Book: Peter Flock - Flawless Consulting

A good reference if you want to [re]learn about consulting methods and approaches. Equally useful for internal and external consultants and maps very well to line management. The discovery process and meeting guidelines described would certainly help a line manager understand and deal with conflict.

Books: Tom Markert

A good and short book from Tom Markert "You Can't Win a Fight With Your Boss and 55 other rules for success"

Very easy to read (143 pages in just over one hour)

Lots that sound familiar and more then it's fair share of ah ha moments.

DWYPYWD? read the book and find out.

An Eye for Jeteye

I have just listened to the Lifehack.org podcast with David Hayden of Jeteye.

As soon as I got the chance I registered and straight away I have found the product to be extremely useful and a great booster for me.

The theory is simple. Rather than wander around and create bookmarks use Jeteye to collect objects (files, links, videos etc) into a jetpak. The collection process is a simple but effective drag and drop interface which is very intuitive for today's users. The collection is then stored and highly available from your account page on Jeteye.com.

This jetpak collection can then be shared, with the usual controls over actions, which is a real boost for collaborative and virtual teams.

I'm definitely going to be using it to collect objects around some of my projects (as in the GTD term) and I am going to try and see if I can find a way to overlay it into my organization.

Maybe there are plans to allow a company to deploy it standalone inside a corporate network. It's such a powerful tool for me I could see it easily displace some of the quickplace stuff we use today.

David Seah, Printable CEO - Emergent Task Planning

When I started to get organized in an effort to get on top of all of the tasks, work and personal, I looked around for ideas.

I found David Seah and his Printable CEO Series. A great lead in and really got me started on planning and, importantly, measuring my work for the day.

In essence the series is a set of PDF files that you can use to layout your day and tasks amongst other activities. The key takeaway for me was the Emergent Task Planner. This is the analogy of the big rocks and the sand. Take a container and load the sand in, now take the big rocks and see how many you get in. It's more efficient to place the big rocks first and then pack the sand around you'll get all of the big rocks in.

Now this container is your day and the rocks and the main tasks that you need to achieve. The sand is the small stuff you do in the day, email, phone calls, browsing etc.

This is where the Emergent Task Planner comes in. Using 15 minute time boxes you can lay out the key tasks for the day and see what is the optimal fit to get them all in.

I found this a great way to overlay some structure to work within. The main benefits are:

• Time boxing gives a visual marker to see how full your day is
• Making an estimate forces you to set a baseline to work to
• Marking the actual elapsed time enables you to make increasingly better estimates for similar tasks

The only downside for me is the limitation that a paper based system brings. I travel a lot and don't have the room or the energy to cart a load of paper around with me. So I took some steps to create a fully editable soft version for myself using Excel. The basics structures are there but a slightly different layout for convenience of cells alignment if nothing else.

Get the file from File Den

Review: Mark Perry and The PMO Podcast

As I continue my self learning through my iPod and venture out into the world of Project Management I found Mark Perry and his PMO Podcast.

A typical cast is around the 10 to 15 minute mark so useful for short commutes or coffee break. Rather than the usual Lunch and Learn brownbag think more Drink and Learn Coffee Cup.

He always uses the same structure.

• The PMO Memo: useful tips and tricks
• The PMO Interview: a keynote speaker from various backgrounds
• The PMO Mailbag: An email initiated QandA session

Mark has really been a prolific 'caster and is quickly approaching 100 episodes.

A very useful resource for PMO managers and members.

Getting Things Done.... David Allen

Like many I struggle with keeping on top of things. This has become progressively more difficult as my remit expands from doing, to managing people and then managing projects.

Some friends of mine were talking about a book that had been recommended to read, David Allen's "Getting Things Done", or GTD as it has become popularly known.

The book itself is not the easiest book to read. However; push through it and try to read the very real and useful message that is being conveyed.

Implementing the theory

The great thing that I find about the theory is the small incremental steps that you can take to start to overlay the principles on your daily life.

Setting the basics for me, the key being what works for YOU, was using a system to keep track of what was on my plate, what I was going to do now and what would still be left outstanding. Due to the amount of travel involved for me in my job this has to be something I could and would take with me. This meant my laptop.

At the company I work for this means something with Lotus Notes. Hunting around I found Brett Philp and his GTD for Notes template. Very easy to use and implement and has made a real difference in getting on top of where I am.

Having gotten used to the GTD way of doing things I went through what David suggest is the logical starting point, implementing your real Inbox. This has left me with some key tasks to complete.

The killer app here is post-it notes. Three different colours works very well, defer-delegate, reference and tickler (what Brett would also call fup, follow up)

Next Steps

David has a suggestion for a live filing system, 43 folders. The system is as basic as it can get so it's worth having a look at.

Useful resources:

• David Allen Company
• Notes: GTD for Notes
• Outlook: Jello Dashboard
• GMail: GTDMail

The PM Podast - a review

As I start to expand into a new role as a project manager I wanted to get some real first hand knowledge to learn by. Book smarts are OK so I did go out and get a language book, the PMBOK third edition, if I'm going to be a project manager I might as well speak the same language right?

Anyway to get beyond the book smarts I started looking for a way to use my newest toy, my iPod, to help. I had already found Controlling Chaos so I went looking for another, complimentary, resource. This is how I found Cornelius Fichtner and The PM Podcast.

Cornelius has a good structure as he leads you in to the interview du jour. His light hearted style leads to easy listening and the length of the 'cast hovers around the 40 minute mark.

He has been very active and his is well into 60 episodes. The supporting website is a very valuable resource and some of his guests have taken me deeper into the world of Project Management.

Well worth listening to.

MindJet's Mind Manager

My former boss and good friend starting using MindJet's Mind Manager and got me using it.

Now, more than one year on, I am still scratching the surface on this excellent tool's features and abilities.

I find myself using it for the traditional uses of brainstorming and defining scope, and initial work breakdown structure, for project initiation.

Having listened to Dina on Mind Manager, an interview with Tim Bombosch, I have taken the time to listen to a couple of the webinars available on the MindJet website. The series looks to be shaping up nicely.

I would recommend the following webinars to learn more of the ability of the software

• Creating a Project Dashboard
• Running Effective Project Team Meetings
• Planning & Initiating projects
• Improve Project Performance - Integrate Mind Manager with MS Project

Now with some of these new features at hand I will using my software for

• Managing meetings more effectively
• Project Dashboard
• Knowledge Management
• Resource tracking - applying some of MT's tools.
  

Controlling Chaos - Review

I found Dina Henry-Scott's Controlling Chaos when searching though Podnova for podcasts on project management.

I have since worked through her back catalogue of 'casts (currently up to 32 episodes) and found her friendly style, particularly when interviewing, to be very refreshing and it makes it a lot easier to listen to.

For those of you working in the software industry, opposed to more traditional PM environments such as Civil Engineering, there is a strong focus on Agile Methods which I have found particularly useful and I am rapidly trying to apply some of those learnings, even though the company I am in at the moment doesn't use agile.

Well worth listening to, Dina herself is currently working on her MBA so the regular 'cast schedule is changing to fortnightly (or more).

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Manager Tools - A Review

I stumbled across Manager Tools at the beginning of the year.

Manager Tools is a weekly podcast with supporting blog and very active forums for registered members. Since finding the podcast I have worked through the back catalogue and have been really impressed by the quality of the podcast, the advice and how successful I have been implementing some of the advice in the real world.

Manager Tools is the work of Mark Horstman and Mike Auzenne. Their style is very informal and well worth listening to