Benefit of the Doubt
When I start to work with a new team, whether it is with a new group for a training session, a new client site where I will be working for a period of time, or that client brings a new employee into the fold, I tend to start with the assumption that everything is good out of the gate. My initial trust is pretty high, and I have high expectations that we’re going to get along well and do good work together. I tend to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, even if people have tried to warn me in advance. Read more
Delivering Value
It is hard enough to get a project team to focus on delivery of value when we are initiating a project, but it is all that much tougher to remain focused on this prize as the project plays out. I would argue that the main reason for this is that the tools we use to manage projects tend to divert our focus. Read more
Blurring the Boundaries
We have been running our own small business for more than 7 years now, and from most accounts, everything is running quite smoothly. While the pipeline has thinned a little as training budgets are slashed, there are indications that even this is turning around. Receivables have been very good, something that I would attribute to personally knowing who cuts the cheque in most places (the biggest challenges have come from the biggest vendors, where I am an anonymous ‘little guy’ with no apparent clout, but I have my ways to get things done there as well…). There remains one area that I struggle with – the traditional boundaries of the workplace. Read more
Ethical Dilemmas
There have been a couple of times in my career where I have encountered people that are not willing to take on a position because they perceived a collision with their own value system. Indeed, there have been times when I have stepped away from an otherwise lucrative gig because it involved something that didn’t quite sit right with me. It is worthwhile to sit down periodically and visit our boundaries, to understand what we will and won’t do, to explore what ethics means to each of us. For me, this is the time for some of that reflection. Read more
