Agile Project Management Expert Scott M. Graffius Featured in New Book on Innovation Management

08 September 2019
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Scott M. Graffius's Agile Scrum Helps Startups and Other Businesses Innovate


LOS ANGELES, California, September 8, 2019 — A fantastic agile transformation experience and result with a client organization in the entertainment industry was the inspiration for Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions by Scott M. Graffius, Principal Consultant and the CEO of Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions™. Material from Graffius's book is featured in Harold Kerzner's newest book, Innovation Project Management: Methods, Case Studies, and Tools for Managing Innovation Projects.

The following content from Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions heads up the section on Agile Innovation (page 36) of Kerzner's book:

"Shifting customer needs are common in today's marketplace. Businesses must be adaptive and responsive to change while delivering an exceptional customer experience to be competitive. Traditional development and delivery frameworks such as waterfall are often ineffective. In contrast, Scrum is a value-driven agile approach which incorporates adjustments based on regular and repeated customer and stakeholder feedback. And Scrum's built-in rapid response to change leads to substantial benefits such as fast time-to-market, higher satisfaction, and continuous improvement—which supports innovation and drives competitive advantage."
— Scott M. Graffius, Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions



About Harold Kerzner

Harold Kerzner, Ph.D., is Senior Executive Director at the International Institute for Learning, Inc., a global learning solutions company that conducts training for leading corporations throughout the world. He is a globally recognized expert on project, program, and portfolio management, total quality management, and strategic planning. Dr. Kerzner is the author of bestselling books and texts, including the acclaimed Project Management: A Systems Approach to Planning, Scheduling, and Controlling, Tenth Edition. Innovation Project Management: Methods, Case Studies, and Tools for Managing Innovation Projects is his newest book.

For more information on Dr. Kerzner, visit his Wikipedia page.

About Innovation Project Management: Methods, Case Studies, and Tools for Managing Innovation Projects

The following includes content from the product description for the book.

Conventional project management methods are oftentimes insufficient for managing innovation projects. Innovation is lost under the pre-determined scope and forecasted environments of traditional project management. There is tremendous pressure on organizations to innovate, and the project managers responsible for managing these innovation projects do not have the training or tools to do their jobs effectively. Innovation Project Management provides the tools, insights, and metrics needed to successfully manage innovation projects—helping readers identify problems in their organization, conceive elegant solutions, and, when necessary, promote changes to their organizational culture.

There are several kinds of innovation—ranging from incremental changes to existing products to wholly original processes that emerge from market-disrupting new technology—that possess different characteristics and often require different tools. Best-selling author and project management expert Harold Kerzner integrates innovation, project management, and strategic planning to offer students and practicing professionals the essential tools and processes to analyze innovation from all sides. Innovation Project Management deconstructs traditional project management methods and explains why and how innovation projects should be managed differently. This invaluable resource:

  • Provides practical advice and actionable tools for effectively managing innovation projects
  • Offers value-based project management metrics and guidance on how to establish a metrics management program
  • Shares exclusive insights from project managers at world-class organizations such as Airbus, Boeing, Hitachi, IBM, and Siemens on how they manage innovation projects
  • Explores a variety of types of innovation including co-creation, value-driven, agile, open versus closed, and more
  • Instructors have access to PowerPoint lecture slides by chapter through the book’s companion website

Innovation Project Management: Methods, Case Studies, and Tools for Managing Innovation Projects (ISBN-13: 9781119587293) is an essential text for professional project managers, corporate managers, innovation team members, as well as students in project management, innovation and entrepreneurship programs.

The book is available at Amazon and other retailers.

About Scott M. Graffius

Exceptional_PPM_and_PMO_Solutions_-_Exceptional_Agility_-_Scott_M_Graffius_-_v22021807-LR-SQ

Scott M. Graffius is a technology leader, project management expert, consultant, international speaker, and award-winning author.

Graffius is a Principal Consultant and the CEO of Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions™, a professional services firm, where he helps clients strengthen their project management capabilities and realize their strategic objectives and business initiatives. The consultancy provides advisory, training, and facilitative consulting services related to project, program, portfolio, and PMO management. The firm’s expertise spans agile, traditional waterfall, and hybrid approaches. While every engagement is unique, outcomes typically include getting more projects done, faster delivery time, improved on-budget performance, improved customer and stakeholder satisfaction, and more. Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions™ backs its services with a Delighted Client Guarantee™.

A fantastic agile transformation experience and result with a client organization in the entertainment industry was the inspiration for Graffius's first book, Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions (ISBN-13: 9781533370242). It helps technical and non-technical teams develop and deliver products in short cycles with rapid adaptation to change, fast time-to-market, and continuous improvement—which supports innovation and drives competitive advantage. The book has garnered 17 first place awards from national and international competitions. Graffius and Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions have been featured in Yahoo Finance, the Boston Herald, NBC WRAL, Informa, Innovation Management, the Dallas Business Journal, Computer Weekly, the PM World Journal, BookLife by Publisher’s Weekly, NHD Podcast, Learning Solutions, Harold Kerzner’s Innovation Project Management, and additional media outlets and publications. The trailer, high-resolution images, reviews, a list of awards, and more are available in the digital media kit for the book.

His second title, Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change (ISBN-13: 9781072447962), was named one of the best Scrum books of all time by BookAuthority. The trailer, a list of awards, and more are presented at the book’s website.

Graffius is a former vice president of project management with a publicly traded provider of diverse consumer products and services over the Internet. Before that, he ran and supervised the delivery of projects and programs in public and private organizations with businesses ranging from e-commerce to advanced technology products and services, retail, manufacturing, entertainment, and more. He has experience with consumer, business, reseller, government, and international markets, as well as experience spanning 20 countries.

Graffius has a bachelor's degree in Psychology with a focus in Human Factors. He holds seven professional certifications: Certified Scrum Professional - ScrumMaster (CSP-SM), Certified Scrum Professional - Product Owner (CSP-PO), Certified ScrumMaster (CSM), Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO), Project Management Professional (PMP), Lean Six Sigma Green Belt (LSSGB), and IT Service Management Foundation (ITIL). He is a member of the Scrum Alliance, the Project Management Institute, and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Within the IEEE, Scott is a member of the Computer Society, the Consumer Electronics Society, the Broadcast Technology Society, the Internet of Things (IoT) Community, and the Consultants Network.

He has been actively involved with the Project Management Institute (PMI) in the development of professional standards. He was a member of the team which produced the Practice Standard for Work Breakdown Structures—Second Edition. Graffius was a contributor and reviewer of A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge—Sixth Edition, The Standard for Program Management—Fourth Edition, and The Practice Standard for Project Estimating—Second Edition (scheduled to be published in December 2019). He was also a subject matter expert reviewer of content for the PMI EMEA Congress 2019, and he is a member of the review team for the Scrum Alliance’s Global Scrum Gathering—New York City 2020.

Graffius regularly speaks at conferences and other events around the globe where he delights audiences with presentations on agile, traditional, and hybrid project, program, portfolio, and PMO management. He integrates content on professional standards, best practices, and his first-hand experience with successful implementations. Graffius uses everyday language and vibrant custom visuals to make complex topics clear and understandable, and he provides audiences with practical information they can use. Attendees have said “Scott is an amazing speaker,” “fantastic presentation,” and “highly recommended!” Appearances are listed at the public speaker section of his website.

About Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions

Shifting customer needs are common in today's marketplace. Businesses must be adaptive and responsive to change while delivering an exceptional customer experience to be competitive. There are a variety of frameworks supporting the development of products and services, and most approaches fall into one of two broad categories: traditional or agile. Traditional practices such as waterfall engage sequential development, while agile involves iterative and incremental deliverables. Organizations are increasingly embracing agile to manage projects, and best meet their business needs of rapid response to change, fast delivery speed, and more.

With clear and easy to follow step-by-step instructions, Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions helps you:

  • Implement and use the most popular agile framework―Scrum
  • Deliver products in short cycles with rapid adaptation to change, fast time-to-market, and continuous improvement
  • Support innovation and drive competitive advantage

Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions has garnered 17 first place awards from national and international competitions. Credit is shared with Chris Hare and Colin Giffen, the technical editors on the publication.

The author and his book have been featured in Yahoo Finance, the Boston Herald, NBC WRAL, Informa, Innovation Management, the Dallas Business Journal, Computer Weekly, the PM World Journal, BookLife by Publisher’s Weekly, NHD Podcast, Learning Solutions, Harold Kerzner’s Innovation Project Management, and additional media outlets and publications. The trailer, high-resolution images, reviews, a list of awards, and more are available in the digital media kit.

Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions is offered in ebook/Kindle (ASIN: B01FZ0JIIY) and paperback (ISBN-13: 9781533370242) formats around the world.

The ebook/Kindle format is available in:


The paperback is for sale in:


And also from other retailers, distributors, and partners around the world.

About Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions™

Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions provides client organizations with advisory, training, speaking, embedded talent, and facilitative consulting services to help them advance their agile project, program, portfolio, and PMO management capabilities to best realize their strategic objectives and business initiatives, making them more competitive and valuable. Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions™ confidently backs its services with a Delighted Client Guarantee™. To learn more, visit https://www.Exceptional-PMO.com.

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