Posts under ‘Organizational learning’

Lesson learned: Maximizing project throughput. Category: Resource management / Portfolio management. The following post is a “Lesson Learned” that comes from the analysis of the failed projects documented in the “Catalogue of Catastrophe” or from the experiences the editorial team have had working with clients around the world. The post is published here to spark discussion and [...]

“As Project Manager, juggling all of the balls is important, but keeping your eye on the right ball is the key to delivering truly successful projects” – RG While understanding the causes of project failure is important, without a common definition of “success”, there is no clear basis for differentiating a success from a failure. Clearly [...]

When it comes to improving success rates, the commercial aviation sector has been one of the most successful. In 1930 taking a commercial flight was risky business. When you board a flight today, the chances of an accident taking your life is about 1 in 30 million. Through rigorous accident investigations and a willingness to [...]

Project Management is a field that has experienced rapid growth in recent years.  Although the origins of Project Management lie in the field of construction, the value of Project Management is now being recognized by organizations throughout the economy. Recent data attained from a major Canada wide job posting website demonstrates that growth and shows [...]

In the Project Management world, it’s a refrain that is repeated in almost every training program offered around the world; communicate, communicate, communicate. Despite the fact that students of Project Management are told that as much as 80% of a Project Manager’s time is spent communicating, in most Project Management training courses, as little as [...]

Lesson learned: Use real life samples to make training more effective. Category: Training / skills development. The following post is a “Lesson Learned” that comes from the analysis of the failed projects documented in the “Catalogue of Catastrophe” or from the experiences the editorial team have had working with clients around the world. The post is published [...]

Being something of a Systems Thinker, I often find myself reflecting on events to see if I can understand the cause and effect relationships that drive the outcomes we attain. Working in the field of education, that interest has caused me to look deeply into the way individuals learn and how different modes of teaching [...]

Most people who have been through basic management or quality management training will have been exposed to the work of Edwards Deming. Known particularly for his work in helping Japanese companies establish a quality culture, Deming is regarded as a founding father of the quality movement. Although Deming is best known for his use of [...]

Lesson learned: Seek out root-causes of project failures, not just surface symptoms. Category: Retrospectives / Organizational learning The following post is a “Lesson Learned” that comes from the analysis of the failed projects documented in the “Catalogue of Catastrophe” or from the experiences the editorial team have had working with clients around the world. The post is [...]

Implementing a process improvement initiative within an organization is an activity fraught with difficulty. On paper it sounds easy. Define the new process, document it, publish it, do some training and voila. In practice, most organizations struggle with the “voila” stage. Of course the problem comes down to culture change. Culture change is the dark [...]