While sitting in a governance meeting the other day, I heard how (before I joined the team) a vendor brought in some high paid six sigma black belts to try to bring the vendor governance workflow in line with my client’s governance workflow.  My client wasn’t sure what they got out of the deal, but if you have a black belt in something, it should be good…right?  Because this venture proved fruitless, the vendor announced, “what you need is kaizen!”  That may be what they said, but it’s not what my client heard.

This was paraphrased by one of my client’s team.  In trying to understand what she was saying, we had a quick back and forth that went a little something like this:

The vendor said there was something that would fix everything.
Cry Pan or Pie Pan or something like that.

I looked at her and ask, do you mean “kaizen”?

She then started to matter-of-factly pointing at me.
That’s it! That’s it! Now, what does it mean?
I said it just means improvement or refinement.

She looked disappointed.  That’s it?

Yep, that’s it.

Now, I know it’s not that simple.  There are no silver bullets.  I do believe in using refactoring or refinement to get you where you need to be, but that’s going to be another post.  This post is more of a shame on you post.  Anyone out there who uses a new term, particularly one in a foreign language without explaining it first, shame on you!  Anyone out there who proposes there are silver bullets in project management, shame on you! And, anyone out there who proposes there are silver bullets in project management, uses a new term to label it, AND charges a lot of money for it, shame on you!

I strongly believe approaches like Agile, Kanban, and others bring a lot of potential value to programs.  Customers don’t need snake-oil nor do they need silver bullets.  What we have here is, a failure to communicate.

I was thinking, maybe I should start a practice that will solve all you’re problems and call it Verbesserung.

Any takers?

This week we dealt with the great blizzard of 2010.  It provided me extra time to write.  Then again, it took that extra time I thought I was going to spend on vacation.  My wife thinks I live in a world where everything is related to project management.   I go on a little rant about treating your customers right and then also lend an ear to my colleagues.  Read how I handle being both the sponsor and the project manager on a project.

2/7/2010

Snow Removal From an Agile PM Perspective

With our home getting hit with over 30 inches of snow in one weekend, I compared our HOA and the snow removal team to an Agile team.  Read how they went from failure to success, in one customer’s eyes…

2/8/2010

My Big Fat Greek Project

My wife compares me to the father on My Big Fat Greek Wedding.  I’m no Gus Portokalos, but give me a word, any word, and I will show you that the root of that word is Greek.  Actually, show me a scenario, any scenario, and I will show you how it can be related back to Project Management.  If that doesn’t do it for you, just put some Windex on it…

2/9/2010

The FedGov Fail Day 3

Jhaymee (@TheGreenPM) Wilson inspired this post.  I was frustrated the Federal Government would be closed for 3 days in a row.  I believed we could all be working, at least in a limited capacity, from home.  If the Federal Government could have a plan in place for H1N1, why the hell couldn’t plan for snow?…

2/10/2010

MS Project Task Types – Fixed Work – Units – Duration

Upon reviewing a vendor’s Integrated Master Schedule, created in MS Project, I noticed something very peculiar. Where some tasks could clearly be marked as Fixed Duration, everything was Fixed Units.  In the post, I include a YouTube video to help you understand the difference between Fixed Work, Fixed Units, and Fixed Duration…

THE most important thing is the customer

…You’re welcome?  Did I say thank you? No, I didn’t.  I offered a pleasantry. Just have a nice day.  Goodbye, our business relationship has completed.  Have a nice life…Listen to them.  Be polite.  Deliver value.

2/11/2010

How Do You Know Your Metrics Are Worth It

So you want to create some metrics.  More importantly, someone has told you that you need to create some metrics.  How do you know if you’re just making work for yourself or if you’re just putting a spin on the same old data?…

2/12/2010

Sometimes It Is Best To Just Listen

It was the first day our team had been together in a week.  The DC FedGov closures have really rattled people.  As contractors and consultants, we are not Government employees.  We play by different rules.  Depending on your contract, if the FedGov is closed, you may not get paid…

2/13/2010

The Difficult Task of Managing My Logo Selection Project

Using 99Designs has allowed me to crowd source a design.  I listed the price I was willing to pay, the duration of the contest and provided as much background information as possible to enable designers to provide me with quality submissions.  We immediately entered a rapid prototyping stage…

Today my wife looked at me and said, “ya know, you’re like that guy on My Big Fat Greek Wedding. We talk about something, anything, and you tell me how it relates to Project Management.”  You know what?  She’s right!  We talk about snow removal…Agile. We talk about getting through the honey-do list…Kanban.  I asked her what I should write this post about.  She said, My Big Fat Greek Wedding.

The person she was referring to was Gus Portokalos. He  said, “Give me a word, any word, and I show you that the root of that word is Greek.” Oh Gus, you wise man.  Recently, I decided I was going to write a lot more.  That leaves me with a bit of a challenge.  I don’t want to produce garbage just for the sake of publishing something.  I see people like James Rich, a blogger I follow, push a volume of product but his quality hasn’t gone down.  As a result, I find myself not only internalizing project management but also verbalizing it at every turn.

Yes, I absolutely believe if you give me a topic, any topic, and I will show you how that topic relates to project management.  So, if by chance you read my blog one day this next week and I’m ranting about how a particular restaurant could offer better service if they employed Agile Methods instead of following a Waterfall Process, you’ll be forewarned.

Remember, there are two kinds of people – Project Managers, and everyone else who wish they were Project Managers.

This weekend, our house at the lake received about 30 inches of snow.  It was pretty overwhelming.  Our HOA at Lake Linganore did a very good job and I’m going to tell you why.  Two significant snowfalls ago, we waited 2 days before we saw the first snowplow.  We didn’t hear anything out of the HOA.  Days later, the residents got an email from the HOA saying threatening telephone calls and emails  didn’t help and to please refrain from doing it in the future.  They believed they did the best they could with the resources they had.

I thought they could have done better.  I sent a very pleasant email to the HOA thanking them for their efforts.  A few days later, I sent a followup email with a proposal:  At the next snow storm, I recommended the HOA send out emails, informing the residents of the progress being made.  Whenever I don’t like how a product or service was provided to me, I try to offer constructive feedback.  The next storm came, and this time, so did the emails.  There were only a few but they were very clear.  They outlined the priorities of the snow removal.  Main arteries were of highest priority.  The side streets would be tended to when they could.  This time, some residents got stuck before making it to their homes.  They abandoned their vehicles, and unfortunately, a group of vehicles got hit by a snowplow.

Though it took a few days, the HOA came and plowed us out.  Other than those who had damaged vehicles, the tone in the neighborhood was very much improved.  We understood the priorities and respected them.  The communications is what we valued the most.

This weekend, we had an even bigger storm then the last.  This time, the HOA revised their process.  We got emails a day before the snow arrived.  They advised us to get off the roads by a certain time and identified where to park to avoid getting hit by a plow.  We were also provided a list of the highest priorities in order of importance and grouped by need to have and want to have.  Lastly, we received regular emails notifying us of progress or impediments and who could expect to be plowed out next.

Here are a few successes

• They listened to customer feedback
• The process was refined, based on user feedback
• A list of objectives was made and circulated, identifying items of greatest value
• Regular communications

We received a status report this evening.  In it, we were advised another storm is on its way.  Though the community will be completely plowed by the time it arrives, we were assured the HOA will keep us informed. They added, snow removal operations will be reviewed to see what went right and what when wrong this time around and apply those lessons learned to the next storm.

Did your snow removal go as smoothly this time around?

I would love to hear your comments or stories.

Regards,

Derek

This week I really wanted to turn up the volume of things I wrote about.  I have a lot to say (and write) about project management and if you missed reading my blog on a given day and don’t have an RSS feed or follow me on Twitter, you’d have to go searching in the archives to find it.  I don’t think that’s good enough.  I should make it easy for you to read what I write.  Hopefully, this week in review will help you find something new while you enjoy your coffee or tea.

1/28/2010

Seeing Value From The Customer Perspective

I don’t care if you’re using Agile, Waterfall, or other methods to deliver value.  What is important is you understand your process and what mechanisms provide the greatest value to the customer.  Just because a process does not appear valuable to you, it does not mean the process does not provide value…

1/29/2010

Refine Your Process If You Must Deviate From It

If you’re looking for a free Microsoft Visio template of a Sprint process workflow, which you can edit at will, you can download it here.  As I mentioned in my post Seeing Value From The Customer Perspective, if you think you need to deviate from a documented or understood process, rewrite or refine your process to account for the deviations…

1/30/2010

The Impact Of Social Networking On Project Management

Good leaders do not operate in a vacuum. They exchange ideas and information with people. Offer free information and it will come back to you tenfold. Listen to knowledgeable people and then make a more educated leadership decision… In this post I compared the traditional communication paths and how that process is turned on its ear, thanks to social networking…

1/31/2010

This Is How You Know When To Kill A Project

A personal rant about paper telephone books and how I never realized, until now, who the real customer was. There is a very similar parallel between the newspaper industry and the printed phone book industry.  They both believe or promote the scarcity of information.  That scarcity justifies cost.  To the contrary, we now live with an abundance of information.  That information is freely distributed and reaches a broader audience…

2/1/2010

The December Numbers Are In For PMPs

Yes, the December numbers are in.  December 2009 numbers for Project Management Professional (PMP®) certifications were published and it looks like there will be over 400,000 holding the certification in 2010…

2/2/2010

And The Best Methodology Is

I recently commented on two blogs that address similar topics.  Jesse Fewell wants to empower teams to succeed, equip managers to lead, and enable executives to unlock the secrets of high performing organizations.  Jesse wrote a blog post offering the real reasons behind the methodology wars.  It’s an insightful post and I would recommend you go and read it…

The other blog post was from Mike Cottmeyer, someone I turn to on a regular basis to find inspiration and wisdom within the industry.  Mike wrote a blog post asking Why is Agile so hard to sell? Again, it is a very good read and you should set aside some time to read some of his writings…

The Pain Of IE6 And Application Development

There are legacy applications out there that were built on IE6 and it’s not an easy migration.  There are some Agencies which ONLY use IE6 and the users don’t have permissions to install a new browser.  So, what do you do?…

2/3/2010

Updated 10 Step Help To Submit PMP PDUs

All PMPs need 60 PDUs during a CCR cycle so don’t put it off until the last minute.  I document the process on how to claim your require 60 PDUs…

2/4/2010

Using Common Sense With Documentation

Though I really love good documentation, going heavy on it does not guarantee a successful project.  My recommendation is you spend a little time identifying documentation that truly meets your needs.  More importantly, identify documentation that truly meets your customer’s needs…

2/5/2010

Managing Risks and Opportunities

Washington DC is in the process of getting 20-30 inches of snow, over the next 24 hours.  Though I know you can’t foresee all possible issues which may occur over the course of a project, you should make an honest attempt to identify them in order to open a dialog with your stakeholders.  Has weather ever delayed your project or pushed it over budget?…