Leaders Don’t Stop at the Decision - They Ensure Success

"A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way."
That about summarize this for me. I've spent 4 years in the military leading and cultivating leaders, and the last 12 years leading project teams. Nothing irks me more than having leaders that lead from their ivory tower, or think that a loud hailer is all they need.

Following through, in my opinion is one of the most important trait of a successful leader. It doesn't always mean doing it by themselves, it could be through structure and behaviors that they setup and enforce.

Who were your the best leaders you have encountered?

Read more here.
http://www.pmhut.com/leaders-dont-stop-at-the-decision-they-ensure-success

Apps that makes managing projects remotely a breeze

Companies in the digital and technology world are typically first movers in adopting new technology to improve productivity and collaboration.

The company I worked in (POSSIBLE), is no different. With our decentralised way of working and closely collaborative studios (aka offices) spread globally, any tools and processes that facilitate collaboration is welcomed.

This article is quite godsend when we recently had a reorg and i wanted to try something new in connecting the teams. Email as a channel is messy and difficult to track and hold accountability. I wanted a way to assign tasks, have followups and oversight without searching thru emails and holding inefficient catchup meetings. But i also wanted something simple to use. Used basecamp in the past, find it bloated.

Picked up Asana instead and gave it a test drive. Looked good so far.

Here's other apps that could be interesting to you.

Read more here.
http://www.inc.com/young-entrepreneur-council/10-apps-that-make-managing-projects-remotely-a-breeze.html 

How to Get Anything You Want with Minimal Negotiation

Ahh. Something we hate (well i do), yet its so important in our day to day. We started negotiating when we are babies (try convincing a toddler not to have that candy or get on that car seat). Yet most of us suck at it. 

To most, there's only 2 methods to negotiating. By shouting and bulldozing your point across or give in to reach that middle ground that on paper is win-win but in reality its lose-lose.

There's more than that in negotiation. Here's some simple techniques. 

Read more here.

http://lifehacker.com/5974807/how-to-get-anything-you-want-with-minimal-negotiation/all 

The constant hunt for professional development units (PDUs).

Ah. The bane of all PMP certification holders. PDUs.

I value the structure to 'ensure' continual learnings and recency with  the project management discipline. But its definitely painful for busy practitioners to maintain this score of 60. I'm into my 2nd cycle of renewal now, having earned my PMP back in 2007. Hope to renew this for as long as its of professional interest to do so. I do not see many PMs in this industry having proper project management certifications or even training to say the least.

Recently attended a 2 day Symposium organised by the Singapore Chapter of PMI as part of this great PDU hunt. This is my 3rd Symposium. I do see a difference in mindset when I attend this particular session. The need for PDUs is still there (i will be honest here, that's the primary motivation), but I do find myself selecting/approaching each presentation from a broader perspective. Its less of what's interesting for my personal development, but more of what can I bring back to implement in POSSIBLE.

To name a few:

• Further develop and incorporate Agile in our PM processes
• Professional development of the PM department.
• How do we measure effectiveness of the training that staff gets sent to?
• Setup and management of our project management office (PMO) 
• Networking to lookout for potential clients and PM candidates to hire. 

Tons of stuff that I think is beneficial for myself and the team. Will try to spend some time over the next few weeks to flesh them out and maybe even discuss some here. 

As per my old army times, Advance and Overcome. 

Understanding someone's inner logic

This is an interesting article from Harvard Business Review.
How many times have we faced the same problem. We find someone's behavior or thinking as unreasonable or illogical. But if we delve deeper and probe with the right questions, we might be pleasantly surprised that its perfectly reasonable and logical when we understand the motivation and mindset that the person is working with.

This is especially important in the context of project management. When you face a seemingly unreasonable stakeholder or client, maybe its time to take a step back. And ask different questions. Find out what could be motivating this unreasonable request.

I remember this quote from Ayn Rand (one of my favourite writer), "Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong."

Bear it in mind. It might get you out of an awkward confrontation.

Read more here.
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/08/discovering_the_other_persons.html

Is Project Management Relevant to IT, Specifically Digital Marketing?

I have been focusing on project management in the last 14 years. Throughout the places that I've worked in; from the extremely hierarchical Singapore Army to various bureaucratic government agencies and statutory boards to free-for-all startups and digital marketing agency.  There is an increasing recognition on the importance and value of effective project management. This is especially true for IT projects.

According to The Standish’s CHAOS Summary 2009 report*, 24% of all IT projects failed (i.e. cancelled prior to completion or delivered and never used) and an additional 44% were challenged (i.e. delivered late, over budget, did not provided all of the required features or functions).

Here’s a comparison table compiled by The Standish from 1994 till 2009. To give credits to the greater fraternity of PMs, the amount of failed projects has greatly reduced.

But still. Those are scary numbers! I worked in a digital agency currently; the PM team and I will get slapped on a daily basis if only a third of the projects we run are deemed successful!

To put into context, the projects audited as part of the report are mostly large scale and highly complex IT projects for large corporations or governments. The digital marketing projects that we run for our fortune 500 clients are nowhere near that scale or complexity. 

But considering the stats above and lessons from my daily work, there is definitely relevance and need for competent PMs with strong leadership skills to handle digital projects. The PM has to find ways to motivate and inspire the project team to meet deadlines and deliver quality work. 

Digital marketing projects, like most IT projects has certain key project success factors that must be met. Here are the top 10 identified within The Standish report:

• User involvement
• Executive management support
• Clear statement of requirements 
• Proper planning
• Realistic expectations
• Smaller project milestones
• Competent staff
• Ownership 
• Clear vision & objectives
• Hard working, focused staff

Have a quick look at that list, and you can clearly identify the ones that require proven project management strategies and tactics.

Next, I will talk a little more about the key considerations that a PM has to take care of.

Getting users involvement and strong management sponsorship of the project is a must have. No point in delivering a project that no one would use because users’ buy-in or requirements were not considered. Or if the project did not have the management’s blessing. The PM must always ensure that both of these key factors are taken into account during project initiation.

A key nemesis to IT projects is ‘scope creep’. This little bugger could come in all shapes and form. Especially difficult to managed if there is not clear definition of the project scope in the first place. How many times have we received a brief from sales that the client has $X to develop a website and no other details. What kind of website, what features will it have, who are the targeted audiences, what technical platform will it be on, when is the go live? etc." Everything for everyone by end of Q2" is not the answers we are looking for. A talented PM knows exactly what questions to ask to clarify the scope. With a define scope, the PM is in a better position to manage the project and scope creep.
You will only know if someone cross the line, when you know where the line is.

Stakeholder management is a key area greatly emphasized in PMBOK or other PM methodologies and theories. But in real live, this area is grossly ignored or under-considered. Knowing who the stakeholders are and what are their involvement and key objectives in a project is critical in understanding their motives and expectations.

Proper planning is essential. All PMs must spend some time just thinking through the project and how they intend to approach it. A project timeline does not equal to a project plan. Other areas like, project communication, project organisation, risk management etc must be considered and planned out. Planning out smaller, more frequent and quantifiable project milestones helps in managing expectations and progress of the project. No one likes to be on radio silence for 3 months after the initial project kick off meeting, wondering what had happened to the project.

P.S. *In case this ‘infamous’ report is not known, the Standish Group collects information on project failures in the IT industry. They aim to make the industry more successful and to highlight ways to improve project success rates and increase values of IT investments. The latest result were compiled into the CHAOS Report 2009 and was published in April 2009. 

Different language & expectations.

You probably would have seen some variation of this set of images. I created this sometime back as part of a "Project Management 101" training program for my team of project managers. I wanted to show how disconnected a project could be, in terms of expectations and responsibilities from different stakeholders involved in a project. With simple images, it really does push the point across.

I truly believe that the project manager is the key person in making sure everyone has the same objectives and speaks the same language. A strong project manager would greatly reduce the disconnect seen in the cartoon above.

Does your organisation have a different set of stakeholders? Like to create your own set of project management cartoon like the above? Try this at Project Cartoon.

First steps..

I've been working in the web and digital marketing industry since 2003 and in the military since 1998. And I've always wanted a place to store all of the interesting reads I come across in my daily work and life.