"The rule of five" is a new-to-me idea for managing multitasking at the individual level. It's a combination of the task board and the idea of dropping things to the floor. Have an explicit list and keep it in control. Interesting.
All in project management
"The rule of five" is a new-to-me idea for managing multitasking at the individual level. It's a combination of the task board and the idea of dropping things to the floor. Have an explicit list and keep it in control. Interesting.
Breakthrough Project Management from Ian Heptinstall and Robert Bolton is a brief guide to getting significantly improved project performance through combining two management approaches: One is Critical Chain Project Management (CCPM) and the other is collaborative contracting. For me the material on CCPM is a confirmation of what I have been doing for many years. And the material on Project Alliancing is new, and yet it rings bells for ensuring successful projects of any type.
The project management community like to point to examples of really bad project management. Every once in awhile, there are examples of extremely good project management as well. These are all videos, but they get the story across
Ajai Kapoor has a nice piece on LinkedIn Pulse where he says, "Please STOP planning ... Really." He recounts the familiar challenge of plan / don't plan. Plan because we want to direct our efforts into the right places to achieve some goal. But don't plan because plans never survive contact with the enemy.
Mike Dalton has a nice series of articles on project management in Industry Week (and copied to LinkedIn Pulse). "Are Your Plans Realistic & Robust?" entry is on planning and using the CCPM approach to construct a plan.
Dee Jacob (author of Velocity) provided a workshop of a game she has been developing over many years of practice in critical chain project management. I have looked around for games or simulations to help highlight the critical pieces of critical chain, and this is the best I've seen.
Another talk on Strategy & Tactics Trees at the conference came from Michael Hannan. In this presentation he suggested updating the current "projects" S&T Tree to be more universal to any project-delivery organization.
Rob Newbold of ProChain (and author of a number of books on CCPM) has been thinking about updating the practice of CCPM around the planning and scheduling of CCPM projects. He presented four concepts that he's implemented, most of them seem reasonable. I don't know if they are all really needed though.
What does it mean when you report a status of "fine" in your work or your project?
"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving." - Albert Einstein
I see a lot of projects within business support organizations that look like "implement this tool." And then the organization is surprised when the project takes much longer than expected and the tool doesn't get used to the extent expected.
Clarke Ching's "Rolling Rocks Downhill" is a great business novel, primarily about TOC and Agile. I like how it combines a number of perspectives and shows how real value can be obtained in surprisingly short time horizons. That said, it helps when there is outside pressure.
A schedule defends from chaos and whim. It is a net for catching days. It is a scaffolding on which a worker can stand and labor with both hands at sections of time. - Annie Dillard
A quick article with opinions from six people on project killers: 6 Experts Share the #1 Thing That Derails a Project | Smartsheet. Of course, there are six different things listed as "the #1 thing." And there are a few more listed in the comments.
A quick anecdote from Realization's newsletter on "There is no such thing as good multitasking" and some thoughts around the idea.
In 7 Wastes That Impact Business Growth Jon Terry, one of the founders of LeanKit, presents a nice way of thinking through the Lean / Toyota Production System idea of waste and how one my think about it in the context of business growth in any type of organization.
The latest HBR Ideacast interview with Erin Reid talks about Why We Pretend to be Workaholics (based on a related HBR article). I enjoyed the discussion, but what really got to me is this idea of "pretending to be busy."
I came across the video from the University of Texas 2014 Commencement address by Admiral William H McRaven in which he describes his training and draws ten life lessons. The story is engaging, and while the lessons out of context sound odd, they make sense in the way he puts it together.
"The CIO's Guide to Breakthrough Project Portfolio Performance: Applying the Best of Critical Chain, Agile, and Lean" by Michael Hannan, Wolfram Muller, and Hilbert Robinson is a good, short description of how to take ideas from several disciplines and apply them to an overall portfolio management approach.
Rather than describe the solution - a description that is always going to be lacking - understand what problem the customer is trying to solve. What limitation or barrier do they need to overcome? And why do they want to do that?