Alan Tsuda - UCSC Extension in Silicon Valley

Don’t just do something, stop and think!” Probably haven’t heard that one recently, have we? I do an exercise with PM students – both experienced and just starting – the topic is about project problems and I give them a set of instructions.  When asked, “Are you ready to start?” there is a resounding, “YES!” [...]

Is Project Management a creative process? Full disclosure: I believe it is. I’ve had some colleagues vigorously take the opposing view.  Those holding this view came from many fields and disciplines – including a few working as project managers. At first, I didn’t think too much about it.  I understood that what I did as [...]

Difficult people. I really don’t like that term. Think back… haven’t all of us been perceived as “difficult” at least once or twice (or, like me, often)? Were we really being difficult? From our own perspective, did we not have important reasons for taking our position? Perhaps it was because our team was moving too [...]

Recently, I had a relatively young (at this stage of my life, it seems most people are in this category) project manager come to me and say, “In all of my projects, I have to deal with so many difficult people! What can I do about them?” Of course, this complaint is not too unusual. [...]

“Project management?  That’s just a lot of useless overhead!”   I remember hearing variations of this a lot years ago.  I don’t hear this much anymore (due at least in some part to the good work at PMI), but I have been seeing something of a variation. Working with some engineering teams at some big [...]

On this theme of Conventional Wisdom…. Not too long ago I was hearing lots of things about Agile.  Most of it was coming from my software development colleagues, but also from project managers in other disciplines.  There seemed to be a significant amount of intellectual intensity (which I interpret as emotion, but would not get [...]

I have been lucky enough to witness (and in some cases be a part of) several overturns of conventional wisdom.  I remember hearing how quality “costs money” and “we can’t afford higher quality.”  Now, it’s common to think about quality and value perception strategically. I remember working with factory schedulers where they were driven by [...]

Know any control-freaks?

For many of them, control is an illusion. Paradoxically, by grasping for more control, they often get less.

The ability to influence people is a good skill for a project manager. Isn’t it?
Isn’t it our job as PMs to influence people on the project? To find ways to get our stakeholders onboard?

Could it be that one person’s influencing can be another’s political manipulation?

Teams.  It seems like such an obvious part of project life. Or, is it? Recently, I’ve been noticing some things about project teams that trouble me. Here are some descriptions of a team: A group of two or more people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose and approach for which the [...]

I was recently working with some relatively young (well, pretty much everyone seems to be younger these days) software developers beginning to make a transition into project management.  As we were going over some of the PM responsibilities and tools, one of them asked, “A lot of this sounds like selling.  Don’t we want to [...]

One often-used lament I hear on projects and in project management classes is, “No one here wants to deal with realistic schedules and budgets.”   Interestingly, there seems to be two perspectives on this phenomenon… First, from the “worker bee” perspective, there is a sense that “management” always “discounts” the estimates. Second, from the “management” perspective, [...]

As I write this, the US is in a presidential transition.  President-Elect Obama won, at least in part, on a platform of hope and the rallying cry, “Yes We Can.” Hope?  In the face of all the obvious difficulties?  Yes we can?  Really?  Aren’t they just fuzzy words? As a project manager, part of me [...]

   Global projects.  Teams in five different time zones.  Team members traveling.  “We will meet again on the telcon at 5 on Tuesday.” When?  Tuesday your time?  my time? Some of us may have a calendar system that automatically can communicate and translate date/time.  Wonderful (and horrible in other ways that we won’t go into [...]

While I’ve never encountered any significant resistance to the idea that a PM has to do a lot of communication in order to be effective, I’ve been hearing some discussion about the value of face to face communication in our “brave new world” of virtual teams and global projects. There is, of course, the classic [...]

Why would anyone want to be a project manager (PM)? It’s a lot of work. It’s been said, only partly jokingly, that a PM may spend about 80% of his or her time on communication tasks, and the remaining 80% on the other required tasks. We get a lot of responsibility and hardly any true [...]

An increasing number of organizations are listing project management (PM) skills as a requirement for their managers. It’s no surprise that many people want to acquire/improve their PM skills. I’d like to start a discussion about the value of the various ways one learns. First, a few disclosures: I consult on PM issues, have taken [...]

I’ve been asked by many beginning project management students about the difference between general and project management. My simple answer has been that the things that make a good general manager (GM) help a project manager (PM), and that the PM does a few additional things specific to projects. That seems to satisfy most, but [...]

I was recently showing this blog site to a friend. As he looked through it, he nodded and mumbled some (did it just seem to me a bit reluctant and slightly envious?) approvals. Then, he looked up and blurted, “Hey, what’s this art thing?” He was talking about the tag line: “The Art of Project [...]

I’m looking for some insight from all of you on a point that’s been bothering me lately. On many recent projects, “time to market” has been defined, and rightly so, as the top priority (I still use the triple constraints as a key organizing/prioritization guide). Given the competitive pressures and the related shortened product life, [...]

In the grand tradition of analytical thinking, the answer I start with is, “Maybe yes, maybe no.” On the Yes side, there are a lot of “things” a good project manager needs to know and know how to do. There are the technical skills that can be taught – what might be referred to as [...]