Agents of Change: The Hippo Resource Center

How do you know if you have an effective culture?

Mark K — Fri, 10 May 2013 11:45:53 -0500

We believe that culture is an important aspect of your organization's effectiveness. How people think, what they believe, and how they behave makes a huge impact on your productivity, change initiatives, competitive advantage and more. But how do you know if you have an effective culture?

An article at McKinsey nails it and provides one key attribute - a single "metric" - that can be used to judge an effective culture. That attribute is: the amount of help that team members give each other. How much people in your organization coach, teach, and consult with their colleagues.

The article cites a study by Harvard psychologists who studied the differences in effectiveness between different teams in the intelligence community. They looked at things like stable team membership, clear vision, effective leadership, roles and responsibilities, and several other attributes, but the amount of help was the clear differentiating factor.

You can read the article here.

So walk around your team and your organization periodically. What do you observe? Are people consulting with each other? Are they sincerely helping each other? Or are they more isolated and doing their job. If you do not see a spirit of collaboration and helping, let's talk.

Interview with Craig Stevens: Part 2

Mark K — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 21:03:53 -0500

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Today’s podcast is part two (and last part) of a discussion with Craig Stevens. In this episode, Craig shares his principles of excellent management (including leadership, culture, and team building) and ideas for project management teams from his book Geronimo Stone.

In the interview, Craig references the "Mobile of Excellent Management" (image below) and his book Geronimo Stone. You can download a free copy of the book here.

Craig Stevens has been a Management, Industrial, and Systems Engineer for over 30 years. Currently he is the Manager for the Process Improvement Program for HCA Physician Services. He is also the president of Westbrook Stevens, LLC; an Author; and a Visual Artist.

Before HCA, he worked as a consultant for over 100 different organizations in 25 states including (US DOD, US DOE, NASA, Lockheed Martin, Westinghouse, DuPont, etc.). Craig has worked in every layer of an organization and in several industries (Healthcare, Government, Manufacturing, Agriculture, Hospitality, Scientific Research, Energy, Waste Management and Environmental Restoration, Not-For-Profits, and Construction). He was the Chief Engineer and Quality Manager for PRAGMATICS, INC. (8a), Program Manager for Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), and was the Mechanical Engineer SME in solar and electric power, explosives, and general engineering for U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI).

Craig is the Author of the Geronimo Stone series and is writing a book on Strategic Project Management for Gower Publishing in London. Currently he teaches Project Management and Business Analysis at Belmont University and has written many papers on management subjects and served as adjunct faculty for Vanderbilt University, Belmont University, Trevecca Nazarene University, University of Phoenix, Nashville State Tech, and UT Knoxville as a TA. He was also a trainer/facilitator of Project Management for the American Management Association International (AMAI) and Padgett Thompson. He has taught graduate and undergraduate classes and workshops in Strategic Implementation, Innovation and R&D, Operations Management, Project Management, Change Management, Manufacturing Management, Strategic Management, General Management Principles, Systems Management, Statistics, Customer Service, Engineering Economy, and Human Factors Engineering.

Interview with Craig Stevens: Part 1

Mark K — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 14:45:44 -0500

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Today’s podcast is part one of a discussion with Craig Stevens who shares his advice on a variety of topics including how to create a great project management team, using conflict effectively, soliciting feedback, how to create a good relationship with a stakeholder, and the key to establishing good team culture.

Subscribe on the left to be notified when part two is available.

Interview with Bob Woolf: Part 2

Mark K — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 13:30:37 -0600

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Today’s podcast is part two of our discussion with Bob Woolf who shares his experiences with project management teams and some of the cultural issues that have made them succeed or struggle. Bob continues his tales from his time in project management, social work, theatre, and even the submarine service. He provides takeaways that you can use as you look at your own teams and people skills.

Bob Woolf has worked on more than 100 projects of all sizes and types, ranging from under $100,000 to $2 billion; worked for international and domestic private firms, state government; been a business owner and currently works as a consultant. Bob also served as a college adjunct faculty member specializing in Teambuilding, Collaboration, Conflict Resolution and Human Motivation making use of his Master’s degree from an earlier Social Work career. He has provided training on project controls, RFP Development, time management and services for construction claims. He also served as an arbitrator for the Better Business Bureau. Through the years Bob has published articles, lectured, and conducted seminars. A proponent of project management skills, he was co-founder of the Nashville Chapter of PMI and has served as President. Currently, he provides consulting services in scheduling, training, project management, and RFP development and response.

Face-to-Face Communication and the Bottom Line

Mark K — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 14:00:00 -0600

I read an interesting article by Audrey Nelson on the importance of face-to-face communication today. Effective communication skills is what we use to grow relationships, persuade, resolve conflict, negotiate, get work done - all of which are vital parts of being effective as a project manager, team member, and a team.

Read the article here.

Interview with Bob Woolf: Part 1

Mark K — Mon, 25 Feb 2013 16:17:27 -0600

Listen now:

Download MP3 File

Today’s podcast is part one of a discussion with Bob Woolf who shares his experiences with project management teams and some of the cultural issues that have made them succeed or struggle. Bob brings some interesting tales from his time in project management, social work, theatre, and even the submarine service. He provides takeaways that you can use as you look at your own teams and people skills.

Subscribe on the left to be notified when part two is available.

How Well Do You Know Your Team?

Mark K — Mon, 18 Feb 2013 15:34:41 -0600

My son plays basketball on his high school team. I really do not know his coach very well, to my detriment. Last Friday, his coach's Mother passed away. I went to the funeral with my son yesterday. It turns out that the coach's Dad had been the chancellor of two universities, the vice president of a major university, and his Mother was very involved and very well known in those circles. It was a whole world of which I had not the slightest clue. Why? Because I never bothered to ask and learn.

Do you know how many times I have done that on project management teams I have worked on? Sure, there were many times in which I did make an effort to connect with teammates and those on teams I managed. But it is very easy to come into work each day, get distracted with doing work, and never connect with an individual, to our detriment. And then, all of a sudden, we need something from them. We ask and persuade but we have not laid the groundwork.

Not only do the interpersonal interactions get better when those connections are made, but going to work is more enjoyable, and those connections stay with you for a long time.

That does not mean the relationship gets real personal - sometimes that is not appropriate. The relationship can be professional, but that doesn't mean we don't take the time to learn and connect. In the next two weeks, who will you connect with, just to ask questions, and learn more about their life and interests? A teammate, a team member, a stakeholder, a manager?

Does Your Project Management Team Have a Story?

Mark K — Fri, 15 Feb 2013 13:59:25 -0600

Does your project management team have a story? Does it have a purpose, a history, a culture that everyone on the team understands, gets behind, and can articulate? Michael Hyatt in his article on "Why Great Teams Tell Great Stories" articulates this concept. There are several examples that come to mind of great teams that have great stories:

The NASA Apollo team and its story in the 1960's to land a man on the moon.

Microsoft's (like them or not) story of personal computing back in its beginnings.

The Apple teams story of innovation and changing the world.

The story of a healthcare IT team that is improving patient care.

Does your project management team have a story? Or do you come to work on Monday and look forward to leaving on Friday? It is amazing what a good story and clarity of purpose does for a team's culture and effectiveness.

In his article, Michael Hyatt provides four tips to model storytelling among your team members:

Share the truth, nothing but the truth (keep it factual).
Catch their interest early.
Tie it to your team's core values.
Keep it simple (don't add too much detail).

Do you want to improve your team's culture? Figure out your team's compelling story.

A little extra communication goes a long way in project management teams

Mark K — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 11:25:16 -0600

I heard a story on the radio this morning on the drive in about the power outages in New York after Superstorm Sandy. Many people were without power for days after the storm. The story I heard mentioned how the Long Island Power Authority had a policy in place to have local towns certify home's electrical inspections before the utility would turn the power back on. These places had been flooded, causing the utility to purposefully turn the power off to prevent explosions and other problems, and they did not want to indiscriminately turn it back on.

According to the story, the problem was that the towns did not know this and did not ask. A classic miscommunication. The utility apparently was waiting for the towns, and the people in the towns were apparently waiting for the utility. In this case, the consequences were serious.

I was recently reminded of working for a "dot com" back in the day, where we would do late night releases. Looking back, I realize that my role as a project manager was mainly one of communication. I don't know how many times the developers would be waiting for the quality folks, while the quality folks would be waiting for the developers, while the release folks would be waiting for everyone, simply because no one got out of their chair to ask the questions and communicate. My job became one of simply walking around, asking questions, and maintaining communication.

Never assume that someone else knows something in your project management teams. Don't just check a box in a spreadsheet and assume everyone knows and is looking at that. Don't assume that everyone remembers and is precisely following the process. A little extra communication goes a long way while a lack of that extra bit of communication has needlessly been the source of many extra hours of work and grief.

Change the thermostat!

Mark K — Tue, 18 Dec 2012 16:04:33 -0600

Why is it that part of working in an office complex is the acceptance that the temperature of said office will never be quite right. It will either be too hot or too cold, never just right.

What is interesting is that there is research that ties warmth with better relationships and improved productivity. One study found that when temperatures were low (below 68 degrees), employees committed 44% more errors and were less than half as productive as when it was 77 degrees.

If you want to read an interesting article about this, read this article from FastCompany.

I am a big believer in the importance of improving people skills to improve project management: good relationships on your teams, excellent team skills, people that can communicate and interact with one another effectively.

So if you want that, I guess one solution is to simply change the thermostat!