Question: How can government be made more efficient with project management software or by using project management in public administration?
Answer: Project management software provides a clear structure in which all steps of a public works project can be spelled out.
A basic break-down of the steps in a project can provide an effective operational overview of municipal or Federal government projects. This gives executives or public sector employees a clear way to track progress, identify bottlenecks and learn from past projects -because the tasks involved and people or departments associated with those tasks are clearly identified. This level of visibility in public administration can breed increased efficiency and transparency in the use of government resources.
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I’ll have the pleasure of speaking to the Mid-Michigan ColdFusion Users Group on January 8th at 7pm.
The topic will be software development and design -specifically addressing the importance of adoption and factors that can improve adoption. This will include a discussion on the use of AJAX, Flash in an interface and how to choose and design specific functionality.
Here are the directions to the user group meeting.
Please feel free to stop on by.
My recent presentation on software development and the importance of useability is available online.
Thank you to Charlie Arehart and the Online ColdFusion User Group for hosting and recording the event.
Thank you, as well, to everyone who participated in the question and answer period.
I will be speaking this Thursday, October 26 at 6 pm ET at the online ColdFusion User Group run by Charlie Arehart. The topic is on building software that people will use.
http://coldfusion.meetup.com/17/boards/view/viewthread?thread=3722239
You can join in from anywhere - so feel free to stop on by.
A big thank you to the Cleveland Adobe User Group for hosting me last week. We had a good session on designing software and on using project management software.
Thank you to Mike Cooper for arranging the meeting and to Lodestone Digital for hosting it.
Congratulations to Brian Meloche on becoming an Adobe Community Expert (an ACE)! Brian has been active in the ColdFusion Community for years. Most recently he hosted some of the best sessions at MAX on ColdFusion. Congratulations on a well-deserved achievement.
Its a week past due but thank you to the Charlotte Adobe Users Group. Had a great time with great people and lots of good conversation (both during and after the meeting).
We talked about everything from software design, user adoption and project management to where is Adobe and ColdFusion going, and what technologies will stand the test of time.
Thank you to Sutton for putting it all together, to Lodestone Digital to hosting and to everyone who attended.
A big thank you to the Toronto ColdFusion’s User Group for having me at their meeting on Wednesday -and for the “after party” 
It was a pleasure meeting everyone.
Great presentations from Ryan Favro, Byron Bignell and Laurence Middleton on CF8. And very enjoyable conversations. Thank you to Clayton Partridge for putting it all together.
Looking forward to next time.
I’ll be speaking to software developers at the Detroit Area ColdFusion Users’ Group (DETCFUG) meeting on Wednesday, August 8 at 6 pm ET. Come on by.
To attend or for more information visit http://www.detcfug.org/cfug/meetingSingle.cfm?meetingID=23.
The topic will be effective project management, particularly for development projects and IT implementations. I’ll also be giving a walk-through of Vertabase Pro, an enterprise project management application written in Adobe’s ColdFusion.
Recent talk on the scalability of Ruby on Rails (RoR) to build a web application more advanced than Basecamp (by 37signals, the creators of RoR) e.g. this from AKuAKu coming back from the Ruby on Rails unconference Rails Camp:
“The performance and scaling session which lasted about 5 minutes when no one could advance the high water mark for rails apps past basecamp.”
Reminds me of some earlier posts by Ben Forta, ColdFusion guru and related CF posts on the advantages of using ColdFusion (and ColdFusion on Wheels) to build larger scale apps.
To see a difference: in the project management software space compare Basecamp to Vertabase Pro (you can request a trial off the site). Vertabase Pro is written in CF.
Jeff Peters has a nice article in ColdFusion Developer’s Journal giving an overview on some of the basics that can be accomplished when using an organized project management process for development using project management software available from www.GrokFusebox.com.
There are an additional set of project management software tools that can surround the software development process as a whole, providing a framework in which the development work takes place. Functionality in this framework includes tracking tasks, priorities, resource allocation across projects or a department and budgetary tracking and reporting.
These features create a more positive environment for software development or for a software development project.
Essentially, with minimal data input from a developer, management can get all the data they need to monitor the project or portfolio of projects (which they’re going to do anyway), without having to interrupt the developers or waste people’s time in meetings.
Vertabase Pro is a ColdFusion based project management software tool that does just this. You can get a look at it by checking out a screenshot tour or requesting a test drive.
Nothing is going to be easier than just being left alone to do your work. But these kind of project management tools can make a big impact on the overall long-term success of a software development project or IT department within a company or in a client/developer relationship.
