Int. PM Day is November 7th. this year

As usual you get for free 4 hours seminar as a Webinar with live feed from International Experts in PM:

Register here (you can even earn 12 PDU or your PMI certification)

Enjoy!

Change Management - A Practical Guide

In a limited period you can get this Little Guide from PMI here.

News from the Risk Doctor - do we forget something important?

David Hillson points out that with Risk Management we are really only looking at the project's explicit risks while implicit risks concerning the decision-making BEHIND the project are completely overlooked. In other words, we look only at whether the project "is screwed firmly together" and not on whether it is "the right project" (in relation to strategy, needs, ideas or problems, etc.).

Read his newsletter here.

From where and to where?

Projects are temporary occurrences in systems with a past and a future. Therefore one of the best 'trick' I've learned in the understanding of an organization or an individual or in general any organic always asking about: "What's happened over the past 5-10 years?" And "Where are you in 5-10 years? ". It provides 100 times as good understanding that even the best analysis of the present situation.

Moreover it is also one of the techniques you need to learn if you want to become a better networker!

New category added: Networking Competences

Concentrate on the important stuff

As a rule of thumb expect that between 10% and 20% of the problems in a project are of technical / professional nature that requires technical / professional knowledge to be resolved.

Yet,9 out of 10 companies see it as important that their project managers have a technical / professional background! So they grab the best technical / professional to solve the 80% to 90% of the problems, which is about something completely different! Is that stupid or what?

More of the same issue here

You make your own fortune

"Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it." -Charles Swindoll

plus:

“If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.”

So maybe you should do something new in this week-end

It might be the most important week-end in the rest of your life...

Have an interesting week-end

You're still a clown at estimation....

... But it's not necessarily your fault. The main reason is surely that you work in an environment or a culture where expectations are that you are presenting low costs and potentially high income (or savings or whatever benefits might be). If (and I mean really if ..) you presented the truth, people would look at you like you were crazy and the proposed project would be immediately binned - or given to "a rmore easonable person".

That's the truth in the construction industry according to Prof. Bent Flybjerg that you can hear talk about the subject here on a visit to Harvard.

But you do not have to go to construction in order to find this pattern of deliberately manipulating the figures. It is found in all industries and also in yours and in your workplace. You will find managers who dare not show the director the real costs. Sales persons who will have orders for almost any price. HR people who dream wishful thinking on employees' potentials. Economy People who believe that SAP can save a decaying business etc.

They are all around you and you are never in doubt about the "right figures".

We should have a Whistleblower mailbox where we could drop our sincere estimates.

What do you instinctively?

Situation: Projector does not like input from a Mac. 80 people coming in about 5 minutes and then it has to Work!. Called technician (coming in only 45 seconds!) begins to fumble around on the Mac and mumbles "well I'm not a Mac user really ...". By the wall is a PC - without power cord.

Question: Which of these do you choose:
1. Hope the best you've learned in 4 minutes then playing the victim-role?
2. Beg the technician temporarily stop fumbling and instead just put power to the PC which presumably are more likely to work with the Projector but in any case doubles the chance of getting the problem resolved?

If you instinctively choose 2) you have the right helicopter pilot genes.

2) is obviously the most difficult to implement, because the technician will feel:

a) it is a waste of time because the problem will been solved in about 2 minutes (or maybe 3 ...)
b) you interfering in something you have no sense of
c) you do not show respect for the technician's professionalism

You can either ignore  this and insist or if there is time ask if it is ultimately safer when 80 people are now dependent on a solution right now?

This little situation you can transfer again and again at the specialists you are surrounded by.

When documents are cheating - you!

Especially with early documents such as Project proposal,s Project Idea Descriptions etc. one must be careful because they are often formulated and written by PA's or similar ministering spirits. Therefore it may very well be the case that one half thought out idea from the boss suddenly appears as an articulate, organized and such straight-to-go-to document. But the reality is just that the writer has made ​​it from own experience of the situation and not least of possible approaches!

Well you say - will it not be discover it when the boss sees it through? No, a good boss will only look at whether the overall things are in place and not the details.

The problem is that your imagination that this particular puzzle solving approved is made by the boss and therefor following it too far.

So what do you do? You go through the document with the writer and then asks into the whole process and get clarification on what is decided and what is open. Expect that 80% of the solution space is open for discussion - if you want to discuss!

Newsletter from The Risk Doctor

David Hillson philosophize this time about trends (more, less or?) in the Risk discipline. Read the newsletter here.

The art of giving Bad News

When we relatively often have to give bad news why not become good at it?

Jennifer Whitt, director of ProjectManager.com has added another fine video on her site. See it quickly here.

I would just add:

Dos

Understand anger and disappointment sand try to accommodate blame
Don'ts

Defend yourself and do not blame others

Summer thoughts

Got my house sold  in 24 days here in June / July, and summer relaxation was replaced by intense work. Well done I thought about the project and once again realized that one is too narrow minded in dealing with the risks - in this and all other projects. We tend to focus only on actions to reduce or neutralize risks, but forget to look at the opportunities that are always hidden in the situation.


 








We make every effort to get rid of the risks, but we do not seem to let our thoughts continue over in the possibilities. We should spend a little more time to ask ourselves, "What if I do even more .... what opportunities would that give?" Or "what is the opposite of this risk, and how can I take advantage of the opportunity?".

Risk Mgnt. - again!

David Hillson - The Risk Doctor celebrates his 10th anniversary with an update on this delicate discipline. Something has improved but there is still much to ask for he concludes in this newsletter.
You can put a little pep in a risk management process by measuring out the sum of the risks in a project - not by a number - but by delay. How much delay gives the greatest risk? and what about the second highest? etc. When we have to deal with the delay, we are forced to think about risk, problem and possible its solution in details. You can also choose money: How much will the greatest risk cost us?
It is also a fine way to cover the risks in a leader- or steering committee. They wake up when there is spoken about delays and additional costs.

Create the reputation before somebody else does it!!

When you  have shut your project down and has received the client's praise for delivering on time and on budget, it is time to create the project's reputation as a successful project. Box 'stories' about the project. Brew a short story: "It was hard ... we fought ... so we were near but so ... anyway we did it ... right in the eye ..." and let everyone in the team begin to tell it at every opportunity.

A great reputation is your only defense against a bad reputation if it turns out later that the project never reached the client's purpose and thereby Success Criteria's. In that situation everyone can remember that you were the project manager (and thus you will quickly be the guilty) while they rarely remember who the commissioners were (the real culprit).

It's big manipulation this blog post!

Yeah exactly!

PM's are not like everybody else!

A study mentioned in the latest issue of PMI's Project Management Journal shows that project managers more likely than the average population are Extraverts and Result oriented. That might be expected when project managers are leaders and must be goal-oriented, but now it is finally proved. The dimensions are taken from the MBTI and include:

Among project managers most are NTs (Intuitive and Thinking) but unfortunately this combination causes the majority of failures! Successes are created at much higher degree of SF'er (Objective perciving and Sentient in decisions).

What do you think? Free test here.

The crisis stopped yesterday!

I am sure that you can feel and see it around you! Something has happened the last few days! Pessimism is gone! There are more Yes than No!

I think it has changed now. We are heading upwards again, and it's going to go faster than ever. Thousands of projects put on hold will soon rbe eleased. It will be fantastic.

Believe in it and spread the Word

Mr. 3Angle and Worklife balance

We all sign up for project management courses though it might be life management courses we really need!

Good project managers are the safest investment of all ...

PMI regularly examine the conditions for and the development of our profession as project managers.

Now the report Pulse of the Profession is on the street with scary findings.


The last five years reluctant to invest in good project managers and thus good projects and thus higher success rates has taken its toll. Companies and organizations are now less successfull in completing  Projects and it leaves its traces in the return on the investments that projects are at the end of the day. The good risk 2% of every dollar invested in projects - the bad 28%! One can say that it is a safe investment to develop project managers because the good project managers reduces the risk of any other Investment!

See key findings in great interactive graphics here or download the report here. Other reports in the series here.

Mr. 3Angle and value creation...

It's hard to be a businessman when you're a professional ...

Yes, it is true that our success is measured by our ability to deliver the agreed deliverables on time and budget, but honestly, would you do business with a company that just delivered exactly what you asked for without asking "what are you going to use it for? "and just leave it up to you and just let you experience a huge blunder? No I don't think so!

It is time to switch from the project manager as a supplier to the project manager as a consultant - from delivery focus to focus on both value creation and delivery. From What do you want to Why do you want? From agreements at the beginning to ongoing agreements that meet the conditions for value creation which are constantly changing. From contradictory steering committee meetings to meetings filled with fighting spirit and enthusiasm.

Whether it's easy? No it's not thanks god. What is sought is seldom easy, and hurray for that because otherwise anyone could well match you as a business-oriented project manager!

Do you have Madonna curves?

As one of few Madonna has managed to innovate just quickly enough to avoid oblivion - it is said that she has carefully assessed when she was about to peak and then turned into a new style. She didn't wait until it was necessary! She did something before it was needed! And she did it again and again.

The same idea or stubborn struggle for success project managers should use in:

1. project team in long-term projects
2. external communication in medium and long term projects
3. handling of key stakeholders - including the customer
4. ones Family
5. personal development (sorry about that!)