Work Management

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10 Tips to Effectively Communicate With Stakeholders

26 January 2012 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

Keeping an open and effective line of communication with stakeholders is important. A couple of years ago I stumbled on this list of tips for presenting to stakeholders, which is worth rehashing. Sometimes it seems like a thirty-minute meeting can be over in sixty seconds. Stakeholders sometimes have short attention spans, so if you don’t capture their attention in the first minute or two, they’ll start checking their email and watching the clock or worse—bail on your meeting.

Anyone involved in project-based work has to deal with sponsors and stakeholders. With that in mind, here are ten tips that might help your presentations:

Pique their interest: An agenda is always a good idea, but a brief summary of what will be discussed is even better. Plus, it gives stakeholders a take-away and allows them to come prepared with questions.
Don’t assume they know their job as stakeholder: They might understand the high-level view, but you will probably need to fill in the details.
Keep it simple: Give them the situation in straightforward terms. Don’t overwhelm them with information. Cut to the chase. (However, be prepared for a deeper dive if they start asking questions.)
Use numbers and pictures: PowerPoint is a great tool for presenting graphics and numbers to stakeholders. It’s how they present information to each other. You should too.
Sometimes you have to use logic: Accept the fact that there might not always be data to support a particular situation. Not having numbers to back up your position could make a successful argument problematic, so you may have to turn to “if … then …” logic to shed light on a situation. However, don’t expect the same results or response from stakeholders—numbers rule with them.
Waiting is never a good option: Don’t wait until a problem is obvious—it’s often more difficult to solve the issue at that point.
Always offer a solution: If you are going to bring up a problem without offering a potential solution, you might as well tell the stakeholders, “Fire me now.” Finding solutions is part of your job as project manager.
Specify the actions required of them: If stakeholders need to take action, don’t assume it will be obvious to them. Restate—in list form—what actions need to be taken and when.
Always say “yes,” but make sure they understand how much “yes” costs: Sponsors and stakeholders don’t like to be told “no,” so don’t do it. Just make sure they understand the cost of their request, so they can judge for themselves whether or not “yes” is worth it.
Don’t stop reporting status because stakeholders stop requiring it: Perception is reality. If stakeholders perceive that you aren’t doing anything—your not. Don’t let your head be the next one on the chopping block.

Regardless of your company’s work management methodology, there are a lot of project management tools available to help manage tasks and time-lines—some will help you more effectively communicate with the stakeholders in your organization. Whether or not your chosen project management tool facilitates that kind of communication, ignoring that important part of your role as project manager is dangerous. What do you do in your organization to encourage a positive relationship with stakeholders?

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The Pain of Change

6 January 2012 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

Benjamin Franklin said, “In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes.”

Implementing change is never easy. When change does happen, particularly within the project management process, most of the common implementation problems are really excuses—not roadblocks.

Knowing (and then educating everyone involved with the change) upfront about what to expect can make the culture shock a little easier to deal with. I’ve noticed over the years that “fear of change” in most cases is a fear of the unknown. Here are some of the most common fears that organizations face as they try to implement new methodologies:

It’s different. Realizing that there are some people who really thrive on change, but most people don’t, is important. You might get push-back simply because it’s a change. I think the key here is to understand that sometimes it takes time for people to embrace the change. Whether it’s a new practice, a new process or a new boss—giving people time to accept change is important.
Some people (managers and team members) are uncomfortable with the additional scrutiny that often accompanies change. If your organization is implementing a project review process to evaluate potential projects, some stakeholders might be a little nervous that their proposed projects might not stand up up to peer review. It’s important to realize that projects that might be important to one senior manager or stakeholder might not be important to another. Making the review process transparent and understandable to everyone often helps reduce those types of concerns.
Some projects are more important than others. Implementing a sound work management methodology will mean only those projects that provide the most business value will get pushed forward—not the “pet” projects of influential stakeholders. Because this might negatively impact some projects, there are stakeholders that may try to block the process.
There are tough decisions to be made. Sometimes it’s not easy for decision-makers to make choices regarding projects and people, but it has to happen. It’s important that senior managers understand that they have a responsibility to the organization—not just their individual departments or careers. There will be some who don’t like this fact.
Implementing change takes time. Regardless of the change, it never happens overnight. It takes time to implement new methods, it takes time for people to accept the change and accommodating for that time is crucial for change initiatives to be successful.

With any change, there will be those who embrace the change and others who don’t. Be prepared for both and your efforts will be successful. What are some of the challenges you have successfully faced when implementing change.

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Iterative Approach to Work Management Execution

23 November 2011 - POSTED by Jackie Golden

Are you managing the work? People? Or an Organizational framework?

I am always fascinated by the way many corporate cultures can thrive on turning everyday work into the most complex, convoluted, costly and time consuming way to get anything done in their organizations.

It’s like taking something as simple as getting dressed in the morning, where you just pick out a shirt and pants or dress and shoes and you’re good to go; and turn it into a complex process by which you must:

Know the weather for the next day
Consider the season your in,
Choose things within the color palette of that season
Determine the right accessories
Assess the right kind of shoes

Now that you have the basic outfit chosen you also must take into consideration all the What Ifs that may happen during the day:

The weather changes part way through day
An invitation to an engagement after work
A last minute special meeting or lunch that day
And on and on and on…….

Now we’ve taken the simplest process that we do everyday and turned it into an exhaustive, complex process in which you couldn’t possible predict all the scenarios that you might run into that could make the outfit you chose for the day completely ineffective.

How do we simplify our thought process and mindset to tackle any type of work, project, or process no matter the complexity in a way that provides confidence of consistent delivery in a simplistic way?

There are two schools of thought on this topic:

1. Traditional Approach – which takes a formal plan for all scope of work and completes a formal set of processes along with a formal testing timeframe and rigid requirements for a final deployment.

2. Iterative Approach – which takes a phased approach of planning smaller scopes of the work, process or project and completes a simplified set of processes along with a unit test in a shorter timeframe to deployment.

The Traditional approach is linear and very formalized where as the Iterative approach is parallel and collaborative. The following graphic shows the difference in timeline effectiveness:

Traditional vs. Iterative Approach

The interesting observations I’ve made in interviewing customers over the last year around how they really get work done, deliver on projects and automate their processes are that they all follow a common process:

Real Time Collaboration

The answer to getting organizations to function more effectively and truly understand what it takes to get work done and deliver on the important aspects of the business that produces consistent quality delivered as expected are to marry these concepts together.

There is definitely the need to have a structured approach to more complex projects and processes to create the consistent quality delivery as planned or expected. However, the way we traditionally plan these projects in all the common tools out there, is very linear and that’s not how organizations work and get things done.

After all, let’s be honest, the only reason we have these structured Project methodologies that we track in various tools is for reporting. At least that has been the tradition over the last 30 years I have been managing people, processes, projects and various types of work. This forces people to estimate what they believe the work will be defined as and plan it, which is inherently linear.

In contrast to that, when you observe a successful launch of a program, delivery of a project or the management of an efficient process and ask how the team got there; it will be anything but linear. It will reveal that the team collaborated on the plan, worked through some design considerations, made changes on the fly, made decisions as they went in a continually collaborative way, executed on the tasks, solved problems real time in parallel to moving other tasks along to ensure they all met the end target on time and on budget. They did this by defining smaller scopes of work for the project in a prioritized fashion and delivered over a shorter period of time in phases. They then created continuous improvement processes that made corrections as needed to these programs, processes and projects in a collaborative effective manner.

In combining the idea of an Iterative Methodology with the a flexible Real Time Collaboration approach, you get a work management framework that will enable your organizations to do the following:

A. Deliver more projects with higher success rates,

B. Build time and people efficient processes in a real time continuous improvement environment,

C. While managing the day-to-day “lights on” tasks seamlessly in the stream of structured work flowing through the organization.

I challenge you to try this in one department or group in your organization and witness the freedom of not managing a structured framework, but managing the ability to execute more effectively by trusting your people to get the work done the best way possible. I guarantee you will learn things about your organization and processes of your company that you never knew before. It will open your mind to the potential of what you really could do as an organization contributing to the overall company or innovating your company as whole.

As always, I welcome your commentary and thoughts on this new and innovative way to manage organizations more effectively as we move into an uncharted territory around creating nimble, fast growing, global and profitable companies.

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Facebook Access and Smart Phone Options over Salary?

4 November 2011 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

The headline in Austin Carr’s recent article for Fast Company reads: Half of Young Professionals Value Facebook Access, Smartphone Options over Salary: Report. I have to admit, although I appreciate that money isn’t everything, this blew my mind.

“For a whole new generation of tech-savvy young professionals, having access to social media or the right smartphone in the workplace is at times more important than earning a higher salary. For business, that means adapting to this change in priorities rather than resisting it—if the Mad Men-era job force expected noon whiskeys and female secretaries, then our modern-day equivalent demands Facebook and iPhones,” writes Carr.

At first glance, it might be easy to say, “Geesh, these guys just want to goof off on Facebook all day.” I don’t think that’s the case. In fact, their desire to stay connected to their network could be a very good thing for project teams—provided we can expand their network to include their colleagues at work, can make the work they do something interesting enough to collaborate about and create tools that leverage what we’ve learned from watching this generation communicate and collaborate via social media.

These findings come from Cisco’s second annual Connected to World Technology Report, released yesterday. “Cisco’s findings are telling of a generation that’s been glued to LCD screens and wired to social networks from an early age. According to the report, 40% of college students and 45% of young professionals would accept lower-paying jobs if they had more access to social media, more choice in the devices they could use at work, and more flexibility in working remotely,” says Carr. “More than half of the college students surveyed indicated that if an employer banned access to networks like Facebook at work, ‘they would either not accept a job offer from them or would join and find a way to circumvent.’”

Although many business leaders are going to read this report with some consternation because of the potential for abuse, Cisco is trying to figure out ways to take advantage of the findings.

I don’t think it’s a secret that our personal lives and professional lives are becoming less clearly defined. My company provides me with an iPhone that I am allowed to use for personal purposes. In fact, every full-time employee in the company has one. Of course, having the phone gives them access to us 24/7—but there are very few employees who are ever required to take an after hours phone call or answer an email. For most of the company its simply a nice perk. However there are times when it’s easier for me to answer an email in the evening or take a phone call on Saturday afternoon than it is to put things off until Monday. My professional life and my private life are less compartmentalized than they were 30 years ago—it’s just my life.

We’ve talked before about how the Millennial Generation has been collaborating and working on teams since elementary school. The same is true for their use of technology that facilitates collaboration via social media. I don’t think this trend is going to change any time soon. And although it might be pandering to the younger members of the workforce, they aren’t the only folks “plugged in” to Facebook. Many of my contemporaries are updating their pages just as often—in not more frequently.

Just how do we leverage this information into something relevant that we can incorporate within the project environment?

Make the project environment a little more flexible: Give the team some input into how they do their job, when they do their job and who they do it with. I have younger colleagues who are online sending emails, writing code or otherwise getting stuff done in the wee hours of the morning—long after I’ve gone to bed. Yeah, they might not show up as early as I do the next day, but if they are able to get their work done, does it really matter?
Provide tools that leverage the social media metaphor to make collaboration easier and more intuitive for them: I know this is going to be considered coddling to the younger generation by some, but if a more social media-like approach works, why is that a bad thing? It’s easy to understand and the medium has become so ubiquitous that even the gray-hairs I pal around with are totally connected. Why not save ourselves some brain damage and create the environment that seems to work?
Recognize accomplishments and provide feedback—regularly and frequently: This generation has become accustomed to an almost consent stream of feedback regarding what they’re doing. It’s been a part of their experience in school and social media has made it a part of their life. Is it any wonder they want to stay “connected” at work? I think the effort it might take to do that in the workplace will be well worth it.

Would I choose Facebook over a bump in salary? Nope. But I communicate, collaborate and otherwise productively get work done every day by using social media and social media-inspired work management tools.

What do you think?

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Does Your Team Work Like a Well-Oiled Machine?

25 October 2011 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

Over the weekend I spent several hundred miles on my motorcycle tooling around Utah. It’s easy to take for granted that the motorcycle is going to function properly, but sometimes when I’m out in the middle of nowhere I have to ask myself, “Is there anything you forgot to check before you left?” Not that I expect anything to go wrong, but even being as few as 30 miles away from the next town could be a problem on some of the lightly-traveled roads I like to ride.

Regardless of the type of work we do, keeping the team working well together is sometimes challenging when project teams are composed of team members with various experience and skill levels. Here are a couple of suggestions that might keep your team working like a well-oiled machine:

Technology can help keep the team together: I always carry a cell phone when I’m out on a ride so I can call for help if there ever is an emergency. Project teams can leverage technology in the same way to work together regardless of where they work in the world. The Internet has made it possible for project leaders in Europe to manage teams in China or South America, and executives in Cincinnati to have access to real project information to make informed decisions.
Because you don’t always get to pick your team, you need to make the most out of the team you’ve got: Most of the time project leaders don’t get to pick their team—nor does the team get to pick their project leader. Building a good working relationship with everyone on the team is important. Earlier this month, I went on a big group ride with 400 or 500 people I didn’t know. Despite the fact that most of us had never met before, we had to trust that nobody would do anything really dumb on the road. What’s more, there were a number of people I got to know and really had a good time.
It’s not fair to expect any team member to do all the heavy lifting: When I ride with someone, it’s usually my brother-in-law Paul. Although he’s been riding a lot longer than I have, it wouldn’t be fair if I left all the ride planning up to him for every ride. The same is true for project teams, the same team members shouldn’t be expected to do all the heavy lifting for the team. When everyone works together and carries their share of the burdens associated with a project, the project is more likely to be successful and the team is more likely to pull together as they all work to overcome challenges and help with the heavy lifting.
Stronger and more capable team members should mentor and help less experienced team members improve their skills: I’m a firm believer in always learning and improving skills, at work and in everything else I do. When Paul and I ride together, once we’ve returned home, we usually talk about the ride. We talk about how we could have made it a better, safer ride. Our goal is to make sure we’re safe and have a good time. Similarly, how we treat less experienced members of the team and potential learning experiences can positively or negatively impact how they perceive their role on the team. I will always be grateful to the more senior people who took an interest in me during the early years of my career and taught me the things that didn’t appear in the HR manual or company training.

Successful teams don’t just happen. Neither do productive working relationships. As project leaders, it’s important for us to remember that we need to build an environment where healthy collaboration and communication can thrive. We need to us the technology and interpersonal skills at our disposal to foster a good team environment—which is no less important than the project management software we use, the work management methodology we employ or the details of our project plan.

What do you do to keep your team working like a well-oiled machine?

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Project Leaders and Making Decisions

22 September 2011 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

decsions Over the years I have participated in a number of discussions (debates really) about whether or not project managers are decision makers. The opinions seem to be pretty polarized. The camp that says "NO" argues that the executives in the organization make the strategic decisions and project managers execute those decisions. In most organizations this is probably true.

Those that argue "YES" (and I find myself in this camp), argue that depending on the size and dynamic of the organization many project managers are a part of the strategic discussion. They might not make "the" decision, but they are part of the process. What’s more, project leaders make all kinds of decisions every day. With that in mind, I think it’s important for project leaders to build some sound decision-making practices. Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert once said, "Informed decision-making comes from a long tradition of guessing and then blaming others for inadequate results."

Adams might be describing many organizations, but it doesn’t have to describe yours or how you interact with the decision-making process. Most companies don’t foster good decision-making practices—handicapping project leaders, project teams and their organizations. The answers to the following three questions will help your organization foster a workable decision-making process:

Who? Prior to the beginning of any project, determining who has decision-making power is the first step. Of course on most projects, there will likely be several decision makers.
What? Different members of the team will probably have different decision-making responsibilities based upon their role. Identifying the scope of everyone’s responsibility regarding the type of decisions they can and can’t make avoids confusion and makes it possible to streamline the process. Nobody wants to "Mother, may I?" every move they make, nor should the project leader or stakeholders be expected to make every decision.
How? Identifying how decisions are made and how they are shared with project team members is almost as important as the decision itself.

Regardless of you work management practices or project management tools, making project decisions is part of a project leader’s job. What’s more, it’s been said that in-decision becomes decision with time.

The Chinese philosopher Confucius suggested, "By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is the noblest, Second: by imitation, which is the easiest; and Third, by experience which is the bitterest."

I don’t think there’s anyone who has to make decisions on a regular basis who wouldn’t agree with Mr. Confucius. What do you do within your organization or project team to foster good decision-making practices?

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10 Famous Failures and 9 Ways to Spot a Failing Project

4 August 2011 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

Failure Failure is not uncommon. According to growthink.com, here are 10 Famous Failures that you might remember (if you visit the above link, you can actually see the commercials for these products):

10. Sony Betamax: It may have been higher quality, but the lower price of VHS-C camcorders and the 40+ companies that decided to run with VHS was just too much.

9. New Coke: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. There was nothing wrong with old Coke.

8. Polaroid Instant Home Movies: A reputation for standing around shaking a photo that may or may not have come our right was probably too big a hurdle to overcome for the instant film manufacturer.

7. Crystal Pepsi: See #9 (New Coke)

6. McDonalds Arch Deluxe Burger: Most adults don’t consider McDonalds fine cuisine, and weren’t interested in paying significantly more for only slightly different burgers.

5. Apple Lisa: Apple was targeting business consumers, and the lower price tag of IBM PCs just didn’t allow Apple to capture much market-share.

4. Levi Type 1 Jeans: Fashion is fickle.

3. IBM PCjr: When it was introduced, it was twice as expensive as an Atari or Commodore.

2. The DeLorean DMC-12: Despite the fact that it was a very cool car, DeLorean himself took the company under after he was arrested for drug-trafficking which resulted in bankruptcy.

1. The Ford Edsel: There were many reasons why the Edsel failed. The name for one. The Edsel story is now a real-world example of how not to market a product.

Although the above examples are all products that failed, it got me thinking about the number of project failures that happen every year. Fortunately, when projects are in trouble, there are early warning signs (if you’re watching). The earliest signs might be hard to measure, but easy to recognize if you’re paying attention:

Lack of Interest: Whether it’s a lack of interest within the project team or among the project stakeholders, it’s often demonstrated by people not showing up for meetings, a lack of active participation and feedback, or a poorly organized user base. This is an early warning sign of a project in trouble.
Poor Communication: If nobody is communicating, including stakeholders, team members and end users, there could be a problem.
Lack of Velocity: Projects should always be moving forward. The best way to keep a good velocity is to divide your project into small deliverables at frequent intervals. If the project isn’t moving forward, it’s likely in trouble.
A "No-Bad-News" Environment: Nobody likes to be the bearer of bad news, but sometimes organizations need to face the reality of negative news. This includes project team members who don’t want to be the messenger and business leaders who tend to shoot the messenger. If there isn’t an environment where the communication is honest about "reality", projects tend to fail.

You don’t need to depend on some of the intangible signs that a project is in trouble, there are also a number of easily measurable signs as well:

Lots of Overtime: A project running on schedule should have little or no overtime. Overtime is often a quick fix, but leads to poor employee health resulting from too much caffeine, too many late nights and too much junk food. (It also leads to mistakes.)
Diversion of Resources: When people are pulled from one project to work on something else, it could be a sign of trouble. If you’ve budgeted your people properly, a few hours here and there on a troubled project can quickly add up and cascade down, endangering healthy projects.
Ratios Trouble: Cost ratios and schedule ratios are financial metrics that allow business leaders to measure budgeted time and money verses money and time actually spent. Without metrics, all you have to rely on is the accuracy of communication you receive from project teams.
Milestones Aren’t Met: This is pretty obvious, but it is surprising how many times this warning sign is ignored. Small, discrete and often, are the guidelines for the milestones of a successful project.
Scope Changes: A common approach to shoring up a lagging project is to change the scope. Eliminating features or relaxing requirements is not uncommon, but if project teams are doing it because the project is struggling, it’s a huge warning sign of danger ahead.

Of course, warning signs are not the work management harbinger of doom, they are just warning signs that a project might be in trouble. Depending on how your organization handles project-based work, the right project management tools can help identify potential problems early, when there’s still time to do something about them.

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Do You Remember?

3 August 2011 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

the little people I think it was Geoff Crane (@papercutpm) who suggested a while back that you wouldn’t walk into the carpenter shop, lay down the power screwdriver on the bench and expect it to build a piece of furniture. It’s not the tool—it’s the carpenter.

I was talking with a friend of mine the other day and she shared with me what I think is a pretty common workplace complaint. "My boss has forgotten what it’s like to actually do the work." Have you ever felt this way? I know I have.

I don’t think it matters if you’re a project leader or have any leadership responsibilities, if you’re not paying attention, it’s easy to forget what it’s like to be the individual contributor at the team level. Although there are some project leaders who have never actually worked as a member of the project team prior to becoming a PM, I think most of us have. Do you remember what it was like?

It’s easy to forget that it doesn’t really matter what work management methods you use or what project management software you log into, the real linchpin to project success is your team. Do you spend enough time outside of your office working with the team? Do you have a complete understanding of the part they play in project success?

You might be surprised to know that a little over a year ago AtTask sponsored some very enlightening research conducted by the folks at Forrester regarding this topic. They asked knowledge workers if their managers completely understood their contribution and what they did. 40% said NO. It was even worse for the executives. 60% said NO.

I feel like I have a pretty good handle on what my project team is doing and I imagine that you probably feel that way too. Unfortunately, perception is reality, and this research suggests that our teams don’t see it that way.

So what do we do?

I think there are three things that will help move the needle:

Step away from the computer and spend time working on the project with the team. Take an active part in the project as an individual contributor if you can. At the very least, make sure you understand the limitations of the work environment so you can remove roadblocks and impediments to performance.
Keep your door open. Be accessible. It might feel like you’re making more work for yourself that way, but part of your role as project manager is to lead the people on your team, which means they need access to you.
Pay attention to team member accomplishment and acknowledge them appropriately. For the most part, people are proud of what they do, and a little recognition for accomplishing something difficult goes a long way. When appropriate, praise should be public and specific. Vague platitudes don’t work.

Like most things, these suggestions are not original to me. I’ve picked them up over the years from wise mentors or the school of hard knocks—but that doesn’t make them any less valuable. Simple as they sound, give them a try and see if your team doesn’t come to appreciate the fact that you understand what they do (and maybe they’ll even be willing to do a little more at those times when you need a little extra effort).

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Are You a Tortoise or a Hare?

29 July 2011 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

tortoise and hare I’ve recently come to discover something about myself. I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting older, or if I’ve always been this way—but it has felt kind of revelatory to me.

I’m a tortoise rather than a hare.

This might not come as a surprise to any of my colleagues, but I think I’m more of a "slow and steady wins the race" sort of guy. I’m going to assume that you all know the story of the tortoise and the hare—if you don’t, click HERE to read more about it.

I have always felt that I am the willing accomplice of change. Change doesn’t frighten me, I like the change in scenery and attitudes that come with implementing change. However, I’m not a big fan of change for change sake (which I think makes me more like the tortoise than the hare). I think this is particularly true within the project environment.

Although I am a real advocate of taking a new look at the project management process with fresh eyes, I’m not advocating a new approach simply because it’s new. I think we need to change the way we manage process and work with teams because the current system is broken. Over the last thirty years, I’ve seen the workforce dynamic change—particularly with the millennial generation—while the way management interacts with the workforce hasn’t kept up.

In my opinion, slow and steady wins the race, and change for change sake doesn’t make sense, but many organizations are coming to the realization that it’s time for a new work management paradigm. The days of command-and-control are fast dissipating and being replaced by a more democratic work management approach.

I don’t think there’s any question that an engaged workforce is the linchpin to a successful project-based organization (or any organization for that matter). Creating that environment requires that project leaders empower team members to create and invent—which the traditional top-down project management approach stifles. Our role as project leaders needs to become one of facilitation, not command-and-control.

Are you a tortoise or a hare? What are you doing to create a more democratic project environment?

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Intellectual or Genius?

27 July 2011 - POSTED by Ty Kiisel

Genius at Work Albert Einstein said, "Intellectuals solve problems, geniuses prevent them."

As more and more organizations turn to project management best practices to increase efficiency and productivity in the workplace, I think it’s important that we consider Einstein’s advice in regard to how we approach the challenges of project-based work.

That being said, I acknowledge that projects are inherently risky and messy things (otherwise they wouldn’t be projects in the first place), and many organizations’ risk aversion actually hampers their ability to execute on meaningful and potentially profitable projects. However, we can (and should) take steps to anticipate challenges to prevent as many as is humanly possible and what’s more, an often overlooked project management best practice is an invaluable tool to facilitate the the genius within.

Learning from experience is an important tool in project environments that are constantly changing. In my opinion, in order to successfully learn from experience, we need to take a regular and consistent approach that can be incorporated into any work management methodology. Here are a few suggestions to help any project team learn from experience:

Establish a venue for sharing lessons learned: It doesn’t matter whether you call it a post-mortem, a project review or a project retrospective, most organizations don’t do them—but they should. It’s a real shame that many project teams move from one project to another without ever taking a breath; let alone taking the opportunity to capture lessons learned from the last project.
Share what has been learned: Although many organizations don’t take the time to do any kind of project retrospective, very few of those that do share what they’ve learned. If lessons learned are captured and then tucked away in a file somewhere, the exercise doesn’t do any good. Not only your own team, but other teams within the organization can benefit from a culture that freely shares lessons learned upon the completion of a project.
Learning doesn’t work as a "corporate" initiative: It’s natural for organizations to try to formalize the learning process into a forced and contrived corporate project. Although a natural learning environment should be encouraged, "corporate" is all too often the same as "bureaucratic," which employees are more likely to avoid.
Don’t make learning a one-time activity: Project learning should be ongoing and interactive. Don’t let it become an isolated activity that happens rarely.

No two organizations are exactly the same. For that matter, no two projects are exactly the same either. Regardless of your project management methodology, it’s important to create a culture and environment where project learning can take place. What does your company do to capture best practices and learn from experience?

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