Today Better Projects posted an intriguing article debunking the myth of “experienced project managers can deal more effectively with complex software projects". They refer to a recent article in HBR magazine, “The Experience Trap”, that basically says that experienced project manager do not outperform less experienced PMs because they stopped learning.

Photography by Worak.
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It is easy to compare team members to cogs of a machine, but in real life situations, not all these ‘cogs’ get along well. People from different backgrounds make for different personalities and these personalities can clash…a scenario that tends to spoil the working atmosphere.

To make sure there is a good working relationship between team members there are some ice breakers that can help the cause along. Team discussions can help and so can tools such as Johari. The tool helps map personalities with a fixed list of adjectives.

Each individual can map his own personality and others can map the characteristics they see in that person as well. While seemingly simplistic, the tool tells us a lot about how others see us along with giving team members some feedback about them as well. It can be a tool for self realization, and one that can help people gauge how to improve their outlook as well as better understand colleagues.

There is not one way to make a great lasagna. Of course the basic idea is always the same, but depending on your taste, cooking skills and available ingredients you can have a lot of variations. Some use all fresh ingredients, make the pasta from scratch and spend several hours in the kitchen. I buy prefabricated ingredients and whip it up in several minutes. Both lasagna, but both very different.

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Yesterday I wrote a piece at SVProjectManagement.com about an important lesson we can learn from the Fish Pond Metaphor: the need to preplan.

"The idea about preplanning is to equip yourself in such a way that you can adapt to circumstances. That you create an start situation that is as good as you possibly can. If you go to the arctic, you take warm cloths, if you go to the tropics you pack T-shirts. If you don’t know, you pack several shirts you can wear over each other, depending on the temperature."

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Ecology, Ethics and the Project manager – A Zen Perspective

"Here it is the month in which Earth Day occurs again; so the question - “How does project management relate to ecology and environmental responsibility?” is very relevant. Let’s explore the question in light of project manager ethics and, more broadly, ethical behavior in general."

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How Our Project Management Education And Recruitment Creates Stiffs When We Need Gumby's

Just for the record I have no problems with Project Management methods. Prince 2, PMBoK, SCRUM, Latest Lean Hype. They are all fine by me.

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