why is it hard to do just enough?
“We take on too much, because we are terrified of too little” from The Deadline by Tom DeMarco
Archive for project management
1st follow, then detach and finally gain fluency
ShuHaRi from Aikido, parallels Teach-Train-Coach cycle.
Shu
Following a process rigidly
“…the student follows the teachings of one master precisely. He concentrates on how to do the task, without worrying too much about the underlying theory.”
Ha
Breaking away from rigidly applied process as understanding grows
“…the student begins to branch out. With the basic practices working he now starts to learn the underlying principles and theory behind the technique.“
Ri
Fluency and flexibility of process
“…the student isn’t learning from other people, but from his own practice. He creates his own approaches and adapts what he’s learned to his own particular circumstances.”
that’s what management is all about
The Deadline - Tom DeMarco
“Get the right people. Then, no matter what else you may do wrong after that, the people will save you. That’s what management is all about.”
more or less… on simplicity
“Simplicity–the art of maximizing the amount of work not done - is essential”
it’s all about outcomes
Outcomes vs. Activity
“…all about outcomes — and not activities.
Focusing on what really matters is a difficult-to-achieve skill in our “attention deficit disorder” world.
…we tend to look at both activities and outcomes as accomplishments.”
the 50-50 nature of communication
Osmo Wiio’s laws of communication;
- If communication can fail, it will.
- If a message can be understood in different ways, it will be understood in just that way which does the most harm.
- There is always somebody who knows better than you what you meant by your message.
- The more communication there is, the more difficult it is for communication to succeed.
(http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/986-osmo-wiio-communication-usually-fails-except-by-accident)
General Patton’s ‘goals not tasks’ quote
“Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.”
“A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week.”
Anthropomorphize everything
“People respond to people. Faces and stick-figures, however crudely drawn, immediatelyelicit attention, understanding, and reaction. Whether to show relationships and quantities,emphasize a point, or just provide a sense of scale, draw people in by drawing in people.”
skinner’s guide to rewards
For many reward situations; use immediate and intermittent responses to player actions.
“One of Skinner’s most important discoveries is that behavior reinforced intermittently (as opposed to consistently) is the most difficult to extinguish. In other words, intermittent rewards beat predictable rewards. It’s the basis of most animal training, but applies to humans as well… which is why slot machines are so appealing, and one needn’t be addicted to feel it.”
http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2007/03/is_twitter_too_.html
Good use of (positive) reinforcers requires;
- reinforcement of behaviors as soon as they occur
- starting with continuous reinforcement, changing to irregular reinforcement when the player has repeated successful
- setting small tasks for a small rewards
design language: zapp rewards
“creating human energy is what zapp is about”
Zapp, William C. Byham with Jeff Cox
Human energy = player passion & engagement
Zapp rewards are moments of recognition or encouragement that energize players rather than frustrate or sapp them. They are given during play rather than at the end of action; they excite action, engagement and fun. A zapp creates energy and encourages the player to keep playing and enjoy themselves.
Set out a ratio of zapps to sapps, and measure in user tests.
could do better…
“Each year… 2 million Americans acquire an infection while they are in hospital. Ninety thousand die of that infection… the one thing that halts the spread of infections: washing hands”
Not performing a simple standard process correctly and diligently undermines an otherwise effective process.
“People underestimate the importance of diligence as a virtue…. it is defined as ‘the constant and earnest effort to accomplish what is undertaken.’ “
Better, a surgeon’s notes on performance, Atul Gawande
By diligently doing the basics well can significant improve performance, without the need for technology, change or invention.
The Apgar score, allows nurses to rate the condition of babies at birth and after 5 minutes on a scale of 0 to 10, based on immediately visible and very simple measures of health.
“The Apgar score changed everything… wasn’t just a matter of giving the clinicians a quick objective read of how they had done. The score changed the choices that they made about how to do better.”
The score doesn’t change process or improve technology, it simply makes performance visible allowing better choices to be made. And allows numeric measurement and encourages competitive comparison.
design language : goldilocks rule
The Goldilocks Rule. Don’t give people too little or too much.
Give them just the right amount for what you want them to achieve or experience.
Rule of Four. Don’t expect the audience to keep in mind more than four groups on a slide. Car license plates and telephone numbers are as long as they are because of how much information we can easily store in our short-term memories: on average about four groups.
Rudolph-the-Red-Nosed-Reindeer Rule. What’s different stands out, be it a red nose, a large graphic, or words in bold.
quality just takes time
“If you buy the notion that quality takes time, then it won’t come as any surprise to you that there is an inverse relationship between quality and quantity. The higher the quality, the lower the quantity (for the same expenditure of time and money).”
Tom DeMarco, Slack.
let down by dreaming of the prize?
Projects need goals.
Goals help focus teams.
Goals are linked to desirable outcomes, or prizes
To achieve a goal, there needs to be next steps or actions.
And action takes you closer to the goal.
The duality of goals, is that it is easy to slip in to thinking about the prize and not the next action required.
It takes great focus to stay on the next action and not to drift off thinking about the prize.
Celebrating before the end zone is reached, spending the money before the success is real.
Dreaming of success is powerful, forgetting to take the next action is fatal.
Another case of the curse of knowledge (or a job for emoticons?)
Similar to the ‘tappers and listeners’ example quoted in Made to Stick. Research from the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology suggests;
You have only a 50-50 chance of ascertaining the tone of any e-mail message. The study also shows that people think they’ve correctly interpreted the tone of e-mails they receive 90 percent of the time. And the sender estimates that 80% of the time the recipient will correctly gauge the tone of the message.
In reality, the recipient correctly gauges the tone only 50% of the time.
The difference between the sender and the receiver’s understanding is a very dangerous gap to leave open to chance…
aligning with the idea to exploitation cycle
- The Idea; academic or breaking new ground work - blue sky & stimulating. Tough to sell to early adopter market.
- 1st implementation; rewarding & thrilling work. Few providers, keeps price high as demand grows.
- Commercial exploitation; efficiency led, next step after initial implementations delivered, less thrilling. Many providers, commoditization & price competition.
The cycle through idea to implementation and through to efficiency is followed in many business or technologies. Business goals and plans need to be aligned with the right stage in the cycles. People’s aspirations and expectations need to be aligned with the cycle as well. Someone seekig the intellectual challenges of new ideas will sit uncomfortably in a commoditization project.
mastery & confidence = improvement
“The idea that creativity is vital to success is not widely accepted, yet it is built on a simple and wonderful truth, that all people have the capacity to be creative. Sir Kenneth suggests that when people are encouraged to be creative, they often find out what they are really good at, and it is when people find out what they are good at that they become better at everything they try. He identifies this as being something to do with “extreme confidence” entering the equation.”
effective project post mortem process
simple retrospective process
- Team survey
- Collated metrics
- Facilitated group discussions/feedback
- Interviews (1-1 with range of people) to confirm group findings or get more specific information
- ‘Project History Day’ to do root cause analysis, leading to changes & actions required
- Management team presentation/recommendation
- Team presentation
- Actions management process
- Follow up 30 days after presentation
difficult conversations
Difficult Conversations : How to discuss what matters most by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, Sheila Heen
The three conversations
What Happened - everyone has a perspective, don’t assume that you know their story without listening, questioning
Emotions - talk about how you feel, without encouraging blame
Identity - constant ego-voice chatter undermines your being in the present, and avoid brittle black & white assumptions about your/their contribution
Learning stances
Open queston,
And not but
Contribution not blame, pretty much every situation has contributions from you and them
Start from the 3rd story
Describe the differences between your stories
Share your purposes
Invite them to join you in sorting it out
Explore their story
Listen and understand, signal you have heard
Share your viewpoint, avoid blame
Reframe away from blame and accusation
Problem solving
Talk about how to keep communication open
sweet spot goals
Aim for audacious and stretching goals, break them down & make sure you know how they are achievable. Be wary of aiming too far, for goals that you have no chance of achieving and ending up straining for something you can’t reach. A slack goal with no challenge, that is easy to reach creates no sense of achievement or reward.
