How to become and IT administator for dummies?

March 3, 2009 9:11 AM

I am at my wit’s end. Can anyone point me to some resources that would help me figure out how to administrate (in the secretarial sense) a haphazard pile of IT projects? Or lay out how to build an administration system from scratch?

I have become the lone administrator of about twelve IT projects, ranging from hardware upgrades to disaster recovery and everything in between. These projects are contracted out to about six different companies. They are individually managed by about four project managers and overseen by one. Appallingly, there is currently no administrative framework in place.

I have no idea how to handle all of this, especially given that I have no real knowledge of the processes and stages involved in completing an IT project. I know that it all starts with RFPs and Statements of Work and ends with the contract closure… There will be no training. Hell, I can’t even get 10 minutes out of the senior PM so that she can explain what’s going on. Please help!

PS. I know about GTD and have found it somewhat helpful. It's just that in this case, I'm not entirely sure what needs to get done...

posted by kitcat to Work & Money (1 answer total)

I am not sure if you have time to read a book on it, but if you were to read one - Project Management for Information Systems by Cadle and Yeates.What you have been asked to do is not a trivial task. You probably need to put in place a formal Project Management methodoloy that all of the PMs should follow but again this will be difficult to do unless you have buy in from the PMs and from the sounds of the above this will be difficult.
posted by clarkie666 at 10:17 AM on March 3, 2009