1. Learn to Communicate at All Levels. Communication is key to a successful project completion, and learning how to communicate comfortably with executives, team members, and shareholders is considered the top-needed skill for project managers. PMs need to be able to tailor their message to the various levels of the organization as well as to the individual. Some executives require specific project details, while others insist on just brief overviews. Whether it is business or personal, project managers need to take interest in whatever the executive wishes to talk about, which allows them to utilize this information later on. Communication …
Why are there people who are funnier than the rest of us? What makes them different? Oh sure, some people are just born funny. Some just have a natural way of saying things that’s funny. Some may look funny while others talk funny. After twenty plus years of teaching normal business people how to be funny(ier) I’ve concluded that the “Highly Funny People (Project Managers included)” all share the same habits, which are learnable by anyone, … even you. They have the ability and are willing to laugh at themselves. Their stories show how they failed but coped with it …
Top 10 Signs You’re a Project Manager 10. Becoming tired of having a social life beyond work. 9. Spending hours planning and re-planning a Friday night out. 8. Thinking Rommel would have been more effective if he’d used a Gantt chart. 7. Using so much jargon customers think you’re speaking a foreign language. 6. Organising your life into milestones. 5. Setting time based tasks for your family at weekends. 4. Buying a personal copy of Microsoft Project for use at home. 3. Giving regular status reports to your other half whilst doing the decorating. 2. Creating a …
This sounds like a dumb question but when I look back on the number of executive and leadership teams we’ve worked with in organisations it’s clear to me that in many instances the members of those teams were technically competent, and nice people, but not great leaders. That begs a couple of questions, the first of which is – how am I measuring the presence or absence of leadership? There are obviously enormous numbers of people who have weighed in on this topic and the vast numbers of books on leadership attest to that. However, I met a man who had three …
While there have been many and many books written on the subject of project management, there is no sure-fire procedure or equation to get it right. Of course, that also explains why there are so many books on it. Well, we’ll cut to the chase and lay out six project management principles that you can use. Research A project manager should have a fair understanding of the industry or niche of the project, so they can lead the team effectively. Now, we’re not saying that you need to know it through and through, but a little bit of research can …
My brain just melted. Or exploded. Or both. According to recent PMI research, 70% of the time, senior executives are not engaged in the project prioritization process. Now this just blows my little brain to pieces and here’s why. Why this statistic blows my mind The executive team is responsible for selecting the strategy of the business. That strategy is useless if not well-executed and project prioritization and selection is the bridge from strategy to execution. Do the executives in 70% of companies really not care whether or not the bridge is a sound one? I just can’t believe that. Executive support and participation is …