With TV Globo completing the final transition from their 20-year-old in-house media scheduling system to SIMS, their first vendor-provided software system, I have had occasion to reflect. Over my career, I have managed projects for NASA, Sony, Avid, TiVo and others. Projects tend to follow a bell curve. In the beginning, there is a rush of excitement as the new project starts. Then it gets harder and harder until it is quite challenging in the middle. Once over the hump, it gets easier over time until the final emotional rush at the end of the project when the objectives are finally achieved. The emotional high at the end is what Project Managers live for. Over the past year and a half since I started with StorerTV in August 2010, the project with TV Globo has followed this bell curve and we have now reached the crescendo at the end in which the entire team gets to celebrate our accomplishments.

The SIMS project for TV Globo has been productive and gratifying. We have solidified a very strong team at StorerTV of developers, QA and Customer Support. We have built robust relationships with TV Globo and with TV Globo's system integrator, PCA, as well as other vendors to TV Globo. And most of all, we delivered the functionality that TV Globo needs to effectively run their operations for many years to come.

Some milestones from the TV Globo project that stick in my memory are:

• Providing our first release to TV Globo in August 2010, less than a month after software development began.
• Completing the first phase of our development effort just before Christmas 2010.
• Two representatives from TV Globo spending a month with us in Mequon, Wisconsin in Jan/Feb 2011 to thoroughly test SIMS in preparation for Go Live. During this time, we had a blizzard which was a significant event for two people from Brazil who had never seen snow!
• Going live with SIMS at TV Globo in April 2011, initiating parallel operations with SIMS and the legacy system.
• Cutover of operations for the TV Globo International channels from the legacy system to SIMS in July 2011.
• Release of extensive additional functionality and features over the second half of 2011.
• And of course, cutover of all TV Globo operations to SIMS, retiring the legacy system, in February 2012.

One of the most fulfilling moments on the project was meeting with users in Rio in November 2011 and seeing the big smiles on their faces. It was very rewarding to have them ask me to thank the developers for improving their quality of life by providing SIMS. While it is TV Globo management that works with StorerTV to ensure that the project is successful, it is the users who use SIMS on a daily basis who are the most benefited by the success of the project. It is very gratifying to have made such a difference in the lives of the users.

After a week at TV Globo in Rio in November, I took advantage of being in such an environmentally rich country to visit the Pantanal which is a very large pristine wetland in the middle of South America, 85% of which is in Brazil. My husband and I were there for a week and stayed at two lodges along the Transpantaneira where we saw Jaguars, Ocelots, Giant River Otters, Howler Monkeys, a Tapir, Tarantulas, tons of Capybara and Caiman, and many birds including Toucans, Macaws, Rhea, Great Horned Owls, parakeets, hawks, kingfishers, cormorants and giant Jabiru Storks which grow to 5 ½ feet tall. It was an incredible experience.

Now I am looking forward to our next project with TV Globo. We are in the startup phase and excitement of a new project with the rise and fall of the bell curve ahead of us.