Forward Momentum: Delivering Results

By Vicki Wrona, PMP;  Rob Zell

While listening to podcasts and reading articles that I enjoy, I thought that if we all share our favorite business blogs and podcasts, we might find a few gems to brighten our weeks. Below are some suggestions. What are your favorite podcasts?

From Vicki:

The podcasts I enjoy listening to are:

• Get it Done Guy’s Quick and Dirty Tips to Work Less and Do More podcast by Stever Robbins provides good tips for professionals.

• TED Talks – available in hi-def video or audio only, TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is a non-profit organization devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. Topics include business, environment, technology, engineering, science.  The podcast can be found at http://feeds.feedburner.com/tedtalks_video.

• To The Best of Our Knowledge (TTBOOK) by PRI and Wisconsin Public Radio. I have subscribed to this podcast for years, both through audible.com as well as directly from their site. I am a fan of this show, its wide (huge) variety of topics, and its excellent interviewers. I have enjoyed shows on topics I would never have thought about or taken the time to look into.

From Rob :

I admit to not listening to many podcasts as I tend to be more of a visual learner. I enjoy a series by RSA called RSAnimate.  You can find them on YouTube for free here:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=rsa+animate&aq=0&oq=rsa

RSA creates videos from audio tracks of famous authors talking about their works and matches it up to video of an artist sketching the concepts. Fun and educational for the auditory and visual learner. It includes summaries from Daniel Pink (Drive), Sir Ken Robinson (on education), and many other thought leaders. It’s fascinating to listen to the summaries while the artist expresses the content visually.

by Craig Covello, PMP

If you have taken the time to stop and read this article, then it’s probably safe to assume that you might be a project manager.  But to narrow the readership further proves difficult, because project managers come from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds.  Some have technical expertise.  Others may have experience in sales or marketing.  Still others may have backgrounds in finance.  So when you’re speaking of project managers as an aggregate, it can be a rather eclectic mix of varied skills and personalities, which then translate into projects that may be run quite differently depending upon who is assigned the responsibility. 

The “PM” title, however, also has a set of consistent expectations.  Project management is defined around a core set of principles, tools and techniques that transcend organizations and objectives.  For example, most projects have some type of scheduling and budget constraints.  All projects require some form of communication among stakeholders.  And many projects, hopefully, have some type of deliverables, objectives and/or accountabilities.  So when thinking along those lines, project managers may tend to view life in terms of definitions, agreements and expectations.  We move along a path that might be considered a straight line, from the point of origin to the point of destination.  We find ways around obstacles and try to keep our eyes focused upon one or more objectives.  Of course, there are times when some flexibility is required, but a project’s success depends upon a reasonably thorough definition and vision of what is to be accomplished followed by managing the expectations of stakeholders.

It’s probably not surprising, then, that many of us can fall into a “project oriented” pattern of thinking when managing our own personal lives.  So allow me a moment to offer my perspective, one based more on feeling than fact.  It is a perspective that is certainly not meant to paint every PM with the same brush, because as mentioned, we are all unique as individuals, even if we share project management as an occupation. Still, I suspect that some of us tend to think of our lives as “projects”.  We look to the future and try to plan accordingly along a perceived path or “straight line”.  That is the mind set of many PMs. There’s just one problem.  Life really doesn’t work that way.  None of us knows with any certainty what the future holds next week, let alone next year.  And it can be a future full of promise that may go unrecognized if our focus is too restricted.  Because real opportunities continually present themselves without much fanfare or notice.  Look straight ahead and you may miss them.

There was an article published by Reader’s Digest a few years back expressing a very profound concept that underscores my assertion regarding limitations of “project oriented” thinking in our personal lives.  The author tried to determine the attributes of perceived “lucky” people versus “unlucky” people.  As you may have already guessed, the “unlucky” people were the ones who limited their goals and aspiratiosn along a single line.  In striking contrast, the “lucky” people were the ones who headed in the general direction, but were able to recognize opportunity, even if it appeared only in their peripheral vision.  And once opportunities were identified, they were actively pursued, often requiring a change in direction, a departure from the stright line.  So it could be argued that looking at life along a perceived straight line path may not be the best strategy for personal growth and fulfillment.  It limits our ability to recognize and take advantage of the best opportunities that life has to offer.  It can also color our perspective, causing us to view certain events and circumstances as a negative, impeding progress on our straight line, when in fact, the same circumstances and events may actually be a positive if we choose to modify our trajectory.  So lately I’ve chosen to scan  the horizon in order to take advantage of the opportunities that may appear in the periphery.  In some cases, these opportunities may be much better than what I can envision on the line straight ahead.

Remember that life is not a project.  It is a journey.

By Rob Zell

It’s soccer season again and I’m reminded how culture and fit impact performance. Your organization depends on both elements to be successful. If you ignore the impact of culture and fit, you are doomed to fail. In this post, I’ll be discussing a bit of both.

I was reminded of fit this evening after speaking to a parent who wants to pull her child from my team of eight year old soccer players. She has some very compelling arguments as to why he should no longer play, the main reason being that he has never played the sport. Imagine being dropped into the design and development space at Valve computer games directed to code the next great game and you have no experience coding! Granted, my boys’ team isn’t World Cup caliber, but they have played for a few years and at least know the basics. In recreational soccer, I don’t have the luxury of “Hiring for Fit”; I play the hand I get dealt and we do the best we can. At the same time, soccer is the beautiful game and a ripe ground for creating a space in which youngsters can learn some basic skills and then should be innovative and creative about using those skills to achieve a common objective, namely, scoring more goals.

In your organization you do have the luxury of hiring for fit. In fact, it should be a priority. There is plenty of research out there that says if you do it, it results in a happier, more productive work force. Your people will have a sense of belonging and that makes them more likely to be successful. If they don’t “fit” they will consistently struggle to perform the basic functions of the organization. Making sure a hire is a fit in the organization means defining the culture.

In a post I wrote some time ago, I reflected on how coaching soccer can be compared to creating a culture of learning and development. It involves a lot of trial and error, awareness of what works and what doesn’t and plenty of positive reinforcement. I started wondering if my team culture was driving that behavior or driving it to extinction. After a hard look in the mirror, I started questioning my performance as a leader of culture.

Culture can be defined a few different ways and has been in plenty of literature. You can start at Wikipedia and continue your research from there. I recently facilitated a workshop in which I presented several elements of culture, namely: Symbols, Stories, Relationships and Rituals. Without exposing too much information, let’s just say that after quick reflection, I don’t think I’m creating the best culture for brand new players to join my team! Luckily, I have the insight (from my recent workshop) to know what my options are. I can either:

1. Change the objectives. Kind of difficult. We do want to win games but I could take some emphasis off that point.
2. Change the culture. That’s a tough one. It means changing my behavior which will require tremendous effort.
3. Prepare to fail. Okay, #2 is looking more realistic. I don’t want to fail as a coach or leader of a team.

You can look at your organization in a similar light. If the culture clashes with the objectives of the organization, then the culture will undermine your efforts. It is usually easier to modify your goals to fit your culture than change the entire culture. I’m not proposing you abandon them. I am saying you tweak them to fit the culture. In my case, my goal might shift from “Win as many games as possible” to “Demonstrate learning the game of soccer every time we play”. I think I can live with this, since we all get trophies regardless of how we perform (that’s a post for another day). Furthermore, I can change the culture of my team by working on my behavior during practice and during games.

You have a choice in your organization – define your culture and leverage it to be successful or be ignorant of the impact on performance and muddle through as you always have. Culture can be defined at the level of the organization all the way down to the business unit or work team. First, take some time to examine your culture and the fit of the team. Second, develop a plan to adapt for maximum success.

I’d love to hear what you think. How is the culture of your organization driving your business results?

By Kathy Martucci, PMP

I have been involved in PeopleSoft implementations for over 10 years – before the product was web-enabled, in fact. Overall, the product is extremely robust and offers literally thousands of functional threads to its customers. Some of the business areas addressed by PeopleSoft applications include: 

• Financials
• Human Capital Management (read Human Resources)
• Payroll
• Customer Relationship Management
• Campus Solutions

Each of these major areas are comprised of several sub-modules (e.g., Financials = General Ledger, Budget, Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, etc.)  that are so complex that sales reps, sales support associates, and implementers generally specialize in one sub-module. Herein lies one of the biggest challenges of selecting this software. It can be so overwhelming as to render mere sales calls and demos practically useless since these discussions barely scrape the surface of what is really happening within the software. Given that fact, it can be difficult to determine the real effort behind an implementation and how your company’s business processes and employees will be impacted.

Having said that, how does an organization know if PeopleSoft is right for their corporation and their culture? What are the key factors and business drivers leading an organization to the purchase and implementation of one of the most powerful software suites in the world?

For simplicity’s sake, let’s go with one suite and say a mid-size company is going to replace its backend financials system. The old system was “home grown” and has evolved over the last 25 years. There are no labor unions and the corporate culture is fairly agile.

Some of the questions to be answered include: 

1. Is there a strategic plan for the company? If so, and if the plan necessitates new systems to support the future initiatives, are the projects prioritized and budgeted? Is there an Enterprise Technical Architecture Plan? How do the two relate? Technology for technology’s sake alone is rarely the right path to follow.
2. What is the maturity level of project resources, especially project management, in the organization? Even if the company is capable of paying substantial sums for an outsourced project team, there is no success factor more critical than having an in-house project manager (and, preferably, team) who know the business and can successfully support the project throughout its life cycle.
3. What technical resources does the organization already have? Is there a robust network, experienced database administrators (preferably familiar with Oracle), programmers, and skilled business analysts?
4. Can the organization afford to allow the most knowledgeable staff (who know the business processes and the current systems) to work on what is sure to be a multi-year project (in spite of what the Oracle sales team is telling you)?
5. What business sector does the organization inhabit…public, private, not-for profit? Once upon a time, PeopleSoft offered a public sector product and a commercial sector product. Over the years, these two products have morphed together. Many public sector organizations conduct their accounting on a cash basis (PeopleSoft doesn’t) and fund accounting (with a lot of attention paid to configuring the General Ledger (GL), this can be done).
6. Does the chart of accounts need to be re-defined? This is a major undertaking even before any technical consideration can be given to the GL. However, even though project team members may understand the business’ accounting and financials, they also need to have a deep understanding of PeopleSoft General Ledger and Commitment Control (budgeting) or most attempts to define a new chart of accounts and properly define budgets takes several months up to years.
7. What is the status of the current data in the financial system? Does it need substantial clean up before conversion can be defined? If so, this is also a parallel, separate project that will absorb project resources.
8. What is the company’s readiness quotient to re-engineer business processes? It surely doesn’t pay to undergo what could be a $20-50M project just to offer a web-enabled version of the existing financial system.

The above represent a tiny fraction of the questions that organizations should be asking themselves as they contemplate a PeopleSoft implementation. Frank, open answers to the questions and a realistic approach can only be advantages going forward. 

In addition to formal due diligence, one of the best ways for an organization to thoroughly understand the road map ahead is to connect with similar organizations that have completed an implementation. Oracle may not be the best place to get candid conversation; however, there are several active user groups and Oracle hosts a convention every fall where users congregate and are only too happy to relate their stories, good and bad. It is absolutely essential to mine these resources for lessons learned. 

How will you assess your organization and connect with other users?