Bas De Baar - UCSC Extension in Silicon Valley

“How is your marriage?” “Well, we have 2 kids out of the 3 we planned. A mortgage at an y% rate. $x dollars in savings. And we are in our 10th year.” It’s an answer. Hey! You could even mention a “emotional index” to indicate progress on the “mood”. Not everybody would be happy with [...]

“Once a photograph of the earth, taken from the outside is available, a new idea as powerful as any in history will be let loose.” – Sir Fred Hoyle in 1948. What do you draw when you are visualizing a project on a whiteboard? I draw an arrow from left to right that represents a [...]

Why is your project taking place right now? And not last year, or next year? Are there also any other projects taking place now? Why? What is the challenge? This can be either a threat or opportunity that is the cause / reason for the project. What is the legacy the organization wants to leave [...]

Why are you actually working on this project? How did you end up here? What do you add to the team? Any clue on why you were selected? When the project is finished, what do you want to add to your resume? What additional skills have you required? What do you want your LinkedIn referrals [...]

Projects are like company earnings. Beat expectations and everybody is happy. Perform below expectations and you’re doomed. Or in different words. A happy stakeholder is a productive stakeholder. An unhappy stakeholder is giving you headaches. Stakeholder management is that part of a Project Managers’ job that makes sure that the stakeholder expectations are in line [...]

Ah. Adventure Maps. Away with spreadsheets, checklists and grid prisons. Bring on your crayons! A highly playful, interactive and intuitive way of communicating complex elements in your project. Or just an excuse to go overboard on the lame jokes and awkward analogies. I find it to do wonders for stakeholder analysis. Stakeholder analysis is a [...]

So. We should have fun and creativity in projects. So. The team should have a shared understanding of the goal and approach. So. If people are involved you get acceptance and engagement, multiple point of views, and alignment. Co-creation is a powerful concept. So. Metaphors and storytelling are useful techniques. So. How do I get [...]

This is a story about Handsome Rob. He is not only good looking, but he is also a great get-away-car driver. If you are planning a heist and need to get away quick, Rob is your man. In the 2003 film “The Italian Job” Rob is played by actor Jason Statham. Handsome Rob loves the [...]

There is a central theme running through my Project Leadership Thoughts: it is impossible to look at a project as an isolated entity. It’s about people and interactions. And interactions happen throughout the entire social network. Every interaction effects another one. What does this mean for you, as a professional? You have to work on [...]

Yelling “Self promotion, Baby” is a little over the top, isn’t it? I love rhetoric. I enjoy Big Stories. Without Too Much Detail. As Too Much Detail ruins a Good Big Story. Although I sometimes say things excited and full of passion (“you need to…”), it’s always an invitation to look at the information and [...]

Why should people want to work on your project? You know about globalization, you know this makes employees competing with people from all over the world. Have you considered The Other Consequence? That you have to compete with other GLOBAL companies and Project Managers to get good people to staff your projects? If developers, testers [...]

If your are into software project management, you are into “marketing”. If you are planning to keep on working in (software) projects in the years to come, you better get good at it. It seems to be a dirty word among technical people: “marketing”. But it’s not about selling your soul to the devil. It’s [...]

We are working with people from all over the world. Globalization goes together with an increase in transparency of reputations. The Internet introduced deadly transparency. With an increase in geographical and cultural distance the aspect of “trust” becomes all important. When people have never met, there are two mechanism we can fall back on:

In this final posting about the Fish Pond metaphor we will look under water to see what we can learn about how (project) organizations can adapt to change. Fish do not simply float around in a tank. Although they once in a while bump into glass walls, they are able to find food, detect other [...]

In my previous postings I have introduced the use of a fish pond as a metaphor for leading projects and organizations in our ever changing times. Thinking about a bucket of water can really help us out. It emphasizes the importance of preparation; the fish pond is all about preplanning. Preplanning a pond is about [...]

Every project is unique. Circumstances are always different. Different people. Different goals. To lead a project, or organizations in general for that matter, to success, you need to tailor your approach to the situation. To be able to do this you got to have a flexible mind. One that can switch from one world view [...]

For those who missed it: the world is changing. We are global, diverse and confused. This is not your grandfather’s earth. It is not even your daddy’s earth. Economic powers are shifting; you are now working with people from all over the globe. With different backgrounds, different beliefs, different economic and social possibilities. If someone [...]

Perhaps it is a sign I have too much time on my hands, or I should really get a good hobby: but : I spent some time going through my mailbox with all my mails from one of my last projects and came up with the following theory: The carbon copy (cc) function in mail [...]

You go to a doctor to get your health checked. Consider the following situations, and tell me who you trust the most… Doctor A A young guy, who looks like a used-car salesman, welcomes you with a stunning smile. His Hugo Boss suit fits perfectly. He offers you some Latte and invites you to sit [...]

To be a successful Project Manager in 2008, wear a suit, print a Gantt chart and get PMP certified. It is what everybody outside our profession seems to expect from us. We, Project Managers, radiate to the outside world our icons like Gantt Charts, two-digits precise risk assessments, large documents that seems to cover every [...]

If you really want to improve your projects in 2008, the best place to start is inside your head. Who cares if you just became a Turquoise Belt Agile Master? Very impressive if you got yourself PiMP certified. If you are a true believer of one particular way of thinking about projects (agile or plan-driven) [...]