Five Whys for Managing Project Dynamics

Five Whys provides a structured yet simple approach to solving problems as they occur during a project and can provide a framework for a team to work through complex problems. It is a simple process at its core.  (more…)

Cross-cultural Intelligence 2.0

The international adventures and pitfalls of a global project manager can make great storytelling for your team campfire. Then why is it that most team members would prefer that you put out the flame? Why not keep the fire burning? When the team has celebrated the successful conclusion of the project, they’re ready to head home and re-energize for the next adventure. Having to perform a post-mortem and share lessons learned is not always an enticing prospect. It can also be difficult to share failures or lessons learned due to cultural perceptions and communication styles. Yet if you succeed in developing an international dialogue, you can ignite new ideas and fire up best practices around the world. (more…)

Project Management For Dummies Horror Story

Wow, I guess they’ve got a for dummies book on everything now.  Awesome.  There is also of course the 10 minute project manager book in case you find yourself dubbed project manager 10 minutes before the kick off meeting.  (more…)

Pssst… How to keep your international team together

Hmm… I remember the bad old days and maybe some of you are still living tlhem, getting up early or staying late to call some foreign country.. (more…)

Project Management Books/Methodologies to Live By and also Die Slow Deaths From

I thought it would be fun to list some impressions of favorite and least favorite Project management books and methodologies.  I wrote none of these.  You too, can feel free to refute my oppinions or add your own replies or spam us with the latest project managment religion.  Why not?  Everyone else does.  (more…)

Mind Mapping Resources

A week ago, Christine Sellers started a Mind Mapping gantthead interest group (GIG) and nearly 100 people quickly joined. The group is packed with resource links, so I wanted to share a few of them here with you…

How to use them

• 10 Tips for Highly Effective Mindmapping Sessions

• Applications of MindManager

• Mindmapping helps you be creative AND get things done

• Project estimating – Mindmaps are a tool in the armory

• Searching mindmaps (more…)

3rd Degree Burns on 95% of the Body

One of the biggest mistakes I made as a novice project manager was burning bridges that I would later need to walk across. Heck, I was a friggin’ arsonist! If someone on my team didn’t do their action item, I’d chew their ass and then came back and do it again before it even had a chance to grow back. If the quality engineer gave me any lip about not having an environmental test chamber available to heat, cool, and otherwise torture to death my $100,000 one-of-a-kind prototype, I’d make sure his boss knew that this small-thinking Neanderthal needed to learn how to use the telephone book (yes, I am THAT old that I remember telephone books!) in order to find a place to rent test chamber time. And if the manufacturing manager, in charge of hundreds of people, wasn’t on schedule getting the manufacturing line set up for the imminent pilot production run, I’d lob a public-embarrassment napalm bomb at him in the next project review meeting in front of the other executives. Naturally my feet got pretty scorched walking over the flaming hot coals of the bridges that I burned as I came to need the cooperation of these unfortunate souls at some future date. (more…)