Seeing the forest for the trees

Some people based on their aptitude for project management and level of experience intuitively see the things others don't see or recognize are even factors of (or for) consideration.

For example, there are critical and chaotic situations where an existing team member, lead or manager that for one reason or another wants or feels the need to do something before they know if that action will make the situation no better and sometimes make things worse. This is the scenario of being busy for the sake of being busy, and is analogous to why doctors hate patients that go on-line and prescribe for / diagnose themselves using some web site (e.g. WebMD).

Now there is a subtle difference between crisis and chaos that sometimes gets blurred in the heat of the moment. Crisis in the context here meaning that there is a real or imagined urgency and need for immediate action. Chaos may or may not come about as the result of a crisis. Chaos in contrast is when people are attempting to do something ... anything to avert further disorder or confusion (sometimes insistently and with great fervor and determination), and it can be made better or worse by actions taken. Thus, I believe likewise that a difference exist between reacting and responding to a certain stimuli -- e.g. an angry customer call. I'll leave that for another post though.

In either case, you need to decide whether you have a crisis or chaos. That might also mean you need to go first to where they are mentally and emotionally and prod them along with you to enable them to see the forest for the trees. Also recognizing some people have gotten themselves deeper into those proverbial woods than others by the time you get to them. Thus, it will require more time and effort on your part to get them to where they need to be.

In all interactions with others (to paraphrase the Dalai Lama) it is important to 'seek to understand before offering one's understanding' and provide a level of respect you would most certainly expect for yourself. Because they didn't understand the question or the situation does not preclude you from doing the same. I recently witnessed a public interaction where I thought one of the two people was about to say "no, duh!" and even though neither did it wouldn't have surprised me if that happened.

Comply v. Commit

A leader with a vision they absolutely believe in and understand themselves is most evident through how they communicate it to those they need to rely on to convert it from dream to concept to implemented reality. They have the ability to talk about that future, that vision, with such clarity it is as if they are talking about the past. That's where the difference between commitment or compliance begins.

We all know there are times when there is a high level of urgency or some crisis and compliance is needed; where the need to get people started and a solution implemented. These are the exceptions.

We also all know at some level the value and benefits of getting people to commit to something and yet it's never too far away until I see another example of "because I said so", ego-driven politics. The following is my short rant of sorts to just get this out there in the hope it does someone good.

The differences between compliance and commitment is regardless of whatever or how much passion you have for whatever you're trying to achieve. Here is a brief list of those differences.

Compliance ---

• People may comply but you still can't force anyone to do anything -- you will fail to fully achieve your vision / objectives ... no matter how much your response to this is "oh yeah, I'll show you!"
• Whatever you're actually able to achieve -- it'll cost more to get there. Maybe through money, time, bad blood, whatever, ... you can be assured it will cost more.
• It'll also cost more to maintain if for no other reason than those who do not agree or believe in your vision (because you didn't get their buy in) will do what they want when they think they can get away with it ... guaranteed.
• ... or maybe they just don't care because you already showed them you don't care.
• Drivers try to enforce their vision by introducing a down side / threats; negative reinforcement

Commitment --- 

• Decisions are made and communicated based on objective, critical reasoning (not subjective -- yes, yes, we already know your mommy said you were wonderful and perfect. She's probably the only one and maybe a few others that think so), and so ...
• people understand why
• they appreciate it's importance and impact
• there is a WIIFM for them that isn't based on a threat
• enforcement is mostly self-perpetual through positive reinforcement

So    much     easier.

A mentor of mine once told me they focus on sharing what they are for rather than what they are against, because what you put out comes back to you; what you sow is what you reap. Good advice. Wish more people knew it.

We Tried Agile and got Nothin’

Anyone who knows me first hand in or from the corporate world knows I’m first and foremost an Agilist. Whatever my title is, at my core I’m an Agilist. That means I live and breathe the principles of what it means to be Agile, and I’ve done so for quite some time now. Sure, I can do and follow traditional practices when it’s called for, but when it isn’t it tears my heart out. When I write ‘Agile’ it’s not a typo either; anyone can be ‘agile’ without being ‘Agile’ and some companies out there may still be doing it very well.

A conversation I recently had with a senior R&D manager included her saying “there are a thousand ways” to be agile. And while that is true there are just as many or more ways to pretend to be agile and not reap any of the benefits that exist by truly being Agile. The following platitudes are a few examples to highlight why some companies have ‘adopted’ or ‘embraced’ agile practices and are still barely or no further along in enhancing productivity, quality or engaged teams.

The companies and teams who say they’re taking a ‘blended’, ‘modified’ or ‘hybrid’ approach to Agile have most certainly adopted something out of a book or webinar on Agile but at their core they’re still 100 percent pure waterfall. I’ve lost track of the number of examples I’ve witnessed or read about that show how much this is the case, and how many billions of corporate dollars are lost every year as a result. It’s enough to almost make a grown businessman cry.

A very wise uncle of mine a long time ago shared with me Mark Twain’s definition of an expert, “someone from out of town.” I’ve always remembered that and been saddened within my career that so many others did not have access to uncles like mine. How that applies here is when companies choose preferred employees with strong influencing skills to attend a conference or something on Agile. That in and of itself can be very good, but only if those same employees are personally interested in the topic have something to lose if they don’t adapt to and adopt to what they learn. Similarly, if you’re going to spend budget money to send those people somewhere, please, please, please make sure it’s from someone who is actually qualified and certified to do that. For example, someone with CST after their name would be good. About a year ago I was speaking with someone in a team lead role at a company who went with the lowest bid. That trainer told the attendees that testers should “go for coffee” while the developers plan the backlog. That company has been adopting agile for about six years now and still hasn’t seen one quantifiable improvement in how they manage projects or products.

Too many times I’ve heard executives and senior managers talk how important this all is to them and in the next breath say the equivalent of ‘find me something I can call agile that means I don’t have to change anything but gets me all the benefits’. Too many times I missed the chance to say ‘you need to go big or go home’ even if you go in small steps. After all, you must learn to crawl before you can walk, and you must learn to walk before you can run. I seriously doubt they would’ve listened anyway. Speaking to those people any more than I have is like spitting into the wind, and has earned me and many others the label and back-handed compliment of being a “purist” among those same people. I don’t take the insults or suggestions that I’m immature in the business world too seriously though, and I hope those others feel likewise. I’ve already empirically proven time and time again that doing Agile as intended will reap the benefits many once though impossible. And to offer some inspiration for some of those others who are only now becoming inspired by Agile, even out of the mouths of babes comes wisdom. Those other naysayers and belittlers on the other hand will never envision let alone earn the ability to achieve anything close to the benefits reaped by other companies who do embrace Agile for all its worth. They and their companies may even lament one day ‘if only we had known!’ Sad thing is for them and all the others they were supposed to lead, they did.

Finally, like any activity, being Agile takes practice to get good at it. Some would even say 10,000 hours of practice. So send people on courses, attend conferences, hire a consultant, whatever you need to do to grab that ‘Agile’ brass ring. Just don’t keep doing what you’ve always been doing except now with some agile term on it that sounds good. You won’t reap the promised benefits (no matter how many excuses are forthcoming) and it tears the heart out of us who really care about this stuff.

The definition of a Leader

I re-watched the Peter Mansbridge open access interview of Justin Trudeau last Wednesday, November 4.

What was perhaps the most inspirational for me was when they were recording him on a teleconference with grade school students. Part of his response to one student was, "A good teacher is not someone who stands up in the front of the class and gives out all the answers. A good teacher is someone who knows the challenges their students are facing and helps them solve all those challenges and get the answers."

When asked about it afterwards he replied, "Being a teacher is what I am."

What speaks to me most about this is that it would be very easy to replace the word 'teacher' with the word 'leader'. This is more than leadership, this is the heart of servant leadership. Time will tell for sure. At this rate; however, I may be witnessing the first politician I will ever believe in.

Kanban’s jump onto the Agile bandwagon

As an agilist with a love of knowledge one of the things that irritates me to no end are when someone modifies the definition of something to suit their own marketing or other agenda. Thus, let's first create a framework for what is to follow.

History

Kanban at its most basic level is a Japanese word that means visual token or instruction card, or yes, there are as many ‘roughly translated …’ definitions out there for ‘kanban’ as there are kanban web sites and product solutions out there on the interweb. :-) 

Many years ago and even some sailing vessels today use signal flags. These flags were introduced at some people’s estimates approximately 300 years ago. And they are part of the maritime standards and laws still today; although I would hazard to guess at the percentage of people today with boats that could read them. The point here is not to suggest signal flags are Agile. They are nevertheless ‘instruction cards’. As such, the message below could mean “AGILE” or “I have a diver down and you need to stay clear unless you’re a pilot at which you should approach at low speed while I alter my course to port (the right) because the ship is quarantined so when I said ‘port’ before I actually meant starboard.” You decide. :-) 

Eventually Toyota started using the principles of kanban for manufacturing in the 1950s. 

And seriously, at none of these times within any of a multitude of this or other examples anywhere across the decades or centuries ago was anyone thinking "Agile" project management. They weren’t even thinking about JIT either for that matter until the 1960s in Japan and the 1980s in North America. 

The word, the principles of kanban and signal or instruction cards existed all the same.

Skip forward to the Present 

The popularity of Agile gaining as much momentum as there are people abusing it to serve whatever agenda they have, and for that matter people and companies applying it as intended and gaining huge benefits as a result.

There are also an incredible number of people and companies schlocking the next best mouse trap. Intermingled among them are some really awesome products that can support and enhance the effectiveness of teams within companies to achieve results unimaginable until they actually see it for themselves. 

So here are some general good practices in no particular order you may just wish to follow if you’re going to use ‘kanban” and “Agile” in the same breath. 

• Unless you're a team of 3 or less and the project isn't that complicated or complex, it needs to be so much more than three columns of states of work encompassing To Do, In progress, Done or some variety of those labels. If that describes your team and the project, sure use kanban; you might just love it! Just don’t call it Agile … at least just not right away.

• The principles of Lean and Limited WIP are important. Create distinct rows for features and priority.

• No tool is Agile if neither it nor those using it are adhering to the principles behind Agile. And in the context of this article in particular, the first value statement in the Agile Manifesto itself … “Individuals and interactions over processes and tools”. That leads me to another factor all too many take undue liberties with; the word is ‘over’, not in place of, or instead of … but that’s another article for another day.

• Whatever tool you plan to leverage, a tool with a Personal Kanban and work by person views so you can see who is overloaded (or overloaded themselves) and is blocking or blocked by others will very likely at one time or another be great a feature to have available to you. Some tools address this by creating Done columns in between functional group columns, or colour-code the story cards.

• If you've got multiple cards that someone says they all have together in their own personal kanban you really should be asking yourself why. Seriously, I've seen project teams of about 20 people with 3-month development windows where they've created over a thousand story cards. Now that's an example of where those deconstructing stories should be checked for OCD! :-)  In all seriousness, any team that does this has with very high certainty eliminated any scheduling benefits available from taking an Agile approach to what they are doing.

• The point at which some process manager or anyone else over-complicates how a kanban approach is used that is also the point you are no longer following the principles of kanban -- as I believe is described so very well in the video attached to http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/kanban as a good example. 

Conclusion

Kanban can be an incredibly awesome and effective way to manage projects. Kanban is not Agile on its own unless the specific guiding principles also applied to it. For that matter, no tool on its own is Agile.

References

https://www.crisp.se/file-uploads/kanban-kick-start.pdf 

https://kanbanery.com/ebook/GettingStartedWithKanban.pdf

http://agilemanifesto.org/principles.html 

You're Agile ... really?!

One really easy way to determine if you are doing Agile or not is to ask if part way through the project, the company could release what you've done so far and start making money from it. Not whether the business will; whether it could.

And as those who know me personally have heard me say many times, ... There is a big difference between big-A Agile and little-a agile. You can be 'agile' without being Agile, but you can't be Agile without being agile.

That for me is what is at the heart of a lot overly complicated answers I see on the web. As apparently said by Albert Einstein, "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." And based on what I've read about Al in the past, 'simple' refers to how complicated something is, not how complex it is, and being able to describe something so everyone can understand it at some depth.

If you want to be truly, over the top successful in business these days you need to understand and build towards the MVPs (minimally viable products) from your customers' perspectives; not yours. Customers' needs change over time so adaptability built into your development practices whether you're creating software or anything else. That said ... remembering all the while that your customers may not know what exactly it is that they want. That's why you're here. (see / Google Henry Ford and Steve Jobs quotes)

Want change because your company doesn't do that well? Adopt new habits and eliminate old routines. Meaning that if all you do is slap agile labels on the way you've always done things, or worse, apply the parts of Agile that align to how you currently think and ignore the rest you might as well be teaching a pig to sing. As the idiom goes "it's a waste of time and all it does is annoy the pig". 

That's my rant for today ... maybe I'll have the where-with-all to read some more 'Agile' (or is that 'agile') spam in my inbox after I take the dogs for a walk. :-) 

This post is is inspired by Tim Rahschulte and his LinkedIn discussion in the Program Management Academy group.

Some of the practices that have worked best for me are:

1)  Educate people early to appreciate (if not understand) that a big project and a program are two different things. There should be at least some delta in the benefits metrics you're measuring because of that. 

2)  Do it, whatever it is, only if the benefit can be described in tangible, non-political terms. If "because it sounds good (ego)" is the only reason to do it, it probably should not be done.

3)  Recognize the mole hills that will become mountains and deal with (perhaps even laud) them as successful learning opportunities.

4)  Appreciate the current speed at which you are traveling. There is an optimal point between managing to the "dumbest common denominator" and the soldier's creed of 'leave no man behind'. It's important to regularly assess whether it is still optimal.

These four things won't guarantee success but ignoring them will almost certainly refute the opportunity to achieve it. I (like many a reader here I'm sure) have seen way too many really good strategic initiatives become question-marks and dogs from stars and cash cows by sponsors and other clouted stakeholders who make it about personal egos rather than corporate benefits. 

How safe really is SAFe?

I've been hearing a lot more about the SAFe framework these days. A lot it sounds like business people (excluding actual Agilists) who have yet to learn the lesson of the trojan horse -- the original one from that war a few millennia ago. Either that or at least believe that it applies to them.

SAFe can work but only if one remembers two things.

1. what the Agile Manifesto says -- the first line in particular, and
2. it's always about People --> Process --> Tech/Tools ... in that order.And as I spoke about at the Ignite Waterloo 14 event, people need to remember that to achieve successful results that order never changes.

Want further evidence to this? See . . . 

As KenSchwaber wrote on his blog "we cannot buy our way to a better future", it takes hard work. Sadly, as even I have seen all too often, there are way to many armchair quarterbacks out there who think reading a book, a few articles, and attending a 2 or 3 day course will make them experts. The rescue project management contracting I did for a few years about a decade ago proved that is not the case.

Another author posted "While SAFe is about alignment, transparency, program execution and (code) quality it’s about how YOU are going to implement the ideas, principles and practices in YOUR environment. In the end it’s the implementation that matters: It’s you, your colleagues, your shared goals/values and the business value you produce."

Ron Jefferies wrote "SAFe wraps those ideas in a package ... to appeal to today’s managers and executives who do not understand Agile, but who know they have a problem to which Agile may be the solution."

The short answer is that SAFe can be a safe and effective tool if the tool is used to supplement the concepts of an Agile approach and have them applied by true professionals who truly understand and appreciate the concepts behind being big-A "Agile". 

A little over a century ago practically anyone could call themselves an engineer. It took the failing of several bridges and one in particular that caused a huge loss of lives for business people, governments, and society at large to appreciate the gravity of the errors in that belief system. True professional engineers wear an iron ring to remind themselves of that. Hopefully one day in the not too distant future business people, governments, and society at large will stop wasting billions of dollars and tens of thousands of hours of people's lives on an annual basis, and they will also appreciate what true professionalism is as it applies to project, program, and portfolio management. 

The Agile Vacation

My 5 min talk on why Agile can be used for anything is now posted http://youtu.be/Gp73bhssPUs -- not bad for first time in front of 300+ people if I do say so myself. :-) 


See all the slides on-line at http://www.slideshare.net/Leyts/ignite-waterloo-agile-vacation?utm_source=slideshow03&utm_medium=ssemail&utm_campaign=iupload_share_slideshow 

When you Hire Smarter do you Really?

An article -- http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/231911 -- I was reading on the 'Entrepreneur' web site read a great quote, "The best investment you can make is to hire people you can trust to take things off your plate." That is so true, and especially with experience as a people manger, it amazes me the attitude of some people.

The reason companies hire is because there is already have too much work for the person doing the hiring with existing resources. That shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone but surprisingly all too often it is. The following examples are some of the surprises I’ve heard or overheard in the last 30+ years. And yes, in the examples I overheard, I did appropriately challenge the speaker. I can’t guarantee that it helped; just that it happened.

Employees (prospective or otherwise):

“You're here to help me be successful.” No, it's actually the other way around. You’re here to help everyone be successful do doing to the best of your ability the role you were hired to perform. As a direct report to someone, your manager will in turn help you help them be successful by using the skills you espoused as within your possession during the interview process. You must sow before you can reap anything. BTW, everyone in a company of two or more people is a direct report to someone else; even if you’re the President and CEO.

“I lied to you because I didn't think I could trust you, and when I was fired that proved I was right.” No, you were fired because you lied to my face and proved I couldn't trust you.

“I'll work with you but I won't work for you.” No, if you're a new hire with relatively few years of post college work experience and someone is going to take a chance at giving you a job, damn right you're going to work for them. A smart business is not an autocracy but it ain't no f@#king democracy either.

Managers:

“I gave you the job; now you're on your own.” No, if you're going to be a people manager, manage your people. You don't want to do that? Okay, maybe it's you that's in the wrong position.

“I was here first, I know better.” No, because if you're the smartest person in the room about everything that needs to be done then you're hiring idiots .... or maybe it's somebody else that's the idiot.

“I expect people to leave their outside lives at the door, and behave in a professional manner while in the office.” Professional (aka 'ethical')? Certainly. Leave their lives at the door?! Really?! You do know you're actually hiring people not robots; right? Sure, to the best of a person's ability they should manage their emotions rather than the other way around. Empathy is a critical factor in leading and managing ... bear with me here ... P E O P L E.

All these people and many others haven’t a clue when the term “servant leadership” is used. It does not mean the leader becomes the servant. It means the leader provides a service in their role as a leader to create something bigger than themselves. And from yet another article “Learning from and acknowledging mistakes requires the humility that Level 5 Leaders display. Level 5 Leadership, according to Jim Collins (no relation), is what separates exceptional leaders from all others.”

Knowing all of this perhaps I was then somewhat overly surprised when I read another article -- http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/232914. This article labels flexibility and drive as personality (78%), cultural alignment (53%), and then skills (39%) as the areas for job opportunities in the future. This actually scares, yes 'scares', me.

Yet from reading this article I further appreciate what I've been hearing some senior economists say over the last year - "there will never again be a company that lasts for over 100 years". I hope the article is a misinterpretation of the study. If charisma and group think are valued more that skill and respecting each others' individual differences then the probability is a whole lot smaller towards ever creating in the future innovations like the iPhone, object oriented programming, or a flexible process that will leave Agile in the dust the way Agile has waterfall.

I listened to a Sr. VP at Google tell a crowd of wannabe employees about a year ago that he didn't care if somebody was the best programmer in the world if they didn't have the skills to get along with those they needed to work with. There is a lot more damage that one developer can create that would more than offset them writing code day in and out. And everyone deserves to feel good about going into work every day they go.

Okay, not everyone, not those who have the perspective that it's all about them and anyone else left can have whatever scraps are left-over.

Not those to manage to what I call the "dumbest common denominator". The perversion of the 'no kid left behind' strategy in the 70s and 80s created class agendas where mediocrity flourished. This was 'easier' than empowering the best and the brightest to go as far as they could, to leverage their own innate talents to go beyond on their own, and use that extra bandwidth available to the teacher to help the stragglers get over the hump. This is the premise of apprenticeships that have worked the world over for hundreds of years. This also opposes the short-sighted mediocrity of unpaid internships. Now of course anyone who can afford to do this may actually be the most qualified for the role, however, those who cannot are never even given the opportunity for those people or companies to ever find out. And as my statistics professor said, “you can’t prove a negative.”

I still have some hope that some of today’s leaders and those into the future are seeking principles over popularity (personality) but if this second article is correct that is not the case. And if that is truly indeed the case, all I have to say is "may god help us all". History has given us examples with companies like Nortel, Enron, MCI Worldcom, NCR, and many too numerous to mention that when popularity and charisma become paramount the company doesn’t last long. Certainly each of those companies thought they were making the best decisions when they started hiring charismatic individuals over those with more valuable ‘skills’. No one intentionally makes business decisions to proverbially slit their own economic throats, but when they do make decisions that do just that then everyone suffers from stockholders to the least skilled laborer to some degree.

So this is where we come back full circle to where I started this post. Hopefully you are hiring smart rather than mediocrity. Hopefully they can do things you can’t or better than you. And if not that, hopefully you are hiring apprentices who are willing and able to learn.

What does this all have to do with project and program management? Well, the same as any other management role; to get things done through other people. Hopefully, most of those people are smarter than you in what they were hired to do. And hopefully they equally recognize that you are smarter than them in what you do as well.

Status reports versus Progress updates

The difference between a status report and a progress update.

As much as the uninformed would have some people believe, no it's not semantics.

For example, a team member has a series of tasks to complete a user story; a requirement. Let's say those tasks are to load and stage the latest development build, and then execute a series of tests to determine if what is new in that build 1) does the functionality that was added, 2) has not broken anything that used to work, and 3) does all of that with the same or better system throughput performance. Let's also say that the original estimate for that work is three-and-a-half days. Further, let's say that equates to 7 story points.

A status report is "I've got the build and I'm continuing to stage the software." A status report or update is focused on the past up to that point in time. And until somebody invents a time machine where people can go back in time to to change things, this is a waste of people's time; including the person giving the update.

A progress update is "I've got the build, I started to stage the build this morning, and I ran into one small problem, so I spoke with Julio and he was able to help me out right away. He discovered there was an error in a default setting for our test environment. So all things considered, I believe the work will still be finished as planned on Friday." A progress update or report is future focused. It focuses on where things are headed and gives people a proactive opportunity to avoid risks while that work is ongoing or for the next time such a set of similar tasks is being performed.

In the status report, there is no way to know whether the work is on, ahead, or behind schedule, or worse, completely roadblocked. It does not support clear visibility into the progress of the work being done. No one knows to offer help if the tester is roadblocked, and for all anyone knows what is occuring with these series of tasks could be the first indication that the project could be completely riding off the rails.

I've heard some people say "well, that's the project manager's job to ask questions to clarify that." And for me, that is completely and utterly obtuse for two reasons.

One, if the project manager has enough time to remember to stay that on top of every task then either the project isn't very complex or the project manager is being under-utilized. Either way the company is wasting money.

The second reason is that I suspect in a lot of situations those same team members would probably next be screaming about being micromanaged if that was happening. And if they aren't, hopefully the project manager is thinking something like "my god, what am I doing here?! Isn't there something better I could be doing with my life?!" In short, the project and the organization in actuality are circling the drain.

In summary, a progress update creates value-added visibility with opportunities to create even more value beyond that specific point in time. A status update takes people away from the value-add they are doing in their individual jobs so they can hear each other ramble on for probably longer than necessary, add just another layer of distraction that further reduces their value and productivity in each of their roles, and creates unnecessary overhead.

Think I'm wrong? Listen to the updates from yourself and other team members in your next scrum session, stand-up meeting, or whatever you want to call it.

Paying back ... or at least forward

"Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I may remember. Involve me and I learn (or I will understand)." 

For me, this is a great quote, that I believe has been around in various forms since the days of ancient China.

The challenge though is how rarely it seems to be applied. Perhaps being the least in the last decade compared to ever in history.

What I mean is ...

To 'tell' someone something they must be listening closely enough to ask questions if you are being vague; or at least for you to clarify for them so they understand you.

To 'teach', one must be willing to be taught. This applies to the student and the teacher, and I remain astounded by the number of people who consider themselves no longer a student as soon as they graduated out of school. As stated by an old proverb, "Only a fool knows all."

To 'involve' is no more of an isolated category than the previous two. And like the other two categories it is a relationship of sorts between the provider and the receiver. It is also a more involved or deeper relationship because it requires more effort to complete. It also creates more value for the short and the long term. As in the movie "Mr Holland's Opus" this teacher learned at the end of his career when he was feeling at his lowest the true impact of his efforts. Most teachers have their students for a few months and then are never seen again. The truly great teachers have students who stay in touch, make the effort to say hello on the street, or attend show their appreciation in other ways with a positive impact that lasts a very long time. 

The question that remains is whether you want to be average or mediocre in the things that only the unique you can do. I'm also neither saying do this for free. Part of the value measurement of any effort is based on what people are willing to pay for it. 

That said, over the last couple of years especially it seems there are more and more greedy and unethical businesses who have been discreetly re-implementing indentured servitude or slavery, and some I'm sure believing themselves wonderful human beings for doing so. They tell themselves they are offering an education that those students would otherwise be excluded from. Their slaves are given labels like intern or football scholarship recipient and that's supposed to make it okay. Back when I was young and for hundreds of years before that when people did a job where they were also learning something it was called being an apprentice or in a co-op program through the institute of higher learning; and we all got paid.

So you think you're a leader . . .

I get a lot of my inspirations from others' articles and blogs. Bruce Kasanoff and his article 'How Do YOU Bring Out Talent in Others' on LinkedIn is no exception. After all, one of the greatest pieces of advice I ever received is 'to read'. So when I read this article and Bruce asked his readers how we lead I had to contribute.

For me, leadership is about establishing clear accountabilities, boundaries, and letting them know I am there to care about (protect) them. And doing that as concisely as possible. For me, these are the ABC's of leadership.

The accountability part; I think that's the obvious part - I hope so anyway. Just in case I need to clarify; my expectation is always for people to make commitments and then adhere to them. Yes, this must be done in a way that is commensurate to the level of maturity and skills of each individual. And yes, people either know or learn that if they don't hold themselves accountable, I will. To clarify perhaps a bit further, two of the US Marines mottos are also two of my favorites. 'Semper fi', short for semper fidelis, latin for 'always faithful. And 'Adapt - Improvise - Overcome'. Life whether in business or elsewhere will introduce hurdles we'd rather not have to deal with. Omission to make a decision (or commitment) is still a decision.

Boundaries - for me it's never ever okay for anyone to deflect responsibility for their own decisions onto others people, or hold onto critical information that impacts other people and their commitments. You know something is up and coming that other people will care about? Figure out who those people are and get that information to them ASAP in a clear and concise way. Part two of that, only make decisions within your realm of authority and responsibility. An in-the-weeds individual contributor should never presume to know more about the business than a Director or VP on the leadership team.

Protection - I expect everyone to 'man/woman up' when they screw up; admit you messed up, honestly apologize to those you impacted, make a commitment to not repeat the behavior, and then move on. If someone wants to lord over you that error; that's when the very pointed, gorilla-in-the-closet, in-your-face me comes out towards that person. In short, don't mess with my team; period. I will eat you alive. 

That's the launch pad. 

The execution is for me to be consistent with myself and everyone else in applying that. 

Accountability -- something I've noticed a lot of over the years is that a lot of very smart people are very dumb when it comes to the cost of doing certain things. I'll offer a couple of examples because this is so important. 

1)     Everyone at the company where you work is there because someone higher up in the chain of command (relative to you) believes the role is needed and that person has the skills needed for that role. I've witnessed people who regularly step on the proverbial toes of others and then loudly complain (sometimes back stab) when others do the same to them. I always set expectations right out of the Ontario Labour Code and a lot of very good books to minimize the occurrences of this happening -- i.e.:

a.     speak to the other person(s) about the concern; and do it respectfully because sometimes some people just didn't realize what they were doing,

b.     if you are not comfortable doing that on your own for some reason; come see me and I will assist you, and finally 

c.      if you've already tried a) and b) more than once and it is still happening, we will all sit down together -- NOTE: this does not mean I will carry your burden (see more below).

2)     I've seen groups of 8 people spend 2 weeks developing huge, detailed, documented plans that other than them, no one will ever look at. And think themselves oh so wonderful for doing it. The cost: $40,000. Now, if you were writing the cheque for that document, would you think it's worth $40k? We all need to be good stewards of not only our own wallets but of our company's wallets too. That is, If we really want the company to be successful.

Boundaries -- in the high tech realms, thinking outside the box in a lot of cases is a really good idea. There is rarely if ever the case when only one right way exists to do a task. That said, if it's not part of your role, collaborate with someone you trust whose responsibility it is to do that. If there is no one who does that (and you've actually checked to confirm) and you're not putting your own job on the proverbial back burner to do that task it may just be a good idea to proceed.

Protection -- I will protect you in public but I will also punish you in private. Sadly in my travels I have encountered some people who define integrity as "it's okay if we can get away with it" and "lying is a valid negotiation tactic". To me, outright lying is just plain disrespectful, and will hasten the severity of that punishment. If Harry or Sally keeps repeating the behavior they've been told to stop, it'll become public when they are no longer present. NOTE: we will go straight to DEFCON 1 in instances where the law has been broken -- e.g.: workplace harassment or bullying.

The results: the teams I mange are filled with a lot of highly motivated people that do a lot of very good and productive work. And yes, over the years, I've also had to fire some people and ignore others. I've also had many different people I haven't worked with in years stop me in the street and in stores to say hello.

Everything else is filling in the cracks; the details that pop up here and there that are just parts of reality because you're dealing with people - not machines. Remember two things -- 1) "because I said so" is always the weakest form of leadership (even if it is sometimes necessary -- usually only in a crisis), and 2) you can't be a leader if no one is willing to follow you. They may follow you because they have to, but that's a boss; a manager, and always temporary.  

Perspective is everything

The other day I was speaking with a group of people who thought it was so horrible that their executives look at the contents of the project tracking system. And worse, that they challenge the project managers when their status updates and the contents of the tracking system don't appear to match.

My first response to them was to ask "How so?"

They elaborated about their belief that they should just be trusted to deliver to what is described in the project plan at the start of the project.

I countered saying my perspective is actually the complete opposite of that. A couple of people just walked away. The smarter people looked at me like I was nuts, and the even smarter people ask "How so?".  I elaborated with the following justifications.

1) Want to know whether or your project is really important to the bottom line? Listen to see whether or not they are talking and asking about it. Seriously, if they're not, it's not.

2) Executives have people they have to report to too. Executives seriously do not have time to ask about the minutea of your project. However, if they can't get the information they need AND the project is important don't expect them not to. And if they don't, it doesn't really matter -- re: see point 1 above. That's one of the great things about burndown charts that are embedded apps within the tracking system being used. It gives a snapshot view of what the status is at any point in time, if it's embedded well, the extra effort to create those charts is somewhere between negligable and nil.

3) It's NOT micromanaging if all they're asking for is progress updates and quantifiable information to substantiate what you are saying. It's called 'trust but verify' and any manager that doesn't do that is either incompetent, a fool, or both. From a financial perspective it's also a SOX compliance issue. To you, it's an 'oops'. To them, it's a potential legal matter and in the most serious cases possible jail time. Blind trust is a fool's overture.

4) EVERYONE wants to go home at night and into the office in the morning with the warm and fuzzies. Executives are no different. 
So reminder to smile, say thank you, and offer a concise and direct answer the next time you get asked what is going on.

Oh, BTW, those people that stayed engaged in the conversation? We all learned something those who left figuring they already knew everything that mattered. We're all further ahead in the game than them. Now also recognize that these are all start people; some of them wise. Yes, there is a difference, but that's for another post.

And when it comes to career management it tends to be those who know the most and work the best with others who tend to start in the game the longest. ... of course there are exceptions. And the companies where those expectations tend to apply also tend to be the companies on the way out.

Like riding a bike

Eric Barker's  blog is on my weekly must read list for what I do during my Sunday morning coffee and before the household gets too active. This blog holds incredible wisdom and insight, and has the ability to get that communicated without the purple prose of similar blogs.

This week's post I thought was a great reminder about how great leaders remain great leaders and riding a bicycle are quite analogous. Remember when you were first learning to ride a bike? Pushing the pedals forward to move forward; esay. Push back to brake; cinch. Balance? Well that something else entirely.
It's easy for us to believe at some point that we've mastered riding a bicycle and we don't have to think about it any more. The reality though is that the task has just become rote. We're still thinking about it; just not consciously. And when we stop doing that? That's when gravity kicks in and shows us who the real boss is.

Managing or leading people is in many ways the same thing. It means keeping everything in balance, making well found decisions without waiting too long to make them, and making sure you don't allow yourself to get carried away on the shoulders of the sycophants.

A few quotes from this week's article:

"Egos expand faster than waistlines."

"The irony of leadership is you need to speak with certainty to be taken seriously. But if you take yourself too seriously, you end up in the hubris trap."

This week's must read article sums up with a statement that "denial, ego and hubris are all parts of human nature. They are like gravity. We don’t defeat them. To move forward we must actively resist them every day."

Want to see the whole article or subscribe yourself? . . . 

http://www.bakadesuyo.com/2013/09/strategic-leadership/?utm_source=%22Barking+Up+The+Wrong+Tree%22+Weekly+Newsletter&utm_campaign=a23f4e90aa-9_15_139_15_2013&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_78d4c08a64-a23f4e90aa-46174749

Soft skills -- Vision – having one … to a detailed level

Having and being able to share a clear vision; being strategic in your purpose. I believe this is what people are talking about when they refer to needing someone who is “details oriented”. It’s also widely recognized that having one is important. I did a Google search just a minute ago and it responded with about 57,300,000 results in 0.17 seconds. And yet having a vision is rarely listed when people are asked what the most important characteristics are for being effective. For example, it was listed only once in a recent LinkedIn PM Community group post.

Now, before I go any further, I’d like to repeat and clarify that the following is focused on those in the project management profession. I and many others have been inspired by leaders over the years. JFK’s vision of landing a man on the moon and safely returning him the Earth by the end of the 1960s. Martin Luther King Jr’s ‘I have a dream’ speech. Those and many other leaders had a very clear vision of what they wanted to see happen. They did not, however, have the skills to technically know how to achieve it. Still, both these and other visions were achieved and the world is a better place for them being achieved. Would they have made great project managers? Probably. JFK was the captain of a PT boat during WWII. Do all great project managers possess the skills to become leaders of industry, government, and causes that will change the course of history? Probably not.

Now, with that out of the way, the clarity of a PM’s / PgM’s vision and level of detail that can be discussed are very much inter-related in my opinion. It is the ability of this person to:

• get into the weeds with the team if and when needed and
• commensurate to their role and
• for the teams they are managing and
• for whom they are reporting into.

Where this seems to go off balance in many cases is where people (both individual contributors and those already in leadership roles) sometimes have a perception that you must be able to do to lead. This, depending on how extreme this position is taken, can be a promotion of individualism over teamwork. It is also the downfall of many people new to management roles. That lesson being to learn to delegate rather than do. Toyota and many other companies almost always promote from within. And this makes a lot of sense in most cases. A project or program manager really should understand what a group of computer science professionals need to do and why to develop and deploy a complex software application. Do they need to hold a B.Sc from a prestigious university to be effective as a PM/PgM? I doubt it. I don’t have that degree and I’ve really done quite well over my career. By the same token though, I equally believe my hands on understanding and experience of software development and the IT infrastructures that software needs to be deployed on has contributed to that success.

It’s also those “and”s that really make a difference. As systems theories seek to promote, it’s not so much the individual components as the interrelationships among them that really make the difference. They are very important because the vision needs to be shared at the level of your audience, and as a PM/PgM I believe we all know that your audience consists of management teams, vendors, customers, and other stakeholders in addition to your core team. Making anyone feel stupid at any time at any place is just plain wrong. It may be immediately satisfying to put a bully in their place in a public way; and I admit that in the past I have been guilty of doing that myself. However, the loss experienced doing that also meant losing the skills that other person had to offer. Yes, sometimes it’s worth it but that should never be the first option. U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt’s famous foreign policy statement to ‘speak softly and carry a big stick’ can equally be applied today. And as he also said during his presidency, the objective should always be to never have to use that big stick. On a lighter note, even in the Bugs Bunny – Yosemite Sam cartoons of my youth Bugs never sought out to humiliate Sam. I think that was a good life lesson.

Finally, if people perceive you as making it up as you go you’ll very likely be perceived as flaky, insincere, not credible, whatever; and that’s regardless of how clearly, concisely, … you communicate. And they won’t follow you. As the old adage goes, you can’t be a leader if no one wants to follow. Someone once said to me a few years ago in a moment of frustration, “It’s not about you! And what makes you think you’ve got all the answers anyway?!” My response was simply, One, I don’t think I have all the answers. That’s why I’ve built a strong team around me. And two, I was put in that position because of the vision I had and communicated to the executives;  on what we needed to do to both resolve existing limitations/gaps, achieve stated strategic objectives, and how and what we should do to go about doing that. If you think I’m completely wrong and the wrong person for the job, take that up with our executives.

I never did find out if I was the source or just the target of that person’s frustration. I do know thought that person was able to convince our executives that the gloss and polish they offered actually made them the right person for the job (not me). I wouldn’t take too much stock in their decision making skills though. I got a call from a recruiter about 18 months later telling me who had been ‘let go’ and asking me if I would consider coming back because the project still needed to be completed. This was a project that should have and could have been completed in less than a year. Yes, karma does exist. A favorite analogy of mine for this event is a beloved children’s game, King of the Castle. The specific analogy being that others may and will knock you off that heap (out of your position) but without possessing the depth of your vision they won’t stay there too long themselves either.

In closing, I’ll offer to you the request and hope I have for you, and why I am writing this post. If you’re going to have a vision, share it. If you want to take over someone else’s vision, I hope you actually have the depth of understanding to actually carry out that vision through to fruition.

Soft skills -- Honesty and Integrity

A senior manager I had a few years back introduced me to a very successful salesman. In that encounter he suggested to me that if I wanted to be really successful I needed to start following the platinum rule instead of the golden rule. He defined the ‘platinum rule’ as treating others as they wanted to be treated regardless of how they treat you or anyone else. I’ve never been really able to apply the platinum rule perhaps in no small part due to the fact that I am a very big believer in karma. What goes around eventually and always comes around. I have learned though (the hard way) that viewpoint makes many of the more politically motivated individuals out there very nervous.

And when it comes to motivating people . . . well lets just say I’m of the school you can’t actually motivate anyone. You can only leverage the motivations people already possess. The other half of this picture that tends to get lost on a lot of people after they’ve been doing a certain job for a long period of time is humility, and offering credit where credit is due is part of that. And yet some people want to receive kudos just for showing up. Still others’ have perspectives that taking the credit as the leader is just how things are supposed to work. If you don’t do that yourself, they see you as weak and not a leader. As the old adage says “provide goes before the fall.” One person said to me in my travels that “it’s only arrogance if you can’t back up what you’re saying with results.” That never really sat that well with me that well either. It seems contrary to sincerity and self-respect / confidence / efficacy. That said, I also know that I’ve been accused of being arrogant. Luckily (for me) there’s been some one else close by in most cases to challenge that accusation. And yes, I can fight my own battles. It’s just that this is one of those situations where the more you protest your innocence the more it looks like you’re not innocent at all. It’s like being called a guru. It’s great if others give you that label and much less so when you do it yourself.

Soft skills -- Communication skills (or BLOT)

For today’s post, a big thanks to one of my readers who suggested I follow the BLOT (Bottom Line On Top) principle on this topic since ‘communication skills’ is so widely viewed as the paramount skill required of all people who are in leadership roles. And I agree; so with that some of you may be asking ‘so what gives?!’

Communication skills in and of themselves are subjective to the environment, and thus generally not a personal characteristic on that basis. If you take any individual and change their environment that person may do equally as well communicating with those they interact with, or they could do better, or they could do worse. It’s the same person, only their environment and the audience has changed. Likewise, you could take a poll at any public speaking event and find people that span the bell curve regarding their perception of the speaker and their topic. Let’s use TEDx as an example. I generally look forward to hearing about the latest speech available on-line because I thoroughly enjoy most of them. You may feel the same way but TEDx, some other speeches, or disagree with me entirely. Now in any of these examples if you had a negative perception of the speaker’s communicative skills and mine was positive the speaker’s skills are not lessened just because your perception is more negative than mine; or vice-versa for that matter.

Saying that, some of you may say “yes, but if they were a truly great speaker then everyone would think they were wonderful.” And again I would agree with you, and I would offer that rising to the level of Gandhi, Churchill, Lincoln, Mandela, and others may be desirable and yet unattainable for the vast majority of us. Does that mean the rest of us are then poor communicators? Of course not, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

Across my career I can come up with multiple examples of people who perceived my communication skills as abhorrent, average or exceptional. It’s like a bell curve like anything else in life. If everyone you meet tells you you’re an exceptional communicator then you’re either a very unique individual on par with the examples above. Either that or they are blowing smoke up your tailpipe because they perceive value in doing so because of your status or position relative to theirs in whatever situation that discourse took place.

Okay, time to wrap this up. Possessing cultural awareness, being perceived as an honest person with a high standard of moral integrity, having a vision you want to share, and being self-aware are all factors that play into how any of us are perceived  regarding our individual communication skills. And that, my friends, is why I have listed ‘communication skills in 5^th place out of 5.

Oh yes, and those on-line discussions that started all of this? I’ve posted the links to a couple of them below.

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/What-type-PM-are-You-35313.S.221953713?view=&srchtype=discussedNews&gid=35313&item=221953713&type=member&trk=eml-anet_dig-b_pd-ttl-hdp&ut=3ohE2E-I-ZTRE1

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Is-arrogant-PM-better-project-35313.S.218477783?qid=5aec2a81-242b-4d90-95f1-e0e0c232dfa3&trk=group_items_see_more-0-b-ttl

Soft skills -- Cultural awareness

I believe this characteristic is very high on the list of required characteristics if not in the number one spot.

One of the benefits I’ve received from being a contractor and working in numerous businesses is the awareness that one size definitely does not fit all. What I mean by that is that having a keen awareness of both the personal cultures of the people you work with and the corporate culture in place will do more than anything else to determine where you and your projects will ultimately sit on the ‘over the top wildly successful’ – ‘absolute failure’ performance scale. This is especially important when there is already a dichotomy between management and worker views on the value of a particular strategy, communication needs, readiness for change, risk tolerances, etc. Depending on your perspective, the same situation or even a single conversation could be positive, neutral or negative. Of course, this also presumes you’re coming into the position with at least a minimum baseline of technical skills.

The most valuable piece of concise advice that comes to mind at this moment is ‘Go slow to go fast’. This tidbit of wisdom is one of the things I think that took me a relatively long time to truly appreciate. Personally, for me, it says so much more than the expression of ‘a bull in a china shop’. Sure, for those of us who have been around for even a while have all seen this situation play out at one time or another, and it’s not pretty. Some newbie PM or high priced consulting firm that should really know better comes riding in like the cavalry to the rescue and the smart ones of us sit back and watch until they either smarten up or fall on their faces.

This is why I truly love the workplaces that have already done some kind of True Colors exercise and everyone has their primary colors posted at their desks. They may as well have a sign up that says “Hi, I’m so-and-so, you can best interact with me by . . .” and you fill in the blank part of that line. Of course, if they appear to be stressed for whatever reason (most of us are at some point or another) you’d probably do best to be observant (aware) and proceed with the color that person has when they’re stressed. By then collectively leveraging and offsetting each other’s weaknesses and strengths and enabling your team with this awareness you then create synergies. And that synergy of awareness to cut a long story short then creates highly productive project teams.

Project Management Soft Skills

I’ve seen what seems like a lot of on-line discussions lately about the level of arrogance of people who choose project management as a profession, soft v. hard skills required to be effective, what qualities make a good program/project manager, etc.

Using Dictionary.com definitions as my premise, …

‘Quality’ is an essential or distinctive or distinguishing characteristic or attribute with respect to level of excellence in personality and traits.

‘Character’ is the aggregate of features and traits that form the individual nature of a person and the moral and ethical qualities and reputation.

These factors are the two sides of the same coin that help me differentiate between Bob, Mary and Bill. Just to be clear; these are made up names referring to no one in particular.

Arrogance, however, is the offensive display of superiority or self-importance; including overbearing pride.

The following five factors listed in order of importance I believe are deterministic for predicting the level of success achievable for a program/project manager; or for any leader for that matter.

1.      Cultural awareness

2.      Honesty and Integrity

3.      Vision – having one … to a detailed level

4.      Self-awareness / wisdom / insight

5.   Communication skills

I will elaborate on each of the above points over the coming days.

I will also say at this point that this list may differ from yours. That’s okay. It’s our unique perspectives that make this world an exciting and enjoyable place to live. And yes, I’m very much aware and excluding the more negative issues that exist in this world; there’s enough of that on the news already.