From the desk
Project delivery written by someone still doing it. The reasoning first, then the tool, template or diagram that makes it usable on Monday.
Two ratios off one earned value figure. SPI divides it by the plan and reads schedule. CPI divides it by the bill and reads cost. Below 1 is bad news in both, for different reasons.
Three figures read at one date. Planned value is what the baseline said would be finished by now, earned value is what did finish, actual cost is what finishing it cost.
One bar per variable, the widest at the top, all of them measured against a baseline down the middle. A tornado diagram ranks what could move an outcome, and by how much.
A risk might happen. An issue already has. That single difference decides which artefact a line belongs in, what you record about it, and who you have to tell.
One row per stakeholder, one column per engagement level, and two marks per row. The distance between the two marks is the only thing on the grid you can actually act on.
Three attributes, seven classes, one question: whose claim gets attention first. Hold all three and you are a definitive stakeholder, and definitive stakeholders do not wait.
Predictive work gets an ending for free, the day the thing is handed over. Iterative work has to manufacture one, which is why so much of it never formally ends at all.
Cadence is the beat the work runs to. Delivery cadence is how often finished output reaches the people who asked for it. Teams conflate the two and then wonder why nobody feels the pace.
A delivery manager does not need to know contract law. They need to notice the moment a delivery problem becomes a contractual one, because after that moment informal handling starts costing money.
Contingency reserve sits inside the cost baseline, for risks already named and priced. Management reserve sits above it, for the ones nobody named. Level and authority, not size.
A reward is set in advance and conditional. Recognition is retrospective, unexpected and free. Most project managers control the second and none of the first, which decides where the effort goes.
Three types, separated by one variable: how much authority the office holds. Supportive advises, controlling requires, directive runs the work. Level is a second axis and a different question.
Iteration-based agile fixes the length of the cycle and commits a batch to it. Flow-based agile fixes the amount of work in progress and pulls the next item when a slot frees.
A needs assessment measures the distance between the current state and the state an organisation requires, in evidence rather than assertion, and it does it before any solution is named.
A make or buy analysis compares the whole life cost of building something against buying it, and finds the point where the cheaper option changes. Capability, control and risk usually decide it.
Most risk registers record one number per row. The number that actually justifies spending money is the distance between two of them.