The middle management is a transformational change agent exhibiting industry expertise, business acumen, negotiation skills, empowerment skills, and strategic leadership, according to my post-doctoral TONES research. I present my ongoing observations to demonstrate my commitment to continuous learning. For more games, thought leadership, book, and KOL talks, please visit my site.
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Sunday, March 31, 2024
Relationship between Artificial Intelligence and Leadership
Friday, February 23, 2024
Demystifying Technical Project Myths
I had the opportunity to facilitate training for a graduate class where there was an interesting discussion about defining technical projects. Now, the discussions were really inspiring and we discussed a number of different characteristics such as novel use of emerging 4th Industrial Evolution related technologies playing a critical role in creating a unique product, service, or result. At the same time, there were also some definitions of technical projects that need to be debunked.
Now, one of the promising unbiased definition of a technical project is that technology is used in achieving the project goals that otherwise are not possible or would take time. It is imperative that we don't limit ourselves that "technology" itself is the use of "information technology". In fact, technology is broadly defined as the application of scientific knowledge or a structured approach to realize an objective. For instance, brainstorming ideas can apply the concepts of design thinking, Delphi techniques, nominal group technique or many other forms such as the 6-3-5 technique (Rajagopalan, 2020). In these brainstorming approaches, a technical tool can be used but not always necessary.
A few things that I would like to consider incorrect for defining a technical project are the following:
- Only technical projects have risks
- Risk is any uncertain event that can positively or negatively impact a project. So, it does not distinguish whether the project is technical or not. If the wrong hypothesis was chosen as the null hypothesis in a scientific project, it is a concept risk that impacts the project's schedule.
- Technical projects always have shorter timeframe
- This idea is coming from the application of adaptive approaches (e.g.: Agile or Scrum) in technical projects. The reason for shorter timeframe in adaptive approaches to facilitate faster feedback from the users who may not always not what they want or may have changes in the upcoming iterations. Progressive elaboration has been present in project management frameworks for quite some time and the amount of time given for feedback facilitation is up to the project.
- Using Jira makes the project technical
- While Jira is an example here, the use of any tool for requirements, test cases, risks, defects, and any other artifacts used in a project does not make a project technical. By that definition, any project documenting its goals and objectives in Microsoft Word should call that project as a technical project.
- Non-Tech projects do not use technology
- As mentioned before, technology is the methodical approach of using a technique. A project may use a technical tool like soil analysis to evaluate if a small campsite can be strongly established for training local students on agriculture. The project may be a non-tech project but uses technology.
- Non-Tech projects do not need special talent
- This is a biased statement thinking that special talent applies to people with advanced computer technology, data science, etc. A plumber, electrician, auto-mechanic, creative artist, musician, linguist, journalist, or market research specialist are all equally qualified special talent. Let us not forget the numerous specialty vocational schools that prepare people many skills and competencies we take for granted.
- Quality is not relevant in non-tech projects
- This is a biased statement thinking manual testing, automated testing, robotic process automation, and a number of other quality control and quality assurance related professions that has emerged. Quality is a function of risk (Rajagopalan, 2023) and wherever there is a project, there is risk. So, to say that quality is limited only to technical projects and further more not relevant in non-technical projects is losing the foundations of total quality management principles.
- Cost is not relevant to agile projects
- This is a false thinking primarily because people don't incorporate cost based decisions in their usual iteration/sprint planning. There is a cost to every iteration (Rajagopalan, 2019). Most often, people are not working free in most of the professional projects except in the volunteer settings where people volunteer their time. Even in such cases, the opportunity cost of working on a feature that is less customer focused than the feature the customer wants is always at the epicenter of MVP (Minimum Viable Product) discussions as part of risk-adjusted prioritization in product planning.
Thoughts? Love your comments.
References
Rajagopalan, S. (2020). Alternative Idea Generation: 6-3-5 technique. https://agilesriram.blogspot.com/2020/01/alternative-idea-generation-6-3-5.html
Rajagopalan, S. (2019). Agile iterations also involve cost. https://agilesriram.blogspot.com/2019/04/test-post.html
Rajagopalan, S. (2023). Quality is a function of risk. https://agilesriram.blogspot.com/2023/03/quality-is-function-of-risk.html
Tuesday, January 30, 2024
Servant Leadership: Demystify the Agile Scrum Scaled Agile misconceptions
- Listening: Here, it is not listening to respond but listing to learn, differentiate said and unsaid things (Rajagopalan, 2017) and self-reflect with a goal towards improving oneself.
- Empathy: Covey (1987) already emphasized "Seek to understand before being understood" and Empathy therefore is action oriented. It is not feeling sorry for something but taking actions to leave the world in a better place than what you found.
- Healing: Being able to connect with oneself is paramount to managing others and leading the society. One can find connections with Emotional Intelligence dimensions here. Being able to forgive oneself and not linger in the post purifies one's mind to see the world differently. As the old saying goes, "we all see the world not the way it is but the way we are!"
- Awareness: Bringing thought leadership and market awareness together, they think beyond the status quo and integrates ethics and values in the decision-making.
- Persuasion: Social scientists discuss the various levels of power that the project management community also adopted (Gemmill & Thamhain, 1974). These power levels include formal (legitimate), reward, penalty (coercive), expert, and referential powers. One's ability to establish the required trustworthy relationships make their expert and referential powers persuade others (especially as they lobby the organization and the stakeholders in the society for a larger cause).
- Conceptualization: Delivering the right solutions the right way at the right time is a critical consideration for servant leaders who both think strategically outside the box (has a huge foresight to dream BHAG) but also focus on tactical operational excellence.
- Foresight: Servant leaders, by their very nature, are comfortable in the VUCA world continuously learning from experiences and still with a childlike curiosity. The serenity prayer "Give me the serenity to accept the things I can't change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference" comes to my mind in defining this characteristics.
- Stewardship: Standing on top of all the previous characteristics, the stewardship is 'leading the world' by 'walking the talk' for the larger society! Without ethical guidelines baked into one's character, it is not possible to be a steward!
- Commitment to People's Growth: This is where I said servant leaders go beyond lip service by committing themselves to everyone's growth. This is also the reason that the transformational leadership is the platform that is integral to servant leadership because practicing the 4I's in the microcosm of a team makes them excel in practicing them well in the macrocosm of the society as the situation warrants.
- Building Community: As the popular saying goes, "Change yourself, and you will change the world," I believe servant leaders change the world by creating, building, rebuilding, and empowering communities. Everyone is responsible for shaping the world that we live in.