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Wanted in the PMO: Strategic Thinkers
| Project management offices (PMOs) don't just change processes. They change their organizations, markets, industries and communities, said PMI president and CEO Mark A. Langley as he kicked off the PMO Symposium 2013 in San Diego, California, USA. The 600 attendees -- representing 406 organizations, 30 industries and 29 countries -- heard just how powerful PMOs can be during the 2013 PMO of the Year Award. The top honor went to Canada Health Infoway, a not-for-profit overseeing CA$2.1 billion in public funds. With a portfolio that has increased fourfold since 2005, the PMO acts as a strategic adviser on digital health-record projects. Proving the value of the PMO's strategic focus: Only 4 percent of projects in the portfolio have failed, and almost all of those failures occurred early in their life cycle, prior to significant expenditure. "Their PMO is a clear demonstration of how organizations can and should implement their strategic initiatives," said Mr. Langley. The other two finalists were:
The sessions that followed reinforced the growing focus on strategy. A PMO is the governor and facilitator -- the organization's glue, said Greg Miller, vice president at PMI Global Executive Council member CareFirst, Blue Cross Blue Shield. PMO staff should go in armed with a comprehensive understanding of the organization's strategy, accept the executive game plan, maintain an orderly and expeditious flow, and unify the organization. "PMOs must take center stage and they must operate strategically." Today's fast-paced project environment is accelerating the drive toward strategic alignment and change management at the heart of a successful PMO, said Michel Danon, senior vice president and CIO, Hawaii Medical Service Association independent licensee of PMI Global Executive Council member Blue Cross Blue Shield. "We need project practitioners who are really adaptable, who can understand and energize people and point them toward a common goal." That means finding and fostering the right project talent -- within or outside of a PMO. Ed Hoffman, PhD, CKO and APPEL Director at NASA, a PMI Global Executive Council member, said PMOs can support talent management by:
"A PMO should be wrapped around the notion of knowledge and development," Dr. Hoffman said. Lynn Batara, PMO director of Franklin Templeton Investments, spoke of the importance of developing project talent and engaging stakeholders: "The mystery of project success is people." Does your organization's PMO focus on strategy and talent development? Read more about the PMO symposium on this blog or on Twitter, #PMOsym. |
Adapting to Cultures, Lessons from my Father
| A few years ago, after I finished a presentation about multigenerational and multicultural teams in Mexico City, Mexico, someone in the audience asked me what kicked off my interest in these topics, which have become a bigger trend in the past decade. The first thing that came to mind was a proverb that my late father used to say to my brother and me: When in Rome, do as the Romans do. He wanted to remind us that we need to adapt to the conditions of our environment. My father was a member of the Silent Generation. He faced many challenges during his childhood and adolescence, but he was able to adapt to every circumstance and went on to explore opportunities in many fields: factory worker, amateur sportsman, mechanic, and opera and popular music singer. Through his interest in opera, he taught himself foreign languages -- he wanted to know what he was singing so he could add emotion to his act. Later, when he explored popular music, he learned to play guitar and created his own performance style. This is how he adapted to different environments -- by learning constantly and proactively. Despite being from the Silent Generation, my father was an extrovert in his own way, which led him to be a great relationship builder. During our Sunday strolls in Mexico City, he always looked for tourists who needed directions and took the opportunity to practice the languages he had learned and ask questions about their culture. Adapting is as much pushing yourself to learn on your own as it is learning from others. And while my father and that good old proverb inspired my interest in these topics, here's one piece of advice I can give you from personal experience: To master multicultural and multigenerational issues, it's pivotal to keep a positive attitude and accept the challenges that different environments offer. What sparked your interest in multicultural and multigenerational teams? Was it second nature, or did you need to do so for a project? |
Communicating Change
| To implement a successful change initiative, you must first create the desire for change within the affected stakeholder community. If stakeholders believe the message being communicated, the way they react and feel changes in response. Research in Australia, New Zealand and the United States has consistently demonstrated physical changes in people based on what they've been told. Studies report people Down Under and in Canada who are told wind turbines cause health problems actually experience health problems. Similarly, in a 2007 study, Harvard researchers told some female hotel employees that their usual duties met the U.S. Surgeon General's recommendations for an exercise regimen. Four weeks later, the researchers found improvements in blood pressure, body mass index and other health indices among the informed group compared to a control group of attendants who hadn't been so informed. What this suggests is the conversations around your change initiative will have a direct effect on how people experience the change. Gossip and scaremongering will cause bad reactions; positive news creates positive experiences. To drive success, you need to make the right conversations. Some strategies to help include:
Expectations tend to become self-fulfilling prophecies. You need to communicate the expected change your project is creating will be beneficial and good for the majority of the stakeholders. If this message is both true and believed (the two elements are not automatically connected), the experience of the stakeholders is more likely to be positive. Communication often can mean the difference between project success and failure. A 2013 PMI Pulse of the Professionâ„¢ in-depth report shows that executives and project managers around the world agree that poor communication contributes to project failure. Of the two in five projects that fail to meet original goals, one of the two do so because of ineffective communications. The study also reveals that effective communication is a critical factor in creating success. Given the stakes, it's time to ask: How much positive communication do you do each day? |
Answer the Call for Innovation
Categories:
Innovation
Categories: Innovation
| A decade of planning came down to seven tense minutes aimed at answering the age-old question: Is there life on Mars? With that intriguing set up, John Grotzinger, PhD, pulled in a captive audience at PMI® Global Congress 2013 -- North America as he outlined the 2012 project that sent a car-sized robot, called Curiosity, to Mars. First, the team had to figure out how to land a spacecraft safely on the red planet. Mars doesn't have enough atmosphere to slow a craft for landing. So the project team devised what it dubbed Sky Crane. After a parachute slowed the spacecraft considerably, rockets prevented it from crashing, and then Sky Crane lowered Curiosity by a rope. It was an innovative "out-of-the-box idea," but U.S. government sponsors agreed to give it the go-ahead. Not all projects are quite so high profile, of course, but Dr. Grotzinger offered lessons learned for practitioners of projects large and small:
Dr. Grotzinger closed with a case for innovative thinking and perseverance: "Great works and great folly may be indistinguishable at the outset," he said. The first time his team presented Sky Crane to NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration), they said it was crazy -- but after tweaking the idea, they eventually accepted the pitch. The final congress keynote speaker, author and consultant Gina Schreck, covered a different type of uncharted territory, at least for some: social media. She broke people into two groups: digital natives, who feel at ease with the technology, and digital immigrants, who don't. But with Twitter, Facebook and other social tools officially an ingrained part of the business world, immigrants need to become natives fast. Ms. Schreck offered several tips to stand out on the social scene:
Ms. Schreck urged digital immigrants to embrace social media and innovation for survival. "If you don't make today's you obsolete, someone else will," she said. What are your tips for fostering innovation? Share with us in the Comments box below. Couldn't make it to New Orleans? Read more from congress. |
Sales and Leadership Emerge as the Skills to Master
Categories:
PMI Global Congress 2013 - North America
Categories: PMI Global Congress 2013 - North America
| "Like it or not, we're all in sales now," said best-selling author Daniel Pink, a keynote speaker at PMI® Global Congress 2013 -- North America in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA. And that includes project practitioners looking to demonstrate the value of project management. But sales isn't what it used to be. In today's world of information parity, buyers can easily confirm or reject sellers' claims. It's no longer "buyer beware," but "seller beware." For project practitioners, that parity translates to opportunities to showcase what they bring to the table. If customers know they have a problem, they can find a solution, Mr. Pink said. But if they don't even know they have a problem, a project practitioner becomes more valuable, shifting from problem solver to problem finder. Sales skills also help gain buy-in from sponsors, stakeholders and team members. Part of that power of persuasion comes from knowing the audience and then tailoring language to the target audience instead of using specialized lingo. Limiting options -- to a project sponsor, for instance -- can also help secure buy-in by making the options less overwhelming. And project practitioners should focus their pitch on what motivates the team. Have fewer conversations about how and more about why. Project managers should even reconsider the way they talk to themselves, Mr. Pink said. Interrogative ("Can I do this?") trumps the affirmative ("I can do this") because it elicits an active response. If the answer is self-doubt, then it calls for more preparation, which is ultimately a good thing. Today's project practitioners also need to be leaders who can influence others even when they don't have formal authority, said author Mark Sanborn, another congress keynote speaker. "Titles should confirm leadership, but they can never bestow leadership," he explained. No matter the title, Mr. Sanborn said leaders win followers instead of just being given employees. They create change instead of reacting to it. They implement ideas instead of simply having them. They build teams versus directing groups. They make heroes instead of trying to be ones themselves. They create shared focus versus just being focused. And they persuade, versus communicate. Mr. Sanborn said leadership comes down to six elements: 1. Self-mastery: Take responsibility and be trustworthy. 2. Shared focus: Focused attention beats brains and brute strength. 3. Power with people: Managers have power over people. Leaders have power with people. 4. Persuasive communication: Use a combination of rapport, logic and emotion. 5. Strategic execution: Do something with the information you have or let it go. 6. Service: Give back. True leaders know what really matters, Mr. Sanborn said. And they make that matter to others. Read more posts from congress. And if you attended congress, we'd love to hear what you thought of these speakers in the Comments section below. |