With Great Innovation Comes Great Responsibility
From the Voices on Project Management Blog
by Cameron McGaughy,
Lynda Bourne, Kevin Korterud, Peter Tarhanidis, Conrado Morlan, Jen Skrabak, Mario Trentim, Christian Bisson, Yasmina Khelifi, Sree Rao, Soma Bhattacharya, Emily Luijbregts, David Wakeman, Ramiro Rodrigues, Wanda Curlee, Lenka Pincot, cyndee miller, Jorge Martin Valdes Garciatorres, Marat Oyvetsky
Voices on Project Management offers insights, tips, advice and personal stories from project managers in different regions and industries. The goal is to get you thinking, and spark a discussion. So, if you read something that you agree with--or even disagree with--leave a comment.
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Date
by Cyndee Miller
Sweet home Chicago — the birthplace of deep-dish pizza, Ferris wheels (and Ferris Bueller), brownies, Chance the Rapper and yours truly.
This is a city driven by innovation.
Not to brag, but we’ve pretty much cornered the market on mind-blowingly awesome construction projects, with the skyscraper as our specialty. We may no longer be able to claim the world’s tallest, but we’ll always be home to the world’s first. Construction isn’t the only game in town, of course. In September, mega consultancy KPMG named Chicago one of the top 10 tech innovation hubs in the world. Take that, Silicon Valley.
And now, PMI® Global Conference is here for a visit, with Sir Tim Berners-Lee as the opening keynoter, no less.
As the father of the world wide web, Sir Berners-Lee has serious cred talking about innovation. Over the years, I’ve heard my fair share of hooey about fostering creativity. I appreciated his stance, which basically comes down to letting people do their thing: “When you see a twinkle in somebody’s eyes, that’s when it’s time to give them some space.”
When he first started talking about his nebulous project called the world wide web, for example, his boss called it “vague, but exciting.” Then he had the good sense to get out of the way.
Still, Sir Berners-Lee said he was constantly working to keep the spark alive. He needed to nurture that flame to get to the next phase: the critical collaboration necessary for the nascent project to take off.
“How do you take the creative energy between these different companies trying to produce the best browser and get them to produce the best HTML so there is just one web, just one HTTP,” he said.
For project managers, it’s about getting people to put aside their way of doing things, collaborate on the common goal and build consensus. “By the time you’ve mixed your ideas with other people’s ideas, you’ll end up with a better product,” said Sir Berners-Lee.
With any major innovation, the people driving the effort usually go in with a really strong idea about the world they want to make, the problem they want to solve. But there are inevitably unexpected consequences once an idea makes its way into the real world, said Sir Berners-Lee.
Take Twitter. Given that Sir Berners-Lee built the internet, he also built Twitter — and the angry tweet. “We used to think just good things would happen,” he said. “Give the world a liberal dose of communication and give them a medium that knows no nation and surely there will be world peace.”
Alas, we all know that’s not quite how it worked out.
“Project managers must think about: If everyone ended up using [a given project], what would be the affect on humanity?” he said.
As innovation continues to ramp up — and project managers begin to step up as agents of change — it’s a powerful and necessary question.
Posted
by
cyndee miller
on: October 29, 2017 07:21 AM |
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Comments (7)
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Stéphane Parent
Self Employed / Semi-retired| Leader Maker
Prince Edward Island, Canada
Project managers, like all leaders, need to be agents of innovation and change.
DEBASISH MOHANTY
Principal Advisor , Digital Transformation Consulting| iAssess Digital Technology Pvt. Ltd.
Bangalore, Karnataka, India
With increasing impact of AI , ML and cognitive computing across project development lifecycle and society , will there be further revision of @PMBOK standards catering to such innovations.
Drew Craig
Sr. Agile & Product Coach| Vanguard
Philadelphia, Pa, United States
Thank you, Cyndee. ... driven by influence.
Jess De Ocampo
Lean Six Sigma Professional/Project Manager/Consultant/| .
Manila, Ncr, Philippines
Thank you for sharing..I agree with the above mentioned comments. Innovation is a must or we become obsolete. Change is inevitable and no matter how difficult it is we have to embrace it...
Dinah Young
Project Manager / Software Asset Manager| Prince William County
Springfield, Va, United States
I do understand the need to allow people the freedom to think, to be innovative. Too often at my current place of employment, innovative think has been blocked. We don't have time for that or we don't have money for that. After awhile people get "stuck". Now that we have new leadership that wants innovation, they are trying to force it, to guide it. It does not always work that way. They need to learn to just let it happen, to support new ideas, to get out of the way.
Yes, PM are change agents.
Thanks.
Kevin Coleman
Subject Matter Expert, Author, Speaker and Strategic Advisor| - Insights
Pa, United States
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