Application Rationalization - Increasing Business Value from Application Portfolios

In today's world of cost-cutting, streamlining and ongoing business transformation efforts, organizations are seeking ways to be more agile, lean and innovative.  One area that business leaders can become more agile and lean is to clearly determine the value of their portfolio and how they can align it to fit the organization's strategic direction over a given timeline. 

Here's an approach to assess the value of a portfolio through an application rationalization framework that leaders or consultants can use to help their clients determine the best disposition of each application and the overall value of applications that can drive the business forward.       

How Leading Organizations Are Using Digital for Strategic Advantage

Digital transformation efforts are underway in most organizations today as leaders continue to uncover new opportunities that create added value and better ways to engage with customers.

Businesses in different industries are in various stages of using digital advancements to better compete. Some organizations are in the beginning stages while others are evolving into digital masters as they implement new innovative digital growth strategies to adapt to emerging trends. 

Although there are many different dimensions to digital transformation, here are some of the key areas that leaders are considering when implementing digital solutions for strategic advantage.


Top 10 Traits of Extraordinary Leaders and Entrepreneurs

Successful leaders are typically measured on the goals they achieve for their organization. However, achieving results is only part of what makes a great leader.

Here is a list of the top 10 traits that apply to both corporate leaders and entrepreneurs. These traits can make a significant leadership difference in any type of organization – small or large, and can be practiced by any business professional who wants to shift from being ordinary to becoming an extraordinary leader regardless of their role.

How to Make Your Project Management Office Provide Strategic Value

A Project Management Office (PMO) can play a significant role in helping organizations implement their strategic initiatives. It can help boost efficiency, reduce costs, and improve project delivery time. But its value continues to be a source of debate as PMOs struggle to demonstrate sufficient value and the needed buy-in at the executive level of the organization.

Recent research shows that as many as 50 percent of Project Management Offices are failing, even as more and more organizations implement them. And of those not quite failing, a high percentage are not maturing fast enough to provide value to the organization’s bottom line.

So What's the Problem?
In this article I discuss why PMOs fail, how High Performance Organizations have leveraged their PMOs and some considerations to take into account to make your PMO provide strategic value in your organization.

The Five Focus Areas For Successful Project Management

The skill of project and program management has become an increasingly important area of focus as more and more companies are realizing the value it has to their bottom line, top-line and overall culture.

Those of us who have been in the world of project management for a while know the multitude of challenges that are encountered in managing projects, many of which can cause major risks if not properly handled. However, organizations still underestimate the level of experience, complexity and the bigger picture of what it takes to succeed in delivering projects.

Are Organizations and Project Managers Missing the Bigger Picture About Project Management?

In this article, I’d like to explore what the bigger picture is and what is missing in terms of best-practices to make project management successful.

Emotional Intelligence - The Hidden Key to Success

Emotional Intelligence (also known as EI or EQ) is one of the keys to success both personally and professionally, yet many people do not have deep insight on what it is and how it impacts performance.  

Unlike IQ that measures cognitive intelligence, EQ is related to awareness and social complexities related to emotions and reactions and the ability to effectively manage them in oneself and with others to drive positive outcomes.

7 Strategies for Overcoming Resource Issues and Risks on Your Projects

Resource management is an area that every project manager knows is critical to project success; It is one of the major responsibilities of a project manager that requires both soft and hard skills. As part of the resource management process, a resource plan is put together with a list of the resources and the estimated time allocation needed by each resource. However many times there is a gap between planning and execution - and that gap could be significant when the resources are identified to work on the project. Project managers can end up with some real-life challenges when they find themselves encountering the people issues that make it very difficult to manage the project. Below are some of the obstacles that are common for project managers to come across when managing resources and seven key strategies for overcoming those obstacles:

4 Effective Ways Leaders Introduce Change into Their Organization

Organizations are reshaping themselves and requiring that they change quickly in order to be competitive. Customers are demanding more; excellence in service is becoming paramount; technology is constantly changing; the workforce needs are shifting; and processes need constant improvements to meet these demands and changes.

Introducing and managing that change in an effective and efficient way is critical to every leader’s success. But with change comes resistance.  Meeting that resistance is one of the biggest challenges leaders face.  The more a leader understands the importance of driving the change cycle and the change management process, the more he or she can be at the helm of that change initiative.

Here are four ways a leader can act as a change agent to facilitate the change and increase the probability for successfully introducing the change into the organization.

How Successful Risk-Takers Think

Risk-taking is an imperative part of leadership and entrepreneurship. Being comfortable with taking risks is a very important characteristic in a leader's effectiveness. Entrepreneurs are by nature risk-takers and must take risks in order to thrive. Similarly with corporate leaders.  However in order to be effective at risk-taking, you need to have a way for calculating the risk and managing that risk.   We've heard the statement "the higher the risk, the higher the rewards". But at the same time, the higher the risk, the higher the failure.

Successful leaders and entrepreneurs who are comfortable risk takers have developed a mindset around risk taking and a process by which to manage their risks in order to manage their emotions about the unknown, reap the benefits and maximize their returns when they take on risks to progress and grow.

Here are five ways that risk takers think to grow their organization.

7 Common Pitfalls to Avoid When Managing Projects

Those of us who have been in the project management field for a long time know the many challenges and risks – both expected and unexpected - that can surface on projects. Combine that with the challenges of managing remote teams, different personalities, different agendas, conflicting priorities, booked schedules, unclear scope, and a stressed environment, and you have a road filled with many obstacles to overcome before you even start.

In this article I’d like to start by summarizing some common pitfalls that I have experienced and observed in many of the client environments I have worked – in hopes to help others proactively mitigate and even avoid them.

How Organizations Grow and Age

Every organization goes through a life cycle that consists of different developmental stages, just as in the human life cycle we experience different stages - from infancy to childhood to adolescence to adulthood, to midlife, and so on.  Along with each of these stages, there are unique challenges, common modes of operations, threats and opportunities for growth.  

Just as in our own personal development and growth, we undergo turbulences, highs, lows, successes and failures, organizations undergo the same. When we are aware of what the causes are and understand what we need to do to succeed both from an internal and external perspective, then we can lead and make the necessary change to become more balanced, sustainable and successful.  Some can ride the waves to overcome these stages, others stay turbulent trying to survive, while fewer find a way to thrive even through turbulent times.  Why?

Three Ways Leaders Use Emotional Intelligence to Make a Difference

Studies in the last decade continue to show that having a high degree of emotional intelligence significantly impacts results and differentiates the type of success leaders achieve.  Although IQ has traditionally been the factor in identifying people's intelligence, emotional intelligence, on the other hand, identifies the degree of effectiveness and ability to relate to and successfully interact with others. 

In this highly competitive, high-stress environment we are in today, one of the areas that is significantly impacted is the successful interactions with others. Why? The simple answer is because stress impacts emotions and emotions impact interactions. Those with higher emotional intelligence recognize that they need to be more aware of their emotions in the moment, manage those emotions so they are not impacting interactions, and relate to what others need in order to build successful outcomes.  

Here are three simple ways that leaders use emotional intelligence to make a difference with their team, especially when interactions seem hard:    

10 Communication Principles to Build Highly Effective Relationships

Communication is the universal tool for connecting with people and developing meaningful relationships in our lives. It is the magic glue that can help us achieve success not only in the work place but also in our personal lives.
The effectiveness or lack of effectiveness of our communications comes from our thinking, emotions and assumptions.
With the awareness about what drives communication and the guiding principles to help you identify what blocks communication, enhances interactions and sustains relationships, you can build highly effective relationships at all levels in business and in your own personal life.

Effective Stress Management Techniques to Apply Daily

Stress is a part of life and impacts everyone. It comes in all forms and levels of intensity, and has both positive and negative effects. Stress is a critical topic to address because it is affecting people at work, at home and in their overall lives. In most cases, stress causes problems when left unchecked. The issue is never whether people have stress or not in their lives; everyone experiences stress. The issue is how much is your stress impacting you and how well are you managing it?

Here are some healthy strategies and techniques to help you be aware of your stress and to turn your stress into productive action so it is does not impact your overall well-being, relationships and performance!


rania-kortRania Kort is an Independent Management Consultant and Business Advisor with more than 20 years’ experience helping Fortune 100 companies successfully implement strategic initiatives. Rania has managed large-scale programs and programs, established and run PMO's and implemented process improvement in many different industries. She ran and grew an IT Management Practice for PricewaterhouseCoopers for more than seven years managing over 300 consultants.  Currently, she serves as an independent consultant focusing on achieving results through collaboration and a team leadership approach that ensures alignment, accountability and trust to develop high-performance teams.

If you would like to contact me, I can be reached either through my contact page or through LinkedIn.