The Project Management Skill | Never Talked About

Here is a good article about the 7 Must Have Project Management skills. I really liked the way that it is explained and I believe that these skills are Must Haves for a successful Project Manager.

The skill No. 6 “Recognize and solve problems quickly” rang a bell. I do agree that a Project Manager should be able to see and resolve a problem quickly. However, what I think is a better skill to have is to be able to predict a particular problem or risk before it happens, work on it pro-actively, and nip the problem in the bud.

The difference here is between a Hero and a Silent Achiever. A Hero might be seen as one who goes in a helicopter, stoops low and douses the bush fire. The Silent Achiever is one who realized that the atmosphere is dry and hot, predicted the bush fire and cut the grass / poured water on the field to ensure that the bush fire does not occur. So, for the casual observer, it seems to be Business as usual and the effort put in by the Silent Achiever is not usually noticed.

All said and done, each person has his place. It takes a lot of hard work to be a hero and a lot more to be a silent achiever. Keep your eyes open and make sure to applaud the Silent Achievers as well.

Cheers,
Sampath Prahalad, Snr Project Manager at One Dot.

Agile: What is in it for me?

All over the world, Agile methodologies are leading to faster value realization for both the businesses and customers. The value that Agile methodologies are bringing is evident from the fast paced and the high volume of companies and organizations adopting Agile.

What we shall explore today, however are the personality improvements that individuals get from being on an Agile team. These are assets for life that team members get from working in a self organized Scrum team. These traits are visible across most flavours of Agile, but we shall stick to Scrum for the moment.

Small steps with feedback: Scrum advocates frequent small releases to market with valuable content rather than one big release at the end of the project. This way, each time a small release is made, feedback is obtained and is ploughed back into the product to make it better. Scrum understands that planning is important, but it is more important to get moving. Similarly, with each personal goal, it is good to identify the goal, break it down into smaller parts, implement them one at a time, observe the results and fine tune or change the goal as needed. Many times, the personal goals and resolutions need constant reminding and by making frequent small changes, you are not only keeping the goal alive, you are also taking steady steps towards the destination. As Ralph Waldo Emerson puts it “An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory”

Effective Improved Communication: Scrum puts power into your hands as a team member. To exercise this power, you have to talk and express yourself in planning and estimation sessions, make your voice heard in daily stand-up meetings and voice your opinions in Retrospectives. Scrum’s rituals are all about being heard without being dominant. Initially, it might be hard for some team members to lose their inhibition, but Scrum’s daily stand-ups, planning meetings and retrospectives urge each one to open up and participate. In a positive way, team members are forced to open up in a trusted team environment and over time, this gives confidence to individuals to be more expressive in bigger groups and forums.

See the other person’s perspective: A team composition in Scrum consists of subject matter experts (SMEs) in Development, Testing, etc. As they plan together and work together Sprint after Sprint, they orient themselves towards the Sprint goal each time. With this, once a person is done with his/her task, he/she is now looking to pick up and contribute towards any other task that needs to be completed to meet the Sprint goal. The team member is picking up new cross functional skills and looking at things in a new perspective along with contributing towards the Sprint goal. Development and testing silos are broken and the team becomes self organized. Each person is able to understand and appreciate the other’s views and experience.

This experience teaches us to think more broadly when we face a situation in life where instead of criticizing a person who holds a different perspective, we try to put ourselves in his/her shoes and think from their perspective. Though this is no rocket science, the experience from working in an Agile cross functional team allows us to pause and listen to a perspective that could be valid and totally different.

Do let us know how your personality has gained by working in an Agile environment.

Agile Implementation: Support from the top

Agile methodologies are gaining increasing importance and acceptance as an excellent way to create software. More organizations are moving from Waterfall to Scrum, Kanban or XP with each passing day. However, as much as we hear about the success stories of organizations that have embraced the Agile methodology, we are also hearing horror stories about botched implementations and problems faced by organizations that have attempted to go Agile.

I believe that when an organization makes the transition from Waterfall to Agile, you would need buy in from the people that are directly involved: the developers, the product managers and project managers. They have to be trained, mentored and completely bought in.

However, what I believe is more important to the success of the Agile implementation is the support from the senior management. They need to be completely bought in and have to understand the principles as well. They would need to support the teams making the transformation and not have conflicting demands which could take them back towards Waterfall. A change from the earlier “Command and Control” mode of operation to a “Team empowerment” mode. A change in the ways of planning, execution and reporting.

See this article on How senior management misconceptions could lead to a failed Agile implementation. Stay clear of these and that would be a good starting point.

By Sampath Prahalad, Snr Project Manager at One Dot.