KerikaA better way to manage your knowledge

Case Study: Transforming a PMO – Leveraging Agile Methodology

Treinen Migrates to the Cloud for PMO Needs

Increase in number of projects

Need increases to expand PMO and account management functions

Explore options; move from “sticky notes” to cloud solution - Kerika

As Treinen’s Project Portfolio Grows Rapidly…• Treinen Associates, Inc. (Treinen) has been exploring various tools to

assist them in managing a large and increasingly more complex portfolio of projects:• Single personnel engagements• Large multi-person projects• Fixed priced/deliverable-based projects• Unique partnering and management combinations• Interstate project needs and demands

The Role for Account Management Becomes Paramount• While the dynamics of a couple of dozen projects while things are

static can be easy to manage through simple tools, the environment quickly can change:• Management of resources must be flexible and proactive• More activity occurs for account management overseeing larger projects • Increased visibility into the portfolio dashboard to align support model• Easy to see differentiation of resource types, utilization, and availability• Allow for constant information feeds from multiple sources that does not

encumber already encumbered staff

Exploring Options Led to an Unexpected Find• Treinen uses a variety of standard tools to support clients and all were

explored and to some degree, tested and piloted. • Due to changing needs and nature of our business, we looked to

some leap-frogging technological as a paradigm shift to match how we do business.• Landed upon Kerika and worked with them to vet out the concepts:• Took several business functions and splashed them against the tool• Build more sophisticated templates and dashboards for PMO resource

management• Upon learning how to structure information, tool become more universal

The Transformation to Kerika was Painless

Describe your business needs

Visualize this in terms of data management and relationships

Begin laying design out in Kerika: -Fast -Flexible -Intuitive

Illustrative Process

Current Process:• “Sticky Notes” =

resources, status, role• Colors provided

differentiation (employee/contractor)

• New needs (orange) placeholder

• Basic project information noted on stickies

• Very easy to “move” people around or add new sticky

Challenges and Needs Identified

• As portfolio grew, quickly determined that more eyes and fingers were needed to assist in managing scope and needs of clients and staff• Worked for one person, but not visible or usable to others; was not

supportive of multiple branches and locations• Needed something that was “as easy” or actually easier than moving

a sticky around – that was a hard proposition we believed• Desired to have both data and visual components to address both

executive level “snapshots” and account managers needs for task level information

Embraced Agile concepts and the Cloud• Met and worked with CEO of Kerika a year ago in Seattle by chance• On and off discussions continued, but we focused on existing tools to

“push them” to do what we wanted• Realized challenges and decided to test out Kerika in detailed pilot• From a hour discussion with Kerika, we spent 4 hours to create PMO in

tool• Logical layout within Kerika was obvious once we began• The “card” is the most versatile element, so determine that first• Now completely manageable via the cloud, but secure and restricted to

only those members that are invited

The New PMO….NEW PROCESS:1. Projects are now laid out and

can be ordered in any fashioned desired; alerts are noted for past or coming due items.

2. Each project has account management, new opportunities, and project specific tracks

3. Resources, tasks, and information can flow easily between tracks or across projects.

Center of this Project is Resources

• Our Utilization List (a Project in Kerika) managing each resource• A resource = “card” that can

be moved, used (multiple times), has attributes that it can be assigned

Benefits of Kerika

• Intuitive thinking can leverage Kerika for any kind of knowledge management, information sharing, or project activity.• Local company with extremely engaged and responsive President• Able to manage a vast amount of information from many different

sources at multiple levels of details• Very customizable to meet diverse business and organizational needs• No hardware or software purchases needed, but can leverage existing

infrastructure (e.g. SharePoint).

Kerika compared to other Solutions

• INSERT TABLE

• Main differences:• Kerika is being used by State of Washington Agencies and the OCIO.• Kerika’s staff and model is all about supporting their customers

• Frequent releases to incorporate client needs;• Local presence, accessible and engaged in customers business• Etc….

Product Feature 1 Feature 2 Feature 3

Kerika

Terrello

Etc.