Time to update a classic that updated a classic. Imagine this: two rival gangs, one named the Jets and one named the Sharks. They live in Anytown, and any time they meet, they rumble. And dance a bit. And when they rumble, they pull out their Butterfly Knife-Styled Pens and show off their tricks. Why? Because this pen can flip and spin and write and it's just plain awesome. And, as you know, the pen is mightier than the sword. What the above illustrates is just how mind-blowing this Butterfly Knife-Styled Pen really is. You can do all sorts of crazy tricks with it, and unlike a real butterfly knife, you can't cut yourself as you learn! And butterfly knives can't write anything, but this pen can. But enough blabbing - watch the video, imagine it's you, and think of how everyone will idolize you and your pen flinging skills. It's all about the skillz, people; the ess-kay-eye-ell-ell-zoyeah!

Butterfly Knife-Styled Pen

$9.99

You know its PM Cool if they made a YouTube video about it.

Rich Bubb

1. Never *assume* someone is doing what they are supposed to be doing. Find unobtrusive ways to check up on their progress &/or results-to-date.
2. Management will change your scope if it serves their purpose. Plan on it happening. This will save you much frustration, and keep you from being blind-sided.
3. ""Murphy"" is real. Murphy will cause as much unintended delays, changes, and/or costs as feasible. Murphy does Not Care about "your problems".
4. Pay attention to project buffers. If management knows you have ""extra time"", they will take it away if it serves their purpose/s. Plan on it happening. This will save you much frustration, and keep you from being blind-sided.
5. Educate yourself on Gantt, CPM, PERT, and most importantly Critical Chain project management methods/techniques.
6. Learn the difference between large and small projects. Not all PM tools apply to each project size.

Ron Falkey

The WBS can be a treasure trove to the PM and Project Team.

Everyone recognizes the value of the WBS as we start planning a new project. However, I've found that many PMs don't realize that not only is the WBS a foundational tool for up-front planning, but it has a lot to add throughout a project's lifecycle. The WBS is a project's index and the internet equivalent to a web-page site map. Not all stakeholders will assimilate information in the same manner. Some are more verbal, other more visual, and others still think in terms of people events and relationships. Using the WBS numbering scheme frequently and consistently in project communication, deliverables, and other artifacts can increase brevity while also helping establish a shared understanding for each of the information processing types.

When recording and reporting on risks, include the WBS # with the applicable risk. That will help folks identify the risk visually in GANTT and network diagrams, or see it in a time-line, or possibly in terms of the resources that could be impacted or brought to bear. All deliverables should be identified with their WBS #. To keep folks focused on the broader and complete picture, items in "status reports" should reference the WBS#.

If we keep the WBS as a central tool in our project communications, it will remain a living and vibrant part of the project, and assist us in revising and refining planning as the project moves down the time-line toward completion.

Toomas Arula

Tip: Use mindmapping after end of a project.

You may have used mindmapping for project planning, task formatting, communicating with every stakeholder, task executing and result protocol. Another application is to create new fresh mindmap about your gained experience. You may have a lessons learned template and these can be used with mindmaps. However, it is also useful to create an experience mind map that is different from the end of your project. An experience mind map will provide ongoing lessons learned as you move from project to project.

Some additional reasons include:
- your learning is different from the recently complete project
- your experience map project stakeholders are different from recent project stakeholders
- the time-scale of your learning is wider than the current project

Your experience mindmap must help you to draw some new conclusions to yourself and your stakeholders. The reward is your better feeling about yourself and more-effective actions in future.

Conclusion: Express your experience with mindmap!

Erik De Haes

Tip: How to handle crisis management in projects

When a crisis occurs you need to manage the crisis using this method:

1. step away from your desk
2. go to the coffee corner
3. take the biggest cup
4. fill it with coffee or tea
5. take at least 3 lumps of sugar and stir
6. stir until ALL SUGAR has disappeared
7. go back to your desk
8. now look again and review the crisis

Alternative for people who don't like sugar nor coffee or tea

1. step 1 to 3 is the same
2. step 4 fill it with coffee, tea or water till the edge
3. step 5 go back to your desk without spoiling a drop
4. step 8 now look again and review the crisis

Simon Dodds

Make one list of all of the things you are waiting for across all projects, and keep the list current. List what, who, since when, and the due date if there is one. Check this list before you talk with anyone who is on the list to make sure that they stay current.

Over the past few years, I've been researching truly useful project collaboration tools.  Sharepoint, Google Wave, Basecamp and other web-based tools are frequently mentioned as collaboration solutions. A lot of these tools are mainly used as web-based document repositories instead of truly collaborative environments.  I've been working with Liquid Planner for a while and am not only impresses with its project scheduling capabilities but its awesome collaboration features.

I encourage you to check out LiquidPlanner’s 30 day free trial and give web-based collaboration and scheduling a try.

The author recommends breaking up work in 90 minute increments where you provide detailed focus and follow the activity by a recovery activity that recharges and refreshes you.  In one of his examples, he explained how he wrote his latest book.  Instead of spending 3-4 hours working intensely on the book, he did the following:

• 7:00 - 8:30 a.m. : Write
• 8:30 - 9:00 a.m. : Eat breakfast and relax
• 9:00 - 10:30 a.m: Write
• 10:30 a.m. - 11:15 a.m. : Go for a run
• 12:00 - 1:30 pm : Write and STOP for the day

By working intensely for short periods and following it by a relaxing activity, he was actually more productive and the book only took 6 months to complete.

Using this example, how do you think you could apply this to project management activities?

You can get a copy of the book here:

The Way We're Working Isn't Working: The Four Forgotten Needs That Energize Great Performance

Since project managers are tasked with successful project delivery, there simply isn't enough time to review all these training sources to learn new ideas and improve existing skill sets. Is there ever a good time to take training during a project? If we are lucky, we have a small amount of time between meetings to skim a few project management websites in addition to checking ESPN.com for last night's sports scores. The other challenge is that all of these activities are outbound activities that require you to search, sort and scour the Internet for relevant content.

Wouldn't it be easier if someone just sent you all the information that you needed to know? Social media helps accomplish this goal by leveraging the interactive and collaborative platforms that Web 2.0 provides. Wikipedia defines social media as "the content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies". Mashable.com defines social media as "platforms for interaction and interacting". I view social media as a great communication platform for learning.

Wordpress blogs, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn and Really Simply Syndication (RSS) technologies are all examples of collaborative social media platforms that enable communication and interaction. By simply tapping into these technologies, you can improve your project management competency with just a small amount of effort. Below are just a few examples of social media and PM Competency in action:

Google Reader also supports integration with other social media platforms. Tim is a project manager who sees the article in Google Reader and likes the article. He then decides to share it using the "Share with Note" feature in Google Reader. His Google Reader account is connected with his Twitter account, and anytime he shares an article it updates his Twitter micro-blog. He can also send an e-mail to his account on Posterous.com and it will publish his comment to all his social media services.

Donna is a project manager who follows Tim on Twitter and uses TweetDeck to read the project management Twitter stream (Figure 2). Donna also likes the article and decides to re-tweet Tim's post to all her followers. The process continues as other project managers read the article, evaluate its value and pass on the bits of wisdom to their project management connections. As a content producer, I only need to create the content once and my information is distributed to the masses. As a content consumer, I follow the project managers and project management sources that contain great content and I'm informed daily.

I recommend the following project management resources that support RSS and have my personal recommendation:

http://www.gantthead.com
http://www.techrepublic.com
http://www.joelonsoftware.com
http://herdingcats.typepad.com
http://mikeclayton.wordpress.com

These should be enough to get you started exploring Google Reader as a social media consumer for project management!

Authors Note: I originally published this article on Gantthead back in July 2009.

The interaction between the two devices and the web-based solution will ensure you'll never lose a key note or piece of information again. Check it out!

By the way...did I mention it is FREE!