My AI Writing Experiment, part 1

 

If you're reading this, you may be wondering "What kind of title is 'Taking the Plunge'?"  When I started this blog(?) almost 20 years ago, it was as I was preparing for the PMP exam, the idea being that when you find something worth doing, you jump into it and then share your experiences with others so that they can learn from your experiences.  I haven't always held true to that idea, and there have been big gaps between my posts, partly because I've been busy doing other things.  I may write about those, soon.  But first, I want to continue my experiment with GenAI.

I'm going to go a little backwards and share something I've learned from this experiment before explaining what I've done.  Working with AI has reminded me that I enjoy the act of creating much more than having a robot pump out something in a fraction of the time.  I've also learned that AI has its place - not in my creative writing, but that's okay.  Let's get to the reason we're here.

This is part 1 of 3 of an exercise in using AI to tell separate stories and then bring them together to teach a lesson, beginning with the prompt, "Speaking as a sarcastic comedian, how would you explain project management to a group of executives who have had negative experiences with project managers?"  Part 2 will ask our sarcastic GenAI to explain executives and stakeholders to a project manager, and Part 3 will bring everyone together for some bonding and mutual affirmations.  Be warned, some of the best and worst comedy has foundations in painful truths.  I'll let you decide which this is.

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Ladies and gentlemen, esteemed executives, gather 'round! Today, we're going to unravel the mystery of project management—a profession as misunderstood as the Bermuda Triangle and as appreciated as a traffic jam on a Monday morning.

Picture this: you're on a sinking ship, but don't worry, the project manager is here! They won't save you, but they'll document the exact time each deck goes underwater, schedule daily stand-up meetings to discuss how wet your shoes are, and ensure you have a comprehensive PowerPoint presentation on the best way to drown efficiently.

First, let's talk about planning. Project managers are like your overly enthusiastic GPS. They create a route so detailed that it includes a pit stop for every restroom and coffee shop. But when the road is closed, instead of rerouting, they insist on discussing the detour over several mandatory, but thoroughly unproductive, meetings.

Then there's communication. Ah, the art of talking without really saying anything. Our project manager sends emails—lots of emails. You’ll get updates about updates, notifications about those updates, and reminders about the notifications. By the end, your inbox will be a black hole of status reports, none of which actually tell you if the project's succeeding or failing.

And let's not forget risk management. Here, the project manager is like a weather forecaster. They'll predict 17 different disasters that might happen, create a spreadsheet for each one, and then be completely blindsided by a real issue that no one saw coming, because they were too busy mitigating the risk of a coffee spill in the break room.

Finally, there's the wrap-up phase. Imagine a grand finale where nothing works as planned, but don’t worry—there's a detailed post-mortem. The project manager will conduct a series of retrospective meetings to analyze why everything went wrong, carefully avoiding any conclusions that might suggest they, or the process, were part of the problem. And then, they’ll enthusiastically propose the same approach for the next project!

So there you have it, project management in a nutshell. It's like herding cats, except the cats are on fire, the project manager is trying to teach them synchronized swimming, and you're footing the bill for the water damage. But hey, at least you’ll have a Gantt chart to remember it by!

Thank you, and may your next project be slightly less of a circus.