Project “P”s - Three or Five
on Aug 05 in Planning, Priority, Understanding tagged Objectives, Planning, Prioritisation by KeithIn a recent Twitter exchange with one of my friends (@eileenb), we were discussing productivity and planning. We covered things like the “5 Ps” (perfect planning prevents poor performance). As you might imagine, with a project manager’s hat on, things like the 5 Ps are stocks-in-trade for delivering the results clients need. My standpoint was slightly different though.
I suggested “3 new Ps” - Productivity, Priority and Purpose.
My thinking was that planning is all very well, but one of the first questions I tend to ask clients when I am starting a project with them, or indeed picking up a struggling project, is “why are you doing this project in the first place?” - the purpose.
No point perfectly planning exactly the wrong thing…
Purpose
This is why purpose is so important. From a pure business point of view, effort expended going down dead ends is pure waste, on the bottom line. An extra £ of cost hurts more than a missing £ of sales after all. What is perhaps worse is the effect that such wasted work can have on morale and motivation, potentially driving a wedge between managers and their teams. If you can’t share a clear sense of purpose for a project, stop it until you (and the others involved) can explain it. Really.
Productivity
So, Productivity. Let’s assume that productivity as our aim or ambition is the first key; since doing more, in less time with fewer resources lets us make money, save money, save time, and as a result generally do the fun and important things in life. The improvements in productivity should support our stated purpose. We should be able to measure or quantify the productivity benefits.
Priority
Priority is the other difficult thing to get right; usually because priority is a fluid, living thing compared to written plans. If it was easy, we’d never struggle to set priorities, share them, and all work in concert. I’ve heard that this is actually not always the case…
Quite often, with both successful and failed projects, we work with clients to do post mortems - root cause analyses of why good and bad results happened. More often than not, the difference between the two types boil down to two things; communication, and priority.
I could then argue that priority is just a form of communication; so, there you go, everything in life boils down to communication - including planning, prioritisation, productivity and clarity of purpose.
So, for your current or next project, how clear are:
- Purpose
- Priorities
- Productivity goals?
And how do you know that other people genuinely share your understanding?
Are they written down, have you asked people?
Worth a check.
Managing Elephants in Rooms
on May 17 in Blog, Priority, Understanding tagged Analysis, Planning, Prioritisation by KeithRisk For The Rest Of Us - Managing Elephants in Rooms
Risk Management is a huge area with lots of specialist people, companies, books, qualifications and so on. So should we even go there if we’re not black belts…? And what’s this about elephants? Read More
The Headline Test
on Feb 03 in Taking Action, Understanding tagged Analysis by KeithWhat might Concorde crashing on take-off, and the Iraq War Inquiry tell us about making business decisions?
I often end up in situations where I am helping businesses make tricky decisions, some of which may have been put off for some time. They usually involve big, important things that affect people, profit, livelihoods, even lives. Read More
New Intro to Critical Action
on Aug 13 in Taking Action, Understanding tagged Action, Analysis by Keith
Allow Us To Introduce…
The new intro "in action"
We have recently created a “quick intro” to Critical Action Limited, as a PDF for you and your clients to download.
It explains a bit about what we stand for, and introduces our new campaign message - “On a mission to simplify consulting“. Read More
Envisioning the Future
on Jul 21 in Strategy, Understanding tagged Future by KeithThe latest round of Microsoft Labs “envisioning” videos have been getting quite a bit of press lately (sadly I didn’t get to this year’s Worldwide Partner Conference to catch the latest “live”).
Click here to see them (in a new window). Some are quite thought provoking, which is, I suppose, the intention. Read More
Perfectionism - Enemy of Priority?
on Jul 14 in Priority, Understanding tagged Analysis, Prioritisation by KeithBusiness improvement thoughts come to me in the strangest places…
We’ve just had a period of sunshine and rain that has been great for the grass in our horses’ field, but it has also caused the ragwort to sprout. Ragwort is poisonous to horses and needs to be thoroughly eradicated from fields (I think it may even be an offence to knowingly let it grow).
This means going out with a special fork to remove the plants including the deep roots. My wife asked me to concentrate first on the plants that had grown enough in the week to flower, to prevent them going to seed and exacerbating the problem.
Being my usual self, I set out with the wheelbarrow and fork, determined to clear every last vestige of ragwort from a 3 acre field. Read More
Nine Principles for Taking Critical Action
on Jul 03 in Understanding tagged Action, Analysis by KeithRecently, we’ve been crystallising our approach to solving problems and seizing opportunities, to build a repeatable, consistent model that can be rapidly applied to save time and money, and create value for our customers - and their customers too. In tough economic times, action needs to be decisive yes, but incisive also - not much point making the wrong decision quickly! Anything that helps in the quest to get it right will help immensely at the moment (and when recovery comes).