Project Management Metrics, KPIs, and Dashboards: A Guide to Measuring and Monitoring Project Performance

I'm the CTO of a not for profit that evaluates and accredits Bodies of Knowledge (IABOK dot org). Kerzner's book loosely follows the PMBOK, but is intented for practical project evaluation and execution in the real world, not self study for the certification exams, although the material will certainly help with a much deeper understanding of what's BENEATH the certification questions. Since I help write those questions, I'll guarantee that the best answers are all about what's here. At a little over 350 pages for a 7.5 x 9" trim, this might seem like a pretty expensive little work, even with Amazon's great discount. UNTIL you get into it. The presentation- format is simply amazing. Dr. Kerzner and his publishers spared no expense with numerous "MBA" like tables, bullets, graphics, charts, etc. to present the salient points in jump off the page color and "3D" like quality. This not only makes the material of high value for density of info, but also makes self study, application and memorability much, much easier. Kerzner is as negative as he is positive-- showing a LOT of "bad" decisions, mistakes, cases and other traps for project managers. I often judge an "advice" book by whether or not the author goes beyond a corporate, bureaucratic perspective. 8 points for taking the customer's "specs" into account, 10 plus for actually extending the project's objectives to the CUSTOMER's success-- and Kerzner does just that. If you're in your own small company, back of the napkin PM is fine, as long as you're a good presenter. But if you're either in a bigger organization, or consult for one, you know that your "powerpoints" can make or break you. Dr. Harold does a superb job of showing not only stunning dashboards used by the best practices companies, but gives numerous, well organized, 3D and color "plug in" dashboards that the reader can emulate to make their own project monitoring, managing and presentations go to the board level. Because project management is much different than transaction or ops management, many books have a lot of "apologetics" that try to justify the PM role, especially in matrix organizations where the product manager controls the budget, and the project folk have to continually justify their authority. Kerzner doesn't "avoid" this-- instead, he uses a LOT of metrics to show numerous ways to both manage and spin cost vs. value, including of the project team's contributions. Even if you're not in project management, you're being measured every day, or your projects and products will be. Understanding metrics is as important for K-12 teachers as it is for Engineers designing nuclear reactors or power distribution grids. I always advise our customers to study metrics of all kinds-- and this book is a MUST in that category, not just for PM. An investment that returns far more than a single reading confers-- you'll refer both to content AND presentation over and over. Skim, read, study or refer? All four in this case. Usual note: I have nothing to do with this author or publisher or Amazon.

For everyone deeply interested in setting a cost effective aproach for dealing with project management perfomance, this excellent book will become the right reference to build an effective framework to assure pragmatic metrics, and KPI's adequate and enough to monitor project execution and ensuring stakeholder satisfaction .

Seeking info on measurement of project activities I found some practical advice. Second half and Chapter 8 is particularly interesting, but first 25% of the book is not.

This book is exactly what I was looking for doing my conclusion work pos graduation. It's about KPI in management projects.

This book is second-to-none. With it in hand I can navigate confidently from elicitation of business reporting requirements through to developing the best solution to meet those needs n' wants.

I bought this book with hopes of finding examples of actual metrics and KPIs that could be used in projects and programs, and how successful they are in practice. Instead, the book is almost all theory, with very little hard information (much like the PMBOK Guide itself).

Very impressive for those who work deep in project management best practices and also want to rise up the bars!

This is a very good entry book for people that are just starting out in the project management or operations world. It is easy to understand and a decently quick read, as far as textbooks go.