Bas de Baar is a Dutch visual facilitator, creating visual tools for dialogue. He is dedicated to improve the dialogue we use to make sense of change.
As The Project Shrink, this is the riddle he tries to solve:
“If you are a Project Manager that operates for a short period of time in a foreign organization, with a global team you don’t know, in a domain you would not know, using virtual communication, high uncertainty, limited authority and part of what you do out in the open on the Internet, how do you make it all work?”
In the final part of my talk with Peter Taylor, The Lazy Project Manager, I ask him how he explains what he does to his children. This was right after a talk he did at the PMI EMEA Congress. In it he made a case for Project Managers to get "out of our box". He said that we are unknown outside our profession. How do you explain to your kids what you do? So, I asked him.
Richard MaltzmanPortfolio Manager| EarthPM LLCAndover, Ma, United States
I recently had to do this. And not only to my my own kids - but to the kids in my kid's classroom.
In fact, my daugther teaches English at a local Middle School (6th, 7th, and 8th grades) and I was asked to come in and present Project Management as a career during their Career Day.
I was up against policemen, interior designers and doctors. Ouch. But I survived, and even thrived, by putting together a highly interactive 30- minute presentation which had the kids participating in the project of designing and marketing a "green car".
I have the presentation available if anyone would want to use it for a similar Career Day.
