The A-Z of Project Management Survival

A firm favourite, the Yellow Stickies tend to get pulled out at workshops as a way of capturing opinion from the assembled workshopees.

While workshops, if they are run properly, are a good thing, the widespread use of the yelow sticky as a means for "getting all the issues out in the open" or "having a stab prioritising the workload" is often badly over/mis-used by people that don't know how to run a workshop properly.

How many times have you seen the "facilitator" scurrying away after the meeting, with a huge pile of flipchart sheets covered in stickies rolled under his arm. Odds-on that's the last you will see of them.

Yellow Stickies in a workshop is an example of a Horses for Courses item; if you cant use it effectively, then don't use it.

** You know what Yellow Stickies are. The A-Z isn't sponsored, so wouldn't want to fall foul of promoting a particular brand, like Post-It from 3M, do we now?

Labels: Y, Yellow Stickies

You: “When do you need this done for?”
Gimp: “Yesterday.”

You will no doubt have had the above conversation countless times. It’s become some kind of glib, I.T. in-joke. The response is generally accompanied by a raised eyebrow and knowing look; “It’s not my fault it’s been dumped on me from a great height”. And of course, they’re now dumping the problem on you. It’s a form of Tennis, but not a particularly great one.

So, in the absence of a time machine you can, by all means do the best you can to satisfy the request, but make it clear at the outset that you will not be held responsible for failure to deliver on time. Remember, you are helping them out. Someone else’s lack of forethought and planning does not become your problem unless you allow it to.

You can of course look to use the event to gain yourself some brownie points, perhaps even seeding the grapevine with stories of how you pulled them out of the fire.

Labels: Y, Yesterday