Based on the extensive media coverage, YouTube videos, TED Talks, and books published, many might agree that 2023 has been hailed as the year of artificial intelligence, at least in terms of mindshare if not market dominance. Throughout the past year, online project management communities have frequently discussed the potential impact of A.I. tools on the role of project managers. While concerns persist about potential negative effects, such as new project risks and potential job displacement, there’s also optimism. A.I. tools, when used appropriately, are seen as potential assistants in deliv ..read more

Whether it is in one of LinkedIn’s project management discussion groups or in PMI’s Projectmanagement.com community, one of the more frequent requests made by members is for mentoring. Sometimes the mentee has done a good job of articulating their needs which will increase their odds of finding a suitable mentor but this is the exception, not the rule. Project management mentors are usually senior practitioners who tend to be quite busy, hence providing limited information almost guarantees that the request won’t be fulfilled in a timely fashion. So before you post a request for a mentor, take ..read more

I’ve almost finished reading “Gigs, Hustles & Temps” by Jason Foster which is about precarious work and the negative impacts it creates on individuals, their families and society in general. While we might think of precarious work as something limited to Uber drivers, home cleaners and other gig workers, such work covers multiple industries spanning both public and private sector employment. The author does a great job of highlighting the personal impacts of precarity such as reduced wages, reduced leverage with employers and delay or deferment of capital purchases, but the chapter on the ..read more

During a presentation I delivered today to members of the PMI Nova Scotia chapter on cultivating psychological safety, one of the attendees asked how would she be able to assess whether the team she was going to join was safe prior to joining. This is a great question because whenever we move to a new company or even a different division in a sufficiently large company, our access to verifiable information is quite limited. For obvious reasons, the leadership of our new team will usually not want to provide evidence of a poor team culture and unless we have trusted connections within the team ..read more

I read a number of project leadership books each year but usually I find only one or two which really make an impact. Professor Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner‘s book “How Big Things Get Done” is one of the latter. I have never had the opportunity to lead a megaproject (the term is typically used for those with a budget in excess of $1 billion), but over the last fifteen years I have read a number of the articles published by Prof. Flyvbjerg on the subject and always learned lessons which were applicable to the projects I was involved with. In the book, the authors provide many case studies sup ..read more

I’ve just finished reading The Revenge of Analog and The Future is Analog by David Sax. In both of these books, he provides compelling arguments supported by a number of case studies taken from different domains to show that while some might envision the future as becoming more and more digital, we will continue to cherish and yearn for analog experiences. The latter of the two books was written during the COVID-19 pandemic where most of us underwent a rapid acceleration into a digital future and in most cases, didn’t like what we experienced. So what does this have to do with project manageme ..read more

A question was posed on my Mastodon instance this morning about combining the roles of Product Owner and Agile Lead (e.g. Scrum Master). The requestor felt that this was a bad idea but wanted to get feedback on whether it was, in fact, possible to do so and under what conditions would it not cause problems. To answer the question, we need to understand the responsibilities of each role. The Product Owner has the responsibility of collaborating actively with stakeholders to help them prioritize all the potential needs and wants which might be addressed by the product or service. They are also e ..read more

After taking a break from writing for a few weeks, I was planning to write about the importance of conversation in the work we do, but a late day Mastodon toot caught my attention today: “Gantt charts are lies“. Based on the hashtags accompanying the post, the author works in the software development domain using adaptive approaches. While I can empathize with the frustration underlying the post, it resonated with me in the same manner as if someone had written “Flat head screwdrivers are useless“. While we might wish the folks who chose to use a flat-headed screw had used a Phillips or a Robe ..read more

(Before you correct me for misstating the iconic quote in this article’s title, read ahead) Over the past week, I’ve seen a number of posts from different practitioners on the Mastodon.world instance complaining about agile. Here are a few of the examples I’ve read: Agile events or meetings taking up most of the productive time each day User stories not providing an understanding of a user’s needs and wants Continuous delivery of changes resulting in significant unplanned outages Sprint burndown charts showing zero completed work till the very end of a sprint Now if someone’s experiences wit ..read more

A Mastodon post inspired me to ask ChatGPT to compose a song about agility in a Weird Al Yankovic take on Right Said Fred’s “I’m too sexy”. Hope you like it! Verse 1: I’m an agile developer, hear me code I’m always delivering, never on the road I’m working in sprints, and I’m doing just fine I’m always on time, and my code is divine Chorus: I’m too Agile, for your waterfall ways I’m too Agile, for your slow and delayed days I’m too Agile, for your old fashioned ways I’m too Agile, and my code always amazes Verse 2: I’m using Scrum, and Kanban too I’m always improving, and my team is true blue ..read more