I had an interesting conversation yesterday where an observation was made that the market is flooded with doers but what it really needs is more thinkers. That got me thinking about what mind-set and behaviours a person needs to bring to the table and, equally as important, how projects and activities should be set up in the first place.

I am constantly hearing stories of situations where project drivers are not clear and where ownership is confused. I have encountered a fair few myself. Commonly, there is an imperative to ‘just get it done’ with only scant attention paid to the measures of success and the level of enablement provided by the operating environment.

PostedOctober 22, 2014

AuthorTrevor Lindars

CategoriesInnovation

TagsThinking, Projects, Behaviour

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It’s pretty easy to observe expenditure, velocity and resourcing. It’s easy to measure these things and create impressive charts and graphs. It’s easy to set targets for manufacturing cycle-time, mean-time-between-failure for a product and response-time for a call centre. It’s pretty straightforward to assess customer opinion, supplier conformance and an increase in sales. So what?

Well, if you’re measuring these things and not doing anything about the insights gained you are just ticking boxes. If you are measuring these things and they do not align with a coherent vision or game plan then it is difficult to determine what the best response should be.

PostedJune 25, 2014

AuthorTrevor Lindars

CategoriesInnovation

TagsMetrics, Projects

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I often meet people who claim to be overloaded – too much work, no resources, no time. I also meet people that get extraordinary things done whilst somehow cutting through the noise of overload.

The secret is simply a matter of priority, focus and commitment. What is important is to focus on what matters most and deliver that. Of course, ascertaining what matters most is influenced by context, objectives and the needs and support of other stakeholders.

PostedJune 18, 2014

AuthorTrevor Lindars

CategoriesBehaviour

TagsPriority, Projects

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Innovation is the new black. But what is it? Innovation is simply a change that adds value. Ok, so what’s coaching? In my view, coaching is a facilitated growth process that helps individuals develop and improve under the guidance of an objective 3rd party – clearly, a change that adds value.

Starting from this premise, it should be easy to spot the overlap between managing innovation and coaching an individual or team.

In both cases we’re trying to get from A to B. From our current state to one perceived to be significantly better (or at least better enough to justify the effort and expense). In a nutshell we’re talking projects.

PostedMay 27, 2014

AuthorTrevor Lindars

CategoriesBehaviour

TagsProjects, Coaching, Frameworks

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This week I thought we’d take a look at what I believe to be the seven biggest mistakes related to dealing with risk (and opportunities):

1. Ignoring it – this is the biggest mistake of all – if you do not have a process to anticipate and manage risk properly then something unexpected can cause delays, overspend or worse. There are five simple steps: Identification, Assessment, Design Response, Implement Response, Review (and adapt); ignore them at your peril.

PostedMarch 20, 2014

AuthorTrevor Lindars

CategoriesInnovation

TagsRisk, Projects

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The risk associated with developing and deploying integrated systems has many dimensions – complexity, novelty, speed, technology, social, political and others. The greater the risk the greater the need for some form of overarching governance and the adoption of risk mitigating approaches.

High levels of complexity are best addressed using a systems approach to compartmentalise the requirement and develop a modular solution architecture that minimises and clearly defines interdependencies.

PostedMarch 5, 2014

AuthorTrevor Lindars

CategoriesInnovation

TagsRisk, Systems Thinking, Projects

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The purpose of this brief discussion is to highlight a significant and useful overlap between core Systems Engineering principles and Program/Project design and subsequent management.

Typically, programs are managed to coordinate a set of interrelated projects such that a phased set of capabilities are delivered to the business. The business then absorbs these capabilities to realise the planned benefits over time and deliver the performance enshrined in the Portfolio objectives.

The key here is that the decomposition of the work to be performed when designing a program (or project) will significantly benefit from adhering to the same rules that apply for designing systems.

PostedJune 24, 2013

AuthorTrevor Lindars

CategoriesInnovation

TagsProjects, Programs, Systems

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If only they gave it more thought...

Metrics that tell you something useful

Overloaded? - propose an alternative

Coaching is Innovation Management

Risk - the seven biggest mistakes

Controlling the Dimensions of Innovation Risk

Building Better Programs with Systems Engineering