The Business Savvy Project Manager

The Business-Savvy Project Manager is your guide to designing and managing projects that make meaningful, positive economic contributions to your organization. From the big-picture fundamentals of finance, accounting, and organizational management to focused techniques for designing effective projects, keeping them financially sound, and pulling long-term economic value from their results, this bottom line–driven book will supply you with the managerial knowledge and insights you need to:

• Prepare and present a compelling business case that convinces decision makers of the merits of committing company money to a project

• Apply risk management tools and techniques to the entire project life cycle, including incorporating risk analysis as a key component of project selection and oversight

• Create a cash flow chart that identifies and models the relevant cash inflows and outflows to assess your project’s financial strength

• Verify that projects integrate well with your organization’s overall project investment portfolio

• Conduct post-project audits that examine the actual results of projects after completion and indicate ways to improve the overall project process

At root, businesses are meant to produce positive cash flow for their investors, and projects are meant to help businesses achieve that financial objective. The problem is, many organizations lose sight of business goals, judging the success or failure of critical projects more on the technical aspects of staying within budgeted time and cost constraints, rather than on the real-world aspects of economic value provided.