Author: Linky

Linky

Leaders Must Adapt To Change

Leaders Must Balance The Temperature

Thermostat

By Tom Atema

Leaders deal with the future, they see a better tomorrow, so they care for today.

This kind of mind and purpose means leaders must adapt to the temperature of today in order to meet the new challenges tomorrow. Today’s leader has to set the leadership thermostat so they are able to adapt to the fast-paced challenges that come their way almost hourly. Today’s challenges bring us into unchartered territory, a place where no one has ever been before.

However, two things are becoming very clear. This is where leaders must take note.

First, any organization that is built on/or operates solely from top down (you do as I say) leadership risks failure. Today, the rules of how an organization is led have changed, like it or not. Today organizations have to move, adjust the organization thermostat to meet the challenges of today. As the thermostat of the organization is moved, change will be needed; a dumping of old habits and the reshaping of how people interact with each other inside the organization has to change or be reshaped. Today the role of each employee has been redefined; each one is a leader and has to be allowed to lead. Top leaders must equip employees with character, skill and thinking formation. All three are needed because they set the environment of the organization. If the heat is too low people get very comfortable and will not make difficult decisions on their own. If the heat is too high, they will jump ship for cooler water.

Second – any organization that believes they can do what they do in a vacuum is done. The truth is we must hit the thermostat and balance the temperature of the organization with others and get out of the “one organization can do it all,” which has placed way too many in the “auto-pilot” mode. Some organizations that have done so have seen some parts of their organization die. And probably the parts that die should have done so years ago! In today’s world, if organizations do not partner, drop their egos and logos, and change the way they operate, they will not last.

After all, if we do today what we did yesterday, we will stay in the mess tomorrow because of the mess we created yesterday.

These are the best of times! Why? Because without the high temperature and the urgency this worldwide crisis has produced I don’t think we would have the heart or the stomach to make the necessary adjustments, the very hard calls that will make us more effective tomorrow.

So LEADER, keep your hand on that thermostat –keep adjusting it to the times.

Related article on Leadership, “Vision Requires Logic And Emotion”

Articles on Project Management: “Project Management’s Golden Ratio“

Linky

Vision Requires Logic And Emotion

Emotion Plus Logic

By Dr. John C. Maxwell

Clearly defined goals are a key component to team success. If employees don’t understand their company’s goals and its game plan, these goals won’t be achieved. Vision determines the direction of the team.

When it comes to casting a compelling vision, I believe that there are two critical elements: emotional and logical transference. This is where many leaders go wrong. Some are great at explaining their vision logically, but they lack the emotion necessary to carry it forward. Others are very emotional when casting a vision, but they lack the logic to sustain it.

If you want to cast a vision that will send your team in the right direction for the long haul, you must do it with logic and emotion. It’s not an either/or situation. You must have both. To transfer a vision emotionally, five elements are needed:

1. Credibility. This is the most important ingredient for successful emotional transference. The person casting the vision absolutely must have integrity. His team must know—beyond a shadow of a doubt—that he walks the walk and talks the talk.

2. Passion. It’s very difficult to pass a vision on to someone else if you don’t believe in it yourself. Half-hearted vision-casting simply doesn’t work.

3. Relationships. The closer a leader is to the members of her team, the quicker they’ll buy in to her vision.

4. Timing. There’s a right time and a wrong time to cast a vision. A good vision presented at the wrong time will fail.

5. Felt need. It’s hard for people to catch a vision when they don’t feel the goal is necessary.

On the other hand, to transfer a vision logically, these seven components are necessary:

1. A realistic understanding of the situation today. If you’re not realistic about where you are today, people will know that you don’t have a clue about tomorrow.

2. An experienced team. It’s tough to keep a vision alive without seasoned players who comprehend why it’s important to the success of your organization.

3. A sound strategy. The step-by-step process of how you’re going to achieve your vision must be well-reasoned and watertight; otherwise it will fall apart.

4. Acceptance of responsibility by the leaders.  The success of a vision nearly always is based upon the buy-in of the leaders who are willing to sign their names to the bottom-line number.

5. The celebration and communication of each victory. Such recognition provides an infusion of enthusiasm and gives your people something concrete to hold on to as they continue to move toward the ultimate goal of fulfilling the vision.

6. Evaluation and communication for each defeat. Be as open about explaining the defeats as you are about celebrating the victories. After each setback, tell your team, “Here’s what we did wrong; here’s why we did not accomplish what we need to.”

7. Time. This is interesting, isn’t it? To emotionally transfer a vision, you need proper timing. To logically transfer it, you just need time.

What happens when emotion joins logic in the transference of a vision? People unite around the goal and start working to achieve it because they believe in what they’re doing and they understand why they’re doing it. That’s how teams win!

John C. Maxwell is an internationally recognized leadership expert, speaker, and author who has sold over 16 million books. His organizations have trained more than two million leaders worldwide.  To find out more, go to www.johnmaxwell.com

Linky

Project Management’s Golden Ratio

Golden Ratio for Project Management   Golden Ratio

“The Golden Ratio is a universal law in which is contained the ground-principle of all forms striving for beauty and completeness in the realms of both nature and art” Wikipedia.

The Golden Ratio is also defined as divine proportion, divine section, golden proportion or golden number. The golden ratio is often denoted by the Greek letter phi, usually lower case (φ).

The Golden Ratio finds its fullest realization in the human form.

Examples:

Hand Mona Lisa

The human hand and Mona Lisa’s face is a perfect golden ratio.

According to a recent Oprah Winfrey show, cosmetic surgeons use the Golden Ratio as measurement when they perform cosmetic surgery to people’s faces.

What Does The Golden Ratio Have To Do With Project Management?

Every Project has characteristics and requirements that set it apart from others, in other words, that makes it unique. Each project needs to be responded to with a fresh approach, with the intensity of effort and with the care and attention to detail that every project deserves.

The methods, processes and best practices used to deliver projects, are like the 3 parts of the Golden Ratio. You need to find the ‘golden proportion’ for each project.

What Is A Methodology?

A methodology is “a set of methods, processes and practices that are repeatedly carried out to deliver projects”. The key concept is that you repeat the same steps for every project you undertake, and by doing that, you will gain efficiencies in your approach.

What Is A Standard?

A standard is “a collection of knowledge areas that are generally accepted as best practice in the industry”.  Let’s try to understand the difference between a methodology and a standard. Standards give you industry guidance, whereas methodologies give you practical processes for managing projects. Standards are not methodologies, and vice versa. The two most popular standards are PMBOK (Project Management Body of Knowledge) and Prince2.

Here are 5 things that should be included in a Project Management Methodology?

  • A core set of processes to follow for delivering projects.
  • A set of templates to help you build deliverables quickly.
  • An option for customizing the methodology provided.
  • The ability to import your existing processes into it.
  • A suite of case studies to help you learn from past projects.

Here is the one thing that a Project Methodology will not do. A Methodology is not a silver bullet. It will not fix projects by itself or guarantee success and an efficient, effective experienced project manager is still required to deliver projects successfully. Remember that the finest carpenter’s tool-box will only be as good as the carpenter.

No methodology will be 100% applicable to every type of project. So you will need to customise any methodology you use to ensure that it perfectly fits your project management environment – to find the ‘golden proportion’.

The biggest mistake in project management is not using a Methodology. Here is what you will gain from using a project management methodology:

  • Create a project roadmap
  • Monitor time, cost and quality
  • Control change and scope
  • Minimise risks and issues
  • Manage staff and suppliers

Of course, you will need to use the elements of the methodology that are most suitable to each project you undertake. When managing smaller projects, you will only want to apply lightweight processes to your project and when managing large projects, you should apply the heavyweight processes to monitor and control every element of your project in depth.

But if you can manage every project you undertake in the same way, then you will gain efficiencies with your approach, work smarter and reduce your stress. You will also give your team a clear understanding of what you expect from them and boost your chances of success.

A simple way to organise your business projects, is to use a Project Management Methodology or at least a standardised approach to manage projects.  This will greatly enhance your chances of finding the Golden Ratio and deliver successful projects – projects that finish on time, within budget and with quality.

If you liked this article, please subscribe to my blog (to the right) and receive more project management tips and articles.

About the author: Linky van der Merwe is a Microsoft Project Management Consultant and an IT Project Manager with 11 years Project Management and 14 years IT industry experience.

She consults with small business owners and service professionals about project management and project processes, best practices and successful delivery through projects. She is most experienced in corporate infrastructure projects (upgrades, migration, deployment etc) and process optimisation. She can be reached at linky@virtualprojectconsulting.com

Linky

Build Your Reputation With Social Networking

Five Ways To Build Your Reputation With Social Networking By Bob Jenkins

Are you using social networks to build your reputation online? Whether you already are or you are just getting started with sites like Twitter and Facebook,  building your online reputation is your biggest responsibility. Here are five ways to make sure you do it right.

#1: Be Proud Of Being You The first thing is, you have to be yourself. You have to be who you are. Because although you can get away with being fake for a little while, as soon as one person realizes that you’re not who you say you are, your reputation is destroyed almost instantly because of the power of social networking. So be yourself. And don’t be afraid of being yourself. Realize that you have some gifts and some knowledge that people need to know about, and those that want to learn from you are going to gravitate towards you. Those that don’t think you’re worth listening to are basically going to ignore you. And it’s at their peril, so don’t worry about them.

#2: Transparency – Never Hide From Your Audience The second thing about your reputation is you should try to be transparent at all times. This means you keep everything real with your audience. For example, I pulled back the curtain to show what it takes to run a product launch. When I did my last product launch, I was Twittering every day what I was doing to get ready for this site. Most of the gurus out there would keep everything under lock and key, and I was being very clear, saying, “This is what I’m doing to get ready for this launch.” It actually helped me have a better launch, even though I told everybody exactly what I was going to be doing. They didn’t think that they had some surprise or whatever like most people teach; they just were excited to be part of it and part of the story. So be transparent. Let people know what you’re doing and why you’re doing it, and they’re going to learn how to trust you.

#3: Be Positive For Positive Results The third way to build your reputation is to be positive. There are folks out there who generally can do a good job of being negative. I don’t know about you, but I don’t find that to be a very long-term profitable strategy. It may get you some attention at first and spark some controversy, but that’s not the way to go. Be looking forward to the optimistic of your industry, of your business and what the results are going to be. It would be easy for you to go onto Twitter or onto Facebook and talk about how you’re having a bad day or this product sucks or this week sucks or this relationship sucks. But you’re not really there for a support network, per se. You’ll find some of that. If you have something bad happen in your life, sharing it with your followers will be very therapeutic for you and you will get a lot of support back. But when you’re just blasting negative things out, you’re going to get negative things in return, usually. So try to be positive as much as possible and look for the opportunities that are out there and look at them from that positive perspective.

#4: Build Your Reputation And They Will Come The fourth thing you must do is to be patient. This is because, initially, your reputation is going to be built only by yourself and the first initial people who get to know you. But as time goes on and you get more followers and you build a larger network of friends and peers, your reputation will solidify to allow your business to grow. Once it hits a tipping point, your reputation and business accelerates at a very quick pace. So be patient and let it happen. Don’t try this stuff out for a week and then come back to me next week and say, “Well, it didn’t really work. I didn’t really get any results yet.” You’ve got to let social networking play out over a few weeks and then a couple months and so on. A year from now your business is going to be tremendously different compared to where it is right now.

#5: Contribute To The Conversation – Every Day! The fifth thing about your reputation is you need to be someone that people look to as a contributor, not as a leech, not as a mooch, as a contributor. You have to be willing to be involved in the conversation, and you have to be willing to give as much or even more than what you’re going to get in return. The people who do that are growing so fast it makes my head spin. I feel that I’m a pretty giving person but I see some other folks out there that just keep on giving, giving, giving and they just build up a huge following and that social capital is a real asset to your business. So you need to make sure that you’re contributing as much as possible to the conversation. I don’t mean that as just go around randomly and try to help people. Within your specific task, your specific industry, the things you know well, you need to be at the forefront of letting people know how to do what you know how to do without charging them money at first. They’ll come and find your site and your products and they’ll pay you for that as time goes on and their needs grow. With social networking you need to be building your reputation up first. If somebody has a question, you should be one of the first people who answers and you need to answer without reservation not just, “Oh, I answered that in my eBook; go buy it”. They’re going to find your eBook if you just talk to them and give them solutions to the problem they are struggling with at that moment. Give people your input, your encouragement for them to get better at what they are trying to do. Any little quick free advice you can give, give it.

Actively Build Your Reputation With Social Networking And Reap The Rewards You’ve got to be in this for the reason of having fun and really building that relationship. But first, connect with people and really help them out. Understand that they’ll become loyal followers of what you do and see you for who you are. Follow these 5 steps to building your reputation online and you’ll not only beat your competition, you’ll have more fun doing it!

Bob Jenkins teaches business owners how to use internet marketing strategies effectively to attract more customers and get more sales without spending a fortune on advertising.

Linky

Public Speaking Tips for Project Managers

4 Tips for Public Speaking

Many people may not realise it, but speaking in front of an audience of 15-20 people, like when you do formal project feedback, is as close to public speaking as you can get. This is not a skill that comes naturally to many people, even experienced Project Managers. According to that great journal (The Readers Digest!), speaking in front of a group of people is still the number one fear in the world today!

The following four suggestions may help you deal with that fear. These will assist you when speaking to 2 or 20 or 200!

  1. Preparation compensates for a lack of talent! Prepare the talk (feedback) in advance. Organize your visuals, handouts, and material. Practice and rehearse not only the content but also the delivery. Analyze the audience by asking yourself these questions: In what are the attendees interested? What is important to them? How do they want to feel or think at the end of my presentation?
  2. Your “first burst” is important! You should practice, rehearse, memorize, and/or choreograph your “first burst.” This is your opening sentence or paragraph. The purpose of the “first burst” is to grab the attention AND the interest of your audience. Using hilarious humor, quotable quotes, startling statistics, topical stories, and/or a focusing question can accomplish this. Use your imagination when creating your “first burst.”
  3. Your audience is more forgiving than you are! Loosen up, lighten up, have fun when making a presentation. Don’t take yourself too seriously. The audience is not expecting perfection and neither should you! Remember: angels fly because they take themselves lightly.
  4. Stick to the goal of the speech (feedback). Ensure that you deliver the main message that you set out to give, nothing more, nothing less.

This post is written with input from an article of Bryan Flanagan about: “How do I give an effective speech”

Linky

Social Media – The New Marketing Philosophy

Social Media Poem

Marketing a business is not what it was, Social Media is the latest craze.

Business has to be smart and know where to start, the number of networking sites amaze.

To really achieve, business culture must believe, Social Media is more than just a cliché.

The first thing to do, is define what we do, and be ourselves or risk results that are blasé.

But how it is done, so popularity is won, will take some time to appraise.

Social Media and Marketing are not the same, Social Media is never a campaign.

Social Media is the philosophy, to ensure customer loyalty remains.

How do we know, our Social Media efforts will grow, to create the required business gains.

To be assured of success, we must constantly assess, the customer’s satisfaction is obtained.

Social Media is more than a craze, it is the new way, Social Media philosophy should now be ingrained.

Written by: pete@seowizardry.ca Search Engine Optimisation Consultant

Linky

Project Management is not the enemy

Once there was a guy, called Henry. He was the proud owner of a successful small business.  He was passionate about his golf academy as this related to his keen interest in golf.  He appointed some coaches to supply golf training to clients.  This business gave him the excuse to spend as much time on the golf course as he wanted.  He had many ideas for new systems, products and packages that he wanted to implement at the golf academy to ensure business growth.  However, he didn’t use a systematic approach to implement each of these ideas. 

One day he decided that it’s time to put in that new system, but he had no idea what to budget for the roll-out of the system from beginning to end. He had no idea of the effort and resources required to deploy the system and therefore he didn’t have an end date for when this should all be done.  He had dived right in and got started, because that’s the way he was used to doing business and getting things done. 

The fact that the system implementation took 3 months longer than anticipated didn’t bother him at first, but the associated costs and lack of adequate resources gave him a huge shock.  His ideas for new products and additional golf lesson packages were dependant on the new system being installed.  For the first time he realised that he was trying to do all of this without a proper business strategy and vision, without a proper plan and without hiring the right people to assist him with the work.  He hasn’t heard of the term Project Management, but he realised that he needed a process and quickly!

Another guy, called Steven, also had a small business which he was very passionate about.  He owned a Marketing and Design Company that specialised in helping small and medium-sized, entrepreneurial businesses get the most of their marketing budget. 

He believed in having a vision, a business strategy to guide business growth and in objectives to reach the strategic goals.  He made a point of doing quarterly planning which usually helped him to identify at least two new business projects.  To him Project Management was no enemy, but the way to get results fast.

Each project was planned properly, budgeted for, with adequate time and resources allocated to it. By applying basic Project Management principles and a simple process, he managed to complete the projects successfully within 6 months.  This resulted in a steady business growth pattern and before long Steven was honoured as national business man of the year.  Most of his success he attributed to the fact that he used project management and sound business principles, which he embraced as his key business tools to ensure growth and success!

The biggest mistake in business is not following a plan to reach specific goals. If you are like Henry at a loss of how to approach Project Management in your business, why not start at the beginning.  Follow a simple Project Management approach that will give you the framework to do business projects and get the results you wanted.

Linky

What Is Project Management

Project management is the application of knowledge, skills, tools and techniques to a broad range of activities in order to meet the requirements of the particular project. A project is a temporary endeavour undertaken to achieve a particular aim.

The Latin word projectum means, “to throw something forward.” Project Management is all about making things happen and moving forward and has existed for thousands of years. For example, the Great Pyramid of Giza 2,550 B.C, the Great Wall of China 221 B.C. – 206 B.C or the Roman Coliseum 80 A.D. all used project management techniques.

Project Management is as much a way of thinking as it is an approach that can be applied to any initiative large or small that must deliver within a certain timeframe and cost, in order to meet specific objectives.

Recognised as an essential capability for organisations to maximise value and reduce costs, Project Management has developed considerably in the past 20 years. Today Project Management is a professional discipline with a body of knowledge, a set of skills and competencies and professional certification bodies (listed at the end of this article).

The Basic Principles

There are a number of significant principles which determine success in any project. These are simple and well known principles, however they are difficult to apply and are quite frequently ignored in practice.

1. Precise Business Needs

Successful projects are business driven. This represents the ‘why’ of the project, and it is important because it provides the basis for all decision making.

2. Defined Benefits

Projects are about translating the business need into the business benefit. In addition to the business need, the ‘bottom line’ benefits must also be well defined in terms of source, timing and quantity.

3. Explicit Plans

Effective planning, allows people to work together in a co-ordinated way in order to achieve the project objectives. Effective planning is dependent on being at an appropriate level of detail and being presented in an appropriate way.

4. Agreed Deliverables

Quite simply a ‘deliverable’ is an unambiguous way of defining responsibilities in terms of outputs rather than inputs. Each phase, area and task within the project plan should have a tangible deliverable associated with it, ie. something that one can see, touch, or otherwise validate.

5. Pro-Active Decision Making

Project work has little momentum of its own, unlike routine work. All parties involved are therefore required to take the initiative and actively look for ways of driving and improving the project outcome.

6. Single Point Responsibility

In business tasks are only completed successfully when people have unambiguous accountabilities. ‘Single point responsibility’ for results is of the very essence. The Project Manager is ultimately responsible for making the project happen.

7. Active Follow-Up

Plans have practical value only when they are used to help people do their daily work. They are similarly used as a means of identifying problems while there is still time to overcome them. Plans must therefore be used throughout the entire project in order to allocate tasks and monitor achievement.

8. Open Communications

Time must be invested in communication as it is the key to a successful project. By effectively communicating the project and issues everyone involved has the opportunity to take the initiative and contribute fully with ideas and decisions.

9. Good Teamwork

Teamwork in projects is absolutely critical but does not happen automatically. Project work involves people from different parts of the organisation, often with competing priorities and different perspectives, which can make teamwork all the more difficult to achieve. Teams must therefore be actively developed by the Project Manager.

10. Strong Leadership

Successful projects are usually led by an individual who is committed to the project objectives, and who has a completely clear view of where the project is going and how they intend to get there. The leadership qualities of the Project Manager are as important as their technical management skills.

Benefits of Project Management

In order to apply project management principles it takes time and effort, disciplines and techniques. The results are there for the taking if you are prepared to make the effort.

Applying a project management approach is not easy. At the start of a project the project management approach may not necessarily show immediate results. But the investment always pays off in the long run.

Project management adds value in quite a number of ways, some of which are detailed below:

  1. maximises the benefits of the project by focusing the efforts, of everyone involved, on the business need while working to improve the value of the result.
  2. advances the benefits by minimising the time taken for the project and wherever possible, achieving a phased delivery of business results.
  3. optimises resources by ensuring that everyone knows what they have to do.
  4. minimises costs by ensuring that only essential work is completed, and that work does not have to be redone.
  5. avoids wasted time simply by communicating extensively, and running effective meetings which result in agreed actions, which are completed.

By using project management principles and practices millions of dollars can be saved on projects. It can dramatically accelerate the introduction of beneficial change, and greatly increase the satisfaction of everyone involved, alleviating enormous frustration usually involved in projects.

When applied with sensitivity and adjustment the benefits of project management far outweigh the time and energy invested.

If you require any further information or would like to speak to a consultant please email linky@vitualprojectconsulting.com