Project managers are the worst to manage. You need a system for yourself.
Andrew Meyer left a comment on Project Manager Interview Questions recently. I started to leave a reply and realized this would be a great post. Here is Andrew’s comment, the context is related to what to ask candidates in an interview for a project management position.
Actually, my favorite question involves two parts. I like to find something major that happened in their personal life, like getting married. My second question is whether they put a project schedule and project plan etc. together for their wedding?
I’ve never yet had someone say that they put together a project plan for their wedding, trip, house sale etc. My follow on question is “Why?” There are multiple parties involved who need to know what is happening and multiple deadlines that have to be met, isn’t that just like a project? If project management is so helpful and they rave about how useful it is at work, why don’t they use it personally?
A question I’d love to know the answer too.
Interesting question Andrew.
I’m not sure I care much if they use these things in their personal lives. Additionally, questions that are geared towards their personal lives makes me a little uncomfortable anyway. I just care about how they behave when at work.
I know what you’re getting at though. How about questions around how they keep themselves organized and on task at work? How do they ensure they “get things done?”
For instance, I have put some systems in place for myself that are sort of like really scaled-down versions of some project management processes. Do they fit my definition of a “project?” No. It doesn’t matter though, project management skills can be applied to just about anything. Let’s talk about mini project task management.
Manage Your Inbox Like a Mini-Project
- Initiation: Hmmm…perhaps the act of putting this system in place is the “initiation”
- Planning: Scheduled blocks of time to address email. When I’ve been out of the office, additional time is reserved specifically for this.
- Executing: When it’s “email time” I work each one immediately and if I need to, I create a new task for myself.
- Monitoring & Controlling: Smack myself around if I get distracted. If it took me a long time to get through my email, I figure out why. Usually I got distracted and didn’t realize it. Then I kick myself. (bruise = lessons learned file)
- Closing: When I’m done, my email box always contains 0 unread messages. That’s my “deliverable” and how I know I’m done.
Manage Small Activities as they Arise Like Mini-Projects
I have a folder on my hard drive called “activities” that includes “active”, “completed”, and “cancelled” sub-folders. The image to the right is an example.
- Initiation: Whenever there is a new activity that is going to take more than a day or that I want to be able to refer back to, I create a new folder in the “active” folder with the naming convention “yyyy-mm-dd [activity name]“. The date is creation date, and I don’t change it. This is my working directory for all notes, files, etc. related to the activity. By creating the folder I have “authorized” myself to work on this mini-project.
- Planning: My “active” folder serves as a way for me to plan my days. I block out time on my calendar to work specific activities this way, using the information in the folders to help estimate how much time I will need. Depending on the activity, I will sometimes sketch out a quick WBS to be sure I do everything to acheive the objective(s).
- Executing: Having scheduled time, the execution takes place with the relevant subfolder open on my PC. If I go talk to people to make things happen, I leave it up. I record conversations here, save files as needed, etc. Everything is in one place.
- Monitoring & Controlling: Starting with [yyyy-mm-dd] means I can sort activities by the date they were started. The goal is to keep the number of folders in the “active” category low, and the oldest ones get natural attention when I review the folder.
- Closing: When I’m finished, I move the whole folder to “completed”. I can search at any time for future reference.
Benefits of These Approaches
- Focus – These approaches have a way of keeping me on-task by insisting on single-threading my attention.
- Accountability – It’s easy to see if I’ve been slacking off. The email screams at me and my “active” folder items stare menacingly.
- Clear Scope – my task list and activities folder are unambigous. Managing real projects has trained me to be unambigous when I name anything.
- Documentation - I keep all my email and activities files. Email is easy to search because it’s all in the inbox, just in a read state. I don’t use rules or subfolders with email. It’s amazing how handy my repository of these “mini-projects” on my hard drive has proven to be. I can do a search and find documentation of relevant conversations, documentation, links, and everything relevant to a particular “mini-project” very quickly. When I left my last employer, I handed off nearly 2 years of organized documentation to my replacement.
How do you project manage your life?
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{ 35 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Josh – good post. This is a part of project management I never thought of before but I can see how useful it is!
Laura
Thanks Laura!
This can really apply as a time management system for just about anyone in an office environment who has “mini-projects”. Especially managers I think.
This is just some of what I do, but there are a lot of great systems out there that may work better than what I do for some people. This is what works for me.
Hi Josh – good post. This is a part of project management I never thought of before but I can see how useful it is!
Laura
Thanks Laura!
This can really apply as a time management system for just about anyone in an office environment who has “mini-projects”. Especially managers I think.
This is just some of what I do, but there are a lot of great systems out there that may work better than what I do for some people. This is what works for me.
Josh,
thanks for the inclusion. I agree with you, prying in people’s private lives is not a great idea, but I wouldn’t hire a sys admin who hasn’t created home networks and done crazy sh*t like linking airplanes to them or a developer who doesn’t write programs for themselves. (usually games…)
For that matter, I wouldn’t hire an accountant or book keeper whose desk wasn’t perfectly neat. My favorite book keeper will align my stapler if I put it down sideways on my desk. I’ve never wondered if she’s going to miss an entry in the accounts.
I’m the same way myself. How did I know I should be in computers? In college wrote a program that alerted me when I a girl I was interested in, logged on. It enabled me to popup a screen with a heart in the center that we could chat through. Furthermore, I knew I would lose my nerve, so programatically my fourth message asked her out on a date.
Our dating wasn’t quite as successful as my programming, but that’s getting too personal. A happy memory I hadn’t thought about until I started writing this…
For me, I prefer hiring people who don’t separate what they do for fun from what they do for work. I’m not so great at the planning part, but I make up for it with the obsession part.
My business partner, who takes a different view, chastises me for being a hobbiest more than a businessman. He’s right. That’s why he’s my partner and why he handles the contracts.
Hobbyists probably don’t make good project managers. You probably need both, though wouldn’t you be more inclined to hire a PM who came to the interview and showed you an example of how he project managed his wedding? With someone whose that obsessive, you don’t have to worry about the details – in my opinion.
I see what you are saying. 8-9 years ago I was hiring for technical support people. It ended up that a lot of the people I hired had no formal work experience, but were definitely geeks and played around with technology ALL the time.
However, I didn’t ask them this. It came out because I set up role playing scenarios for them to demonstrate their skill. I put a computer in front of them, having broken several things on purpose to judge their ability to troubleshoot logically.
Many of them would volunteer that they play around with these things all the time. To me though, the proof is in the pudding. I want to see someone doing it so I can judge their skill.
In the case of hiring project managers, I coached someone through an interview process recently. The company did a mock customer meeting to initiate a new project, and the candidates ran the meeting. Now THAT’s a good test. If someone blows my socks off in a role playing scenario like that, I don’t care if they obsess at home or not.
Josh,
thanks for the inclusion. I agree with you, prying in people’s private lives is not a great idea, but I wouldn’t hire a sys admin who hasn’t created home networks and done crazy sh*t like linking airplanes to them or a developer who doesn’t write programs for themselves. (usually games…)
For that matter, I wouldn’t hire an accountant or book keeper whose desk wasn’t perfectly neat. My favorite book keeper will align my stapler if I put it down sideways on my desk. I’ve never wondered if she’s going to miss an entry in the accounts.
I’m the same way myself. How did I know I should be in computers? In college wrote a program that alerted me when I a girl I was interested in, logged on. It enabled me to popup a screen with a heart in the center that we could chat through. Furthermore, I knew I would lose my nerve, so programatically my fourth message asked her out on a date.
Our dating wasn’t quite as successful as my programming, but that’s getting too personal. A happy memory I hadn’t thought about until I started writing this…
For me, I prefer hiring people who don’t separate what they do for fun from what they do for work. I’m not so great at the planning part, but I make up for it with the obsession part.
My business partner, who takes a different view, chastises me for being a hobbiest more than a businessman. He’s right. That’s why he’s my partner and why he handles the contracts.
Hobbyists probably don’t make good project managers. You probably need both, though wouldn’t you be more inclined to hire a PM who came to the interview and showed you an example of how he project managed his wedding? With someone whose that obsessive, you don’t have to worry about the details – in my opinion.
I see what you are saying. 8-9 years ago I was hiring for technical support people. It ended up that a lot of the people I hired had no formal work experience, but were definitely geeks and played around with technology ALL the time.
However, I didn’t ask them this. It came out because I set up role playing scenarios for them to demonstrate their skill. I put a computer in front of them, having broken several things on purpose to judge their ability to troubleshoot logically.
Many of them would volunteer that they play around with these things all the time. To me though, the proof is in the pudding. I want to see someone doing it so I can judge their skill.
In the case of hiring project managers, I coached someone through an interview process recently. The company did a mock customer meeting to initiate a new project, and the candidates ran the meeting. Now THAT’s a good test. If someone blows my socks off in a role playing scenario like that, I don’t care if they obsess at home or not.
Josh,
Many of the things I do at home have helped me significantly on the job.
My best example (um, I wrote and article on it http://hubpages.com/hub/Quicken-Is-A-Great-Project-Management-Tool) was on financial management. I found my detailed tracking of personal finances made working with ever larger budgets and more complex accounting systems almost easy.
At one company I motivated our Director of Finance to get our financial system improved by threatening to, with the other Directors, pool our pocket change and buy copies of Quicken.
There are a lot of things one can do at home, that not only helps at home, but helps prepare one for doing better at work.
Regards,
Bruce
Josh,
Many of the things I do at home have helped me significantly on the job.
My best example (um, I wrote and article on it http://hubpages.com/hub/Quicken-Is-A-Great-Project-Management-Tool) was on financial management. I found my detailed tracking of personal finances made working with ever larger budgets and more complex accounting systems almost easy.
At one company I motivated our Director of Finance to get our financial system improved by threatening to, with the other Directors, pool our pocket change and buy copies of Quicken.
There are a lot of things one can do at home, that not only helps at home, but helps prepare one for doing better at work.
Regards,
Bruce
Hi Josh,
In my very successful training courses, one of the “projects” I have been using for years is getting married as an example of “practical” applied project management.
And given I live and work in Asia, where weddings of 3,000 to 20,000 people are not all that unusual (especially in India!!) one can begin to imagine that we are not talking about finding a church, restaraunt and band for a group of a couple of hundred people for a day or so, but events that last for 5, 6, 7 or more days…..
Very interesting to note that if you look at the Association for Certified Professional Wedding Planners http://www.acpwc.com/ you will see an exponential growth, especially over the last 5 years or so.
Bottom line here- As I have been saying for many years, project management is a life skill, that is hard wired into the psyche of human beings. If we didn’t have projects to do, we would INVENT them….. Think about it….. How did we tame fire? How did we start creating stone and then metal tools?
BR,
Dr. PDG, Jakarta
http://www.getpmcertified.com
Hi Josh,
In my very successful training courses, one of the “projects” I have been using for years is getting married as an example of “practical” applied project management.
And given I live and work in Asia, where weddings of 3,000 to 20,000 people are not all that unusual (especially in India!!) one can begin to imagine that we are not talking about finding a church, restaraunt and band for a group of a couple of hundred people for a day or so, but events that last for 5, 6, 7 or more days…..
Very interesting to note that if you look at the Association for Certified Professional Wedding Planners http://www.acpwc.com/ you will see an exponential growth, especially over the last 5 years or so.
Bottom line here- As I have been saying for many years, project management is a life skill, that is hard wired into the psyche of human beings. If we didn’t have projects to do, we would INVENT them….. Think about it….. How did we tame fire? How did we start creating stone and then metal tools?
BR,
Dr. PDG, Jakarta
http://www.getpmcertified.com
PS: One nagging question. Assuming we can more or less be successful at planning thing like weddings (well, maybe a little over budget?) getting a degree, buying a home and other “projects” in the program of life, how is it when we get into our organizations, the process so often breaks down?
Therein lies an important piece of wisdom…..
PS: One nagging question. Assuming we can more or less be successful at planning thing like weddings (well, maybe a little over budget?) getting a degree, buying a home and other “projects” in the program of life, how is it when we get into our organizations, the process so often breaks down?
Therein lies an important piece of wisdom…..
As a Project Manager I do wonder perodically about the value of PM in everyday life. I do think that much of life is process work and PM doesn’t apply to it. I think if you are planning a wedding on an Indian scale, then you do have a project, & I would imagine that professional wedding planners are using techniques that we would all recognise. Of course, if you are trying to make changes in your life then certain elements of PM may be useful, and you can already see them in personal development literature so setting measurable goals, breaking work down into chunks, having a plan, monitoring your results and making adjustments etc. But I think that bringing the full weight of one’s PM techniques and experience to bear on them can be overkill – can’t see myself producing a Gantt chart for moving house.
True Jane. You’d only ever want to use a level of rigor and detail that fits the situation. If it doesn’t add value, throw it overboard.
What I described above is something that doesn’t involve a schedule (except for maybe a rough estimate in a text file), etc. The overhead has to be very low on small stuff like this.
As a Project Manager I do wonder perodically about the value of PM in everyday life. I do think that much of life is process work and PM doesn’t apply to it. I think if you are planning a wedding on an Indian scale, then you do have a project, & I would imagine that professional wedding planners are using techniques that we would all recognise. Of course, if you are trying to make changes in your life then certain elements of PM may be useful, and you can already see them in personal development literature so setting measurable goals, breaking work down into chunks, having a plan, monitoring your results and making adjustments etc. But I think that bringing the full weight of one’s PM techniques and experience to bear on them can be overkill – can’t see myself producing a Gantt chart for moving house.
True Jane. You’d only ever want to use a level of rigor and detail that fits the situation. If it doesn’t add value, throw it overboard.
What I described above is something that doesn’t involve a schedule (except for maybe a rough estimate in a text file), etc. The overhead has to be very low on small stuff like this.
That’s actually hysterical, because I’ve had this conversation with several friends who are also PMs, and we actually build project plans for EVERYTHING (including, thank you very much, our weddings) — dinner parties, moving, New Year’s resolutions/goals, renovation projects, diets, etc.
The truly funny part is that when I tried to gloss over the whole “did you create a project plan for that?” question, they all looked at me, raised their eyebrows and refused to believe me until I confessed.
Oh man, maybe Andrew is hiring!
That’s actually hysterical, because I’ve had this conversation with several friends who are also PMs, and we actually build project plans for EVERYTHING (including, thank you very much, our weddings) — dinner parties, moving, New Year’s resolutions/goals, renovation projects, diets, etc.
The truly funny part is that when I tried to gloss over the whole “did you create a project plan for that?” question, they all looked at me, raised their eyebrows and refused to believe me until I confessed.
Oh man, maybe Andrew is hiring!
I actually do a podcast talking about how to use PM techniques in real life.
I actually do a podcast talking about how to use PM techniques in real life.
Cool Clay, I’ll have to check it out!
There are a number of reasons why I don’t Project Manage my personal life as opposed to my work life.
1) It’s not as much fun, I plan things all of the time but allow myself much more flexibility, especially if there are few or no co-dependents. Also my professional credibility is not at stake.
2) I don’t have to resource plan everybody elses time to ensure deliverables, if I hire somebody to provide a service and they don’t show they don’t get paid and their business suffers, that is a defining factor for them much more than what I have written on my gantt chart.
3) I write ‘To do’ lists at busy times and this keeps me focused and reduces stress. It also helps to clear the head making me more productive in carrying out individual tasks.
4) At work it is important you show your colleagues you know what is going on and what should be happening, so many people just want and wait to be told what to do, it is the only way you can make them accountable is by personally assigning them tasks. A lot of work colleagues will happily devolve responsibility to someone if not made personally accountable for a task. Even then it may be difficult getting the task completed in a timely manner.
5) PMs need to report to senior management regular updates on the project status, usually something graphic with colour and bullet points to keep it simple, this formal feedback is not required in my personal life where much of the feedback is verbal.
It never ceases to amaze me how few people know how to write a project plan or to stick with it throughout a project. One of the worst things is scope creep, another is a poorly written project that forgot a few vital things. If you can’t write a SMART plan (at home or at work) and/or then don’t have the discipline to stick to it the whole process becomes an academic exercise and a bit of a waste of time.
I recently started going to Slimming World to lose weight. I met lots of people who were failing to effectively manage their weight meaning they kept going back for weeks, months or even years. I lost a stone in two weeks and left having achieved my short term goal, I had a deliverable, the people I left behind had a plan without a time constraint and an unlimited budget….not SMART. If I decide to lose another stone or two maybe I’ll go back but to be honest I probably won’t bother.
When you walk down any high street you see many people with no plan and no direction in life, and from time to time they become frustrated at their lack of progress, ask them what their plan is?
NigeeBaby
There are a number of reasons why I don’t Project Manage my personal life as opposed to my work life.
1) It’s not as much fun, I plan things all of the time but allow myself much more flexibility, especially if there are few or no co-dependents. Also my professional credibility is not at stake.
2) I don’t have to resource plan everybody elses time to ensure deliverables, if I hire somebody to provide a service and they don’t show they don’t get paid and their business suffers, that is a defining factor for them much more than what I have written on my gantt chart.
3) I write ‘To do’ lists at busy times and this keeps me focused and reduces stress. It also helps to clear the head making me more productive in carrying out individual tasks.
4) At work it is important you show your colleagues you know what is going on and what should be happening, so many people just want and wait to be told what to do, it is the only way you can make them accountable is by personally assigning them tasks. A lot of work colleagues will happily devolve responsibility to someone if not made personally accountable for a task. Even then it may be difficult getting the task completed in a timely manner.
5) PMs need to report to senior management regular updates on the project status, usually something graphic with colour and bullet points to keep it simple, this formal feedback is not required in my personal life where much of the feedback is verbal.
It never ceases to amaze me how few people know how to write a project plan or to stick with it throughout a project. One of the worst things is scope creep, another is a poorly written project that forgot a few vital things. If you can’t write a SMART plan (at home or at work) and/or then don’t have the discipline to stick to it the whole process becomes an academic exercise and a bit of a waste of time.
I recently started going to Slimming World to lose weight. I met lots of people who were failing to effectively manage their weight meaning they kept going back for weeks, months or even years. I lost a stone in two weeks and left having achieved my short term goal, I had a deliverable, the people I left behind had a plan without a time constraint and an unlimited budget….not SMART. If I decide to lose another stone or two maybe I’ll go back but to be honest I probably won’t bother.
When you walk down any high street you see many people with no plan and no direction in life, and from time to time they become frustrated at their lack of progress, ask them what their plan is?
NigeeBaby
I do agree with NigeeBaby’s views. There is no certainity or even 50% probability that being a good manager of personal life that ensures success as a professional project manager and vice versa. Because personal life always carries some prejudices that brings on the spot compromises to continue the life as one whises to be. But the personal attitude of think before act nature surely helps to some extent in professional life execution. There will not be any second chances in professional life as we all PMs continue to work for the benefit of organization success. The projects can only have binary status, meaning either success or failure. But in personal life, these binary terms are always relative to the specific occassion/incident/situation/ambience/ and cannot be abolute as the interpretation of varies as applicable.
As Josh mentioned earlier, this question can be pertinent to test the PM skill awareness than to evaluate purely based on the response given by the interviewee.
Great points! I’ve seen people who run their whole lives in consistency with how they work, and others who are completely different from one realm to the other.
Some are successful, some are not. Perhaps it’s an indicator, but there isn’t a strong enough correlation there for me to rely on.
I do agree with NigeeBaby’s views. There is no certainity or even 50% probability that being a good manager of personal life that ensures success as a professional project manager and vice versa. Because personal life always carries some prejudices that brings on the spot compromises to continue the life as one whises to be. But the personal attitude of think before act nature surely helps to some extent in professional life execution. There will not be any second chances in professional life as we all PMs continue to work for the benefit of organization success. The projects can only have binary status, meaning either success or failure. But in personal life, these binary terms are always relative to the specific occassion/incident/situation/ambience/ and cannot be abolute as the interpretation of varies as applicable.
As Josh mentioned earlier, this question can be pertinent to test the PM skill awareness than to evaluate purely based on the response given by the interviewee.
Great points! I’ve seen people who run their whole lives in consistency with how they work, and others who are completely different from one realm to the other.
Some are successful, some are not. Perhaps it’s an indicator, but there isn’t a strong enough correlation there for me to rely on.
I had a project plan for my recent move from house to house. Other than that, I have real trouble managing my home like a project-ful environment; I need a break from what I do all day when I get home.
I had a project plan for my recent move from house to house. Other than that, I have real trouble managing my home like a project-ful environment; I need a break from what I do all day when I get home.
I created a “lite” project plan for the remodeling of our kitchen. It was very helpful, right from the get-go. Knowing who were the key stakeholders…the dogs were included!
I am really interested in ejly’s project plan for moving!
I created a “lite” project plan for the remodeling of our kitchen. It was very helpful, right from the get-go. Knowing who were the key stakeholders…the dogs were included!
I am really interested in ejly’s project plan for moving!
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