Master many skills and make sure you look good doing it.

One of the great things about being on the downswing of a career is not to have to master many new things and not having to look hat good while doing it. I can't be promoted any more.


I am really skilled at a few things, so I get to wear Hawaiian shirts while doing those things. Some things I'm not so good at (and maybe do care more about), for those things I wear the requisite jacket and tie, but no white shirts.


On more than a few occasions recently my ties (selected and bought by my wife) get compliments.


So here goes.

The pundits are now saying, get used to 10% unemployment. What does that mean for you. It means continued job stresses and a convenient hammer for employers to do two things to you:

• Make you work more hours and be more productive
• Pay you less for the privilege of work.

How can you cope? Well, there are plenty of examples from history to help us. Even some relatively younger folks (like me) who did not experience WW2 or the great depression have some ideas from when  those two ideas were the operative mode in U.S. business.


So if you are going to work longer hours for less pay, how can you succeed and even thrive.


Most importantly, make sure you pick up some new Project Management skills that will increase your productivity in those extra hours. Just working longer hours without added productivity won't help you move up.  Make sure your previously normal days are productive and not distracted.


PRODUCTIVITY IMPROVEMENTS

• Turn your personal cell phone off. Maybe permanently  (we had our home phone disconnected, no ringing in the house now).
• Stop reading anything but direct work email: I delete 90% of my email without reading. That's the first thing I do when I fire up the email.
• Turn your email off for most of the day. Open it only a few selected times each day, so that you don't get side tracked. Maybe your email has a sound that pings when your boss sends a message or team mates send messages, that might help you to read only the most important messages.
• Skip playing office politics unless you are a master of it. Amateurs always get burned.
• Work your first eight on you present job assignment only.
• Work you extra hours on the extra work you are given. When the extra work is produced in a timely manner, when you behind on the regular work it will be overlooked for a time. (Anyway if you eliminate the distracters from your first eight hours, you get more work done in your second eight hour shift.

NEW SKILLS

• Go spend a Saturday or a few week nights at the community college or other learning venue for some new computing skills.
• If you are Project Manager, maybe database management or some great graphics program.
• Take a course in presentation creation and giving. Maybe a theatre class would be great. (I can't tell you how many junk powerpoints I have seen) Even the simple act of standing Down Stage Right (that's to the left looking forward) is not often followed. If we read English from left to right, your eyes naturally return to the speaker if she is on stage right.  Chinese might be different. Join Toastmasters and learn how to speak in public.
• If you business has lots of social events, brush up your ballroom dancing skills (I'm not kidding). Early in my career I was in a black tie business and being able to make a not so painful "Fox-Trot" around the dance floor with my wife or an amenable female colleague was a way to set myself out in front of others.
• Use your new skills to ask for new and exciting assignments. Your extra hours will be more challenging rather than drudgery.

SELL YOURSELF FOR SUCCESS

• Always dress one or two steps above your position. More would look phony.
• If you are a man get an expensive suit or jacket to wear when you might meet board members, officers and executives of your employer. In my day I had $1K suit for special occasions, and always a suit in my office (I still do today) for emergency calls. Nothing says, "Don't promote me!", like scuffed shoes, and a wrinkled shirt or tee shirt.
• If you are a woman, check out what successful women in your business wear: my guess women executives do not wear "uniform suits' above a certain level. Skip the uniform black suit and dress like an executive. Be easy on the makeup, very easy on perfume, and no cleavage please, unless you are in a specialty niche in sales or entertainment. (Women employed by WWE ignore this, maybe!)
• For both men and women: shop discount stores, vintage, used clothing or on-line. You don't need to be this year's fashions with boutique labels, but very wide lapels and poodle skirts will tip off the boss. My guess, for most businesses your boss and their spouses are NOT fashionistas and won't know what the latest NY/Paris fashion is. Last years fashions and colors will be fine if its well made and suits your physique.
• Get a three hundred dollar watch (no more than that, a Rolex will look phony on a PM and maybe will be perceived as fake.
• Keep a newer cell phone on hand, it doesn't need to be an iPhone or a Blackberry unless they improve your productivity. But a shiny new cell will say, I keep my technology up.
• Unclutter your work place. No excuses.  "I know where the stuff is".. as a quote.. doesn't cut it when your boss walks by and its a mess and you are out of the office, what will they think. At least clear your work space every evening before leaving.
• Be the first employee in each day and NOT in the first group to leave. If you are productive you don't need to be the last to leave.

In summary:

• Become more productive, stop letting others steal your productivity.
• Learn new skills, especially social skills.
• Present yourself well but not over the top.

Napoleon Bonaparte PPM?

I have been asked by some of my students to suggest or review books on project management. The book Napoleon on Project Management by Jerry Manas was suggested by a former student. Through a historical review of Napoleons life, war and administration, as well as his writings, Manas draws a portrait of Napoleon as a master project manager (as well as a leader). Napoleon Bonaparte PPM?

Because I love history (mostly the local history of where I am living at the time) I picked up a copy. Unlike Leadership secrets of Attila the Hun, another of my favorites, Manas’ book relies on quotations and writings (ascribed to Napoleon).

Napoleon’s Six Winning Principles as recounted by Manas.
 

Exactitude
Speed
Flexibility
Simplicity
Character
Moral Force

Napoleon once said “In war, everything is perception-perception about the enemy, perception about one’s own solders”. Manas points out that perception is more than seeing, it the processing of what we are seeing into a rational world (or project) view.

Dr. Rogers has eight rules for Project Management and if you look carefully you can see the overlaps. Remember my motto is: Indolese rapio. (genius steals)

Exactitude: Being prepared and using facts and past experiences to guide you.
Rule 1 If you can’t measure it you can’t manage it.
Rule 2 Failure to Plan is a Plan for Failure.
Rule 5 Project Communication is a two way process not a one way street.

Rule 7 When all else fails read the directions.

Speed: Projects fail when schedules are either not built with consensus (military can give orders) and followed up on. Things go wrong on projects when the attitude of the leaders is lackadaisical or unconcerned.

Rule 3 Focus on product over process.

Flexibility: Having teams that are adaptable, empowered and unified.

Rule 5 Project Communication is a two way process not a one way street.

Rule 6. If it hasn’t been doen before that’s reason enough to try it.

Simplicity: Projects with clear simple objectives succeed.

Rule 3 Focus on Product over process.

Character: Means integrity, calmness and responsibility.

Rules 1-8. If you have your own consistent set of rules that guide your actions you will be seen to have integrity, you will be calm because you know what to do and you will always take responsibility for yourself and others.

Moral Force: Providing order, purpose, recognition and rewards.

Rule 1 If you can’t measure it you can’t manage it.
Rule 5 Project Communication is a two way process not a one way street.

Rule 8 Have Fun

I recommend this book because:

It’s a fun read for those who like historical work. It’s an easy read, not too complicated and It outlines another famous persons consistent rules, supporting my contention that each of us should write down our own hard learned rules for work and for life.

Dealing with difficult personalities, uncertainty and literalism.

Dealing with difficult personalities is a fundamental truism for management. One of the good things about projects is that they last a finite time and team members change often. Because of this dynamic environment, most project managers just rely on the inevitable personal change. This is being lazy, and I can assure you that I relied on this lazy technique from time to time. But good management is dealing with the present time reality.

This is the first of a series of postings on dealing with difficult personalities. In this post we will deal with literalists. In future posts we will discuss other types of annoyances.

Let me start with a caveat. There are no bad people just bad managers. Using your human capital to its best project advantage is a great skill. What kind of person am I? Why was I effective as a project manager and business executive? Why did my success confound certain individuals who worked for me?

I am by nature (most good folks are) kind of introspective. Not that I spend time inspecting my belly button lint, but I do spend time trying to puzzle out why some folks are more successful at work than others even when intellectually they seem to be more or less equally gifted.

These are my personal observations, they do not reflect any formal psychological or sociological studies, research or findings. What makes us unique also makes us interesting to work with.

Here are some observations and suggestions.

• Literalists are those who read every direction, correspondence, direction etc from a pure literal view. They seldom look at the context or the importance of the matter, but focus on its correctness and internal consistency. Literalists do not like internal contradiction even when the area is minor or insignificant. Uncontrolled a literalist can bombard managers with clarification requests, observations of “mistakes”, and seldom complete tasks on time. As life and work are, more often than not, messy and inconsistent, how does one deal with literalists.

Literalists get upset (and sometimes angry and combative) when their supervisors are not able to provide a consistent information environment, or worse when the manager providescontradictory or inconsistent directions. Among others, these inconsistencies can come from the clients, government regulations, incomplete scope documents, or conflicting market signals.

How does a manager deal with individuals who have problems dealing with inconsistent information?

My recommendation:

Eliminate fear as a motivator or demotivator on your project.

Create a place where honest mistakes, based on judgment are not punished, just acknowledged and repaired.

Make sure that your team members know that the outcome of the project is more important than perfection.

Keep a culture of open communication, one that embraces ambiguity as a reality of the work place.

When faced with continued questions from a literalist, never give them an answer, ask them a question., such as: What do you think? What would you do? Did you check with the source author? Be supportive of the answers, offer other options for decision making.

When your team members know that making decisions based on sound judgment is encouraged and rewarded more than asking questions are, they will make decisions. If the environment of the project encourages decision making, make sure you team members feel comfortable to report their decisions. Never react negatively to a decision made by your team. Engage in positive communication.

If a mistake, due to inconsistent or ambiguous information was made, I would apologized to team members for not providing good information, clear up the information inconsistency and add what additional information is now available. Ask the team what they would do differently now.

If you have a literalist on your team, make sure you constantly reassure them that you know that the world is ambiguous and that their need for consistency is a good thing, not a character flaw. Encourage them to make decisions, record the ambiguity and report it. Ask them not to stop what they are doing, but go forward with what they think is right. Reward them, never punish them.