum at the Canberra Club. The September Forum is this joint ACS/AIPM one, held at the beginning of the month at the Southern Cross Club.

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Next Meeting

Please see above

ACS Canberra Contacts
PO Box 779
MAWSON ACT 2607
Ph: (02) 6290-0711
Fax: (02) 6290-0722
Email: acscanb@acslink.net.au
Web: www.acs.org.au

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You should have all recently received a "Member Details Confirmation" sheet in the mail. Can you please review this, and ensure that we have all your current contact information. If you did not receive a letter, please contact me.

For those of you that attend our regular monthly forums, you will notice that we have provided feedback forms on every table. Could you please take a minute at the next forum you attend, to complete one of these feedback forms, as this will help us in preparing the agenda's for future forums.

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