Leadership Traits

5 Pillars of Leadership

1.  Integrity

2.  Vision

3.  Accountability responsibility

4.  Trust

5.  Professional competence

       Cmdr Kirk Lippold 10/03/14

Documentation, how much?

The never ending battle --- How much documentation should we produce? If you have deep methodologies, or extended, i.e., "mature" (??) practices, you are almost always bound by extensive documentation mandates.  This is further complicated by contracts, audit requirements such as SarBox, and some maturity models, such as CMMI and OPM3.

But fortunately, the tide is beginning to turn.  Newer methods and frameworks are lessening the demand.   Concepts like Lean and Agile are breaking the mold on the definition of necessary, frequency, size and content.   None are proposing abandonment, but rather rethink, and minimization.

The challenge, though, is how to change the minds of those governing bodies, management, process ingrained staff members.  Is this change managment?  How do we even begin?  I for one, am definitely in favor of documentation reduction.  I have seen extensive efforts, and along with that, large costs, spent, fully for the sake of producing a document that solely sits on a shelf, figuratively, phsically, or electronically.

Here is a link to another article of similar nature:  http://pmtips.net/documentation/

Values and Principles

I've always been one that takes certain principles and values seriously.  Things like honesty, morals, ethics, always bring a certain sense of solid dependable character in a person.  While we all have weaknesses, and sometimes we make excuses for occasional lapses, those who keep a high standard are continually valued and respected by others.

How we rate ourselves objectively is key.  How we tolerate situations of weakness of others is another battle.  A few of the latter situations come to mind:  a situation where a management individual was determined to find ways to berate and belittle any manager or staff, inside or outside of reporting structure, who was not in alignment with her power seeking needs;  a individual who dominated every conversation; a staff individual who was determined to cut every one else's ideas down; another individual who continually showed up late for work, not appear to do any work, and would dependably disappear when the boss was away from the office; one acting manager - lead who would instead of working and growing his team, would rather spend his time socializing with those who he believed were people of corporate influence.

While these situations agitate us, how we respond defines ourselves. About the time of one of these situations I happened to purchase a special framed photographic work which I enjoyed.  Underneath was the caption: The Courage of Integrity.  It hung on the wall directly across from my desk where I could see it at all times as a reminder.

Here is another article or a related subject:  THE DECISION TO BE MORAL

An unusual benefit to a webinar

I watched a previously recorded webinar today for reasons of continued educational credit to maintain a professional certification (project management - PMP).   Ironically 3/4 through the presentation I happened to note the sound of a vibrating cell phone in the background.  LOL.  While I had a unplanned chuckle of that, it would always be advisable to validate your entire environment when giving a presentation to ensure professionalism and your integrity.

Getting back in the groove

A few weeks ago a friend and former colleague noted that I haven't been posting much on my blog here.  A gentle reminder, thanks RM, that caused me to regroup and think about what I wanted to accomplish.  So,  what better way to (re)start than with a little professional "music".  Thanks JW for the link..   For all of you project managers, check out Frank S.

Twitter favorites usage

I use the twitter #favorite - star to flag tweets  for follow-up, read later.   Anyone do the same?

Motivation is....

“Motivation is when your dreams put on work clothes.” – Benjamin Franklin

Nonsense & follow-up sales of extended service contrats

This morning I received a phone call from a major computer hardware provider.   They were reminding me that the service contract on my equipment (original warranty, multi-year) was about to expire.   Did I want to purchase an extension?   I *distinctly* said no, and was able to end the conversation quickly.

Ironically though, only minutes later, I received an email from them, reaffirming their offer that I was interested in (I was?  I don't remember that), a price quote (we never got that far on the phone) with instructions to complete the transaction.    Not only was the email insulting, the price was silly for a product that was already multiple years old! 

One good way to lose a customer!