Perspective PM

Lost in Translation

George Bernard Shaw once said, “America and Britain are two countries separated by a common language.” As an American married to a Brit, I can personally attest to the truth of this statement. Minor differences in culture can create a language barrier even when we think we’re using the same language.

While our countries of origin create a bit of a cultural gap, an even bigger one is created by the fact that I am a project manager, and he is a network engineer.

Read the rest of this article at digitalmediabuzz.com.

"Need more info" = Procrastination?

Have you ever sent a relatively simple request to someone and gotten a delayed response requesting more information? Was the request for more info justified, or did it just frustrate you and cause you to waste more time explaining something that to you is either obvious or irrelevant?

I seem to be getting a rash of responses that say in effect, "Gee I'd love to help, but can you be more specific about what you want? Please tell me the exact time of day you need this done, how much detail you need, and the color of the shoes you were wearing when you first made the request."

What the election can teach us about QC

Driving to DC this morning I tuned into the Laura Ingram show, who was mid-rant about this NY Times article. She was sure that donors to the Obama campaign were shady characters who were contributing under false names to protect their identities.

As an IT professional, I recognized the names immediately. Anyone who works in software development and testing is well acquainted with Mr. Test Person, Mr. & Mrs. Jgtj Jfggjjfgj, and of course, little Asflkj. We are also quite familiar with the company Fdsa, as well as it's sister corporation Asdf.

This is not the forum to make judgments or pontifications about either campaign or the legality/ethics of their fund raising practices, but I will say that the Obama campaign's website developers could brush up on their testing practices.

Let's say these contributions were innocent test transactions made my testers or developers. Shame on them. There are ways to test software in a production environment that don't result in garbage data.

Or, maybe these contributions actually were made my people who wanted to conceal their identities. Shame, again, on the software development team for neglecting to include some basic validation. There may not be an easy way to identify false first & last names, but a simple integration with a service like Group1 would eliminate the possibility of getting contributions from fictitious cities like Rewq, ME.

So what have we learned?

1. Always include adherence to industry or government regulations in your business requirements.
2. Don't forget to include non-technical business requirements in your test plans.
3. Orchestrate your testing in a way that does not result in test data living in a production environment.
4. When hiring a vendor, ensure that they adhere to good project management, software development and testing practices.

Double your efforts for all of the above in cases where minor errors could result in major public scrutiny, like oh, say, running for president.

How to Deal with Bad Meeting Behavior

Most of us know how to behave in someone else's meeting, but what if someone is being disruptive or unproductive in YOUR meeting? Here are some tips on how to gracefully handle some of the worst meeting etiquette offenders.

Unintended Comedy

Via Tech Republic:

This commercial for EDS Consulting is supposed to inspire confidence in the company’s ability to build your business as you run it, but what it also does is illustrate the supreme idiocy of trying to use a software product while it's still being coded.

A List of Don'ts for Presenters

Last week I attended a seminar hosted by the NYC chapter of a prominent professional organization with the intention of sharing and adding to any wisdom I may have gained from the experience. However, it didn’t go quite the way I’d anticipated, so instead, I give you:

How Not to Conduct a Seminar

Show up 20 minutes late.

In a city like New York, "there was traffic" is the lamest possible excuse possible for being late. There is ALWAYS traffic. You should plan for that. You should also plan to arrive early to check out the venue and introduce yourself to attendees before your presentation. That way if you're running late, you'll still show up on time.

Make no attempt to look presentable.

You don't have to be a supermodel to give a presentation, but you should at least look like you cared enough about your appearance to run a comb through your hair. You may also want to ensure that your shirt is buttoned properly.

Be sure any handouts are riddled with grammatical errors and typos.

There is no excuse in this day and age for more than one or two typos in any written material. If word processing isn't your strength, have your work proof-read by someone who knows how to use a spell checker.

Swearing in the workplace

Via Network World:

“Employees use swearing on a continuous basis, but not necessarily in a negative, abusive manner. Swearing was as a social phenomenon to reflect solidarity and enhance group cohesiveness, or as a psychological phenomenon to release stress, ” the study stated.  “Most of the cases were reported by employees at the lower levels of the organizational hierarchies and it was clear that executives use swearing language less frequently. "

More here.

In my own house, among my own friends, I have a mouth like a sailor.  I don't think swearing by itself has anything to do with stress relief. I think that supressing parts of your personality in mixed company is stressful, and that the relief of that stress comes when you have a casual/friendly enough relationship with co-workers that you can be yourself. Executives use swearing language less frequently because they have less casual/friendly relationships with most staff. It's more important for them to maintain a professional demaenor, lest they lose respect as an authority figure.

Try replacing the every instance of the word "swearing" in this article, perhaps even in the study itself, with terms like "dressing down," "coming out," "cracking jokes" or anything else you normally curb in mixed company & it's probably just as true.

10 Reasons You're Not the Manager

Many of the things you can’t stand about your manager are the very skills it takes to be one.

Have you ever heard yourself saying, "This guy is an IDIOT! How could he be my boss when he doesn't even have half the skill I do? I could do his job better; why aren't I running this department?" Here's why.

1. You don’t play politics
Why does one employee get the same compliment for a mediocre job as another employee for an outstanding one? Maybe the boss knows that this mediocre employee needs to feel appreciated, or not only will his mediocre performance become terrible, he'll also be a general pain and make life unpleasant for other outstanding employees. Seemingly inexplicable management decisions sometimes have reasons you just can't see from your vantage point. When management's priorities don't align with yours, it's dismissed and disdained as "office politics."

2. You refuse to make sacrifices
Juggling the needs and priorities of your staff and the business means making sacrifices. Sometimes one option jumps out at you as being the best one, but sometimes there is no clear best option, and you're stuck shooting down a great idea for one that's only marginally better/cheaper/easier. If you've ever been accused of procrastination, you likely have difficulty making decisions that aren't clear-cut.

3. You pay great attention to detail
Attention to detail is a great attribute if you're a designer, programmer, instructor, analyst, etc. But as someone charged with the overall success of an operation or project, you'll need to keep your head out of the details and keep an eye on the big picture. It's near impossible to do both effectively at the same time.

4. You hate paperwork
Managers spend anywhere from 30 to 85 percent of their day with various forms of paperwork. Status reports, budget reports, project plans, performance reviews... the list is endless. Sounds exciting, no?

5. You refuse to take heat for others' mistakes
If you think it's unfair that your boss occasionally gets credit for your accomplishments, consider that they will just as often be blamed for your mistakes. Be prepared to take responsibility not only for your own screw ups, but for all the screw ups of everyone you supervise.

Open Source Project Management

Via http://wolphination.com/linux/:

...many Open Source projects fall apart before they see the light of day, mostly due to management reasons. You are receiving this directly from someone who has had an Open Source project disintegrate ... and has had to pick up the pieces, so the common pitfalls listed below are frighteningly genuine and happen to the most motivated of project managers. They all, ultimately, result in developer dropout and thus the death or dormancy of the project...

More here.

I would add to the list: lack of project justification. In the corporate world, the very first step in any project is to define the business need. Whenever decisions have to be made, the initial business reason behind the project is revisited to help determine what path to take. I find that many open source projects start with an idea that's really cool from a programming standpoint, and at the first sign of a challenge everyone asks, "what are we working so hard to accomplish again?" and starts to drop off. There has to be a reason to stick through the times when it just doesn't seem like any fun anymore.

Top 10 Signs You Aren't Cut Out for Anything

Via Tech Republic:

10 Signs you aren't cut out to be a project manager:

1. You're a poor communicator
2. You don't work well with people
3. You prefer the details
4. You don't like to manage people
5. You don't like to follow processes
6. You don't like to document
7. You like to execute and not plan
8. You prefer to be an order taker
9. You are not organized
10. You think project management is "overhead"

More here.

As I commented there, most of those qualities make you unfit not only for project management, but pretty much any job that involves working with the public or a diverse group of people at all. Number 2 implies number 4. If you don't like working with people but you do like managing them, you're probably just bossing them around. That's not managing.

To me, two key attributes that separate those who might be good at project management (in just about any industry) and those who might not are their ability to multitask and their ability to prioritize. Can you separate the critical issues from the minutiae? Can you get neck-deep in an issue but still switch gears smoothly if needed? Can you decide between costing your company lots of money or hurting its reputation? Are you as willing to take the blame if it all falls apart as much as the glory when it all comes together?

If you answered yes to all of the above, you're probably a bit of a masochist. You'd also make a terrific project manager.