If you compare the Blackberry® and iPhone® on a features and functions basis there is not that much that tells them apart; yet they are as different as chalk and cheese.
The Blackberry is a phone with a screen. The iPhone is a screen with a phone.
This difference seems like semantics but betrays the fundamental difference.
With the Blackberry, the screen is essentially an output device, displaying what is received or is about to be dispatched. With the iPhone, the screen is whatever the context needs it to be; an email address input screen, a phone number input screen; an email text input screen or movie output screen.
The iPhone has revolutionised phones. (One of my sons, who admittedly works for Apple, cautions me when I refer to my iPhone as ‘a phone’; “it’s a portable computer!” he reminds me; and he is right.)
This seeming similarity yet fundamental difference is what TOP® (Totally Optimized Projects™) brings to project and program delivery.
On the surface, the orthodox approaches of PMBOK, Prince2, MSP, Val-IT and others can claim similarities with TOP, based on feature and function comparisons, yet they are fundamentally different.
Orthodox methodologies approach projects, programs and portfolios from a project, cost and control perspective. TOP approaches projects, programs and portfolios from a business, strategy and value delivery perspective.
The difference is as great as the iPhone difference described above.
TOP expands the opportunities to deliver value exponentially. It changes how you think about, deliver and measure projects and their success. It equips and enables the business to lead its own projects.
Like the launch of the iPhone, TOP provides a new choice — value delivery over project delivery.
