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Information Management – the Weakest Link in your IT Chain?

Mark SmalleyMark Smalley, IT Paradigmologist, ASL BiSL Foundation, will be running a session at this year’s APMG-International Showcase on 20th June in London focusing on effective information management.

Most organizations have to cope with rapid and disruptive business change while utilizing evolving technology. This needs to be addressed from an end-to-end perspective, with close collaboration between a multitude of disciplines across the whole IT value chain. You may feel there is a weak link, but how do you identify it?

In this interactive session, participants will explore a notoriously weak link: information management. Information is an increasingly important business asset and information management is the link between the business and IT. But what does information management entail? How do you demonstrate governance? Who is accountable and responsible? Mark will answer these questions and more and you will be able to gain insight into the ‘state of the nation’ as represented by your peers in the session and into the guidance that the Business Information Services Library provides. 

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By Jessica Wharton – May 23, 2013

Maasvlatke2 Achieves Level 5 Maturity Award

Last month Alan Harpham our Chairman and Graham Bosman, one of our chief assessors, went out to Port of Rotterdam to present the Maasvlatke2 project team with a Level 5 Maturity Award. This is a fantastic achievement, the first award to be presented anywhere in the world. You can read our press release here or watch this short film.

 

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By Kate Winter – May 22, 2013

Gavin Esler at Showcase in June

gavinEslerWe are delighted to announce that Gavin Esler, Newsnight and Dateline London presenter, will be the keynote speaker at this year’s APMG-International Showcase in London.

Gavin is an award winning television and radio broadcaster, novelist and journalist. Having finished university, he started a job at The Scotsman in Edinburgh, moving then to The Belfast Telegraph before securing a position at the BBC in Belfast. From there he became the BBC’s Chief North American Correspondent and reported from countries across Europe as well as China, Peru, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and more. Currently, Gavin presents BBC2′s Newsnight and Dateline London on BBC World and the BBC News Channel.

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By Jessica Wharton – May 21, 2013

BiSL Foundation Exam available all over the globe

Jasper says BiSL is now available globally

Jasper says BiSL is now available globally

Business Information Management

Within the complexity of today’s market, organizations simply cannot function without a fully functioning information provision, including technology (IT). The most critical elements are found in the alignment of IT and business processes. It is precisely this alignment that is often far from perfect. All over the world people are looking for guidance on how to manage business information management.

BiSL framework

The BiSL® process model provides an insight on all the primary processes within the field of business information management and the relation between the various processes.

BiSL Training courses

I am training professionals all over the world and I’ve seen a lot of interest in BiSL, for example in the USA. However, most BiSL training courses are scheduled in the Netherlands.

BiSL Foundation Exam

On LinkedIn I saw people from all over the world asking how they could take the BiSL exam.  I wondered how Capgemini could help. On one hand the ASL BiSL Foundation and APMG were trying to provide examinations in other countries. On the other hand, an accredited training organization can provide virtual exams to their participants via the Internet. So I wondered whether we could provide training courses (including exams) all over the globe.

The solution

Beside BiSL training courses I also provide training in ITIL. I had already worked on the development of Capgemini’s virtual ITIL training course (including exam) because so many of our customers don’t their employees to travel, due to high costs and loss of precious time. Being a BiSL expert that is able to provide virtual training in ITIL it was easy to come up with a virtual BiSL training course including a virtual exam. This makes us the first (Dutch) company to provide BISL training courses and exams all over the globe.

More information about our virtual BiSL Foundation training course can be found on the website of Capgemini Academy click here

Jasper Maas

jasper@bislexpert.com

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By Kate Winter – May 20, 2013

Are your lessons learned being used?

Cartoon used with special permission from glasbergen.com

Cartoon used with special permission from glasbergen.com

It’s all very well filing your lessons learned reports but is your organization taking note of them?  During the project Start Up phase, project managers should look for Lessons Reports from previous projects and incorporate them in the Lessons Log for the new project.

Tracking is a job for Project Assurance and this can be done at a number of points in a project. Firstly, has the project manager looked for Lessons during the SU process? Secondly, at each stage end, have any new lessons been added to the Lessons Log? This can be compared to the stage results – time, cost, quality and to Highlight Report mentions of any problems encountered during the stage.

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By Kate Winter – May 16, 2013

Better Skills, Better Business: The 2013 Canadian Showcase

Presenters

On 1st May, the Allstream Centre in Toronto played host to the second annual APMG-International North American Showcase.  Over 150 attendees from cities such as Toronto, Ottawa, Raleigh, Calgary, Fredericton and Salt Lake City were in attendance and represented a variety of industries such as Federal, Provincial and Municipal government, Utilities, Banking and Insurance and Manufacturing.  The theme of the day was “Better Skills. Better Business. Delivering Benefits Through Effective Project, Program, Portfolio and IT Service Management.”

The opening session was kicked-off by Alan Harpham, APM Group Chairman, who gave a welcome introduction and overview of APMG-International.  Alan was followed by Opening Keynote speaker Fred Fox of the Terry Fox Foundation.  Fred captivated the audience with stories of his brother, Canadian icon Terry Fox, and his courage and determination during his cross-Canada Marathon of Hope.

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By Guest Authors – May 15, 2013

Facilitation Methodology Endorsed

Facilitation-LogoUsing facilitation skills expounded by Tony Mann, of Resource Strategic Change and senior examiner on APMG-International’s facilitation skills certification scheme, with the senior team at Premier Foods’ Hovis plant in Avonmouth, has proved extremely powerful, believes the Site Manufacturing Manager, Gordon Swanston. According to Gordon: “Our ability to very quickly coalesce as a mature problem solving team is vastly different from how it was before the facilitation programme began.

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By Bob Little – May 14, 2013

Cabinet Office & Capita issue first e-bulletin

Cabinet Office and Capita have issued their first e-bulletin explaining their intentions for the Best Management Practice Portfolio.

http://www.best-management-practice.com/gempdf/Best_Management_Practice_eBulletin_Issue_01.pdf

Questions should be emailed to ask@swirlenquiries.com

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By Kate Winter – May 13, 2013

The Need for Skills in Business Change Management

CHAMPS2 LogoChange is increasingly becoming business as usual for the majority of organizations. It is therefore important for organizations to develop capability to deliver change of ever increasing pace and complexity.

Change requires people to perform multiple roles and acquire new knowledge and behaviours. Consultants can play a vital role, though over-reliance on consultants can bring into question whether they are effectively transferring knowledge and skills to support staff development.

Organizations that develop their own in-house change management capability are better able to motivate and engage people in change and are better placed to innovate, seize opportunities and adapt to new challenges. The CHAMPS2 business change method can help to create an organization capable of effectively managing holistic change of any scale and complexity, across organizational structure, business processes and technology.

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By Guest Authors – May 8, 2013

Accreditation – Why it Matters

maven-logoMelanie Franklin, CEO of Maven Training tells us why accreditation matters and what it’s like to work with APMG.

Why should people use accredited training organizations?

I think the first thing about using an accredited training organization is that you know they have been externally validated. Somebody has come in and audited us as a training company and for me it’s important that they audit us from three aspects. First of all it’s the quality of our training materials, so we have external assessors who look at everything that we’ve put together – the volume of materials that we’re asking people to do, the content of materials we’re asking them to do during the week and pre-course, and also that the materials cover the full syllabus so that we’re not leaving anything out. It makes sure that from an external point of view, you know that the course materials you’ll have will cover everything you need for the exams.

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By Jessica Wharton – May 6, 2013