Who’s Really on Your Team? How to Work with Difficult People

PMI Community Post, by Pattie Vargas, MAOM, PMP

Never Say No - Managing Change in a Project

A blog posted by Martin Burns

Never Say No To a Client

Project Managers: Just Say No!

A blog posted by Raven Young at Raven's Brain under Project Management

Saying "No": A Tutorial for Project Managers

by Rick Brenner

Have you ever thought "Why did I ever agree to do that" ?
Have you ever wished that you knew better how to say no — or even how to avoid volunteering to do something — without suffering undue consequences?
Giving a firm and clear No can feel good if it comes from a place of high self-esteem.

How to Say No

By John Hrastar

Goddard Space Flight Center

John offerred two points of thought re. saying no as a project manager:
1. Focus on meeting the basic requirements
2. You don't necessarily need to know how to solve the problem. The refusal forces a reappraisal of the issue, possibly stimulating more creative solutions.

You cannot outsource risk

According to Gartner, more than 60% of companies do not do any security risk mitigation when outsourcing development.

Rob Rachwald has some suggestions.

International Project Management Standard - ISO 21500

IT trends in banking: key focus for 2009

European banks will this year invest in IT to improve risk management, increase flexibility and reduce complexity. And they will outsource and offshore more…

Outsourcing can offer good returns

IT outsourcing has proved disappointing for many companies, failing to live up to the promises of the business case or deliver the expected return on investment. But good management can turn it into a success, as Liz Warren discovers.

…So you want to be an independent consultant…

By Jennifer (Tharp) Russell, President, Mastodon Consulting and Alex S. Brown, PMP, President, Real-Life Projects, Inc.

Statutory holidays in Ontario

Often missed holidays in 2009:

• Family Day (Third Monday in February) - Mon, February 16
• Good Friday - Fri, April 10
• Victoria Day (Monday before May 25) - Mon, May 18
• Civic Holiday (First Monday in August) - Mon, August 3
• Labour Day (First Monday in September) - Mon, September 7
• Thanksgiving Day (Second Monday in October) - Mon, October 12

26 Ways To Know Your Software Development Project Is Doomed

Does any of these sound familiar to you?

• The project name changes for the third time in as many months.
• The requirements definition is begun four months after development started.
• The developer doesn't understand the spec document and continues to develop anyway. And the QA team doesn't know how to test, but they "test" anyway.
• The user or client requests new features instead of focusing on bug fixing and performance enhancements.
• The technical project manager asks you to compose the list of user requirements—without consulting any actual potential users.
• Status reports are seen as insubordinate.
• You learn that management had to insist that the interface definitions be checked into version control after the first code freeze.
• The QA team is told, "We've only allocated three weeks for testing" (on a project that has lasted six months already). Or QA is told, "The date is fixed. We have to have all this functionality by that date."
  

Want to see the entire list? Go to http://www.cio.com/article/470103/_Ways_To_Know_Your_Software_Development_Project_Is_Doomed

On the other side, there are Ten Tips for Running Successful Projects: http://www.projectsmart.co.uk/ten-tips-for-running-successful-projects.html

And more … Make or Break: Why Accurate Cost Estimation Is Key: http://www.projectsmart.co.uk/make-or-break-why-accurate-cost-estimation-is-key.html

The First-Time Manager’s Guide to Performance Appraisals

by Diane Arthur

• The primary objective of a performance appraisal is to ensure the maximum utilization of every employee’s skills, knowledge, and interests.

• Managers as Coaches
• Coaching is the day-to-day interaction between you and your employees. Its purpose is to provide regular assistance, support, praise, and constructive criticism.

• (1) Approachability
• Whether they need help or want to talk about an idea they have concerning how to proceed with a task, you need your employees to view you as responsive and accessible. Employees should feel that you are available for coaching, at any time and for any reason.

• (2) Consistency
• To earn the trust and respect of your employees, strive to apply organizational policies, procedures, and rules as evenhandedly as possible. Conversely, avoid showing favoritism, bending the rules, or looking the other way, even when it doesn’t seem as if any harm will come of it, or if it’s unlikely that anyone will find out.

• (3) Dependability
• Nothing shakes an employee’s confidence more than feeling uncertain about whether he can count on you when needed. Managers who demonstrate that they are reliable are more likely to have maximally effective employer-employee relations.

• (4) Empathy
• Managers frequently find themselves in the position of listening to employees’ work-related and personal problems. When this happens, you must strive to remain impartial, thereby maintaining an emotional distance so you can best help the employee achieve resolution. The key is to be empathetic, not sympathetic.

• (5) Honesty
• You should try to be straightforward and forthright without being harsh or disrespectful. This is best accomplished by adhering to the facts in all matters calling for both praise and criticism.

• (6) Knowledge
• Smart managers are as clear about what they do not know as they are about what they do know. Smarter still are those who view themselves as lifelong learners.

• (7) Respect
• You cannot demand respect from your employees if you do not offer it. This includes having regard for employees’ views, approaches to tasks, requests, and needs.

• Managers as Counselors
• Counseling is the structured interaction between managers and their employees, with a keener focus on specific work-related problems.

• (1) Attentiveness
• By being attentive, managers may follow-up coaching with more structured counseling.

• (2) Broad-Mindedness
• You cannot look the other way when an employee’s behavior is outside the parameters of her job. By being broad-minded, you can leverage the impact one employee’s behavior has on others.

• (3) Commitment
• Savvy managers know that being committed to helping employees achieve a maximum level of productivity in accordance with specified job duties, policies, and procedures can be highly beneficial to all concerned.

• (4) Conscientiousness
• You need to be ever vigilant about what’s going on in your department. Even if everything appears to be proceeding smoothly, it is still prudent for you to determine, firsthand, the status of what each employee is working on, as well as any interpersonal matters that could impact work. Then, if anything is out of sync, you can step in with counseling.

• (5) Focus
• It’s easy for first-time managers to become sidetracked when it comes to matters impacting employee performance, but with a little effort you can remain focused and make objective decisions.

• (6) Interest
• Maintaining an active interest in your employees is likely to result in a good rapport. Then, should counseling issues develop, employees are likely to be more responsive and less resentful. Note that interest does not mean involvement.

• (7) Realism
• it’s important that you take into account each individual’s level of skill, degree of knowledge, and extent of interest in relation to the expectations of the job, rather than your personal expectations based on your own prior level of performance.

• The Golden Rules of Performance Appraisals
• Ongoing coaching and counseling set the stage for any performance review; that is, by doing her job as an effective coach and counselor, she’ll be prepared to successfully apply the three golden rules of performance appraisal:
• (1) nothing that is ever said during a performance appraisal meeting should come as a surprise to the employee;
• (2) managers should be prepared to praise and criticize elements of the employee’s work from the time of the employee’s last review or date of hire; and
• (3) every incident that is referenced should be documented.
  

Assessing Technical PM Competencies

by Andrew Makar

1. schedule development skills: activity definition, sequencing, resource estimation, duration estimation, resource leveling, baselining
2. monitor and control project work: regular status meetings and reports, measure schedule and cost variances
3. business requirements management: process flow diagrams, use case models, sequence diagrams, activity sequence diagrams
4. SDLC methodologies: iterative processes (RUP, agile, extreme programming), waterfall model
5. software quality management: requirements traceability from requirements definition through user acceptance testing, MercuryQualityCenter, IBM Rational ClearQuest
6. issue and risk management: review log with team regularly

10 Steps to Successful Strategic Planning

by Susan Barksdale and Teri Lund

• Step One - Laying the Foundation
• Step Two - Scanning the Business Environment
• Step Three - Collecting Relevant Data
• Step Four - Analyzing the Collected Data
• Step Five - Stating Mission, Vision, and Values
• Step Six - Prioritizing Needs and Identifying Risks
• Step Seven - Designing and Validating Tactics
• Step Eight - Prioritizing Tactics and Resources
• Step Nine - Documenting and Communicating the Plan
• Step Ten - Maintaining the Plan

PM leadership behaviors

• result-oriented leadership behavior - coordinate across multiple teams, overcome obstacles, deliver project's goals
• courage and willingness to take initiatives - solve problems, identify new opportunities, take action without being prompted
• balance between customer demands and project constraints - build rapport with customers, seek to understand the underlying needs, proactively address their concerns
• balance between quality and schedule - risk-based approach, prioritize test cases/cycles
• effective client-vendor relationship - emphasize mutually beneficial goals, focus on critical issues to work together

Four Steps in Conflict Resolution

From book "Conflict Management in the Workplace—How to Manage Disagreements and Develop Trust and Understanding", 3rd Edition

• step 1. attend to the other person, validate/acknowledge the opinion, feeling or intention - does not mean to agree, understand what the other person WANTS

"What can we do about it?"
"What do you need from me?"
"What would you like to see happen?"
"What needs to happen so it is right for you?"
"How would you want it to be?"

• step 2. explore the NEED behind the WANT, keep the focus on the other person, deepen understanding

"Why is that important to you?"
"Why does that matter?"
"Why do you want that?"

• step 3. invite the other's SOLUTION on BOTH sets of NEEDS, focus on solution not prpblem

"How would you see us solving that?"
"What do you suggest?"
"What would be your solution?"
"What can we do so you get … (your need) and I get … (my need)?"

• step 4. build for maximum win-win

"What I like about your suggestion is..."
"My concerns are..."
"What do you suggest we do?"

Power plays - Here is a way of being assertive while keeping a sense of collaboration. It enables you to begin a conversation without any hint of blame, accusation or demand. It is in three parts:
1. The behaviour – a non-emotive description of the current behaviour
2. Your response – how you feel or think about the behaviour
3. The preferred behaviour – what you would need instead

e.g."When I sense my needs are being dismissed I feel angry. And I would like us to work in more collaborative ways."

If the other person continues to dismiss your needs e.g. ‘You are over-reacting’, you can loop again on your assertive request.

e.g. "I appreciate you feel I am over-reacting. However, I feel dismissed. And I would like us to work in a more collaborative way."

Bank bail-outs to hit IT spending and offshoring - TowerGroup

...



Government-sponsored banks might be forced to pull out of offshoring and bring their call centres back to Britain, suggests TowerGroup.

Seven Habits of Effective People

Effectiveness - do right thing right the first time

• Habit 1: Be proactive - choice

the power to choose

"can do" attitued

"I decide to..." not "I have to..."

repond by principle not emotion

• Habit 2: Begin with the end in mind - vision

live by design not by default

develop a personal mission statement - values, principles, talents, roles, responsibilities
Templeate:

The things that matter most to me are:

The principles I will use to guide my life are:

I will make a contribution and enjoy life by using my talents of:

I will live with purpose in the following roles:

As a [role], I will [responsibility]

create a work-back plan from the vision

• Habit 3: Put first things first - priority with integrity

schedule your priorities, not prioritize your schedule

focus on top priorities

urgent vs important

do more planning

• Habit 4: Think win-win - mutual benefit attitude

win-win or no deal

emotional bank account - deposit:

seek first to understand

show kindness, courtesy, respect

keep promise

be loyal to the absent

set clear expections

apologize

give feedback

forgive

• Habit 5: Seek first to understand, then to be understood - active listening skill

"talking stick" - speaker seeks to be understood before passing it to another person

empathic listening - reflecting what a person feels and says in your own words, avoid advising, counselling, solving, probing, questioning, interpreting, evaluating, judging, disagreeing or agreeing

• Habit 6: Synergize - 1+1>2

Begin with common goal/purpose before discussing different viewpoints

• Habit 7: Sharpen the saw - renewal, balanced self-satisfaction in body, heart, mind and soul

Regain "production capability" by engaging in carefully selected recreational activities

The Tech Disaster Awards: What You Can Learn from IT's Biggest Project Failures

By Jake Widman

1. IBM's Stretch project: Try to salvage something of lasting value from the wreckage, even if you don't meet your project's main goals.
2. Knight-Ridder's Viewtron service: Sometimes you can be so far ahead of the curve that you fall right off the edge.
3. DMV projects -- California and Washington: (a) Don't place your future in the hands of one supplier. (b) When a project is obviously doomed to failure, get out sooner rather than later.
4. FoxMeyer ERP program: Make sure your operation can survive the failure of a project.
5. Apple's Copland operating system: Keep your project's goals focused.
6. Sainsbury's warehouse automation: Problems that go unaddressed at rollout will only get worse, not better, over time.
7. Canada's gun registration system: Define your project scope and freeze specifications before the requests for changes get out of hand.