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Change Management
Getting people, process, and technology to change can be a challenge. These posts talk about concrete tactics for results, with some “war stories” sprinkled in.
Help for the Newly Minted Project Manager
Congratulations! Due to the recent [acquisition / divestiture, market expansion / contraction, organizational realignments, other] you have been identified as a Critical Resource for this particular bit of business process change. And, to help us implement these changes, you have been named the Project Manager for this effort. So now you are a Project Manager [...]
Change and the Crop Duster
Drive south through the state of Indiana on I-65, and before you hit Indianapolis you will come across an impressively large array of wind turbines, the new vertical symbols of energy self-reliance and innovation. I remember not so long ago, when this section of the road was just miles of cornfields, as far as the [...]
A Nice Knock-Down Argument
Sales and the Gantt “Why exactly does he want to meet again?” I could sense the exasperation in Karl’s voice, faintly; the sales manager wasn’t about to slip out of his professional demeanor over some perceived technical triviality. But for the fact that the request was coming from his newly-hired PMI maven, he probably would [...]
Design and Change Management
I have developed a few strongly-held architectural beliefs, and one came up in conversation last week, during a spirited discussion on minimal quality requirements for a[ny] data mart. I hold that the data copied from source to destination must be provably correct and complete with little effort. When agile-ly rolling staged deliverables into production, I [...]
Managing Change: Pick Something, and Do It Well
This is the first in an series of posts on Managing Change … look for more over the course of the next few weeks … A common way of expressing the holistic nature of a project is to talk about “People, Process, and Technology”. I’m not sure who came up with this little gem, or [...]
What’s the Difference between Announcements, Blogs, Discussions, Wikis?
Alternate Title: Battling Collaboration Memes As mentioned previously, we are trying out SharePoint where I work, and I’m finding it interesting, maintaing 3+ blogs, including this one. Actually, the focus of the internal stuff is quite different, as Dennis McDonald and others have been noting. Lot’s of details and stories to write about, but one [...]
Finding shapes in the fog – How to frame a wispy, wandering conversation
An excellent discussion this afternoon, on a fairly complex topic we’re trying to move forward. When dealing with broad system concepts that have been trivialized into TLAs – think CRM, PLM, BPM, TQM, yada – you need to help folks define some sort of framework to focus and steer the initiative in a general (hopefully [...]
Subtle Anarchy
In any organization – if you’ve been there for a while or are brand new – there aren’t many ways you can get away with introducing some change, shaking things up a little, and get away with it. Here are some stealthy, subtle ways to bring in a little healthy anarchy (they get progressively riskier) [...]
My Favorite Paradox
Entropy (again), the great oxymoron/paradox of our universe … constant change. I like the concept because it’s simple yet confusing, short/terse, and powerful (actively, passively, and conceptually). I think I picked this up from my Thermodynamics professor – an anti-Hesburgh Hindu at Notre Dame (love those tight loops). There is a link to my current [...]
First week, new gig – drinking from the firehose
By the end of the week, “drinking from a firehose” became my massively overused one-liner to describe how the week was going. Still, nothing that was unexpected; new organization philosophies and theories, new terminology for familiar concepts, new “rules of engagement” for working with the technology infrastructure. Also, against my better intentions, it’s been tough [...]
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