By popular demand (well one person asked us) Rick and Peter are back with a second ‘An Audience with Rick and Peter’ free webinar on Tuesday 15th December at 5pm GMT/12pm ET
This time we will be talking ‘Speaking in Project Management’ – covering presentation tips and how to get started as a speaker in the project management world
Book your place RIGHT HERE
Check these out – 6 (yes six!) chances to hear Pete
Why Stakeholders regularly Ignore your Project Reports and how to Fix that – Wed, 18 Nov 2020 17:00 GMT https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/why-stakeholders-regularly-ignore-your-project-reports-and-how-to-fix-that-tickets-127335713547
By Invitation Only: AI in Project Management ‘a deeper discussion’ – Tue, 17 Nov 2020 16:00 GMT – message me for details if you lead a lead of 25 or more
The Project Management Software Selection Struggle – Thu, 26 Nov 2020 16:00 GMT https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-project-management-software-selection-struggle-tickets-128124336339
Will Artificial Intelligence (AI) support of replace Project Managers in the future? – Wed. 25 Nov 2020 17:00 – 21:00 CET https://www.pmi-sgc.de/events/eventkalender/635
Process, People, and Products – a Special Workshop with Lee and Peter – Wed, 9 Dec 2020 14:00 GMT/9am ET https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/process-people-and-products-a-special-workshop-with-lee-and-peter-tickets-126783142793
Speaking in Project Management: An Audience with Rick and Peter (2) – Tue, 15 Dec 2020 17:00 GMT/12pm ET https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/speaking-in-project-management-an-audience-with-rick-and-peter-2-tickets-128595686159
Not a Project Manager? But you are a Project Manager? Then book your place on this Free webinar
https://informalprojectmanager.eventbrite.co.uk
The Informal Project Manager
There are three strata inside organisations today. There is ‘Business As Usual’ (BAU) what your business is all about, what do make, what you sell, what you offer, there are ‘Projects As Projects’ (PAP), the big scary changes that demand a full-time project manager, and ‘Projects As Usual’ (PAU). These are changes led by the Informal Project Managers of the world, and there are many such change leaders who deliver this as part of their day job but who, perhaps, have never been told how to do this, or who have no supporting community to aid them.
This Webinar is aimed at your world, your challenges, your needs. Led by Peter Taylor, The Lazy Project Manager, and supported by a panel of experts from Microsoft Project targets your needs, today.
Agenda
Join Peter on 24th June and hear some great advice, meet many other Informal Project Managers, as well as having an experienced mentor ready to help you.
https://informalprojectmanager.eventbrite.co.uk
PLACES LIMITED
I’m heading to Switzerland on 26th and 27th February for a series of presentations/workshops – details to follow – but if you are interested in an in-house session for your company around those dates then just let me know.
See http://www.thelazyprojectmanager.com for my offerings – let’s talk today
An experienced Change and Transformation Specialist who has operated at a global scale within many industries, for organisations ranging from small to enterprise.
Peter is the author of the number 1 bestselling project management book ‘The Lazy Project Manager’, along with many other books on Project Management, PMO development, Executive Sponsorship, Transformation Leadership, and Speaking Skills.
He has delivered over 350 lectures around the world in over 25 countries and has been described as ‘perhaps the most entertaining and inspiring speaker in the project management world today’.
Key strengths include: Embedding robust governance to ensure successful delivery of £multi-million change programmes and working with stakeholders throughout the project life-cycle to ensure delivery of tangible business benefits; as well as introducing best practice processes aligned with an organisation’s culture and maturity. Working across multiple industries including Manufacturing, Health, Pharmaceuticals, FMCG, Aerospace, HR, Public Sector, Education and Finance. Deep understanding of the project economy world and internal/external stakeholder interaction. PMO design, build and re-engineering expert. Strong communication skills and the ability to engage effectively at all levels within an organisation, shop-floor to board level.
As we all start the journey that is 2019, a few questions:
If so then I, and my team, would love to speak to you about how I might be able to help you
I am the author of the number 1 bestselling project management book ‘The Lazy Project Manager’, along with many other books on project leadership, PMO development, project marketing, project challenges, presentation skills and executive sponsorship as well business transformation
In the last 5 years, I have delivered over 300 lectures around the world in over 25 countries and has been described as ‘perhaps the most entertaining and inspiring speaker in the project management world today’
I specialise in all things relating to project management and project leadership as well as presentation skills training, and executive coaching
My mission is to teach as many people as possible that it is achievable to ‘work smarter and not harder’ and to still gain success in the battle of the work/life balance, as well delivering presentations, keynotes and lectures that are both fun and informative
More information can be found at www.thelazyprojectmanager.com as well all of my contact details, or message me through LinkedIn
Contact me today to discuss how we can work together in 2019
Check me out today at www.thelazyprojectmanager.com
The following is an extract from my new book ‘How to get Fired at the C-Level: Why mismanaging change is the biggest risk of all’ in association with my friends at Tailwind Project Solutions – previous extracts followed a series of 5 Challenges that I think every organisation should consider, and consider very carefully – and now we will look at the 5 tests of control:
The Cycle of Engagement (some also refer to this as the Cycle of Resistance, but that might be considered somewhat cynical) describes some typical stages in a project. Not stages of the project lifecycle you understand but stages of even getting to the project lifecycle, in getting the project started – despite the business case being approved and the project being well and truly ‘in the portfolio’
It goes something along these lines:
Corporate change initiative approved and announced, everyone cheers loudly. Kick off meeting (party) fueled by marketing spend is completed.
A department or team are asked to pick up the project and implement the change in relation to their day to day work.
The cycle commences…
You see what is happening here – no real commitment or buy-in, only lip service to the change and the value of that change.
Back to that classic isn’t it?
1. What do we want? ‘Change’ comes the loud reply from all
2. Who wants change? All hands go up as one
3. Who wants to change? No hand goes up
Ensuring a successful change, it is necessary to create that clear vision and to make sure people are ‘on board’ with that change.
TAKE THE TEST: If you recognise this behaviour inside your organisation then you definitely have an attitude issue and your organisation needs to do a whole lot of Organisational Change Management[1] (OCM) and generally get out there making people realise that this stuff is important.
Tailwind Project Solutions was formed in 2014 to provide a bespoke approach to project leadership development. Owned by Director & CEO Alex Marson, the organisation works with large FTSE 250 clients including some of the biggest companies in the world in the Asset Management, Professional Services, Software, Automotive, Finance and Pharmaceutical industry. The company has a team of world-class experts who provide a bespoke approach to the challenges that our clients have, and the company was formed because of a gap in the market for expertise which truly gets to the heart of the issues clients are facing – providing a robust, expert solution to change the way that companies run their projects.
At the time, the market was becoming flooded with training companies, providing a ‘sheep dip’ approach to project management, and the consensus was that This didn’t solve the real challenges that businesses and individuals are experiencing in this ever-increasing complex world of project management. The vision was to hand-pick and work with the very best consultants, trainers and coaches worldwide so that Tailwind could make a difference to their clients, to sit down with them, understand their pain points, what makes them tick, and what is driving their need for support.
These challenges being raised time and time again are in the project leadership space, from communication issues, not understanding stakeholder requirements or having the confidence to “push back”, lack of sponsorship support, working across different cultures, languages, levels of capability and complexity. We expect more from our project managers – we expect them to inspire, lead teams and be more confident.
Tailwind’s experience is vast, from providing interim resources in the project and programme management space, supporting the recruitment process, experiential workshops, coaching – from project managers through to executives, providing keynote speakers, implementing PPM Academies, PM Healthchecks and Leadership development. The approach is created often uniquely – to solve the real challenges of each of their individual clients.
[1] Organizational Change Management (OCM) is a framework structured around the changing needs and capabilities of an organization. OCM is used to prepare, adopt and implement fundamental and radical organizational changes, including its culture, policies, procedures and physical environment, as well as employee roles, skills and responsibilities.
How to get Fired at the C-level goes beyond the constraints of a book.
To that end the author offers some focused workshops, keynote presentations and insightful supporting education to help organisations achieve the success in strategic change that they desire, and to help C-level executives understand the challenge and benefit from the opportunity.
This is all about bringing a reality check to your executive team, and help can be found right here.
If your organisation or team needs a short sharp executive ‘scare’ session (or reality check) then Peter Taylor can deliver this, customised for your organisation, your executive team and the time available.
If you need to take it to the next level of detail, then the author offers two specific workshops based on his book.
Both can be customised to suit your audience’s needs and indeed, a fully customised engagement can be proposed if you feel your organisation requires something very specific in order to help you look at what you should be considering and doing to make sure your change, your projects, your organisation and you are still around for the foreseeable future.
Workshop 1: Executives – stop failing your projects!
Yes! You read that right – not ‘Executives – stop your failing projects’ but ‘Executives – stop failing your projects’.
The report Why good strategies fail: Lessons for the C-suite published by The Economist Intelligence Unit Limited in 2013 stated in its conclusion that there was a need for increased C-suite attention to implementation (and therefore projects). It said, ‘Leadership support is the most important factor in successful strategy execution, yet a substantial number of survey respondents indicate that the C-suite is insufficiently involved’.
This is why I make the loud and bold challenge that executives are failing their projects and why I strongly believe the situation needs to stop – now!
The workshop will explore the true value of your strategic change portfolio (projects) – which will probably be bigger than you think – and will explain why it, you and your organisation are at real risk of failure (and wasting a lot of that financial investment).
What you should do about this critical situation is, of course, explained simply. The two key actions you need to take to avoid strategic change failure will be introduced, making this undertaking far less onerous than it would have been had you attempted it solo.
Workshop time 1 to 3 hours[1]
Participants C-level executives and senior project leaders
Workshop 2: Two key actions you need to take to avoid strategic change failure
If you are concerned about strategic change failure, and by association your portfolio of projects, then there are two key actions that can dramatically de-risk this potential situation.
Step 1: Strategies for project sponsorship
It is stated in the Standish Chaos Report, amongst many others, including PMI’s ‘Pulse of the Profession’, that the sponsor is the person who is ultimately responsible for the success (or failure) of the project, who represents the business and the business change. And yet, there is a chasm in many organisations between this statement and the reality of the professionalism and associated investment in development of those active sponsors.
We will explore the current challenges of project sponsorship maturity and offer some techniques for creating an effective sponsorship community as one of the two foundations of project success.
Step 2: Building the best PMO
Here will explore the true value of a good PMO in guiding project success and supporting the sponsor community in the management of the portfolio of project change.
We explore what is meant by a balanced PMO, a design developed by Peter, as well as presenting a new working model for project management excellence with the project academy concept.
This all adds up to a critical second foundation for project success.
The workshop will be an interactive experience with first-hand case study insights and the opportunity to spend some time with one of the world’s most experienced PMO leaders.
Workshop time 2 to 3 hours[2]
Participants C-level executives, senior project leaders, sponsors and PMO leaders
The workshops are standalone but related and follow the journey from strategy investment through to the key foundations of change/project success.
Also available are keynote presentations based on this book, on project sponsorship and PMO leadership.
Peter Taylor
Known as The Lazy Project Manager, Peter Taylor is a project management office (PMO) expert.
He is currently leading a global team of more than 200 project managers acting as custodians for more than 5,000 projects around the world from Kronos Inc., a billion-dollar software organisation delivering workforce management solutions.
Peter is also the author of eighteen books, including the number 1 bestselling project management book, The Lazy Project Manager. In the last four years he has delivered more than 200 lectures around the world on his mission to show people how to work smarter, not harder in their quest for career success.
www.thelazyprojectmanager.com and http://tailwindps.com/how-to-get-fired-at-the-c-level/
[1] Workshop timing can be customised to the availability of the audience – the shorter workshop focuses only on the high-level issues with minimal interaction time permitted, the longer workshop allows for a ‘deeper dive’ and with audience interaction and discussion
[2] Again, here the workshop timing can be customised to the availability of the audience – with the longer workshop allowing for some audience interaction and discussion
The Social Project Manager
Balancing Collaboration with Centralised Control in a Project Driven World
We human beings are social beings.
We come into the world as the result of others’ actions. We survive here in dependence on others.
Whether we like it or not, there is hardly a moment of our lives when we do not benefit from others’ activities.
For this reason, it is hardly surprising that most of our happiness arises in the context of our relationships with others.
Dalai Lama
Social project management is a non-traditional way of organising projects and managing project performance and progress aimed at delivering, at the enterprise level, a common goal for the business but harnessing the performance advantages of a collaborative community.
There is a paradigm shift ongoing in many organisations that is all about finding a practical balance between the challenges to traditional project management made by what is known as Project Management 2.0 – which encouraged a move away from centralised control of projects and instead promoted the value of team collaboration – and the practical recognition that large scale projects do require a stronger form of centralised control and governance.
It is this balance, if correctly made, that will take the best of both worlds and move project management into the highest levels of performance and achievement, into the world of the social project and therefore the world of the Social Project Manager.
Naturally the starting point for conversation around social project management is with the project management role itself; what does this specifically mean for any project manager, what should they think about, and should they adjust their behaviour? But let’s expand this thought process to the project team as a whole and consider how such social tools impact the team performance.
Thought: I believe that all project team members, including the project manager, who welcome any approach that reduces the amount of time invested (and for the greater part wasted) in meetings.
Add to that the ever-present challenge to project managers of getting true commitment to the project goals from contributors then an approach that achieves this will also be welcomed.
If we consider the world of the project team, of which the project is part of course but also a separate entity in itself – and one that can be constantly in flux throughout the project lifecycle with team members coming and going, joining the team with their skills and time and then leaving to return to their ‘business as usual’ roles and responsibilities.
Thought: If you have ever managed a project for any significant length of time I am sure you will recognise, as I do, that the project becomes a ‘being’ in itself and takes on a ‘life’ within the organisation and project community.
As such the concept of communicating ‘to the project’ is one that I personally find logical, it becomes in many ways ‘one of the team members’.
I feel we can think of the communication as at three levels, all interacting with each other and crossing boundaries – social means fewer boundaries after all so perhaps we should say ‘without boundaries’ – but to understand the types or themes of project conversations then the diagram below might help:
I describe these as the three elements of ‘social’ project communication – and it is critical to empower all three and provide a seamless flow of engagement, interaction, conversation, and idea generation, decision making and team-building through all channels.
Considering ‘social within project’
Beginning with social within project then this is the communication about the project components, the tasks, the activities, the challenges and the team members themselves, the mechanics of meetings and reports and briefings, together with the deliverables and benefits.
Everything that is to do with the project lifecycle and the end goals of the project.
When is ‘A’ required? What will happen if ‘X’ happens? Can we get help from someone on ‘Y’? Are we going ahead with ‘B’? What did we learn from ‘C’? And so on.
Here the social project management team engages with each other to share knowledge and update each other on progress, seek assurance and help, encourage and congratulate, solve problems and celebrate achievements. It should be a self-regulating activity with the team contributing and providing knowledge and wisdom to each other, it is when the sum of the parts is definitely greater that the whole.
This ‘team’ will include the project itself based on the previous insight that the project becomes itself is a “member of the project”, with whom other project members can communicate, and who can communicate with other project members.
Collective purpose is shared and reinforced through this social within project communication and, as we have seen, by using a social project management activity stream and project-centric communication, the feedback about what is going on with the project becomes nearly constant which adds to the value of this type of project communication.
Considering ‘social about project’
I noted in another of my books ‘Project Branding’[1] that ‘I learned something very important a long time ago, when I first started out in project management: no matter how good a job you do, if you don’t let people know, then most people just won’t know!’ and I went on to advise that ‘The art of project marketing is to ensure that your project is understood, expected, appreciated, welcomed, and supported within its organizational home (and, if relevant, the wider community of stakeholders. Such acceptance is crucial to long-term success, since this is where the project deliverables will eventually be implemented, once the project has been completed. Project marketing is the proactive process of educating all stakeholders about the value of your project deliverables in order to aid successful delivery and acceptance.’
Social about project is this very world of project marketing and perhaps even project branding which is the purpose and process of ensuring that your project is well known (for good reasons) and is well understood, together with the right levels of expectations set for the widest community of stakeholders.
Considering ‘social around project
Think of your own working day, today or yesterday – it doesn’t matter. Now think about how much of the day, at the start over your first coffee, when you bumped in to so and so at the water cooler, at the start of that meeting with the team from the other building, or when you joined that conference call with the remote users… how much of that time was spent in talking about non-project matters? Non-work matters actually. How many minutes during each event and how many hours in the day?
This doesn’t make you a bad working or lazy, it makes you human. Human to human interaction is social in its very nature.
Humans are in fact highly social beings. We all like to be surrounded by friends and family and co-workers and we all valuing being able to share our own personal experiences with others, and to hear what others wish to share with us in return. In fact the recent appearance of all of the various social tools, and their incredibly rapid adoption illustrates the fundamental desire for social belonging and interpersonal exchange.
Therefore it has to accepted that whatever ‘project’ or ‘business’ orientated social tools that you provide will also be used (hopefully respectfully) for ‘around project’ social communication and this is actually a good thing.
It helps bond team members (we will see this in the later section around remote and virtual teams) and adds an honest ‘human’ aspect to the communication. This in turn can only aid the project.
Therefore, looking at these three elements of ‘social’ project communication, I believe that the best social project managers, the ones who understand the value and potential of this new social world, will be the ones that combine these elements into one cohesive communication experience.
To a degree it is a leap of faith and perhaps very different from how project managers have gone about the job in the past.
Thought: One of the significant issues that I uncover which project managers who have only just started on the project management journey is the bad practice of channeling as much communication as possible through themselves, thereby creating a bottleneck for decision making and an unnecessary burden to the time of the project manager
It is a time of change and, as discussed, there is a paradigm shift ongoing with a move away from centralised control of projects and a rise in the value of team collaboration for many organisations and therefore project managers.
It is about taking the best of both the traditional project world and the opportunity of the new social project world, the world of the Social Project Manager.
The Social Project Manager, Balancing Collaboration with Centralised Control in a Project Driven World Dec 2015, Gower (Peter Taylor)
Peter Taylor is a PMO expert currently leading a Global PMO, with 200 project managers acting as custodians for nearly 5,000 projects around the world, for Kronos Inc. – a billion dollar software organisation delivering Workforce Management Solutions.
Peter Taylor is also the author of the number 1 bestselling project management book ‘The Lazy Project Manager’, along with many other books on project leadership, PMO development, project marketing, project challenges and executive sponsorship.
In the last 4 years he has delivered over 200 lectures around the world in over 25 countries and has been described as ‘perhaps the most entertaining and inspiring speaker in the project management world today’.
His mission is to teach as many people as possible that it is achievable to ‘work smarter and not harder’ and to still gain success in the battle of the work/life balance.
More information can be found at www.thelazyprojectmanager.com – and through his free podcasts in iTunes.
[1] Project Branding: Using Marketing to Win the Hearts and Minds of Stakeholders; Nov 2014, RMC Publications, Inc (Peter Taylor)
In life it is important to celebrate everything that should be celebrated and enjoy those special moments as well.
So what is the ‘Starbucks Moment’?
Well firstly it has to be noted in the interest of objectivity that ‘there are other coffee franchises and independent stores available to you as a consumer’, I am not specifically recommending Starbuck’s, and I am not being sponsored by them either (but hey, always open to such offers) – in fact it isn’t even my usual coffee haunt (there goes the sponsorship deal) – but I experienced a ‘Moment’ in a Starbucks and so, for me, it is known as the ‘Starbucks Moment’ – name it as you wish, the ‘Nigel Moment’ or the ‘Maud Moment’ or even just the ‘Moment’, doesn’t really matter.
And the details of my own ‘Moment’ aren’t really important either but personally it was a moment of clarity and huge emotion and it was, without doubt, one of life’s special moments for me.
The coffee was OK as well, Tall Caramel Macchiato, I even had a Cheese and Marmite sarnie to go with it if you really wanted to know, but it wasn’t the coffee or the snack that had anything to do with the ‘Starbucks Moment’, these were just pleasurable incidentals.
My point on this rambling story is that we all have moments such as these, some small and some big (some perhaps even life impacting) and it should go without saying that, in these moments – or very soon afterwards – you should recognise what has happened and celebrate them in style.
In projects, it is often difficult to remember, when you are neck deep in alligators that you are there to drain the swamp – or some such similar analogy. But throughout the project lifecycle there are moments that need celebrating, and celebrating with your project team.
So take the time to identify and recognise these moments, take a breather from the whole ‘alligator’ issue and focus on the success or achievement and celebrate it. Doesn’t have to be a big party with all the works, nice when that does happen of course, but it can be small; a pat on the back, a smile and a thank you, a gift (maybe even a Starbucks gift card perhaps – now my legal representative says I have to say ‘there are other coffee franchises and independent stores available to you as a consumer’), in fact anything at all that recognises the ‘Moment’.
Speaking of alligators, I was only last week on an airboat in the Florida swamps hunting (OK well spotting) alligators – wonderful fun.
The captain of the airboat, Cap’n Fred as he was known, said about how to avoid being eaten by alligators. The common myth is that you run in zigzags as alligators can only run in straight lines but Cap’n Fred said this was rubbish and the best way to avoid being eaten by an alligator was to ‘trip up the guy next to you and then keep running’ – good joke.
In the project team world it is all about no-one being left behind because you need each and every person, and therefore one way to do this as a project manager is to spot those ‘Moments’ and celebrate them appropriately.
So my advice is make sure you know when you, or someone near you, has had a ‘Starbucks Moment’ and enjoy that moment in style.
Peter Taylor is the author of two best-selling books on ‘Productive Laziness’ – ‘The Lazy Winner’ and ‘The Lazy Project Manager’.
In the last 4 years he has focused on writing and lecturing with over 200 presentations around the world in over 25 countries and has been described as ‘perhaps the most entertaining and inspiring speaker in the project management world today’.
His mission is to teach as many people as possible that it is achievable to ‘work smarter and not harder’ and to still gain success in the battle of the work/life balance.
More information can be found at http://www.thelazyprojectmanager.com – and through his free podcasts in iTunes.
A project is a temporary endeavour where people come together to work towards a common goal and purpose; it is therefore a temporary endeavour that must rely on a social system of communication and collaboration in order to succeed.
But for common purpose to be achieved there cannot be chaos.
Social project management is a non-traditional way of organising projects and managing project performance and progress aimed at delivering, at the enterprise level, a common goal for the business but harnessing the performance advantages of a collaborative community.
There is a paradigm shift on-going in many organisations that is about finding a practical balance between the challenges to traditional project management made by Project Management 2.0 – which encouraged a move away from centralised control of projects and instead promoted the value of team collaboration – and the practical recognition that large scale projects do require a stronger form of centralised control and governance. This balance, if correctly made, that will take the best of both worlds and move project management into the highest levels of performance and achievement, into the world of the social project manager.
Based on the book The Social Project Manager: Balancing Collaboration with Centralised Control in a Project Driven World – this is the first in a series of 12 videos exploring the world of the Social Project Manager –
https://youtu.be/A-kt2umTO2U?list=PLVmvTj_zUGUpvHh2X-Ex4kVkHP6n5PYYI
The Lazy Project Manager's Blog 