Stickyminds Column About Project Vision
I have a new column up on Stickyminds.com, What’s Your Project Vision?Please do visit and leave comments. Labels: project management, Stickyminds columns
MPD, Stickyminds columns
MPD
MPD, personal
Greetings from New Zealand
After the US-based Software Development conference last week, I flew to Wellington, NZ. I’m speaking at the Wellington/Auckland/Sydney Softed conferences this week. I have slept almost enough, so if you’re in any of these places and you would like to get together for dinner, let me know. (The last time I was here, I did
MPD, requirements
Beyond Bold
I’m an assertive, bold, blunt, and direct person. I try to live within the bureaucracies I encounter, but I don’t always succeed. I’m at SD West this week, where I did a half-day tutorial Monday and am presenting two classes (really talks) today. Before I speak/teach/consult, I like to eat a real breakfast, so
MPD
Multitasking is Conflict Avoidance
There’s a great quote over at The pernicious thinking behind multi-tasking. Note the admission that required multi-tasking is an implicit means to avoid conflicts around setting priorities. I’ve been doing a bunch of multitasking talks this year (and suggesting ways for people to say no), and have written about it in Successful Project Management.
MPD, writing
Writing Status Report
I’m in what I hope is final editing for Successful Project Management. (I”m still doing gross editing, final copyediting is one more stage. But I’m not supposed to change ideas in that stage 🙂 If you want to know how to write a book, read PragDave’s series of So You Want to Write a Book.
measurement, MPD
There is No Such Thing as Percent Complete
Jason Yip’s Hail Mary software development talks about what happens when you defer all the finishing to the end of the project. In the dashboard chapter of the book, I have a sidebar called “How Can We Have No Completed Work?” which talks about exactly the same thing. The more serial your lifecycle, or
MPD, personal
A Little Marital Humor
We’re on our way home from a ski vacation. Mark’s the driver; I’m the navigator. This morning (in the dark at 5:30am), Mark said, “I don’t need a GPS. I already have a voice to direct me.” I, of course, cracked up. Labels: humor, personal
management, MPD
It’s Too Hard to Bring New People Into the Organization
A number of my clients and colleagues are struggling with the problem of bringing people into their organizations. In Hiring the Best …, I recommend the buddy system for bringing people on. I wrote a little article, How2 Create a Buddy (Informal Mentoring) Program. But maybe you didn’t know that, or can’t figure out how
MPD
Estimating Tasks: How Much Time is in Your Day?
I plan on about 6 hours of work in a regular day. That’s project work, not answering the phone, email, making arrangements for workshops or consulting or speaking, or invoicing, or any of the other things I do. Nope, that’s just project work. The other half of that question is how many regular days