Come Together
Conflict in a team setting is one of the natural hazards of the workplace. Unless you are on a project with no schedule pressure, and no technical challenges, and a single obvious way to get the job done, there will be some form of conflict (if you do happen to work on that sort of project, then you’re probably going to have to deal with the challenge of keeping yourself awake). Different perspectives of how to get the work done are healthy, but when we get into situations where it gets personal, trouble is brewing. Listening to how we express our frustrations with someone else on the team can be quite revealing. Read more
Pushing Too Hard
We often make commitments to get things done within a given timeframe. Whether the time constraint was handed to you or you chose it is moot, as long as you have agreed to the commitment. If that time commitment is firm, and you find that it is not looking possible at some point, strange things start to happen. Read more
Spotting Potential Conflict
With almost any team endeavour, whether it is called a project or not, there will be ample opportunities for stresses to creep in, for decisions to be made that don’t make everyone happy, for things to not go according to plan. Just as with any stresses, if left unchecked there is a really good chance that matters will only get worse. Everyone on the team needs to be able to spot when something is not quite right, and deal with the issue at first opportunity. Read more
From Telling to Asking
Filed under: Leadership, People, Project management, Teamwork
There are a number of flavours of project management workshops I’m involved with these days, online and face to face, running the whole show or facilitating with wider participation. One thing that they all have in common is that many of the issues have to do with team dynamics, and the many ways in which this manifests itself. Here’s another example. Read more
Focus on the Craft
In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell provides a rule of thumb that people will get good at their craft after they have spent 10,000 hours plying it. He talks about the Beatles and their years in small clubs in Germany, Mozart and his long tenure in music, and describes the early years of Bill Joy and Bill Gates as well. I’ve heard similar 250,000 word rules for writing (I’m well past that mark and think there’s still lots to learn), and the practice time put in by some of the sports greats is legendary. Seems there is something to all this: that time – lots of time – is an important part of becoming good at something. Raw talent or innate genius will only get you so far. Read more
High Cost of Success
Filed under: Leadership, People, Project management, Quality
In all kinds of projects, despite all the theory behind project management best-practices or ‘branded’ methodologies or lifecycles, I would say that the majority of projects get done with more than a little ‘seat-of-the-pants’ effort. In construction circles you will see ‘as built’ notations on the drawings, in many projects you will see a lot of scurrying, sprinkled with some long hours, and a dash or so of frayed nerves. The project gets done, we declare success, but at what cost? Read more
What’s That PMO Doing?
I was running a workshop on project management yesterday, and one of the first things I did (as usual) was to go around the room to ask what people were looking for in the session. One person volunteered that back on their project, they have a PMO that drives things, and what he wanted to get out of the session was to “find out what goes on behind those doors”. I may not know what does go on behind those doors, but I do have thought or two to share. Read more
Intentional Influence
An important consideration in projects is that, consciously or not, we all exert influence on those around us. If we are trying to make life on our projects better, we certainly effect the behaviour of others, as well as their character. We can influence them. Read more
What Drives Us
What motivates you? Chances are that it is not one particular thing but a mix of a wide range of things. Chances are even greater that if you look at the other people on your team, their mix of important motivators are quite different from yours. If we know what motivates us in our environment, we can behave in a manner that feeds these motives and results in a much more rewarding experience. Read more
The Rule of Three
When I first started focusing on improvement initiatives (over a dozen years ago now), the typical approach was to perform a deep analysis and come up with a big laundry list of recommended changes. That never did much more than pad the wallets of the consulting firm that provided the recommendations. For that reason alone, I’m sure the approach won’t be going away soon. For the improvee, though, the victim of these massive recommendations, there remains hope for a better way. Apply the Rule of Three. Read more
