Monthly Archives: November 2012

Struggling with Reporting the Status of Your Agile Projects?

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The juxtaposition of the term ‘Agile’ and the term ‘Project’ actually creates a bit of a conundrum.  They may even be contradictions.  However, these two words are used together as a term constantly as Agile continues to make its way into development teams across the world.  This is a big mistake, in my opinion.  Agile is inherently goals driven (think business results, such as “Reduce customer trouble tickets by 10%”), whereas a Project will involve identifying, planning for, and executing specific actions (scope) to achieve a result within a specific time frame and for a specific cost. Continue reading →

Ducks and Bunnies

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In one of my previous positions as a project manager, I had to present materials in a new weekly forum to a handful of senior executives.  I had put a draft together for my manager and mentor at the time, who quickly suggested to me that the information needed to be drastically more simple: “Ducks and bunnies,” he said.  This message has always stuck with me and has allowed me to become a very effective communicator of project data, especially when I’m introducing new information.  Regardless of the direction in which I’m communicating; upward, downward, or externally, delivering my messages successfully has since been purposefully one of my most practiced skill sets.  I am a Gantt Artist. Continue reading →