Journyx Project Management Blog

When a friend suggested that I might benefit from meditation, and generally taking a more “Zen” approach to project management, I had my doubts. How in the world was I going to get anything done while being tranquil?!! Too much serenity is bad for results. On a deadline-driven project the very words “tranquil” and “serene” have the stench of impending disaster. They are filed in my subconscious right alongside phrases like “no progress to report” and “we tried our best.” Visions of status review meetings featuring updates like “everything is unfolding as the universe intended” and “it just wasn’t meant to be” popped into my adrenaline-soaked brain. No way was I going to let thousands of years of introspective tradition anywhere near my projects!

From what I understand, Zen promises the cessation of suffering. No suffering? Project managers unite! This could be a serious threat to our livelihood, since many projects are intended to end one form of suffering or another—insufficient revenues from new products, excessive costs, inefficient processes. And I think a majority of experienced project leaders would agree that most projects either include or inflict a great deal of suffering.

Not that I don’t appreciate inner peace, mind you. I wrote this entire article while sitting in the lotus position. I am always searching for ways to get in touch with that calm, quiet place within—but faster and with more surefire results than old-fashioned techniques like deep contemplation or lengthy introspection. (Did you ever notice that the word meditation is very close to the word medication? Coincidence? I think not.) But sometimes the only force driving a team forward is the nagging feeling that doom is just a couple of steps behind. And, practically speaking, what busy project leader really has time to linger in the inner sanctum of their subconscious? I’ve heard that you should meditate for at least 30 minutes a day, unless you are too busy, in which case a full hour is required. Ha! Imagine what the PMs of this world could do with 60 more minutes a day! Global warming would succumb to our collective might! Poverty, disease, and unfashionable dress among technically gifted engineers would fall before our cumulative strength!

Read the entire article at Project Connections.

“How do I make my people more accountable?” As a management consultant, I get this question all the time. In fact, I’d have to say that in general, making people more accountable is one of the top aspirations of technical managers. So it’s worth answering the question here are simply as I can.

Here it goes: You can’t make your people accountable. Get over it. It’s that simple.

Here’s what you can do:

Threaten them.

Bully them.

Micromanage them.

Beg them.

Offer them incentives.

Praise them.

But none of these things produces accountability. The list can go on and on, but it won’t get you to accountability.

The problem is not that we managers lack the creativity and energy required to make people accountable. It’s that accountability isn’t something that managers can mandate. It’s not something managers can enforce. It’s something that subordinates feel. It’s a mental and emotional state, not some condition that managers impose. There’s no magical formula for making anyone feel this way.

So how does it happen? Real accountability occurs when employees believe these things:

Their work matters.

They have substantial control over their ability to succeed or fail.

The quality and timeliness of the work is important.

The rewards and consequences that result from their work are fair.

They have reasonable influence on the evaluation of their work.

Read the rest at ComputerWorld.

The 2008 Summer Olympics are quickly approaching, and soon millions of people world-wide will be cheering from their respective corner of the world. Part of the success of each team will depend on individual athletes and on their determination and hard work. The other part will depend on the support and coaching provided to the team as a whole.

There are many lessons to be learned from the achievements of the Olympic participants; these can be incorporated in your daily work successes and management of projects. Here are six steps to consider in championing your players and leading a winning team.

1. Set the Rules
People need guidelines to keep things flowing smoothly. As coach, it is your job to set the ground rules, including how decisions will be made. Will it be up to the leader or will the majority rule? What are the project’s objectives and what are the boundaries? How will you measure the project’s success? What are the assignments and who will be handling each task?

Brainstorming the rules together with the team can produce great results because it will:

Ensure every detail is covered

Generate excitement about the project

Discuss issues and questions up front so that there aren’t any surprises later on

Read more at Developer.com.

Jason Averbook flies around the country advising major corporations how to weave social networks and Web 2.0 tools into recruiting and other human-resources practices. So when Averbook needed to add staff to his 50-person HR industry consulting firm recently, he knew he had to practice what he preached.

Instead of going through traditional channels, Averbook updated the “Status” section of his profiles on three social networking sites, Facebook, LinkedIn and Plaxo, to show he was “desperately” seeking new employees. It worked. He got 19 qualified candidates in two days, compared to the five that his Minneapolis-based firm, Knowledge Infusion, attracted through a job listing on their website over the past three months. “Based on interviews that are already happening I predict we’ll end up hiring some of them,” Averbook says.

Like Knowledge Infusion, other small businesses are using social networks to recruit employees at all levels. Because networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo and Ning cost little or nothing to join, there’s no reason small and mid-sized businesses shouldn’t try them for recruiting purposes, according to recruiting industry sources.

Read the rest at Inc. Technology.

World-class leaders have the personal resolve and willpower to create effective plans and the organization to implement their strategies. They energize their organizations through these plans. They act decisively. They assess and adjust their plans constantly on the basis of sound situational awareness and outer directed information gathering.

This level of adaptability depends on a few leadership strategies, techniques and principles. When you follow my advice below you will achieve success.

My Top 7 Leadership Strategies You Need to Lead Your Organization Under All Circumstances

1. Get clear on objectives and stick to them.

If you don’t know your destination, you and your organization will meander aimlessly and enter storm-tossed seas.

Effective leaders know where they are and where they want to go. And, they stick to their aim.

2. Create robust plans.

Plans have three key benefits.

* Effective planning allows you and your team to delve into a situation beforehand
* Plans create a common language for everyone involved in the organization’s mission.
* Plans tell you what needs to be done, by when, and with what resources.

Read the rest at the CEO Refresher.

IT certifications are one way to distinguish between well-trained job candidates and prospects whose skills on specific hardware or software aren’t quite up to par.

At least that’s the way it’s supposed to work. In recent times, however, an overabundance of certifications and widespread cheating on exams caused in part by lax security at testing centers have tarnished IT certifications’ reputation in the eyes of many human-resources executives and hiring managers.

“It’s a big problem,” agrees Don Sorensen, marketing vice president at Caveon, a Salt Lake City test security company. He says there are “literally hundreds” of so-called “braindump” websites that share or sell test questions.

According to a 2007 report from the Association of Test Publishers, of 101 IT vendors and certification test centers surveyed, slightly more than half said that 46 percent or more of their IT certification tests had been copied, stolen or breached in some other way in the recent past. Some test givers said their new tests could be found on braindump websites within a month of being published, and in some cases, as soon as two days, according to the report.

Read the rest at Inc. Technology.

Before we talk about team building, we must have a fair idea of the word “Team”. Team is a collection of people, often from diverse but related groups, assigned to perform a well-defined function for an organization or a project.

From the word, team comes “Team building”. Team building as the name so evidently suggests is the process of building an effective team. A team building exercise helps in making for a strong cohesive unit that has a common goal and purpose. It also involves coordinating the dynamics of the group to improve its efficiency. When you build a team, it is important to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each and every team member. This will enable you to assign tasks that they will be good at.

Read more at at: http://journyx.com/rss/redir/projmag-teambuild.html

I’ve often heard people complain about intense projects: They’re too much work and emotionally draining. But oddly, I’ve noticed that people seem to have more trouble after an intense project than during one.

Read more at: http://journyx.com/rss/redir/cworld-nowwhat.html

“If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.” - Francis Bacon

Leaders face dilemmas every day. Decisions we make are translated into real-world outcomes, with each decision cascading into other actions. Sometimes, we mentally frame difficult choices and decisions in terms that simplify them—at least on the surface. We turn them into black or white just to get some clarity around them, yet in reality, they are not black or white, not either/or—they are gray.

How we address these difficult choices—as black and white, or as gray—will determine the feel of our organization. It will determine how people interact, and how work gets done. It will determine the strategies of both our present and our future.

Read more at PM World Today.

I’ve talked in previous articles about aspects of being a great project manager, including what I view as business-oriented leadership: driving forward and leading the team to ensure that a project is launched, planned, and executed with alignment to business goals and customer needs.

I haven’t yet touched much on a different aspect of leadership, which I refer to the “leadership persona” - not just what you do as a leader, but also how you come across to others as you lead the team. Along the line I have heard particular managers labeled as strong leaders based (apparently) on their extroverted motivational styles. “He’s really good at keeping the team charged up.” “She’s excellent at inspiring everyone even when the project is difficult.” Did this mean that “rah rah motivational leadership,” being good at making speeches to keep the team jazzed, was a must? That’s how it came across to me at the time.

Over time I have concluded personally that successful team leadership does not depend on the “rah rah” version of extroverted leadership as a foundational requirement. But I do believe that how you come across to people as you fulfill the project manager role can significantly add to or subtract from your effectiveness and the team’s energy, morale, and success.

We ask people to do hard things - work hard, meet tough deadlines, operate in the midst of uncertainty and pressure. It is certainly helpful if the way we lead makes it easier for them to follow and contribute and get it all done with a positive attitude! I have looked back at times to ask myself, who made me feel we had a chance of a great outcome, who instilled in me a sense of confidence and trust, even during particularly challenging projects or organizational situations? And when have I felt I was a good leader in this way, or a NOT so good leader?

Here are a few vignettes:

Communicating through more than words: I remember being PM for a new medical software application, lots of feature decisions to make, rapid iterations to make business-critical milestones several weeks apart. One day I was walking down the hall thinking about a decision I had to make. I passed one of the team members and he said, with quite a bit of worry in his voice, “Wow, what’s wrong?!” Startled, I said “Nothing, why?” His answer was, “You just looked really tense and I thought something had gone wrong on the project.” I realized that he had seen my problem-solver face. Coming from an engineering background, where a primary joy in life is in wrestling nasty problems to the ground, intense worrying of the details of a problem is normal, not negative, actually a positive! But there I was, giving this team member the impression that the sky might be about to fall in. Was I walking around looking like this all the time? There were certainly enough challenges on this project that it wasn’t outside the realm of possibility. Yikes! When a project is intense already, who needs their leader walking around looking like doom?

Read more at ProjectConnections.