For most of us, that’s like being asked:

“Would you like some ketchup on your ice cream?”

The answer is NOOOOO!

Fortunately, there is a better way of structuring a performance conversation. Read on to find out how.

The Automatic Reaction

Why are we allergic to feedback? Because we often perceive feedback as (well-intentioned) criticism, which triggers the same kind of response in the brain as physical pain.

No surprise that the most common reactions to feedback are denial, defense, and dislike.

We first deny the reality of the situation: “The project is not really that far behind schedule. We’ll make up the lost time by next month.”

We then defend ourselves: “Anyway, it’s the customer’s fault. He keeps asking for changes.”

And finally we dislike the person giving feedback: “I’d like to see her try to manage the customer’s expectations.”

The Alternative: Use GROW to Structure the Dialogue

Feedback is a one-sided judgment about past performance. Exploratory dialogue, on the other hand, engages the other person in a mutual search for solutions.

GROW (Goal, Reality, Options, Wrap-Up) is a structured process that uses questions to find solutions. The aim is to help the other person identify and commit to actions for moving forward.

• First agree on the goal for the conversation.
• Then explore the current reality. Ask open questions to get the full picture of the situation—what’s working and what’s not.
• Once you understand the situation, invite the other person to provide options for moving forward. As a coach, refrain from making suggestions yourself.
• Wrap-up by obtaining a commitment from the other person on specific actions.

Image courtesy of la vaca vegetarian / CC BY-SA 2.0 

In addition to national cultures, corporate and functional/professional cultures will influence your team. Not to forget individual differences – age, gender, personality types. You need to be a culturally intelligent leader to steer the team through troubled waters. According to Elisabeth Plum “Cultural Intelligence (CI) is the ability to bridge and benefit from the cultural complexity of people with different nationalities, work areas, professional backgrounds, personalities and organizational cultures”.

Sounds complex, right? If you are leading a cross-cultural team, what should you be most concerned about? In my experience, national culture plays a much less important role for project teams than does the team leader’s behavior. Your personality, leadership style, listening and relationship building skills will play a major role in shaping the team culture. It helps to be sensitive to the cultural norms, customs and behaviors of your team members. Here are a few things that I found useful:

• First and foremost, focus on the common project goal and team performance. As Katzenbach and Smith said in The Wisdom of Teams: “When people do real work together toward a common objective, trust and commitment follow.”
• Avoid cultural stereotypes. While good-natured joking about differences in food preferences may help get people talking, you should intervene if people use cultural stereotypes to explain other team member’s behavior. If this occurs, refocus the conversation on project issues and how you can work together toward the project goal.
• Clarify roles and responsibilities at the beginning of the project. Relationships can be improved and conflict can be avoided by ensuring that team members understand each other’s roles and how they are dependent on one another.
• Make sure the project goal and tasks are clear to everyone. English is likely to be the working language of a cross-cultural team. However, it may not always be easy to understand team members for whom English is a second or third language. This can be frustrating for everyone. Show patience and tolerance, paraphrase what has been said and ask clarifying questions to prevent misunderstandings.
• Walk around to see how your team members are doing and what they are working on. Let them demonstrate their work if they have something to show. You will build rapport this way.
• Be aware that some people may not tell you directly about a problem. Use focused questioning to get to the core of the problem. For example: “What else do you need to complete the task?”
• Be a leader that people want to follow – what matters most is that you are honest, forward looking, competent, and inspiring. These are the top four traits that people respect in leaders, according to James Kouzes & Barry Posner.
• Awareness of cultural research like Geert Hofstede’s five dimensions of culture is helpful but be careful when applying it. Hofstede’s IBM studies reveal averages or tendencies. Keep in mind that you are dealing with individuals who may not fit the average. For example, you may have a team member who cannot say no to requests from senior managers. This could be due to the fact that the person comes from a culture where people are less likely to challenge an authority figure. However, the person might simply be introverted and hasn’t learned how to say no. As a team leader you need to address this. Model for the team how you would respond to requests from senior managers. When you notice that team members are reluctant to speak up, approach them individually and ask focused questions to see where things stand and get to the core of the issue. You might also consider doing a “premortem” simulation at the beginning of the project to help foster a team culture where it is ok to speak up and raise questions. You’ll find more on the premortem exercise in an earlier article.

Since I live and work in Switzerland I will use Hofstede’s findings for Switzerland to illustrate the cultural dimensions:

• Power Distance Index or how we relate to authority. Malcolm Gladwell refers to the power distance dimension while discussing airline safety in his book Outliers. Korean Air had more plane crashes than almost any other airline during the end of the 1990s. According to Gladwell, a lack of communication and teamwork in the cockpit was a major cause. Co-pilots were reluctant to challenge the authority of the pilot, even when the pilot made a (fatal) decision. The problem has been solved with training. According to Hofstede, Switzerland has a low Power Distance (PDI) of 34. Compared to the world average of 55 and the European average of 45, Switzerland has a relatively equal distribution of power across the population.
• Individualism versus Collectivism or how much individuals are expected to look after themselves. The second highest Hofstede dimension for Switzerland is individualism (IDV) at 68. Compared to the world average of 43 and the European average of 61, the Swiss tend to be more individualistic than collectivist.
• Masculinity refers to the importance of traditional male or female values. Cultures with a high masculinity index tend to have greater differences in the roles of men and women. Compared to the world average of 50 and the European average of 59 Switzerland ranks high in Masculinity (MAS) at 70. This indicates the presence of stronger differences in roles, norms and values between Swiss men and women than in countries with a low MAS index like Norway (MAS 8), the Netherlands (MAS 14) or Denmark (MAS 16).
• Uncertainty Avoidance or how does a culture tolerate ambiguity? Cultures with high uncertainty avoidance tend to enforce stricter rules and familiar structures (e.g. employees tend to remain longer with one employer). Switzerland scores 58 in the Uncertainty Avoidance Index (UAI), lower than the world average of 64 or the European average of 74. A country with a low UAI value such as Switzerland generally has a greater tolerance of divergent points of view.
• Long Term Orientation refers the relative importance of the future versus the past and present. Long term oriented societies tend to value perseverance and status relationships. Short term oriented societies tend to value personal stability and reciprocation of greetings, favors, and gifts. Most Asian countries score high (long-term orientation), while Western nations on average score low (short-term orientation).

In sum, be aware of cultural differences, focus on the project goal and above all trust in yourself to become a credible leader.

One more thing. Depending on where you are from a grasshopper can be viewed as a delicacy or a pest.

Photo credit: OakleyOriginals

Additional Resources

Leadership & Teambuilding

• A classic leadership book: James Kouzes and Barry Posner. The Leadership Challenge, Fourth Edition. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2008.
• See James Kouzes’ talk on “The Leadership Challenge” as part of the Leading@Google series on Youtube.
• Another classic on team building: Jon Katzenbach and Douglas Smith. The Wisdom of Teams: Creating the High-Performance Organization. Collins Business, 2003. 

National and Corporate Culture

• Geert Hofstede’s Website describing the five dimensions of culture
• There is an iPod application called Culture GPS that allows you to access Hofstede’s findings on the go. I haven’t used it.
• Trompenaars’ video explanation of what culture is
• Or Trompenaars on corporate culture
• Elisabeth Plum’s blog on Cultural Intelligence. She discusses current views on culture focusing on today’s business reality.

“People will forget what you did. They will forget what you said. But they won’t forget how you made them feel.” ~ Maya Angelou

How do you usually respond when someone tells you about something good that happened to them?

Do you say “That’s great!” while hurrying on to your next meeting?
If so, you are missing out on an opportunity to build relationships.

Research shows that how we respond to others in good times is as important for building relationships as how we react to negative events.

Read on to find out more.

Celebrate the Positive

Communicating positive events increases our well-being. And when others respond enthusiastically to our news, we feel even better!

Last month we talked about the positivity tipping point. People who experience at least three times as many positive emotions as negative emotions are more likely to flourish.

Active, constructive responding is a great way to help others feel good and boost our own mood at the same time.

Here’s how it works.

Responding actively and constructively is more than just saying “that’s nice” when someone shares a positive event. It involves showing interest and asking questions to help the person relive their positive experience.

Imagine a colleague tells you his proposal was accepted by a new customer. An active and constructive response might be:

“That’s great! I know you put a lot of time into that proposal and it sure paid off. Did the customer say why you got the business?”

Try This At Work (and at Home)!

Then next time someone tells you about something good that happened to them, take extra time to respond actively and constructively (the slower, the better). Write down your response and also how they react to your response. Try this for a week. Research by Shelly Gable and colleagues shows that the result will be improved relationships and better moods.

Other Person’s Event: ____________________________________

My Response to Them: ___________________________________

Their Reaction:  ________________________________________

Professor Shelly Gable on the power of active, constructive responding in relationships:

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons / CC0 1.0

“Positive emotions change the way our minds and our bodies work—change the very nature of who we are, down to our cells—transforming our outlook on life and our ability to confront challenges.” ~ Barbara Fredrickson

Do you know your positivity ratio?

That’s the ratio of positive emotions to negative emotions you experience over time.

Research shows that people who experience at least three times as many positive emotions as negative emotions are more likely to flourish.

Read on to find out why.

The Positivity Tipping Point

Psychologists Barbara Fredrickson and Marcial Losada note that a positivity ratio of about 3 to 1 (three positive emotions for each negative) is a tipping point. Above that point, people begin to flourish. Below, people languish.

A ratio of 3 to 1 includes negative emotions as well as positive. It doesn’t require going through life with a perma-grin. Negative emotions are a part of life; it would be self-deception to pretend otherwise.

Positive emotions have been linked to improved immune function, lower risk of diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease. In one study, healthy Canadians who scored high in positive emotion had significantly less incidence of coronary heart disease over a 10 year period.

The 3 to 1 ratio applies for organizations as well as individuals. Losada and Heaphy measured the number of positive comments (e.g. “that’s a good idea”) and negative comments (e.g. “that’s the dumbest thing I ever heard”) made during management team meetings for over 60 strategic business units (SBUs) at a high tech company. They found that  SBUs with a positivity ratio of more than 3 to 1 performed better in terms of profitability, customer satisfaction and 360 degree assessments of leadership ability.

With intimate partners, the ratio is even higher—at 5 to 1. John Gottman found that married couples who did not have at least five positive interactions for each negative were in trouble.

How to Cultivate the Positive

“Your brain is like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones,” according to Rick Hanson. A long memory for difficult, painful situations helped our ancestors survive.

So, given that negative experiences stick, what can we do to cultivate and reinforce positive experiences?

Barbara Fredrickson mentions five qualities of mind that prime the pump for positive experiences:

• Be open (to the moment)
• Be appreciative (of the good)
• Be curious (about the world)
• Be kind (to yourself and others)
• Be real (about how you feel)

Here’s a simple exercise by Martin Seligman to develop a positive mindset.

What-Went-Well

Every night for a week before going to sleep, write down three things that went well during the day. For each, also answer the question “why did this happen?”

What went well today? ____________________________________

Why did this happen? _____________________________________

Research shows you are likely to be happier (and addicted to this exercise) six months from now!

Take the Positivity Test

Calculate your positivity ratio in 2 minutes here.

Repeat the short test every day for a week to get an overview of how much positivity is in your life right now.

What’s important is not how you feel at any one moment, but how your positivity changes over time. As you make changes in your life based on the practices outlined above (openness, gratitude, curiosity, kindness, authenticity) revisit the test to look for differences.

The stakes are high. Cultivating the positive is good for your health, your relationships, and your performance at work.

Barbara Fredrickson on positivity:

Read the study on positive affect and reduced 10-year incident coronary heart disease here.

Read the study on business team effectiveness here.

Photo credit: tyger_lyllie / CC BY-2.0

“Nobody is talented enough to not have to work hard, and that’s what grit allows you to do.” ~ Angela Lee Duckworth

Do you sometimes wonder why it’s easy to follow through on some plans but not others? Read on to find out why.

What it Takes to Succeed

Which of the following attributes most reliably predicts whether cadets will drop out of the grueling summer training program at the US Military Academy at West Point?

a) intelligence
b) teamwork
c) physical fitness
d) none of the above
 
The correct answer is d) none of the above. The best predictor of success at for new West Point cadets is GRIT, a measure of “stick-to-it-ive-ness” developed by Penn Psychologist Angela Lee Duckworth.

Duckworth defines grit as “perseverance and passion for long-term goals.” Last month we talked about self-control. Grit is self-control in service of a goal.

Achievement = Talent x Effort

Both talent and effort are necessary for achievement. Without talent, you can put in lots of time and not get very far. And talented people often fail for lack of stamina. While talent depends on intelligence (the smarter you are, the faster you learn), effort is directly related to self-control.

Duckworth found that high grit scores predicted higher grades for university students, success for entrepreneurs, as well as the performance of West Point cadets.

It’s grit that keeps a person going long enough to put in the 10’000 hours of dedicated practice needed to achieve mastery in a field. And it’s grit that kept some famous “failures” going before they achieved their breakthrough success. Abraham Lincoln lost more elections than he won; Walt Disney was fired from a newspaper job for lack of imagination!

How To Develop Grit

To develop grit, you need to identify goal(s) which turn you on over the long run. It’s hard to be gritty about something you aren’t passionate about. But having goals is not enough. You also need what Stanford Psychologist Carol Dweck calls a “growth mindset” — the realization that excellence takes time and effort to develop. A person with a growth mindset tells herself that achievement is a result of “ability combined with zeal and the capacity for hard labour.” (Francis Galton)

One of the best ways to build grit is to attempt something difficult and fail, and then get back up and try again. In the face of failure, we learn who we really are. And we grow. Growth is critical for individual and organizational success.

Determine your grit score here (click on link “Get your Grit Score”):
http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~duckwort/index.html

Here are some well-known “failures” who possessed enough grit to persevere until they succeeded:

Photo credit: rosemilkinabottle / CC BY-2.0

Self-control—the ability to delay gratification, concentrate on a task, resist a temptation, or control emotions—is key to success at work and in life. The good news is that we can improve our willpower.
 
Recent studies show that a leader’s behavior can boost other people’s level of self-control. When leaders create a culture of reliability, trust and mutual accountability, people are more likely to exercise self-control. Read on to learn more.

Self-Control Matters!

In 1970, Stanford psychologist Walter Mischel conducted what’s become known as the “marshmallow experiment.” The subjects were four-year-olds from the campus nursery school. Each child was given a marshmallow and a choice: they could eat the marshmallow immediately or they could wait 15 minutes and receive a second marshmallow.

Most of the children tried to wait. And most failed. Only about a third were able to control themselves long enough to receive the second marshmallow.

Here’s a charming reenactment of the famous experiment.

When researchers followed up years later, they found the four-year-olds with the most self-control (those who waited the full 15 minutes) had grown up to become more healthy, happy and successful young adults. They scored higher on tests of aptitude, were more popular at school and at work, earned higher salaries, had a lower body-mass index, and fewer problems with drugs and alcohol.

Pretty amazing outcomes to predict based on the behavior of four-year-olds during 15 minutes!

Leader Behavior Matters!

In an interesting twist on the original experiment, researchers found in 2011 that children’s ability to maintain self-control is dependent upon being in a trusted environment. Here’s where the leader’s behavior matters.

Children assigned to an “unreliable” experimenter who failed to keep their promises (i.e. a poor leader) showed low self-control—they ate the marshmallow. In contrast, children in a reliable environment were able to hold out four times longer.

This makes sense. In an “unreliable” environment in which long-term gains are uncertain or rare, the best strategy is to grab the immediate rewards.

What are the implications for the workplace? For one, we know that a leader’s behavior has a major influence on whether or not others perceive the environment to be safe, reliable, and fair. When leaders fail to build trust in their team, they may be predisposing others to maximize short-term gains at the expense of long-term rewards.

A question for self-reflection: “Am I doing all I can to build an environment of trust in my workplace?”

Here’s a video explanation of the 2011 research conducted at the University of Rochester.

“I can resist anything except temptation.”

Willpower. Who wouldn’t like to have more of it? We need willpower when we concentrate on a task, solve a problem or resist a temptation. Read on for tips on how to build your willpower.

Behavioral economist Dan Ariely offers two techniques for improving willpower: reward substitution and commitment contracts.

The first technique involves rewarding yourself today for doing something that will be good for you in the future. We tend to discount the future benefits of good behavior and the costs of bad behavior. This leads us to act today in ways that may harm us later. For example, we don’t exercise enough or we fail to build our professional relationships.

The reward need not be large. Because it is immediate, a small reward can have a large effect on our behavior. We end up doing the right things for the wrong reasons!

The second technique is called a commitment contract. The idea is quite simple. Set yourself clear rules in advance that that you will follow in a particular situation. For example, “When I am at a buffet, I will not touch the sweets.” A clear rule is easier to stick to than a fuzzy vow to “eat less.”

Commitment contracts work best when you make them public – tell people what you plan to do. There’s even a website that uses commitment contracts to help you reach your goals.

“In the future we are all wonderful people.” ~ Dan Ariely

Dan Ariely shares his personal story of how he developed his willpower and was able to stick to a rigorous treatment plan that helped him overcome a major illness.

Photo credit: Family of Captain William M. Scaife C&GSs / CC BY-2.0

Watch in German

Topics Covered:

• Work Breakdown Structure
• Work streams and work packages

And when the time comes to present, it is all about being in the present moment with the audience. A good presentation is a well-told story backed up by compelling visuals—not a deck of slides packed with bullet points.

One practical tip is to place a monitor between yourself and the audience that shows what’s on the screen behind you. Large auditoriums often have such monitors installed. If not, make sure your laptop computer is placed in front of you on stage. That way, you can view the slides on the laptop screen without having to turn your back on the audience.

His advice: thorough preparation and practice!

Bridges offers a three phase transition process:

• Ending, losing, letting go
• The neutral zone
• The new beginning

A transition is usually accompanied by a range of negative emotions such as denial, shock, anger and stress. After letting go, people may suffer from a lack of confidence and reduced productivity while in the neutral zone. Finally, with rediscovered hope and enthusiasm, people may embrace a new beginning.

An organization’s leaders play a key role in making change work by ensuring there is a steady stream of communication about what needs to be let go and the benefits of the new beginning.

Kotter recommends an eight step process:

• Establish a sense of urgency based on market realities, crises or opportunities.
• Form a coalition of people with the power to lead change.
• Develop a vision and strategy to provide direction for change.
• Communicate the change vision at every opportunity and role model the desired behaviors.
• Empower employees for action by eliminating obstacles, changing systems or structures and encouraging risk taking.
• Generate short-term wins that reward and motivate those involved.
• Consolidate gains by hiring/promoting people and launching projects that support the transformation.
• Anchor change in the organization by developing leaders who model the desired behaviors.

Danny personified leadership excellence. He was open-minded but always prepared to take a tough decision. He gave clear direction when I needed it and allowed me creative freedom when I craved it. Throughout our first 6 month project together, he never failed to introduce me to important customers when they visited the office – a privilege usually reserved for more senior people. He shared credit generously.

As the project progressed, Danny gave me increasing levels of responsibility. For example, when the team was expanded to include content creation and multimedia specialists, Danny let me manage them. He held me accountable for overall quality and deadlines but let me explore possibilities and test alternatives. The entire team worked hard to meet deadlines but had fun doing so.

Finally, the project was completed, Danny and I flew to the customer’s headquarters to present the results. Although I was the most junior person in the room by at least a decade, I will never forget the pride I felt in being shown respect for a job well done.

Years later, I visited the firm and spoke with several new associates. I recalled my experiences with Danny. Most amazing was that each and every person I spoke with had similar experiences working with Danny. That is the true mark of excellent leadership: Danny made each of us feel as if we were the most special person in the world, ready and eager to give our best. And we did, all of us!

First Line Leaders

First line leaders are the brave people on the front lines of organizational leadership. Their titles vary—they may be team leader, project manager, or department head. What they have in common is that they are called upon day in and day out to lead a team. Productivity, satisfaction and ultimately the team’s success are dependent on their efforts, for there is no one to fall back on if a first line leader fails. They tend to lead by example while getting the job done. Most first line leaders are caring people who work with their hearts and hands to make a difference for their team and their organization.

Many of us have been fortunate to have known an excellent first line leader at some point in our lives. Maybe the person was one of our parents, a favorite teacher or professor, or perhaps a supervisor at work. These exceptional leaders were able to motivate us to give our very best. Under their tutelage, we worked hard not only for ourselves but also because we wanted to please them. We developed our skills and grew while delivering the results needed.

Where do these excellent leaders come from? The answer is they are all around us. Each of us has the potential to become an excellent leader if we are willing to put in the time, effort, and discipline required to get there. Leaders are made, not born. Smart organizations nurture their leaders on their path to excellence. Investment in first line leadership delivers enormous returns in terms of team productivity, motivation and satisfaction.

Photo credit: Charles Knowles

Further Reading

Goldsmith, Marshall, John Baldoni & Sarah McArthur (Eds.) The AMA Handbook of Leadership. New York: AMACOM, 2010.

IDEA + ORGANIZATION + COMMUNITY + LEADERSHIP

Creative people need more than good ideas. They also need organizational skills, a supportive community, and strong leadership to turn their ideas into finished worked. Many people are secretive about their ideas. This is unnecessary, according to Belsky. Good ideas are plentiful; it’s the successful implementation of ideas that is difficult. A community provides a creative person with feedback needed to refine and test ideas, a network of people with complementary skills, and introductions to potential customers.

Leadership is important because innovation happens in teams. (See Scott Berkun’s The Myths of Innovation for evidence against the myth of the lone inventor.) Empowering others to make decisions that will affect the fate of the project can be scary, but it is ultimately the best way to see your ideas turned into reality.

The authors, Chip and Dan Heath, say their book is a companion to Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point. Gladwell introduces the “stickiness factor” and mentions that innovations are more likely to pass the tipping point when they are sticky. Chip and Dan Heath dig deeper to explore what makes an idea sticky.

The authors describe six principles of sticky ideas:

• Simplicity: Strip the idea to its core to explain it simply and profoundly.
• Unexpectedness: Surprise people to pique curiosity and generate interest. Example: “A bag of popcorn is as unhealthy as a whole day’s worth of fatty foods!”
• Concreteness: Use real-world analogies and concrete images like “ice-filled bathtubs” to help people understand and remember ideas.
• Credibility: The key is knowing which source is credible for the audience. Sometimes anti-authority may work better than authority.
• Emotional: Show people how your ideas are associated with things that they already care about. Appeal to their self-interest as well as their identity – not only to the people that they are right now but also to the people they would like to be.
• Stories: Stories are inspirational. Stories can also be simulations demonstrating how to solve a problem. Stories are one of the best ways to get people to act.

If you are looking for quick access to the main points of the book, refer to the “easy reference guide” at the end of the book. “Idea Clinics” throughout the book offer helpful exercises.

Essential knowledge – the knowledge about how to get things done in the real world – is often transferred through stories, gossip or observation. Information systems designed to “collect, distribute, re-use, measure and codify” knowledge often fail to capture essential knowledge. In contrast, social media communities can facilitate the exchange of stories, helping turn knowledge into action.

Pfeffer and Sutton provide us with 8 guidelines for closing the knowing-doing gap:

1. Put the Why before the How. Simply trying to copy a successful organization’s practices does not work. First understand why the organization is successful—what philosophy, values, and principles have led to its success.
2. Knowing comes from doing and teaching. “Teaching is a way of knowing, and so is doing the work…” Mentoring or coaching programs that get people involved in teaching others are an excellent way to put knowledge into action.
3. Actions count more than plans. “Failure to act is the only true failure.” Action creates opportunities for learning by doing. Without action, learning is not grounded in real experience.
4. Tolerate mistakes and learn from them. “Punish inaction, not unsuccessful actions.” When someone makes a mistake, practice a culture of “forgive and remember.” Embrace the mistake as an opportunity for learning and avoid making the same mistake again.
5. Eliminate fear. Pressure and fear often make people do irrational things. “No one is going to try something new if the reward is likely to be a career disaster.” Strong hierarchies and status symbols reinforce power distance and fear in the organization.
6. Fight the competition not each other. Most innovations are made in cultures of collaboration, not dog-eat-dog infighting. Be hard on the competitors, but go easy on your colleagues.
7. Measure what matters. The old saying goes, “you get what you measure.” If you measure individual performance, you will end up with a small group of star performers in a mediocre organization. “Focus attention on factors critical to organizational success.”
8. Leadership matters. “Leaders create environments, reinforce norms, and help set expectations through what they do, through their actions and not just their words.” Smart leaders act to encourage learning by doing—and their organizations are better for it.

Where do you get your best ideas? Most people say in the shower, while jogging or taking a walk– not at their desk. Why can’t we simply turn on the idea factory when we need it?

This is part one in a series on creativity and innovation. In this article, I will explore where ideas come from and what we can do to increase the amount of good ideas we have.

Ideas don’t just happen

Often, we remember the place where we had an idea but we forget all the prior work and influences that led to the great insight in the shower. In The Myths of Innovation, author Scott Berkun demystifies the belief that good ideas come out of the blue. Innovations or flashes of insight are the result of a process that draws on prior knowledge, skills, and lots of trial and error.

Think of a great idea that you and your team had during your last project. What knowledge, experience and influences was this idea built on?

A new idea is hard to find

It is difficult to come up with a truly original idea – something that no one else has thought of before.

Try this with friends or colleagues: Imagine you have founded a new company around a product or service. Brainstorm an original name for your product or company. Now put the term into Google or other search engines and see what comes up. The chances are high that someone has already thought of the name.

You don’t have to be original to be creative

The good news is that creative ideas build on other ideas. Everyone is doing it in every field – putting existing ideas together in new ways.

Practice combining ideas by trying the “Yes, and…” exercise with your team. The rules are simple. One person starts by mentioning an idea. Others contribute by saying “Yes, and…” and then adding to the idea. This exercise helps people learn to listen carefully and build on the ideas of others without criticizing. Keep going as long as you can. Make sure that you have someone who is recording the flow of ideas.

Diversity spices up a good brainstorming

Daniel Gilbert, Harvard psychologist and author of Stumbling on Happiness points out that we are more alike than we think. You should expect people in your field and department to think like you. After all, you went through a similar training and are shaped by a particular department culture. One of the oft-quoted rules of brainstorming is to encourage wild ideas. This is difficult to do with a group of people with similar professional backgrounds.

The ideas that you generate will only be as good as the people that you invite to your session. Ideas from a diverse group will be more varied and the potential to uncover a real gem is greater. Of course, you will also generate a lot of ideas that don’t hold water. That’s ok. The purpose of brainstorming is to generate lots of ideas. Evaluating and selecting ideas for further exploration will come later.

Try this. To encourage wild ideas, invite people from different departments or the customer to your next brainstorming session. Help them prepare for the brainstorming by providing them with a description of the issue or opportunity that you will explore.

Challenge assumptions to generate new ideas

Just because something has always been done a certain way doesn’t mean that is the best way to proceed. Innovations almost never happen without challenging and overcoming common assumptions. Consider the following example: Drs. Barry J. Marshall and J. Robin Warren became convinced through their research that stomach ulcers were caused by the bacteria Helicobacter pylori. Their results challenged the existing assumption that bacteria could not survive in the acidic stomach environment. Old assumptions die hard. To prove his point, Dr. Marshall drank a petri-dish full of the bacteria to demonstrate that stomach ulcers could be caused by H. pylori. Marshall and Warren were not working in a vacuum. The timeline relating to the discovery that peptic ulcer disease is caused by H. pylori shows there was much evidence in place that supported their hypothesis. In 2005, the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Barry Marshall and Robin Warren, “who with tenacity and a prepared mind challenged prevailing dogmas”.

Identify an assumption that almost everyone takes for granted in your department or field. Ask yourself how you could test whether the assumption is true. Could there be a different and better way to do things? As Edward de Bono, best known as the originator of the term lateral thinking suggests, try to escape from things that we all take for granted.

Fear – the great idea killer

Fear kills ideas. We fear ridicule from our peers and our boss. Fear causes us to hold back from communicating or implementing our ideas. Tim Brown provides a good example how afraid we are when we have to expose ourselves in front of an audience. In his TED talk he asks the audience to draw their neighbor in 30 seconds.

As a team leader, what can you do to create a trusted environment that is inducive to exploring ideas? Set the rules for brainstorming, display them publicly and make sure you stick to them. As facilitator, step in when an idea is under attack. Consider creating an idea box – a place where ideas are collected and visible to all. This can be idea management software. The advantage to software is that people don’t have to expose themselves to the immediate reaction of their peers. They can take the time they need to phrase their idea correctly and they can get stimulated by and build on other ideas.

Build your creative toolbox

In The Creative Habit, Twyla Tharp says before you can think out of the box you have to have a box to begin with! The box can be a folder on your computer, a web site, wall space in your office or a shoe box under your bed. What’s important is to have a space dedicated to the project containing artifacts and visual reminders of what is important.

What I do to get ideas

Here are some of the things that I do to get ideas. What else should be on this list? Let me know what works for you.

• Read widely. I continue to add books, articles and relevant blogs to my reading list. When developing learning products, I look at neighboring disciplines like Design Thinking or Experience Design. If you don’t yet have a reading list, a good start is: The 100 Best Business Books of All Time by Jack Covert and Todd Sattersten.
• Build a diverse network. I like to surround myself with people from different fields. If you are a technical person, seek out people with design skills. Consider joining a book group to discuss ideas and ignite your own ideas. Don’t limit yourself to groups in your professional area but also consider neighboring disciplines.
• Draw. Learning to draw is a fundamental skill that trains your eye to see things that we usually don’t see. Milton Glaser, the graphic designer best known for the “I Love New York” logo, emphasizes the importance of drawing in order to make sense of the world: “It is only through drawing that I look at things carefully.” The next time you are trying to solve a problem, ask yourself whether a simple drawing would illustrate the problem better than words.
• Gain a different perspective. I like to grab my camera, choose a single object like a paper clip and shoot it from different angles. Try it. It is fun to look at things from a different perspective.
• Capture ideas. I almost always have a small notebook and camera with me. Great ideas come at unexpected moments. Document your thinking so that you don’t forget your ideas and can revisit them at any time.
• Movement. When I feel stuck, I get up and move, take a walk or exercise. Don’t become glued to the issue at hand. Move away from it, get some distance and then revisit it when you are fresh. Sometimes, a bit of distance from an issue is all the brain needs to come up with a creative solution. That may be one of the reasons why we get our best ideas while we are doing something unrelated to the problem.
• Get inspired. Inspiration comes from many sources. For me, nature, music and art are inspirational, as are exhibitions, conferences, and online communities. Make a list of things that will inspire you. One reason the TED conferences are so popular is because people need inspiration from art and science to make new connections and generate ideas.

Last but not least: Be patient

Good ideas are the result of a process that requires time for incubation. So get back into the shower and enjoy watching your ideas surface!

Resources

• Tharp, Twyla. The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life
• Michalko, Michael. Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques (2nd Edition).
• Csíkszentmihályi, Mihaly. Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention.
• de Bono, Edward. De Bono’s Thinking Course, Revised Edition.
• Watch Milton Glaser draw and talk about the importance of drawing.
• Watch Tim Brown’s drawing exercise and his talk on creativity and play
• Watch Edward de Bono speak on creativity
• California artist Scott Hanson on Overcoming Creative Block

• The project is moving full steam ahead under its own power.
• Corporate politics blow from different directions with varying intensity.
• Resource availability may buoy the project up or cause it to crash on the rocks.
• Technology trends and market forces pull the project along in directions you that are hard to predict or control.

In this article I will introduce an approach for identifying, analyzing and managing stakeholders in order to maximize support and minimize interference.

Steps to Managing Stakeholders

The following steps, applied throughout the project lifecycle, will keep your stakeholder relationships on course.

• Identify people who have an interest (positive or negative) in the project.
• Understand each person’s interests and potential impact on the project.
• Group stakeholders according to common interests and levels of power.
• Set a strategy for managing your relationship with each group.
• Plan communication actions and apply influence principles to implement the strategy.

Identify your Stakeholders

Identify all the people who could or should have an interest in what you are doing. Stakeholders have one thing in common: they care about the project. Some will benefit from the outcome. Others may fear the changes the project will bring.

Ask yourself: who will benefit from the product (or service)? Who might be interested in the technology we use to develop it? Who stands to lose once the project is completed?

Don’t stop with the obvious – customer, sponsor, team. Identify stakeholders both inside and outside your organization. Consider managers of other departments from whom you may need to borrow resources, other project managers who could profit from your best practices, concerned citizens, politicians and others.

Stakeholders are individuals, not groups. While it may be tempting to identify the marketing department as a stakeholder, marketing is not a stakeholder! The Product Manager should be; a new Marketing Associate could be. Each individual has unique interests, habits and preferences. By identifying individuals instead of groups, you will be better able to target your communications.

The “B” word. Let’s face it: your project is not for everyone. By identifying potential blockers at this stage, you might be able to minimize the project’s negative impact on them. While you will not always win support, you will be able to reduce opposition.

Understand Stakeholder Interests and Impact

Once you have identified stakeholders, discuss their potential impact on the project with your core team. Since you will be talking about people’s power and influence, set ground rules such as “whatever is discussed stays in the room” and agree on who will have access to the final stakeholder analysis.

Level of impact does not correlate with the organization chart. It is important to realize that impact on the project is not the same as power within the organization. A technician may have high impact because of her expert knowledge, whereas the head of an unrelated business unit may have little impact on the project.

Cherish your supporters but ask why. It is vital to understand why each person supports the project. Ask: “What’s in it for them?” Discuss this question with your team until you reach consensus on the stakeholder’s interest and motivations. Without knowing why a stakeholder is supporting you, maintaining the support will be a matter of luck.

Know the opposition. Understand why a stakeholder opposes the project. Perhaps the person is not convinced the technology will work. Or the person fears you will pull resources from her projects. By addressing the stakeholder’s concern, you might succeed in turning a wind of opposition into a supporting breeze. For example, you could point out reputable sources who have evaluated the technology favorably. Or you could work out a resource sharing plan.

Below is an example of a completed stakeholder interest/impact analysis.

Group Stakeholders by Common Interests

Grouping stakeholders with similar interests will streamline your communications. Just as marketers target communications specifically at customer segments – people who share common interests, habits or preferences – you can aim communications at specific stakeholder groups such as power users, resource managers or technophiles. For example, you might start a discussion forum for power users, hold one-on-one meetings with each resource manager and publish a monthly TechBrief for your technophiles.

Group stakeholders based on common interests, not on level of support! Since people may support the project for different reasons, your supporters may not all be interested in the same information. For example, the VP of R&D may be interested in your technology while the VP of Marketing is excited about the new product features. These people need different communications.

Set a Strategy for Each Group

The truth is you won’t be able to turn everyone into a high impact supporter. Set realistic goals for each stakeholder group, using the chart below as a guide.

High Impact Supporters: Keep them Satisfied!

Ask for specific actions. High impact supporters want you to succeed but may not know the best way to help you. Find a role that suits each person’s interests and position. Get the CIO to talk to other CIOs. Ask a manager to spread the word within her department. Send a technically-savvy supporter to meet with techies at a customer organization. Know why each person supports the project and continue to do things that earn their support.

Low Impact Supporters: Get them Involved!

Low impact supporters may need a boost from you to get going. Inform them about project status, upcoming milestones and important decisions as early as possible. Groups are more powerful than individuals, so look for ways to bring individual supporters together. Invite selected stakeholders to a relevant conference. If a community forms around your product or service, make sure you support it. Consider creating a community if it doesn’t already exist. You’ll find more tips on building communities in this article.

Low Impact Opposers: Watch them!

You might be tempted to neglect low impact blockers, focusing instead on satisfying supporters or converting high power opposers. However, you ignore blockers at your peril, for their power over the project could quickly change.

For example, you choose to ignore a department manager who opposes your project since she has no direct authority over the project. The organization restructures and suddenly she is responsible for your product line. Her first action may be to slash the budget.

Build relationships in advance. Instead of ignoring the manager you decide to find out why she opposes the project. You meet with her and discover that she favors an alternative technology. After researching the technology you conclude it would also satisfy the project requirements. You integrate the technology and gain a supporter.

Public works projects (roads, airports, etc.) will often have many low-impact opposition groups. Smart project managers seek dialog with these groups before conflicts arise, looking for ways to address their concerns while still delivering project results.

High Impact Opposers: Win Support or Reduce Impact!

The rule is: pick one. Winning support or reducing impact requires different methods. By all means, win support where you can. Start by uncovering the reasons why the person opposes the project. If you can’t address these reasons directly, look for areas of common ground – things you can agree on. Start small and build from there.

Know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em. Some stakeholders will be opposed to the project for reasons you cannot rectify. Accept that you will not turn these people into supporters no matter how hard you try. The best strategy here is to reduce their impact on the project.

Silence opposition by demonstrating your support. By displaying how much support you already have, you increase the cost and risk of opposing the project. If a stakeholder sees other people supporting your project, she may also jump on the bandwagon as you race towards the finish line.

Stuck in the Middle Stakeholders: Engage their interests!

Show the relevance. People who neither support nor oppose the project probably do not see the relevance of the project. They may lack information about benefits. If the project will help these stakeholders, find a way to let them know. Keep in mind that you might not be the best person to deliver the message. Make sure a credible authority, someone the stakeholder respects and trusts, delivers the message.

Hushing it up doesn’t work. Consider letting stakeholders know about potential negative consequences in advance and work with them to reduce the impact. While it is not possible to eliminate all negative consequences, the fact that you tried will help your working relationship. Most people will reward honesty with helpfulness if they can.

Photo credit: Ville Miettinen

For Further Reading

Part 2 of this article discusses how to plan communication actions to influence stakeholders.

Plan Communication Actions

Once you have set a strategy for each stakeholder group, you need to identify communication actions to get you there. Get these actions into your calendar as soon as possible. For each action, answer the following questions:

• Who is the communication for?
• What is the message?
• How will the message be delivered (in person, email, presentation, multimedia sound and light show)?
• When will you complete the action?
• By whom should the message be communicated?

Replicate communication actions. Planning the same communications for stakeholders with similar interests/impact will save you time and effort. For example, if you decide to write a biweekly tech update, send it to all those stakeholders with a technical interest in the project. If you plan to meet one-on-one with each of your supporters, prepare a common list of questions in advance to probe their needs.

Delegate responsibility. The person delivering the message should be the person with the most credibility with the target audience. For example, have a marketing core team member present to stakeholders from marketing, but not from R&D.

Apply Influence Principles

Often, stakeholders are senior managers in the organization. You must influence their opinions and actions without relying on formal authority. Since you can’t force, threaten or cajole these people into supporting the project, you must find more subtle ways of influencing opinion and behavior.

Project managers can draw on a well-researched body of knowledge on the psychology of influence. Social Psychologist Robert Cialdini has identified six widely used influence principles.

Reciprocity

If I scratch your back, you’ll scratch mine. Help your stakeholders before you need their help! Reciprocity will make them want to help in return. Caution! Reciprocity applies only for deeds already done. The promise to help someone in the future is not likely to motivate people to help you today.

A project manager I know has the habit of sending articles of interest to his stakeholders. He knows the articles are relevant and valuable to each stakeholder because he has spent time learning about the stakeholder’s interests. He also knows that it is much easier to ask the stakeholder for support if he has helped them recently.

Scarcity

Going once, going twice, sold! People are attracted to things that are rare, exclusive or temporary. To influence stakeholders, think about what is truly unique or uncommon about your project and emphasize these qualities in your communications.

Fear of Loss. Decision science researchers Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky demonstrated that people are more motivated to avoid a loss than to make an equivalent gain. Describe honestly what stands to be lost if the stakeholder does not take action. For example, “Without your approval for the software license, we will miss our milestone and may lose a key customer.”

Authority

Your best arguments will be useless in influencing stakeholders until you have demonstrated your credibility. People are more likely to act on information from a credible authority, someone who possesses the right combination of knowledge and trustworthiness. Make sure the message always comes from the most credible source on your team, e.g. have the techies talk to tech stakeholders.

Trustworthiness is built over long time by upfront and honest behavior. James Kouzes and Barry Posner state that while credibility is built up over years, it can be lost in an instant through dishonest or disrespectful behavior.

Except for all my flaws, I’m perfect. According to Cialdini, you can increase your trustworthiness by mentioning a weakness just before making your strongest argument. You are more believable if you admit that your project is not perfect up front.

Commitment / Consistency

Feeling good. People are more willing to take actions that they perceive to be consistent with what they have already said or done. If I make a commitment and follow through, I feel good about myself. I tell myself I am reliable, trustworthy, faithful and honest. If I fail to keep a commitment, I must find a rationale to justify my failure.

Get a public commitment. We can influence future behavior by getting a stakeholder to make a public commitment. The best way to do so is simply to ask for a commitment and then wait for the stakeholder to give it. Ask your stakeholders (especially supporters) for their commitment.

“Will you…” These two words have the power to elicit a commitment! Tack them on to the front of a question and then wait for the answer.

“Will you help me solve the technical problem?”

“Will you help get the budget approved?”

A word of caution: commitment works both ways! Be careful what you commit to and make sure you honor your commitments.

Consensus & Social Proof

If you can’t fight ‘em, show ‘em. People are influenced by the behavior of a crowd. Use this fact to reduce the impact of opposers. Rather than fighting blockers directly, show them how much support you already have! The fact that everyone seems to be supporting you already will make it less likely that a blocker will actively oppose you.

Brief supporters in advance. If you expect resistance from a stakeholder at an upcoming meeting, prepare by briefing your supporters in advance. Ask them for their commitment to kick off the meeting with positive statements about the project. If enough people do this, it may take the wind out of the opposer’s sails. The stakeholder may not want to risk an argument or embarrassment in front of his peers.

Social proof also increases the impact of low power supporters. By drawing together isolated supporters, you can increase the chance that their voice will be heard. As an added benefit, you may also gain useful suggestions on how to improve your product or service.

Liking

People prefer to say yes to people they like. Liking comes from positive connections, shared interests, experiences and common goals. What can you do to build more positive connections with your stakeholders?

Pay attention to others. Look for areas you have in common, which will provide a basis for conversation to help build a productive working relationship.

Staying on Course

According to the Project Management Institute®, a project manager spends up to 90% of her time communicating. Much of this communication is with stakeholders. Applying influence principles to your communication actions will help keep your stakeholder relationships on course.

Photo credit: Cherrylet

For Further Reading

Cialdini, Robert. Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, Collins Business Essentials, 2006.

According to Etienne Wenger, “Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.”

Benefits

Since participation is usually voluntary, a community must deliver value to the organization and to individual members. Individuals profit through increased knowledge, networking opportunities and peer recognition for their expertise. New employees can turn to the community to find out what really works. All this can lead to significant cost savings for the organization. Schlumberger states that its InTouch system, which provides technical and operational support to field staff, saves more than USD 200 million per year. The company has also measured a 95% improvement in response time for technical queries.

Challenges

Often, existing networks form the foundation of new professional communities. This was true for Schlumberger’s Eureka Technical Communities. The Intranet based-system made it easier for existing networks of experts to share knowledge with colleagues around the globe – allowing true communities of practice to emerge over time.

You cannot force “community.” Communities evolve organically – they must be nurtured before they will take root and thrive. Henry Edmundson, former Director of Technical Communities at Schlumberger, notes in Fast Company: “It’s fairly chaotic, and that’s good. You can’t force these things. People will use groups the way they want to – or they won’t use them at all.”

Developing a professional community is more about providing the right opportunities for interaction than designing the community from scratch. Unless members interact and share, simply having a community website does not make a community of practice. Active communities such as open source software development do have different roles such as community leaders, branch maintainers, core contributors, etc. However, these roles tend to emerge from the community and evolve over time.

How to Get Started

If you are thinking about building a community within your organization, here are a few things worth paying attention to from the beginning.

• Determine the focus and goal(s) for the community. What product, idea or problem do you plan to cultivate the community around? Guy Kawasaki, author of The Art of Creating a Community, says, “If you create a great product, you may not be able to stop a community from forming even if you tried. By contrast, it’s hard to build a community around mundane and mediocre crap no matter how hard you try.”
• Identify the people who are already excited about the product or idea. They will become the heart of the community, actively contributing to the core body of knowledge, ensuring quality of contributions and helping the community grow.
• Make sure you are ready to take on “founder” responsibilities. A community needs a leader to inspire and bring people together. As founder, you will actively shape the community. Your actions and behaviors will determine whether others will contribute. In the beginning, it is likely that you will be the one coordinating events, establishing infrastructure and letting people know about the community. Make sure you are prepared to shoulder these responsibilities until others step in as the community begins to evolve.
• Start small and invite people personally. Scott Berkun provides an example of a “relaxed” community invitation in Making Things Happen: “Want to kick ass at leading and managing teams? We are forming a small group of people interested in becoming better team leaders and managers.”
• Be realistic about levels of participation. Time and energy are limited. We all have to choose carefully where to invest. Don’t expect to draw everyone immediately into active participation. The “core” group of contributors may remain small. Quite a few people may attend community events but still choose not to contribute actively. Some may feel that they do not have the knowledge or authority needed; others may simply lack the time. Over time, more people may choose to get involved if they see the value of contributing.
• Do not underestimate people’s need for recognition. Contributions will likely increase when people are recognized for their work. The pleasure received from public recognition voluntary work is sometimes referred to as Egoboo. Reciprocity also plays a role; people contribute with the expectation of receiving help in return. Incentives such as awarding members points that they can spend in a virtual store may also boost participation.
• Establish ground rules. Guidelines help make expectations clear and avoid unnecessary conflicts. For a common body of knowledge such as a wiki, you will need guidelines concerning quality, ownership and editorial decision making to avoid potential conflict. Wikipedia has listed more than 200 guidelines.
• Welcome new members.  Help people get oriented quickly. Recruit community volunteers to show new members around and introduce them to others.
• Don’t just sit there, do something! Guy Kawasaki says, “Communities can’t just sit around composing love letters to your CEO about how great she is.” Create a list of problems and issues to work on. Look for ways to improve and innovate. Refrain from endless debates and end each meeting with actionable items.

Photo credit: Yodel Anecdotal/Yahoo! Inc.

Further reading:

• In their Harvard Business Review article, Etienne Wenger, Richard McDermott, and William M. Snyder provide seven principles for cultivating communities.
• Guy Kawasaki lists things to consider in the Art of Creating a Community.
• Etienne Wenger explains what communities of practice are.
• This Wiki article discusses why people are motivated to participate online.
• Edmundson, Henry. (2001) Technical Communities of Practice at Schlumberger. Knowledge Management Review, 4 (2), 20-23.

Berkun draws on his experience as a Microsoft project manager. He provides many practical suggestions, such as what questions to ask to get better estimates from programmers. The book is full of gems like “Good questions attract good ideas.” Also remarkable is his chapter on ”self-reliance” – a topic not usually covered in a book on project management but nevertheless of great importance.

Making Things Happen is not a step-by-step guide to managing a project but rather a collection of well-written and informative essays on relevant topics for the IT project manager. If you are looking for a concise overview of the steps involved in managing a project, we recommend Gary Herken’s book Project Management.

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Choose language: English | German

What makes a good decision maker?

Good decision makers have lots of experience. They are experts who have been in similar situations before. They know what cues to look for, are able to recognize patterns and decide how to respond quickly. Their decision-making is fast and intuitive because they can draw on prior analytic experience. They can make what Malcolm Gladwell calls a blink decision. According to researcher Gary Klein, it’s the novices who need to compare different alternatives in order to solve a problem.

Klein interviewed veteran firefighters in order to understand how they make decisions. Rather than outline all possible alternatives, expert firefighters quickly come up with a plan of action and then assess whether or not it will work. Klein found that, over time, firefighters develop a mental catalog of different types of fires and how they should react to them. Expert firefighters subconsciously categorize fires in their mental catalog according to the best response. 

What can we do to make better decisions?

According to Gary Klein, mental simulations are effective for helping people get past the beginner stage and build a rich knowledge-base to draw on for future decisions. To run a mental simulation, we need to project ourselves into the future and imagine that we have already made the decision and are watching the consequences unfold in our inner eye. This model of decision making is called Recognition-primed decision (RPD).

Using mental simulations on projects

One of the simulations that Klein recommends doing at the beginning of a project is called a “premortem.” This is how it works: the project leader asks the team to look six months into the future and imagine that the project they are currently planning has failed. Everyone writes down reasons why they think the project derailed. Afterwards, people share their reasons for failure and discuss appropriate adjustments to the plan.

In the context of mental simulation, people feel secure and are more willing to share what they really think about the project. Experience shows that people are otherwise reluctant to raise issues or concerns during the planning phase. Nobody wants to appear pessimistic about a new project. Visualizing a list of potential problems helps everyone avoid the overconfidence that typically plagues new projects in the initiation and planning phases. It also helps the team think of ways to overcome stumbling blocks. As an added bonus, people build their repertoire of pattern recognition skills which will help them become better decision makers on future projects.

Computer simulations can also help project managers and teams practice decision-making by confronting them with typical scenarios faced on projects. Through the simulation, project managers accumulate experiences in a safe environment-without risk to the project!

What else will help?

What else will help you build your knowledge and experience base? Here are some things to consider:

• When thinking about an issue or opportunity, write down your thoughts. Writing helps us focus. My motto is: “You need to write to think.”
• Before tackling a new decision, ask yourself the following questions:
  • How urgent is the decision? By when do I need to decide?
  • Should the decision be made alone or in a group?
  • Who else should be involved in making this decision?
  • How much effort should be spent on the decision?
  • Can I draw from experiences that I or someone else has had in the past?
  • What are my biases and limitations in making this decision?
• Experiment with different formats. Consider a simple list of pros and contras. Use a table format to note and evaluate alternatives.
• Start a list of people you can draw on for advice. Identify the right person to talk to. We all need a sounding board from time to time.
• Identify relevant sources of information, data, and past experience. For example, make a list of similar projects and the names of project managers.
• If time permits, let information you collect settle for a day or two before acting on it, allowing time for incubation and reflection.
• After you have made a decision, reflect on the decision-making process. What was effective and what was not?

Photo Credit: Harry Brignull

Additional Resources

Information by or about Gary Klein and his research

Breen, Bill. What’s Your Intuition? Fast Company, Vol. 38, 2000. Article on Gary Klein in Fast Company.
Klein, Gary. Performing a Project Premortem. Harvard Business Review, Sept. 2007, pp. 18-19.
Gladwell, Malcolm. Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking. Back Bay Books, 2007.  See especially the discussion of Klein’s work in the chapter “Paul van Riper’s Big Victory”.

Books by Gary Klein

Klein, Gary. Sources of Power: How People Make Decisions. MIT Press, 1999.
Klein, Gary. The Power of Intuition: How to Use Your Gut Feelings to Make Better Decisions at Work. Broadway Business, 2004.

A useful guide to the classical decision making process is

Hammond, John S., Ralph L. Keeney and Howard Raiffa. Smart Choices: A Practical Guide to Making Better Decisions. Broadway, 2002.

• project stakeholders
• technical audience
• business audience

It is helpful to have different messages ready, each tailored to one of the above audience types. Having different messages on hand will ensure that you don’t stumble over your words and also have time to enjoy your lunch! For simplicity, I divide the audience into three groups. Of course, you should also adapt your message to the person you are talking to.

Stakeholders

Be prepared to provide a short update anytime and anywhere. For example, a stakeholder may approach you at the coffee machine and ask: “How’s the project going?” It doesn’t matter that you just sent a project status report; it is likely the stakeholder hasn’t read it. Be concise and state the facts. Don’t try to hide problems. You gain credibility by acknowledging problems and communicating how you plan to solve them. For example, if your project is behind schedule, state the reason why and mention what you will do to get the project back on track.

Technical Audience

You will also run into project managers or team members from related projects. These people are likely to know about your project and may be familiar with the technology you are using. Focus on exchanging information that may be useful to both of you. Share any knowledge or resources that you have gained that may help the other person. Don’t be afraid to ask for advice on technical issues related to your project. Communicate project status only if you are specifically asked.

Business Audience

You are standing in the lift. Just before the door closes, a senior manager steps in. She turns to you and asks about your new project. Does the thought of this scenario make you break out in a cold sweat? It shouldn’t, not if you are prepared to communicate the value of your project. For a business audience, explain what the project is about, who needs it and why. Most people want to know how something will help them. It can be quite a challenge to distill a complex project into a clear and concise message. You need to be able to pull yourself away from the details and explain something complex in non-technical terms. To prepare, it helps to jot down some key words and phrases.

For example, an information architect I know explains what she does in simple terms. She compares herself to a librarian for the web—she helps people find information. Try explaining to a distant relative what you are working on. A blank stare in return will alert you that you need to say it differently. Also try recording yourself explaining your project. Listen to the recording and make adjustments wherever you sound shaky.

Photo Credit: Andreas Hagerman

Additional Resources

Frank, Milo P. How to Get Your Point Across in 30 Seconds or Less. Pocket, 1990.

Where to begin

Choose the right content

Using notes or a script

What is my presentation style?

Learn from others

The beauty of the beginning

Some other things to pay attention to:

• How do presenters handle questions from the audience?
• Do they use PowerPoint or Keynote? How many slides? How much text is on each slide? What kind of images, graphics do they use?
• Do they end on a memorable note? How do they close the presentation?

Practice, practice, practice

Use a video camera

Invite your friends to be the audience

The rhythm is it

“Mise en place”- Learn from the French chefs: Put everything in place before you begin

• Check out the facilities in advance if you can. It puts my mind at ease to know what the room looks like and what resources I have available. If somebody helps you set up, make sure you know how to reach them if something is not working.
• Arrive early. Make sure you have time to get set up before your audience arrives. That way, when people start to arrive, you will be able to engage in a conversation.
• Have water within reach. Edward Tufte said that making presentations and taking airplane rides are the two most dehydrating experiences that people face. Take your time to have a sip during the presentation. This will also allow your audience to digest what you have just said. I remember Jan Chipchase, a design researcher for Nokia, delivering his entire presentation at a user experience conference with a bottle of water in his hand. He mentioned that he just got off the plane and needed to drink a lot. The audience didn’t mind because what he had to say was worthwhile.

Enjoy the performance

Feedback and reflection

Also see:

Additional resources

Resources in German

Know your audience

Understand expectations

Clarify your goals

Define your message

Ask yourself questions

Make an outline

Decide on how to show the numbers

Determine media

Be prepared to make recommendations

Pose questions to stimulate discussion

Always provide handouts

Additional Resources

Numbers are central for measuring success, identifying opportunities and making informed decisions. According to Stephen Few, poor presentation of data is more common than we would expect. He says there are so few examples of good data presentation that most people aren’t even aware there is a problem.

An oft-quoted example of how poorly designed information can lead to the wrong decision is the Space Shuttle disaster in 1986. Edward Tufte pointed out that the explosion of the Challenger might have been prevented by a better display of information. Poor information design also hindered good decision making in the Columbia accident in 2003. See the discussion on Tufte’s website: PowerPoint Does Rocket Science.

Most of us have not been trained in designing tables and graphs. Communicating quantitative information requires not only that we understand what the numbers mean, but also that we can display numbers so that others are able to quickly and accurately interpret their meaning. 

Imagine you are a project manager asked to present information in the following two scenarios:

Scenario 1: Show a preliminary budget for the project.
Scenario 2: Explain why the project is behind schedule and over budget.

For which scenario would you use a table? For which would you use a graph? How would you design the table or graph? What additional text do you need to explain important data?

Here are some suggestions that I have found helpful. They are adapted from Few and Tufte on how to display data.

Determine your primary message

Try to write what you want to say into one or two sentences. Be clear on what you need to communicate. Your primary message will direct how to present the data.

Decide on the best means to communicate the message

Use tables:

• to show precise values
• to present individual values, so that people can refer back to those values
• to compare individual values
• to communicate more than one unit of measure

Tables are also preferable to graphics for many small data sets. Tables are ideal for combining both detail and summary values. For presenting a preliminary project budget (scenario 1), I would use a table since we need to show individual numbers and it is important that we can refer back to them.

Use charts:

• when the shape of the values is important for the message
• to show relationships among multiple values

For explaining why the project is behind schedule and over budget (scenario 2), I would use a graph showing the budget and schedule deviation over time. I would use additional text to explain what caused the problem. For example, if a task in week 2 caused most of the delay and cost overruns, I would add a text box close to week 2 in the chart explaining why. Tufte stresses the importance of showing cause and effect relationships.

Avoid pie charts

Most of us think that including different kinds of charts will strengthen our presentation. Variety is the spice of life. Not so with pie charts, according to Few and Tufte. Few advises us to “save the pies for desert.” Pie charts have a low data density and fail to order numbers along a visual dimension. Although the round form is appealing, I have cut pie charts out my presentations and use a simple table instead. See Few’s explanation.

General suggestions for information design

Your message may require multiples tables and charts along with text explanations. Decide what should come first and what you want to emphasize. Write a short introduction for a report outlining what the reader will find in the document, what she should pay particular attention to, and what actions are required.

• Use descriptive titles for all tables and charts.
• Highlight the data that are most important for your message by circling or using a different color font.
• Combine words with charts and tables. Small text messages next to a chart or table are highly effective. It is important that the text explanation is located close to the data it refers to.
• Use horizontal text so that the reader does not have to turn their head.
• By using labels and placing them as close as possible to the data they describe, you will not need a separate legend.
• Spell out all words (no abbreviations).
• Avoid glitzy radar charts and bubble charts.
• Avoid the use of 3D graphics. They are difficult to read correctly.

Tips for table design

• Avoid using grids to delineate rows and columns.
• Use lines to separate the headers and footers from the table body.
• Lines can also be useful for grouping and highlighting subsets of data.
• When white space alone will not effectively delineate table columns and rows, light fill shades and hues work better than grids and lines.
• Make group summaries visually distinct from details by using a bold typeface.

As Tufte says: “Above all else show the numbers.”

Resources:

• Few, Stephen. Show Me the Numbers: Designing Tables and Graphs to Enlighten. Oakland, Calif.: Analytics Press, 2004.
• Few’s website includes examples of data presentation problems and their solutions.
• Tufte, Edward R. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, 2nd edition. Cheshire: Conn.: Graphics Press, 1983.
• Cleveland, William S. Visualizing Data. Summit, N.J.: Hobart Press, 1993.
• Article in CIO Magazine by Sue Bushell on Stephen Few’s Show Me the Numbers
• Processtrends: A great resource site on presenting data with charts by D. Kelly O’Day
• Recycling chartjunk as junk art. Critiques of charts from existing publications, often with alternative suggestions for how to display the data.

Photo Credit: Mykl Roventine

Be aware of the three levels of conversation

Explore both points of view

Look for how each person contributed to the situation

Engage the other person in problem solving

Summing it all up

• Be aware of facts, feelings and identity issues (three levels of conversation)
• Include both points of view and ask for the other person’s help (I want to hear your perspective on the project and discuss what we can do to get things back on track.)
• Don’t make statements disguised as questions (Are you going to tell me what’s going on?)
• Don’t use questions to cross-examine (Why didn’t you tell me that?)
• Ask open ended questions (How do you feel about that?)
• Ask for more concrete information (Can you tell me more about the changes?)
• Paraphrase for clarity (Do I understand you correctly that customer change requests are causing most of the delay?)
• Engage in mutual problem solving (What can we do to ensure the problems don’t continue?)

For further reading:

Let’s look at an example.

Barbara is project manager for the redesign of a document management system (DMS). She is preparing to interview Michael, a key stakeholder for the project, to determine Michael’s requirements and expectations.

Barbara has prepared a list of questions for Michael. She has also sent him a brief overview of the project via email. This way, he will be informed about project goals, major milestones and who is on the project team. Barbara will not have to spend time during the interview making a project “presentation.”

Barbara also plans to show Michael wireframe sketches for the new document management system. Although the sketches are basic, Barbara hopes that by observing Michael’s reaction to the sketches, she will better understand his needs and expectations.

Prepare Your Questions in Advance

Preparing a list of questions in advance is essential. Although you may not ask each stakeholder every question on your list, at least you will be able to compare the answers of individual stakeholders for the questions that you do ask. If you are interviewing stakeholders about an existing product or service, use questions to try to gain insight into how they currently use the product or service, what they like best about it and what they dislike. In our example, Barbara identified questions in the following areas:

Function

• What kind of documents do you use in your job?
• Can you provide some examples of how you use the document management system?
• What are the most common things you do with the DMS?
• What types of content would you like to see in the DMS?
• Are there any documents you would not keep there? Why?

Frequency

• What parts of the DMS do you use most?
• How often do you access the documents?

Preferences

• What do you like best about the DMS? What do you like least?
• What content would you expect to find on the home page?

Problems

• How do you work around problems?
• What concerns do you have with the system?

Expertise

• Do you have any tips and tricks for using the DMS?

People

• Who else should I talk to?
• Who else needs access to which kinds of documents?

Other

• What content would you like to have that doesn’t exist?
• Have I missed anything?

Asking about problems is important for two reasons. First, you will identify areas in need of improvement. Second, the stakeholder may already have discovered a solution to the problem. If you are developing a new product, you may discover innovative ideas by asking people about their experience with existing products or services.

Tips on How to Ask Questions

Avoid asking “closed” questions that can be answered with “yes” or “no.” Instead, ask “open” questions that start with how, why, or what. Open questions encourage the stakeholder to provide rich, descriptive information.

Stay as objective as possible and refrain from offering your opinion. Avoid asking leading questions. Remember, the purpose of the interview is to determine the stakeholder’s needs and expectations and to build a relationship with them.

Avoid using terms that might confuse the stakeholder and stay away from technical jargon. Unless the stakeholder is an IT expert, the first question in the example below may be too technical.

How to Bring in Sketches

Sketches can be helpful in providing an overview, clarifying a specific function, or visualizing ideas. For stakeholder interviews, simple line drawings are preferable to polished computer-rendered sketches. You want to convey ideas without giving the impression that the design is finished! In fact, showing a detailed user interface at this point would be counterproductive—stakeholders would likely focus on the details of the interface rather than on the overall system.

For example, Barbara might show Michael a sketch of a wireframe for the document management system front page and follow up with questions to hear Michael’s thinking.

Barbara: “Here are some elements that the team has identified as important. Are we missing anything?”

Also see my post on the value of sketching.

Consider using the “Think out Loud” Technique

We often gain valuable input when we ask others to do something and observe them doing it. It is important to ask the stakeholder to “think out loud” while they work through the task. If they have trouble doing so, ask them questions to keep them talking. In our example, Barbara might ask Michael to find a document on the existing system.

Barbara: “Michael, you said earlier that you use the DMS for [task that Micheal mentioned]. Could you please find the most recent [document related to task] on the system and explain out loud how you go about it?”

This way Barbara gains insights into how Michael is currently using the system. Michael not only gets a refresher on what life is like with the current system but will reflect on what he is trying to accomplish. This may lead to a valuable discussion and a list of things to do to improve the overall user experience of the system.

Tips on Conducting the Interview

• Do not hesitate to paraphrase and ask clarifying questions. “Do I understand you correctly that…?”
• Don’t let the stakeholder run the interview. You are there to get the stakeholder’s input, not to defend the project. Of course, you should be polite and try to answer questions, but be sure to gently redirect the discussion back to your list of questions for the stakeholder.
• Remember that the interview is not just about getting information; it’s also about building a good working relationship with the stakeholder. You will need their support and input during the project and the interview is an opportunity to get the relationship off to a good start.
• After the stakeholder answers a question, wait a few seconds. Often, the best information will come after a short silence.
• As soon as possible after the interview, summarize your notes and send them to the stakeholder. Ask the stakeholder to review and correct any factual errors. Also ask them to add anything that they feel was missed in the interview. Keep them in the loop.

Further Information

• Understanding organizational stakeholders for design success
• Setting Up Business Stakeholder Interviews, Part 1
• Setting Up Business Stakeholder Interviews Part 2

Photo Credit: Samuel Mann

So, what makes a good interview? I’ll be exploring this in several parts. Today, I want to cover preparing for and conducting a stakeholder interview.

Do your homework

First, identify the right people to talk to. This may sound banal but it is essential that you do not miss the input from a key person. Ask others in the organization who you should talk to. In fact, you may want to end each stakeholder interview by asking who else you should talk to.

Before you meet with a stakeholder, find out as much as possible about them. Besides checking your organization’s intranet, do a Google search for the person. Activate your network for informal information about the stakeholder.

Prepare questions in advance

Make a list of questions or issues you want to raise. Make sure that each question is clear and relevant to the goals of the interview. Choose your opening question carefully. Your first question will set the stage for the rest of the interview. It should be a question that the stakeholder feels comfortable answering in order to build rapport.

Agree on time and place

Determine how much time you will need for the entire interview. The interview should not be longer than an hour—30 to 45 minutes is ideal. Call the person to agree on a time and location where you both will feel comfortable. A private office or meeting room would be a good choice, a table in the busy cafeteria or hallway would not be.

Let your interview partner know the purpose and the agenda of the interview in advance. A good way to do this is to send an email meeting request with an outline of the agenda.

Conducting the interview

Thank the stakeholder for taking the time to meet with you. Repeat the goal of the interview and let your interview partner know why their input is important. Ask your opening question. Maintain eye contact and listen carefully. Focus on what is being said rather than frantically taking notes during the interview. If anything, you might want to jot down a few key phrases that you can fill in with details right after the interview.

Pick up on important issues that are not clear to you. One effective technique is to paraphrase what your interview partner says to check whether you understood them correctly. Don’t be afraid to ask for further clarification—you may want ask for an example to illustrate a point. Consider creating a quick sketch and inviting the stakeholder to contribute to it. See my post on the value of sketching. Don’t forget to save or take a photograph of the drawing at the end of the interview!

Remain focused but flexible

Keep the goal of the interview in mind. If the conversation starts to drift, gently refocus on the goal. Make sure that you cover the most important issues but don’t feel you have to plow through every question on your list. It’s more important to engage your interview partner in a natural conversation than to check off a list of questions and answers. Keep an eye on the clock and do not overrun your scheduled time.

Think twice about whether you need to record the interview. Ask yourself if your notes will be sufficient. An interview partner may agree to be recorded but may not be comfortable speaking freely. Also, listening to the interview recordings takes time.

Feedback and next steps

Allocate time for the stakeholder’s feedback at the end of the interview. Ask them whether there is anything you are missing. End the interview by informing your interview partner about the next steps. Be sure to tell them what kind of results they will receive from you by when. Summarize the interview notes (if possible, immediately following the interview when it’s still fresh in your mind) and send the stakeholder a copy for review. This will put the stakeholder at ease because they will be able to check their comments and add to them if necessary.

Some final thoughts

The best interviews are not a one-way street. They serve to build a relationship between you and the stakeholder. Ideally, both you and the interviewee gain information and insights. Approach your interview as a process of mutual discovery and problem solving. Both you and your stakeholder will be rewarded by doing so.

How to Interview Stakeholders, Part 2: Using Open Questions, Sketches and Thinking Out Loud

Photo credit: JoeG2007

For further reading

Leeds, Dorothy. Smart Questions: The Essential Strategy for Successful Managers, Berkley, 2000.

Why zebras don’t get ulcers

What can we do to cope?

• Build your social network: Sapolsky emphasizes that one of the best outlets for stress is a social network you can lean on. Many of us have heard the good advice that when you feel like you’re drowning in your own problems, find a way to help someone else. Build a network both at work and outside of work. Consider using social media to link to people in your field. As Chris Brogan says, “nothing is a solo sport any longer.” By hearing what others are doing and sharing our experience, we don’t feel alone.
• Slow down: Set time aside every day to unwind. Sapolsky suggests that we need to remind ourselves to take one step at the time.
• Meditate: Everyone will recommend a different technique. Find one that works for you. I like Jon Kabat-Zinn’s mindfulness stress-reduction meditation.
• Don’t spread the worry: Make sure you don’t give your ulcers to anyone else. Sapolsky mentions that one effective way of reducing your stress is to take it out on someone else. However, this will come back to haunt you at work and in the family.
• Protect your team from stress: Team leaders need to be extra sensitive to stressors and responses to stress in the team. To counter lack of predictability team leaders should communicate clearly and frequently. Make sure that the team knows where things stand and that you are there to look out for their interests.

Additional resources:

Put the big goals in place first

Begin to act like the person you want to become

Don’t try to do it alone

Do learning professionals use Twitter to keep the discussion going after a learning intervention? As Jane Hart and Jochen Robes write, more and more learning professionals are using Twitter to share links and information “bites” both professionally and personally. I would be interested in learning how many of us are already using Twitter or other microblogging tools as pre- and post-work for our seminars and workshops.

Twitter is popular. Twitter hit 1 billion tweets last week. Are brevity and frequency the key ingredients of Twitter’s success? Short and sweet are in. The highly-rated book, Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure, edited by Rachel Fershleiser and Larry Smith, also points in the direction of brevity. SMITH magazine asked their readers to describe their life in six words. As the New York Post put it: “The brilliance is in the brevity.”

Photo credit: James Cridland

Note: this book does not teach you how to draw. You won’t learn to draw boxes in perspective. However, Roam does encourage you to practice drawing simple shapes such as lines, arrows, people and objects. Roam’s illustrations are simple, powerful and convincing. I especially like the step-by-step drawing examples that show what he drew first, second, etc.

I have the feeling that there soon will be a sequel to the book—a workbook with more examples of how to create simple business graphics. In the workbook, people will hopefully have more opportunities to practice Roam’s master framework, the Visual Thinking Codex. I was happy to find the Visual Thinking Codex for download on the book’s companion website. This is a valuable addition, since most of the drawings in the book are small due to the “napkin” size of the book. He concludes with a clever “Swiss army knife” visual summary.

Most of us believe that drawing is something better left to artists and architects. Although we all start out drawing in kindergarten, few of us continue to draw after leaving school. Many of us are uncomfortable sketching out an idea or a process. My experience is that with a little bit of guidance, most people perform just fine. Dan Roam, author of The Back of the Napkin, is convinced that we are all born with a talent for visual thinking, and that we can learn to quickly visualize an idea. This is true, he believes, even for those of us who think that we cannot draw. More info on Dan Roam’s approach on Vizthink.

During the drawing activity on my last client project, I noticed time and again that people had important insights into their work processes while they were drawing. Often, the drawings became difficult or nearly impossible to read because of all the information that was added in during the drawing process. Therefore, it was helpful to document stages of the drawing with a digital camera and to take notes on what people said during the process. During the debrief of the drawing exercise, team members explained and discussed the process and the insights they gained. At the end of the day, the drawings themselves were less important than the results they achieved. People gained insights into their work processes-insights that led to ideas and actions for improvement.

Photo credit: Kai Chan Vong

For further exploration, see:

The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures
by Dan Roam

When you need to identify tasks, generate alternatives and assess risks for a new project, resist the temptation of booting up your computer first. Grab a stack of sticky notes instead! The computer will come later, but first you want to make people feel comfortable contributing ideas and discussing alternatives. That is best done when technology doesn’t get in the way.

Sticky notes are quickly labeled and displayed for all to see. Since nearly everyone likes to write on them, sticky notes have a way of drawing people into a naturally flowing discussion. Once you’ve got your basic ideas down on stickies, you can transfer the plan to the computer for further elaboration and refinement.

In my experience as project manager, I’ve used sticky notes for identifying tasks and alternatives, as well as for structuring and scheduling the work. In fact, I would not even consider showing up at a project team meeting without a stack of sticky notes. I make it a practice to empower team members by handing out sticky notes at the beginning of a meeting and encouraging them to write down their ideas about what needs to be done.

Some Uses for Sticky Notes

Here are some of my favorite uses for sticky notes:

• Identifying and structuring project tasks
• Assigning resources to tasks
• Weighing the pros and contras for alternatives
• Identifying risk factors and actions for mitigation
• Identifying project stakeholders

While sticky notes can help you and your team plan a project and solve problems, they are not a magic fix for all issues that arise during a project. Over the years, I’ve developed a checklist of things that work and things that don’t during sticky note planning. Here are some guidelines to help you get started.

What Works

• Do it with the team: get the core project team together for the sticky note planning; don’t try to do this on your own.
• Work on one problem at a time: focus on planning one small part of the project at a time, rather than try to solve all problems at once. It’s better to have multiple short planning sessions, each leading to a usable result, than to have one marathon session that exhausts and frustrates people.
• One task per sticky note: Sticky notes are cheap. Write only one idea or task per sticky. This will allow you to easily rearrange and group the notes later.
• Be colorful: Consider using different colored sticky notes for group headings or labels. Use a different colored marker for each category.
• Spread out: You’ll be surprised at just how many sticky notes a small group can produce in a short amount of time. Make sure you have enough space to arrange the notes without having everything bunched up in the corner.
• Get horizontal: If your team is small enough, do your sticky note planning around a large table. Horizontal notes will not fall on the floor to be carried away on the bottom of somebody’s shoe! If you do use the walls, hang flipchart pages around the room that you can roll up and take with you.
• Take pictures: Once you have a result, take a picture for easy distribution to project stakeholders.

What Doesn’t Work

• Don’t discuss it to death: Asking people to “explain” their sticky notes before posting them is a surefire way to use up all the oxygen and kill any motivation in the room. Remember: questions can be answered later. Your goal should be to get as many notes displayed as quickly as possible.
• Don’t reject the weird, wild or wacky: Try to collect as many ideas as fast as you can without evaluating them. Evaluation and selection will come later. It may well be the one wacky idea that spawns other ideas leading to a major innovation.
• Sticky notes are not a substitute for Microsoft Project: While sticky notes are a great tool for identifying tasks and generating ideas, they are not intended to be a substitute for final project schedule. For one, they tend to fall off the wall overnight! Second, it is difficult to track and update progress for a bunch of sticky notes hung on the wall. Once you are done with your sticky note planning, create a project plan and schedule using project management software.
• Don’t invite too many chiefs to the planning session: Try to keep the group size small (in my experience between 3-7 people is ideal) for the initial planning session. This will allow everyone to participate and will keep the creative juices flowing. In you need to involve more people, consider sending out the draft of your plan to a larger group for review and feedback.

Download article: PM Tips: Sticky Notes for Project Planning (PDF, 44kB)

For Further Reading

Rapid Problem Solving with Post-It Notes  by David Straker

Many of us first think of mind maps when we think of visual methods for note taking. Who hasn’t been to a conference or a meeting where you sat next to someone who was taking notes by creating a mind map? Some of my former colleagues used mind mapping software to take meeting notes. I tried it too – for a while.

What is a mind map? According to Tony Buzan, a mind map is a thinking tool that reflects our radiant and associative thinking. However, for notetaking I no longer use the mind mapping technique of starting with a central concept and branching out from there. I guess that when I ran out of space to branch out, I became frustrated with the branching form. On top of that, while I was trying to fit all my branches on one page, I couldn’t focus on the presentation!

I do think that a mind map is a good tool for learning and retrieval, for clustering information, and for grasping a concept by visualizing its elements. The mind map is also a good technique for review. For example, I often ask my seminar participants to work in groups to create a mind map as a review on the second or third day of a seminar. This allows teams to capture and share their knowledge and insights.

For notetaking, I now use a free-flowing form to capture information, key words, and sometimes a quote. I use colors to highlight important points, and create drawings to clarify a concept or often just for the fun of it. Taking colorful notes is not only a pleasure, but the process also helps me reflect on the information and improves my thinking. The more I practice this form of colorful note-taking, the more confident I become in my drawing abilities. After all, the artistic sketches that we see shared online are most likely done by people who started drawing a while back and have honed their skill over time.

My own experience has been that once I got started with my notebook and colored pens, I began to enjoy the process of combining words with pictures. My drawings have improved with practice, and I believe my thinking has, too.

Photo credit: Dean Meyers

For further exploration, see:

Rapid Viz: A New Method for the Rapid Visualization of Ideas 
by Hanks and Belliston

Choice is good, therefore, more choice is better. Not so, says psychologist Barry Schwartz. When faced with an abundance of choice, for example, when deciding on a cellular phone plan, choosing the best alternative becomes difficult and daunting. There is an “opportunity cost” associated with choosing any one alternative, namely, the fact that we must forgo the benefits of all the others. The more alternatives there are to choose from, the higher the opportunity costs and the higher the potential dissatisfaction.

In contrast, when the number of alternatives is limited, we can quickly choose the best alternative among them. This simple fact has far-reaching consequences for product and experience design. For example, when designing an e-commerce website, it is best to minimize the number of choices immediately presented to the user. Additional choices should be located on additional pages, so that users who want to can “dig down” to find more, but the rest of us are not overwhelmed by too much choice.

Collins found that there was a leader combining personal humility with professional will at the helm of every good to great company during the transition years. However, leadership alone is not enough; Collins presents several other factors that make good to great companies different.

Our favorite concept from the book is “First Who Then What.” Collins stresses the importance of getting the right people “on the bus” before you start moving. His reasoning: if people get on board because of where the bus is going, they will be resistant to changing directions if needed. However, if they get on the bus because of who else is already on board, they will be more likely to help move the company in innovative, new directions.

Additionally, good to great companies:

• Confront the Brutal Facts – they don’t hide from the truth but maintain a faith that they will prevail in the end
• Develop a Hedgehog Concept – they understand what they can be best at and have the courage to abandon things they are already good (but not best) at
• Maintain a Culture of Discipline – disciplined people have little need for hierarchy, disciplined thinking requires little bureaucracy, and disciplined actions have little need for controls
• Use Technology Smartly – technology is used as a means to accelerate performance
• Accelerate the Flywheel – slow, steady progress gains momentum with each turn, until it becomes an unstoppable catalyst for change

• the myth of the lone inventor – most things are invented by teams
• the myth that good ideas are hard to find – good ideas are common, it’s the good implementation of an idea that is rare
• the myth that people welcome innovation – people have a steady history of rejecting innovations, much to the frustration of inventors everywhere

Many of us have experienced flow at some point in our lives. Flow is when work feels like play, our actions feel natural and spontaneous, and time flies by until we are sorry to see the experience end. Flow is a state of mind characterized by concentration on an activity or goal, lack of self-consciousness, direct feedback on performance, and a deep sense of satisfaction. In short, flow creates a memorable experience for us.

The best-designed products and services allow the user to experience flow. This classic book from Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Emeritus Professor of Psychology at the University of Chicago, remains a useful guide for designers in their attempt to create flow with their products and services.