Corporate term: “Pathfinder Project Manager”

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Definition:

A project manager who can deliver complex and unusual projects without subject matter expertise by looking for individual shapes and gaps in deliveries rather than running a project by generic rote.

Explanation:

A lot of what can be both good and bad about project managers is their understanding of the subject matter.
 
Technical project managers understand the details of the subject matter intimately, they know all the nooks, crannies and potential issues, they are subject matter experts for the deliverable in their own right, be that technical or business.
 
Standard PM’s do not have this and rely on being good at organisation to cover this. They are they often classed as leaders and can take on broad roles. They don’t need to know the subject matter and are reliant on other people for the subject matter expertise.
 
Pathfinder PM’s however hold more information than standard PM’s but are not subject matter experts and more importantly they know their weaknesses. A Pathfinder PM might not know the detailed implications of a business problem, but they know enough to identify the shape of something when it’s wrong. They are often very detail orientated in the structure and the organisation of the project. Their Sprint’s are often exceptionally well organised and the end deliverable is planned to the last detail, and this detail orientation enables them to see the shape of things that are wrong or do not make sense.
 
They are exceptionally good generalist PM’s and unless you have a technical PM, they are the only way of really dealing with a difficult project where a general PM does not cut the mustard. They can see the path ahead of them and they can see the shape of the problems. Even if they do not know the contents of the problem.
 
An easier way to think of this is in terms of treasure hunting. You do not need to know that there are gold and jewels inside the treasure chest. But if you can follow the map, you know what a treasure chest looks like, and you can identify when people have gone off course rather than just following the map blindly, then you can still get the treasure.  
 
 
 
Disclaimer: As always these posts are not aimed at anyone client or employer and are just my personal observations over a lifetime of dealing with both management and frontline associates.

Podcast interview with one of my favourite bosses.

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Paul Brotzel is one of the few high-level directors that I have ever truly trusted. 1. and it’s fascinating listening to his history outside of a pub.
He and I are working together on some side bits, but I look forward to hopefully working with him again the next place he takes by storm.
  1. There have been 2 in total[↩]

Corporate term: “An Age of Miracles”

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Definition:

A phrase used when an issue or difficulty, suddenly resolves itself, with no explanation of what was done to resolve it and no indication of what caused the issue in the first place.

Explanation:

This may be maligning people, but this tends to happen in IT more than any other part of a corporation. A problem that’s been happening persistently or suddenly effects one part of the business, will suddenly miraculously start working often with the phrase, “oh, just try again”, and suddenly, the problem has gone away. No one is able to tell you what has been changed. It’s just fixed and there is always an overtone of “Well It’s working now. No point in chasing down the why”


In context, this phrase is often used on the next management meeting. and is a very sarcastic and corporate way of saying, “We don’t believe you. We know you’re lying to us. Tell us what you bloody fixed.” This desire isn’t just for witch hunting, but so that we know what to go looking for next time it breaks. Without a root cause these things just happen time and time again.

 

Disclaimer: As always these posts are not aimed at anyone client or employer and are just my personal observations over a lifetime of dealing with both management and frontline associates.

Management Nugget No 19: Explain Deadlines and Reasons

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Nugget 19: You will get far more engagement from the people you work with if you give them a decent and full reason why you are asking them to go above and beyond.

Explanation:

Very often managers, project leaders, or directors, just state “oh, we need to meet deadline X” when they are asking for an extra push from teams and seem to infer that just because a deadline exists that all other people regard that as in some way critical.

But I have found that spending five minutes of giving a decent explanation in your communications as to why you genuinely need it, and the end consequence you are trying to avoid by asking for extra effort works wonders, And by that I do not mean threatening “If action X does not get completed by the end of this week, then director Z will be mad”. 1

Show people valid business orientated consequence in a non threatening way. Ask for their assistance to solve a slightly more holistic problem. Don’t just demand, don’t just threaten. You can chase, you can cajole, but if you give people a good reason, then they will help you and understand why, doing it this way also aids them in providing answers as to why you are jumping the queue, If they have a good reason they can also use that to give to their boss to try and get extra resources for this kind of issue.

Ultimately, give people solid reasons, if your work is so important they should be easy to supply.

 

Disclaimer: As always these posts are not aimed at anyone client or employer and are just my personal observations over a lifetime of dealing with both management and frontline associates.

  1. The very worst incarnation of this push for deadline without a reason issue, is when the people doing the work know what the deadline is and the reasons for it, but you chase for them earlier. A perfect example is if something has to be done before the end of a day and people plan their work accordingly, But you are chasing them for an update at 9.30am. This helps no one, it doesn’t mean the project will be done better, quicker, or more professionally, it just means that the team is no longer going to give you any update unlessed force. Because you are unreasonable with your update expectations.[↩]

Corporate term: “Magical 5 year old football”

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Definition:

A situation inside a corporation where there is one point of interest which causes everyone to cluster in one place, ignoring all of the current essentials that require that their existing coverage be maintained.

Explanation:

This is a phrase heard at a security conference that quite gave me the giggles and in context, it means that if there is a large security incident or general outage, suddenly everybody in the corporation from network and security people to management, all suddenly cluster around this one issue, getting in each other’s way and not being efficient, just kicking at the problem without any plan. Everyone wants to be seen leaping to the most important thing, abandoning their current duties and leaving the space open for a more coordinated assault by competitors or bad agents.

 

Disclaimer: As always these posts are not aimed at anyone client or employer and are just my personal observations over a lifetime of dealing with both management and frontline associates.