Organizational change and transformation efforts are often challenging. Most fail to meet their planned objectives with 30% failing outright. In last month’s article, ”Road Trippin’ Organizational Change: The Beginning”, I recommending using adaptive-agile planning practices and treating the effort like a road trip: Set the […]
“You are not in the room for the conversations that impact your career.” Farley Price I was having dinner with an old friend and colleague. We were talking about the arc of our careers and the events that brought us to this point. Farley remarked that […]
“All good lessons come at a cost. Try to learn them inexpensively.” Howard Zucker When I made a mistake as a child, my father would remind me that all lessons come at a cost. The goal was to learn them cheaply. I did not always […]
Remember the last time you joined a new team or organization. What was it like? Was it awkward? Did you make decisions easily? Were expectations clear? Did the team gel immediately? You probably answered “No” to these questions. High-performing teams do not form quickly or […]
I spent most of my career in management, leading teams in fast-paced, ever-changing companies. I have a lot of experience with organizational change. I led teams through reorganizations. I have also been reorganized. Change is often necessary. Today’s business environment is disruptive. Enterprises must adapt. However, […]
There is an ongoing dialogue in many enterprises: Should project management be a centralized, shared-service? Or, should project managers be decentralized and embedded within their functional organizations? The answer is, “it depends.” Every enterprise is unique with its own organizational structure, culture, expectations, and needs. […]
There is a debate in the Agile community regarding the role of the project manager and the scrum master. These discussions remind me of a song from the musical, Oklahoma. Rather than drawing on the commonalities and shared mission of the roles, the focus seems […]
The Agile Manifesto declared independence from constraining, process-centric software development methodologies. The Manifesto advocated for a product-focused, team-centric approach. As Agile has moved mainstream, it has spawned its own industry of methodologies and tools. Organizations embracing Agile must remember that people are the key to […]
What do the following have in common? Best Practices, Business Process Re-engineering, Matrix Management, and Management by Objective According to Inc.Com, these are five of the 10 worst management fads. Several research groups have found that PMO failure rates are high with approximately 50% of […]
Say you are assigned to a new project. What process do you follow to determine your approach to engaging the team? Do you analyze the project’s organizational structure? How do you decide which role and power type to use? The project’s organizational structure influences the […]