BOOK REVIEW
Book Title: Project Management Beyond Waterfall and Agile
Author: Mounir A. Ajam
Publisher: CRC Press, Taylor And Francis Group
List Price: $66.36 US
Format: Hardback, 336 Pages
Publication Date: 2018
ISBN: 978-1-138-70563-0
Reviewer: Gina Pickett, PMP
Review Date: October 2019
Introduction
Project Management Beyond Waterfall and Agile delivers exactly what the title offers- a comprehensive project management methodology that goes beyond the familiar approaches. The Customizable and Adaptable Methodology for Managing Projects (CAMMP™) offers a solution for the project manager who wants to explore an alternative approach.
The author presents CAMMP™ as a three-dimensional model consisting of Project Life Cycle, Project Management Processes/Groups, and Advanced (project success, competence, sustainability, and best practices). The author is a project management practitioner with many years of experience. The book emphasizes that it was written for practitioners, by a practitioner.
Overview of Book’s Structure
The book is divided into three sections, with seven appendices. The author describes the “current state” of project management that led to the development of CAMMP™, then progressively takes the reader on a journey through the CAMMP™ dimensions.
Section I: The Current Reality: The author presents a brief history of the current state of project management, with references to frameworks such as PMI PMBOK®, ISO 21500, and IPMA. The author clearly states that frameworks are the backbones that support a methodology; CAMMP™ being no exception. This overview of the current state of project management is necessary to move the reader forward to Section II.
Section II: The Offered Solution: The CAMMP™ model is presented along with a very informative graphic diagramming the three phases: Discovery, Development, and Delivery. The Discovery Phase corresponds to the Pre-project work that occurs in every organization but is often not included in an organization’s project management methodology. The nine stages that are subsets of the phases are: Concept, Feasibility, Requirements, Strategy, Definition, Implementation, Closing, Operational Readiness, and Initial Operations. Within each stage there are Stage Gates, each with an output which is the stage deliverable.
The author describes several areas of the CAMMP™ methodology that are innovative, most notably the adaptability of the method; “fit for purpose instead of being rigid”, (Page 60). CAMMP™ espouses the practice of including project closure as part of project delivery. Including operational readiness as part of the project is another concept outside the boundary of some methods. Processes along with their respective process gates are also described in Section II. There are six processes and four process gates. The processes are repeated in each stage.
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About the Reviewer
Gina Pickett
Texas, USA
Gina Pickett, PMP is an IT professional with more than fifteen years of experience in project management, service delivery, and service desk management. She has worked in the telecommunications, property management, and hospitality industries. Gina obtained a master’s degree in Educational Human Resource Development from Texas A&M University, with an emphasis in adult education/virtual learning. Gina is a member of the Project Management Institute, Dallas Chapter, and holds a PMP certification.
Gina can be contacted at ginagaile1@gmail.com or https://www.linkedin.com/in/gina-pickett-pmp/
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