People that work in groups (project, organization, society as a whole) have to cope with change. The more effective you are in this area, the more success you will have in this ever morphing world. This is a short outline of how people effectively cope with change.

Photography by Sabrina's Stash.

Humans In Groups Are Systems

"Whatever your take is on projects, at the end of the day it is just a bunch of people working together to achieve a certain goal. During this endeavor to laugh, cry, pull pranks, play dirty tricks and have all other kind of behavior towards each other." (source)
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My monthly column at TechTarget is up:

"But even when the (reputation) system is working properly, even when transparency makes sure people's behavior will be noted around the globe, this doesn't mean you can reap the benefits for your project or business. With a good reputation there is a lot to gain, but having a bad rep puts a lot at stake. So people will play things safe. They will create low-risk behavior, ultimately resulting in mediocrity…"

Read the entire column.

This time in my series "Proud Postings" it's Elizabeth Harrin from A Girl's Guide to Managing Projects in the spotlights. She is the author of "Project Management in the Real World" and lives in the UK. I asked her: "What are the 3 postings you are most proud of?"

"The first two pieces I picked out make the cut because they both involved a lot of research. I don't rely on other people's analysis of the situation when I write; I make every effort to go to the source material myself so I can make my own judgements and really get perspective on the issue."

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Craig Brown writes a blog at BetterProjects.net. Craig and I are regular readers of each other’s sites and now we are having a conversation from site to site.

Hi Craig,

Thanks for your opinion on why you think my requirements keep on changing. I agree with you on all accounts. You left me with three reasons for the changing requirements and asked me in return:

"What do you think are the key drivers of these three 'controllable' issues?"

Photography by t3rmin4t0r.
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Recently Project Shrink has had an enormous increase in new readers. At this moment the Feedburner counter shows 14460 readers! WOW! I am very happy to welcome you all! The blog in its current form is almost a year old (July!), but my main site SoftwareProjects.org originates from 2001.

Photography by bfick.

If you have only been a reader of this blog, you might want to check out the following reports/articles:

• "Using Stakeholder Analysis in Software Project Management" (PDF)
• "Project Profiling With Systems Thinking" (PDF)
• "How Project Management Will Get Its Groove Back" (PDF)
• "Learn Project Management In 15 Minutes" video page

Please, dig around the site, use the search function, or leave a comment if you have a question or remark.

Thanks for reading the blog!

Cheers
Bas de Baar