General EPM Partners Qualifications

[john]

Hello Project Server Community,

I have been going through the process of trying to qualify potential EPM
consultants or EPM companies to contract for my organization. I have been
really boggled by the responses that I have received when I ask them, if they
are actually using MS EPM within their own organization and a majority have
said "NO". Is it a requirement for EPM Partners to "Eat their own Dog Food"
to be using Microsoft EPM? I would assume a company would be using what they
are selling to customers as a solution.

I appreciate any insight out there to see if this is just what I am coming
across.

Thanks
John

 

[Paul Conroy]

For a partner to obtain the EPM Core Compentancy they need

Two certified staff each having passed one exam related to project 2003 or
2007
Three customer references where they have engaged in relation to Project,
SharePoint or SQL technologies

There is definately no requirement for partners to run EPM internally.

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[john]

Thank you Paul. I would like to see MS include this in their Partner Status.
It provides much more credibility in the Partners Status. So far, I have
ranked the candidates higher if they can prove to me that they have deployed
the EPM solution internally and not learning on my or the "Customers Dime".

Paul - do you use the EPM system in your organization?

I would like others to respond and share how they are doing in their own
organization.

I would think this a value-add for Microsoft to rank their EPM Partner
Statuses.

Any other comments?

Thanks
John

 

[Paul Conroy]

I do use MS Project and SharePoint, though being a small business with
limited resources, using Project Server would be overkill.

Before starting my own company I did deploy Microsoft EPM within the company
I worked for.

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[john]

Thank you Paul for your honesty.

Anyone from the larger Partner Companies using EPM religously?

Thanks
John

 

[Marc Soester [MVP]]

Hi John,

I am responsible for a large EPM consulting organisation in Australia and we
are using project server 2007 to manage all of our projects, to the point
where we create our customer status reports using Project Server.

Having said this, I believe that there are very good reasons for consulting
organisations not to use Project Server and that is due to the nature of the
consulting business. For example: Project Server only manages resource cost
and not resource "revenue". Most consulting organisations require the
abillity to allocate a "price" per resource per project. That is one very
large gap that project server cannot handle and certainly a reason why even
EPM consulting firms dont use the solution.

I dont believe that only because an EPM organisation doesnt "eat their own
dogfood" makes them less of an EPM organisation. It is important that an EPM
organisation has a structures business approach implmenting EPM. check their
experience and make reference checks to customers where the organisation has
already implmeneted EPM. That will give you a much clearer picture if the
organisation is actually doing a good job.

Also most EPM organisations are smaller organisations ( due to the niche
market ) and Project Server may well be an overkill. Paul is a great example.
From what i can see Paul is one of the most experienced EPM consultants you
will find, but only because he doesnt use project server doesnt make him a
bad consultant. What Paul can do is apply the BEST practice of EPM for your
organisation and that makes him a great EPM consultant ( sorry Paul to use
you as an example mate ).

Anyway I hope I made my point clear. Do reference checks and dont judge "a
book by its cover", that will give you a better picture.

Hope this helps
All the best

 

[john]

Thanks Marc for making my point. I still see the value in adding this to the
criteria of a Partners status.

An analogy I can make for my concern, when evaluating talent is that we sell
and make Fords, but go home and drive Toyotas. The strongest EPM consultants
I have come across so far are the ones that have a good balance of Technical
and Functional skillsets in demonstrating how they personally overcome
challenges.

Another Issue I see is when it comes to the Project Portfolio Management
Process, this really hurts the EPM niche companies not having much first-hand
experience going through a rigid process that Larger organizations have to go
through.

Will Microsoft address the price per resource in future releases? Large
organizations charge back as well to other departments and I see this as a
huge issue.

Thanks again for the response.

John

 

[Gary L. Chefetz [MVP]]

John:

I agree with you that it's difficult to tell your clients to use a
technology that you do not use yourself. Besides, you learn a lot more about
Project Server when you use it every day. That's why we use Project Server
to run our EPM consulting practice.

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Gary L. Chefetz, MVP
MSProjectExperts
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