I wrote about TRIZ Principle -1 - Segmentation in the earlier blog. Here I am writing about two more TRIZ principles.

Principle – 2. Taking Out (Separate an interfering part or property from an object, or single out the only necessary part (or property) of an object.

By segmentation principle we have segmented our work/project. There is always a chance of troublesome or critical segment or part in our work, which we can take out and handle separately.

Umasree continues from where she left in the last post…

It is not just PMP and beyond…it is Project Management and beyond… that is what makes Project Managers successful business managers and people leaders.

I have 10 principles that I would follow as a Project Manager and most of the PM’s would find themselves aligned to these 10 principles in one way or the other.

Both my parents worked in government sector and I was so used to hearing them saying that their managers control their work lives to a great extent.  Even after 3 decades and now that the private sector is cherished with a greater Corporate Culture, lot of things changed except the fact that even today, mostly our managers control our work lives.  The kind of infrastructure where we work ( compared to good old depleted government buildings Vs Lead Skyscraper buildings),  Posh office furniture ( Rolling cushion chairs compared to Wooden seats with cotton cushions not changed for decades),  well maintained housekeeping ( compared to dirty toilets and rusty ceiling fans filled with dust over years with now High class wash rooms with deos and perfumes, handwash and towels),  Fringe benefits (Compared to Rs 1 or 2 tea wala refreshments to Vending machines in office/  Microwaves and in-house Kitchens and 24 hours food malls in the office building)… the list goes on and on in the comfort zone. Yet, today’s employee is a very stressed out and unsatisfied project team member.  Why is it so?

Dr.Gopinath keeps a detailed blog of his toastmasters projects which is an informative and interesting read.  Here he is stressing the value of TM program for project managers. Right from the Little Rock days in 1996 I have attended Toastmasters meetings on and off and have enjoyed them. So I fully endorse the views shared of Dr.Gopinath.

Sometime in 2004-05, I got a chance to meet one of the Senior Vice Presidents from Netherlands of the Bank I was working for when he came down to India. First ever one on one session with a senior person in the Organization and he came up with few questions to understand how we operate on the floor for a global migration project.  When I informed him the process, he sounded surprised saying that he was not aware that we have been doing so much of efforts in the back end.   I felt disappointed and I asked him, whose fault?   He was frank enough to tell me, that he never heard my name nor the process I was talking about and said, it is a big question of visibility.   And where was the gap-  Communication!

Last week there was a discussion on usefulness of Project Management in product development in this blog. Umasree Raghunath added a detailed comment on the topic. I thought it deserves to be highlighted as a separate guest blog. Here goes…

I would like to begin with a vital way of we perceiving the service industry today. To most of us working in the IT industry, the applications we build is also considered as Products. And hence Product Management and Project Management widely go hand in hand.

Last week there was a discussion on usefulness of Project Management in product development in this blog. Krishna Shivaramakrishnan added a detailed comment on the topic. I thought it deserves to be highlighted as a separate guest blog. Here goes…

Project management:

Objectives:

1.Delivering Value (to all stakeholders)
2.Reducing the time to market
3.Early returns for the customers and vendors
4.Producing Scalable products
5.Reducing the wastes(including costs and defects)
6.Allowing for Co-creation and
7.Customer collaboration

David Kershaw, founder and CTO at eVisioner has shared some wonderful insights on leadership, organization and optimism. Don’t miss this one. Thank you David.

I work with people who teach folks how to lead both, professionally and by example.  I also have the good luck to rub elbows with many individuals who help people learn how to organize.  Leading and organizing are both very important skills, particularly for project managers. Talking to professors of leadership and governance makes me an optimist who believes that learning to apply organization and leadership skills can overcome the odds of failure.  Along with optimism, that belief is also quite high on the list for project managers.

For a while now, I am been thinking about this….BTW, this is not an article. Want to use Ganapathy’s blog to have an open (and heated, if possible) discussion on this topic and learn something in the process.

We all agree that Project Management is different from Product Management. What I am curious is how Project Management is viewed in Product Companies vs Service companies and why it is that way.

Today’s post is from Lakshminarasimhan, PMP. Narasimhan is a Project manager with HCL  and has been with HCL for 9 years. Prior to that he was with CMC Limited, Hyderabad for 4 years, learning Telugu and Hindi along with other computer languages.

Today’s guest post is from Caroline Cayce. Thanks Caroline for your time and efforts. Practical ideas that we can readily use!

According to the American Society of Employees, the top ten concerns of employees are as follows:

• Recognition

• Autonomy

• Clear/fair policies and a system for airing grievances

• Fair/generous benefits

• Team cohesion

• Positive management – employee morale

• Manageable workload