|
|
| |
|
Index section
|
|
1. Welcome to Elements!
2. Keeping the Project Focus
3. Ending a Project
4. Links: Real Estate
5. Coaching Notes: Corporate Consulting
6. Newsletter Notes
|
| |
Welcome to Elements! |
|
The recent
feedback I've received about your projects revealed two major
themes:
1) how to stay
focused while in the heat of a project
2) Energizer Bunny projects that keep on going and going.
Much of
project-related activities are based on common sense and cause a
reaction such as "Oh yeah! I knew that". It compares to what is
found in one of my favorite books, "All I Really Need to Know I
Learned in Kindergarten", by Robert Fulghum. In kindergarten he
learned how to share, how to flush, how to look before crossing the
street and many other necessary skills that we all use. The premise
of the book is that you already know most of what's necessary to
live a meaningful life and have known it for a while. Living it is
another matter. With projects, the knowing how to do it and the
doing and finishing it is another matter. This edition of Elements
covers the doing part of the project.
One journalist calls real estate websites the new porn for the web.
I have included three real estate related links this month. Even
If you are not in the market, it's worth checking them out. I dare
you to take a virtual home tour and not have some reaction, whether
you view it as obscene, exotic, disgusting or a great idea!
In coaching notes, I list the type of consulting and training skills
and services that I offer and have been focusing on within
corporations.
Thank you to the volunteers who provided great feedback and fun for
the pilot workshop, "Project Management and Coaching for Real Life
Projects". Our group project was job hunting and networking. The
workshop is conducted in three sessions and uses coaching skills to
step you through the stages of your project. Contact me if you are
interested in bringing the workshop to your company or your group.
Keep the feedback coming,
Sincerely,
Star |
|
top |
2. Keeping the Project Focus |
|
When you
are in the middle of a project, bearing down, plowing ahead with
deadlines looming before you, this is the time when the goal, the
plans and the well-intentioned actions get thrown out the window in
favor of the easiest and quickest solution. Here are some ideas to
consider when you see that the focus is drifting:
A. STOP working on the project. Take a break; step back for a
few minutes,
hours or a few days as necessary.
B. SIMPLIFY - Classify, Integrate or Relate to the Goal.
- CLASSIFY into Categories: If too many things are going on, if
it's overwhelming,
or if there are too many tasks and milestones it may help to
create top level
categories that accurately describe a bunch of things to plan,
take action on,
review, and complete.
- INTEGRATE into a Whole - If the progress of the whole isn't
moving forward
and it seems disconnected, there may be too many categories and
segmentation.
It might be time to eliminate all or to combine several
categories in order to
focus of the whole project.
- RELATE back to the goal - If it looks like you are lost in the
details and it's
overly complex, ask the simple question,
"How is this helping me achieve the project goals?"
C. TRY A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE - For example, if you're
immersed in the
detail, then summarize.
Target the 25% work done as complete instead of the 75% as still
to be done.
It's similar to the example of looking at the same glass of water
as being either
half full or half empty.
D. MAKE THE GOALS, PLANS AND ACTIONS VISIBLE for you and
everyone
involved in the project
- PRODUCE WRITTEN MATERIAL OF THE GOALS in posters, Signs,
Team Meeting Places, Email Signatures.
- CREATE VISUALS of the complete project, Pictures, Rendering,
Token representation, Memorabilia.
- ACKNOWLEDGE AND CELEBRATE Successes, Milestones, Learnings and
Task Completions
E. REMOVE UNNECESSARY STRESS
F. USE EVERY OPPORTUNITY FOR LEARNING AND IMPROVEMENT
G. CREATE PRIORITIZED TO-DO LISTS for the project, yourself
and the team
H. MAKE IT FUN AND ENJOYABLE
"If at first you don't succeed, try again, and then try something
else",
said Mason Cooley.
I have listed eight ideas for keeping a project focused and that can
easily be adapted to many types of projects: Stop, Simplify, Change
Perspective, Make Visible, Celebrate, De-Stress, Learn, Prioritize
and Have Fun!
|
|
top
|
| |
3. Ending
a Project |
There is a sense
of satisfaction and accomplishment in completing a project. Five
years after completing a project an engineer told me, "You were the
only manager I've worked for that ever finished projects." In
hindsight, ending these projects required lots of energy and effort.
Sometimes it's helpful to understand why a project doesn't want to
end, in order to make an ending occur. Common reasons for project
not ending are:
1. The desire for it to be perfect when it's delivered
2. That there's always something better coming along soon
3. Someone else has to say it's done
4. There is a delay in waiting for a supplier, resource, or other
person
5. The initial goals don't make sense anymore
If the Project needs to end and it's not, try some of these
recommendations:
1. Finish this project and start at least one new follow-on project
(version 1.1)
2. Turn an existing milestone into the END
3. Define the END in a less traditional way
For example, I'm declaring my screen porch project as complete
when we have
our first social gathering with food in it, and not when all the
construction is done.
A product can be considered done, when the final version goes to
manufacturing.
Getting it into a customer's hand and money milestones can be
follow-on projects.
4. Have Two Ends: Private and Public Ends
A private end date is reasonable and achievable for you and your
team. The other
is what the outside world is aware of.
5. Review and Change your Initial Goals to what's appropriate for
now.
Time has moved forward and things are different. See if the
initial goals still are
appropriate and modify as needed.
6. Encourage Accountability for completion
Determine who cares about the project being completed and will
help with motivate
towards of completion. A friend uses this technique she tells
lots of people when
she's going to be done so everyone asks her, "Is it done yet?" As
a coach,
Accountability to completing actions and projects is something I
frequently do.
7. Force a date or money milestone or completed feature to end the
project
(or review it and extend the date).
Completion of a project brings with it a sense of accomplishment, no
matter what the results. Some part of the project is yours to
complete as you see best. I challenge you to find an end to at
least one non-ending project. As a coach and consultant I'd love to
brainstorm with you on ideas that will work for your projects.
|
|
top
|
4. Links: Real Estate
|
www.homeadvisor.com
This web site is nice looking and has lots of great tools and
features, which also makes it very busy and overwhelming at times. It
includes additional information such as gardening, decorating,
shopping, and virtual tours of homes.
www.realtor.com
This is a more Spartan site. In my limited testing, it seemed to have
more homes, more details on them and updated info about the homes on
the market.
www.isoldmyhouse.com
This site is geared towards selling your own house. Its inventory is
significantly less than the others.
|
|
top
|
5. Coaching Notes: Corporate Coaching
|
|
.As a consultant
I frequently use the same skills and services as I do in coaching for
corporate teams and organizations as I do with individuals. The types
of consulting services I enjoy best and have been doing recently are:
o Facilitation - Provide objective meeting management, conflict
resolution,
brainstorming and problem solving while working towards achieving
the
stated goals.
o Project Lifecycle Consulting - Assist in creation, updating or
analysis of project
processes.
o Project Management Consulting - Partnering with managers and the
team on
delivering results more effectively
o Management Consulting - Partner with senior managers on problem
solving,
strategy and vision.
Other skills and services are:
o Workshops for Lifecycles, Project Post Analysis, Vision Creation
o Translator of Business to Technical to Business
o Collaborating with Teams on solving sticky and complex problems
o Project Management Trainer - I have course material on project
management
workshops that I customized to each organization and team, based on
their
organizational strengths and areas of improvement needed. Here are
some
examples of available workshops:
1. Three-day workshop on Project Management, using real projects and
organizational issues. It's very practical with the goal of
determining what can be
done to improve the efficiency of projects right now and in the
future
2. Two-hour Seminars related to Project Management such as: Project
Lifecycle,
Project Management 101, Goal Setting, Requirements, and Project
Processes
3. Weekly project management topics to follow a real project. It
combines a short
training lesson with the consulting
4. Coaching Skills for Projects - Combines basic project management
and coaching
skills for project success
Lifelong learning is most effective when training, consulting and
coaching are combined. Training puts the ideas out, consulting
customizes them to your environment, and coaching locks in the
learning over a lifetime. Here are two quotes from recent corporate
clients where training, consulting and coaching were combined:
"The project management training exercise and coaching carried out
this year has had an immediate and significant impact on our ability
to deliver projects. We were given exactly what we were looking for,
a theoretical base with practical hands on expertise. The coaching
was probably the most useful since it allowed us to really put the
theory into practice in the minefield that is project management
today." - Executive VP of Services and Sales of an International
Software Company
"I have found the last few months of coaching to be very rewarding and
very useful for me as a new Project Manager. Coming from a very
technical background, my communication and people skills are not as
strong as my technical skills. I think what helped a great deal in the
beginning of the coaching was that we set up goals to focus on during
the project. I feel that I have improved a great deal in those areas
of my work and I feel this was largely due to the weekly coaching I
had with you. Coaching has become an essential part of my working
week." - Project Manager and Technical Manager of a Customized
Services Group. |
|
top |
6. Newsletter Notes
|
|
Elements January
2002
Written by: Star Dargin
Edited by: Ruth Gleba,
gleba@aol.com
Advertising will be accepted.
Contact Star for rates at:
stars@stardar.com
Personal submissions will only be published with permission from the
submitter, who is responsible for ensuring rights to the material.
Based on your preference, submissions can be published anonymously.
Elements is published 12 times a year.
The deadline for the next issue is February 8, 2002
To subscribe or unsubscribe send email to
stars@stardar.com
The opinions expressed in Elements are the author's viewpoint. While
every effort has been taken to verify the accuracy of the content,
such information is subject to change without notice. Elements is not
responsible for inadvertent errors.
Star Dargin
34 Robinson Road, Littleton, MA 01460
978486-4603
Star Dargin is an independent coach, consultant and trainer and is a
partner of Shared Learning International:
www.sharedlearningint.com
As a professional coach she collaborates with individuals and teams to
provide focus and balance in achieving personalized results. As a
consultant, she specialized in bringing software methodologies and
project management to life for business, teams and individuals.
|
|
top
|
|
|
|
