May 2011
38 posts
Earlier today, I posted a link to a checklist for project success. We all know what is needed to successfully deliver a single project. But doing so consistently across a portfolio of project requires more.
I might have titled this differently. It’s not so much competencies as it is an excellent - and comprehensive - checklist of what should be in place to help a project be successful.
Too many to synopsize here, so go read Core Competencies of a Successful Project from Herding Cats.
By the way, has anybody noticed that I’m often point to Glen Alleman’s Herding Cats blog? If you’re serious about managing projects, especially large scale programs or those being done under government contract, he should be on your regular reading list.
(reblogged from scienceisbeauty)
Good piece on the skills needed for effective social media marketing. From the piece…
Do as we’ve done, and hire folks with social media knowledge and expertise. It will open opportunities that wouldn’t be otherwise available, and if your other processes around monetization and customer acquisition scale, social is a phenomenal compliment to whatever channels you’re currently pursuing.
Along the same lines as yesterday’s post about too many priorities, my old blog-buddy, Jack Vinson talks about how to address three necessary conditions of product management without sub-optimization of any of them…
The big issue is here: each of these drivers requires a very different mindset. Optimizing when you are trying to differentiate will create major problems. And differentiating when you are focused on neutralizing will probably create overkill. You get the picture: each project has to be focused on one goal. And I like the comment that I think I heard at the outset: don’t put the same teams to be on projects that will divide their energies.
[Read No multitasking for teams either from Knowledge Jolt with Jack]
I’ve written a lot about strategic focus in my past life, but this piece from the Harvard Business Review blog, continues to beat the horse that will not die…
We all know instinctively that we cannot do everything - and our companies cannot either. The most pertinent question you can ask is not: “How can I find more business opportunities?” It is: “How can I focus on the opportunities where my company can excel — and then reap the benefits of that discipline?” The key to success is choosing the opportunities that are best for you, learning to turn down many that seem appealing on the surface — and may even represent huge monetary stakes — but do not offer you a real chance to win.
The real, long-term wins require a focus on the constraints inhibiting your efforts and the choice of which one you want to strategically maintain and grow. You’ve got to manage your constraints if you don’t want them to manage you.
[Read the whole thing at Stop Chasing Too Many Priorities]
Murphy’s Law has not yet been repealed.
As project managers, we know this is true. Otherwise, there would be less of a need for us. Yet a surprising number of project plans and schedules I’ve seen do not take into consideration the need to address the likely need for rework and revision, even though we all know it will probably appear.
The linked page, Rework Will Happen!, offers up one way of dealing with the risks of requiring rework - building iterations into the project network. To the extent that we can predict several such iterations of related tasks, this works fine. An old Focused Performance post of mine - Opening Up About Project Risk - offers another approach based in Critical Chain Project Management, utilizing range estimates for tasks, which can be applicable to rework that might occur within individual tasks. The latter approach can also be applied to the potential variation in number of iterations involved.
The best approach is to assure you use both approaches - build as complete a project network as is necessary to define the anticipated necessary work, and make use of a schedule that promises its completion taking intra-task and iteration variation into account as well.
An amazing collection of expressive faces. Very individualistic.
[via Science of Beauty via RadioLab]
Important discussion of why single point task estimates (and schedules/promises made with them) are not very useful.
From Why Facebook Is Still A Startup at TNW Social Media…
Facebook…has defined a space in the digital sphere. But crucially, it hasn’t stopped defining that space.
Facebook has blazed a trail; it is actively inventing the rules of engagement as it progresses and, as such, it has come in for a lot of criticism on a number of issues, including privacy and also how it supports businesses on Facebook.
But Facebook doesn’t have other peers in the same space to look at and say ‘oh, that’s how we should be doing things’. It has been trial and error, but it is getting there.
…When Facebook no longer innovates and starts to stagnate, it won’t be a startup.
Roger Ebert, writing about the new Terrence Malick film, “The Tree of Life” - A beautiful essay
A framework for introducing your presentation: The First Five Slides from Beyond Bullets…
- Setting
- Protagonist
- Current Imbalance
- Preferred Balance
- Solution
I’ve recently been intrigued with the possibilites for responsive design for the webs.
This link points out that it’s not just for mobile applications, but for use in smaller than standard browser windows as well.
It’s very tempting (and scope-friendly) to tell a client that we can adjust their site for mobile users, when much of the time what we’re actually doing is simply adjusting a design for small screens.
Potential applications in “pop-out” window content that might also be called upon for viewing in normal browsing as well come to mind.
[“Mobile” versus ”Small Screen” from monkeydo.biz via Zeldman]
