Kaizen

By Rich Maltzman • June 3rd, 2009

Taking advantage of the social networks that we PMs have started to form on LinkedIn, I did some polling in early 2009 to gauge the interest level (see post below) in the brand-spanking-new PMBOK(R) Guide.
Using a completely non-scientific scale that I made up in 17.4 seconds, and asking the question on the larger LinkedIn Groups [...]

Courage is positioned as a pivotal issue for project management panache by Mike Levy. Courage is facing difficulties without fear. So what’s to fear in project-land? Plenty!
Let’s name a few fear factors:
•    Potential loss of job
•    Actual loss of team members
•    Churn in project portfolio’s
•    Confusion in corporate goals
•    Lack of time for skill development
•    [...]

Craig Brown in his Monday comment professes that project management panache requires presenting information with no fear. When the news is bad; it takes pluck and power and prowess.
What is pluck? It is passion, grits and guts for a subject. For me; project performance improvement is my passion. I, like Craig, talked about the Chaos [...]

Project management panache packs a punch when project managers are perceived as “having expertise in a critical area.” Andrew Meyer pressed this powerful point in response to the first blog on panache.
Expertise is defined as providing unique interpretations and insight (readmore). Andrew also posited that this is the may be the only protection against project [...]

My prodigiously prolific project management peers have several deliciously witty answers to the question; “what provides a project manager with the panache needed to stand strong in tough situations?” yet, none walked away with the text book answer. A textbook answer is. . . . (can you hear the drum roll crescendo?)
•    Context in which [...]

What’s panache? Its your distinction style. You know project managers who have a special sense of dash, verve, or flair? They seem to consistently pull off tough conversations with apparent ease and confidence. And they get noticed and get recognition and respect.

We’re asking that every 6 months (too long/too short?) that the students in the Santa Clara Valley Water District’s (SCVWD) Project and Program Management Certificate program do a short (half-page?) report on lessons learned to date. During that time most of them should have completed 1-3 classes (30-75 hours of training.)  Since the time taken [...]

The classes in the Santa Clara Valley Water District’s (SCVWD) program this year (it varies slightly from year to year) are Role of the Project Manager, Scheduling Optimization Techniques for Managers, Project Integration & Risk Management, Creating the Successful Project Team, Project Management Negotiation Principles & Techniques, Project Leadership & Communication, and the capstone course [...]

I’ve occasionally been involved with trying to collect ROI data for classes UCSC Extension in Silicon Valley has offered.   It’s challenging and unless a company is really prepared to spend some money and time on doing the collection and analysis (and involving HR and confidentiality when you start talking about rating people’s skills) ROI usually [...]

As can be expected, much of the feedback pointed towards a cutback in new investment and thus projects.  Another significant portion of the comments discussed another inevitable trend in hard times…increased scrutiny of current projects and focus on the dollars.
Cutbacks

North America – Although layoffs have occurred in the Canadian oil patch in recent weeks, the [...]

Today I would like to cover two categories in the survey that are nearly opposite.  The first is Reduced Quality. The second is what I classified as an Increased Demand for Good Project Management.
Fire
Most of these actions appear to me to be short-sighted ones that solve a current financial problem at the expense of long-term [...]

Moving up through the categories, I’ll discuss three now:

Project Manager Layoffs
Project Staff Reductions
Reduced PM rates.

Reading through the responses, may of them were not surprising. One thing I noted in a few posts was that some companies are shedding senior PMs and opting for less experienced ones. Of course I have no idea about [...]

Status Quo
Ah, it is nice to hear that some people are not feeling any impacts due to economic recession. 8% of the respondents noted that they have not seen any impacts. Half of those were from the North America, other responses came from Australia, India, and Africa.
I noticed 2 similarities from what I [...]

I recently conducted a survey on pmStudent.com asking for anecdotal stories about how the economy is currently impacting project management. This week I would like to share the results with you.
The survey was 100% anonymous, and I even removed any identifying information that a few responders put into the answer. Note that this survey [...]

I just returned from hearing Carly Fiorini (former CEO of HP) speak at Celebrity Forum. She defined leaders as those who made change – who see an opportunity and seize the opportunity.
Leaders have the vision to make changes.  Managers deliver within a set of (I can’t think of her word but mine is – parameters.)  Leaders [...]

Think about Google and Net Apps.  Now think about the Ritz-Carlton Resort-Hotel Chain, Best Buy, Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods and Wynn Hotels.  What do they all have in common?
It’s how they treat their people.

Technorati Tags: building_relationships, common-sense, everyone-wins, Interpersonal, Leaderhip, management-theory, Professional-Development, soft-skills, What-really-works

One of my CEOs recently mentioned that the recession is forcing him to rethink all aspects of his business, including how many employees it takes to do a job.  (Six people to change a light bulb?)
He remarked that he is in the business of clearing out the deadwood and is glad for the excuse to [...]

Hi, It’s my time to blog again – and this is my birthday week – so I am going to take advantage of it and have some fun.
Just to let you know:  I am currently teaching at Keller School of Management.  Teaching several MBA courses which include Leadership & Organizational Development, Business Planning, and International [...]

One critical choice project managers face is between control and results.  Managers say they want results but actions speak even louder to say they want control.  Do onerous controls inhibit achieving the very results they were intended to produce?  Is control an illusion?   Is it possible for managers to pursue both control and results: up [...]

Image by Łukasz Strachanowski via FlickrOur theme of this week was “living life smarter”. We started with defining SMART goals and reflecting on where we are now. Then we looked at setting priorities so we use our limited time and finances wisely. Focusing on the highest priority items that give us the most value for [...]

Image via Wikipedia
To take Wikipedia’s definition, a gap analysis is a business assessment tool enabling a company to compare its actual performance with its potential performance. At its core are two questions:

Where are we?

Where do we want to be?

As we know from our projects, the gap analysis process involves determining, documenting and approving the [...]