Kick butt right now with 5 essential 2009 career goals

Kick Butt Right Now With 5 Essential 2009 Career Goals!

These days you need stand out more to your current employer and other companies. When you take the initiative to get noticed correctly you’ll be a much better candidate in the job market. And you’ll be a more valued employee in your current job.

So, here’s how you can position you for success :

1. Try to feel differently about the people around you. Instead of trying to acquire more and more contacts, spend more time with the ones you have .

2. Visualize where you want to be in one, three and five years. What kind of job, where is it located, whom do you want to work for and with, and what are your compensation expectations?

3. The best way to be visible and rise higher in your career is by being passionate about your work. And do it exceptionally well. When you excel, other people will talk about you.

4. If you’re doing an outstanding job and senior managers aren’t noticing you, maybe you’re not talking enough about yourself. Market yourself within your company. For example, acknowledging others’ success raises their visibility and puts the spotlight on you.

5. You have to build your contact bank or expand your network. Why? Because the most valuable resource you have is not your resume or work history, but your access to a diverse range of folks who can be helpful to you in many different ways.

These career goals go way beyond the passive «traditional» ways of thinking about career advancement. With the old-fashioned way you take a quantitative approach . . . thinking that doing more of the same will get you ahead. In other words you’re getting nowhere fast . . . you’re just moving in place, only you’re moving a lot faster. That’s last century thinking.

In case you missed it, we’re living in the 21st Century. So why use last century methods to look for a job or advance your career?

The dynamics of the 21st Century have changed everything.

OK. You can still find classified openings in the newspaper. There are still lots of agencies and recruiters at work, as well. And, of course, you can post your resume to some job sites.

But the marketplace has shifted dramatically. Expectations of both employers and job-seekers have moved in decidedly new directions. For example, employers expect job-seekers to know and understand corporate goals. They want prospects to demonstrate how they can contribute.

On the other hand, job opportunities are being created on the spot and the candidate can be part of the creation process. Above-average deals are the products of above average negotiations where «dollars» is only one part of the total package.

Most importantly, if you want to excel, if you want a superior job with more money, if you want to select your next job rather than settle for it, you must understand and embrace the dynamics of today’s job marketplace.

Leapfrog many years ahead of the competition by accomplishing 20 times more

Leapfrog Many Years Ahead of the Competition by Accomplishing 20 Times More!

Did you ever play leapfrog as a child? If you did, you probably landed just beyond the other child. But if you had used a springy trampoline to launch yourself, you could have gone a large distance beyond. Wouldn’t that be fun? What if you could use a rocket-assist pack on your back to fly like you were on the moon hundreds of yards past the other person? I think that would be even more fun, don’t you?

Let’s examine how you might get a similar advantage over your competitors by shooting way past their future performance long before they make those improvements.

The steps for creating a 2,000 percent solution (accomplishing 20 times more with the same time, effort, and resources) are listed here:

1. Understand the importance of measuring performance.

2. Decide what to measure.

3. Identify the future best practice and measure it.

4. Implement beyond the future best practice.

5. Identify the ideal best practice.

6. Pursue the ideal best practice.

7. Select the right people and provide the right motivation.

8. Repeat the first seven steps.

This essay looks at step four.

Jump Past Where Everyone Else Wants to Go

Successful leapfrogging the future best practice (the best anyone will do in five years) requires that your best change leaders unify efforts. These leaders must commit to this challenging objective and shift the organizational culture to support them. Those working on the implementation must become masters of understanding the subprocesses needed to make the successful change.

Triage for Maximum Effect

Narrow your focus to a few areas of highest promise so that you do not water down your potential for results. Begin by segmenting those aspects of exceeding future best practices into three categories that:

1. Can be implemented almost immediately with little effort.

2. Can be implemented within two years with effort and attention.

3. Can be implemented over more than two years.

In your triage agenda, you should be able to do most things that fall into the first category easily, quickly, and with little help except where the activity causes problems for a high-priority item from the second category. The challenge comes in selecting from the second and third categories. Here’s an important limitation to keep in mind: You probably cannot make more than three or four changes at the same time that involve the same people. You’ll make the most progress when you pick the best balance of near- and intermediate-term benefits while placing the least strain on your people and resources. To that mix, add anything else you can do through aggressive use of outside resources that doesn’t increase the internal burden. Within that agenda, give high priority to actions that will give you the most benefit over the next two years. Encourage everyone by organizing your work so that significant benefits will be realized at least every six months.

We’re Almost Done-In

Since the thinking involved in steps five and six (finding and approaching the ideal best practice, the best anyone will ever be able to do) will suggest other outstanding choices, beware of setting too many firm projects at this step. After all, you may be ready with better ideas from step six within just a few weeks. But if completing step six will take more than a few months, you should begin to implement some of what has been identified in step four.

In this case, my recommendation is that you reserve some change capacity (such as time of key people, analytical resources, and budget) beginning around the time that you will have some new projects to add. This approach may mean that you will choose to mine category 1 from the triage list more heavily for now than category 2.

Outsourcing for Outstanding Possibilities

To estimate how long it will take you to put a new practice in place, look at the experience of those who preceded you in implementing those practice elements. Then consider whether your organization will be a faster or slower learner and integrator than they were. As you consider your choices, consider speeding your progress by having the company you studied or some of its former employees be an outsourcing provider. Simply because you want to employ a certain subprocess doesn’t mean that you need to become the world’s expert in that area.

Go Where the Benefits Are the Greatest

Beware of taking quantifications of likely benefits too literally. One project may appear to offer ten times the potential of another project, but the former project may also be a thousand times more difficult. Instead, emphasize places where you can effectively concentrate your resources while facing little resistance from any stakeholder or competitor. Choose a project that seems to offer more benefits, however, when two competing projects present similar difficulty and degrees of opposition.

STALLBUSTERS

Understand Your Track Record for Implementing Beyond Future Best Practices

Organizations vary widely in their ability to exceed future best practices through assembling new combinations of subprocesses. Many overestimate how well they will do in bringing groundbreaking new directions to an industry. Ask yourself these questions:

How do you get life cover

How Do You Get Life Cover

If someone in your life depends on you financially then you should have life cover. Your number one concern should be life cover. What happens to your family if something happens to you? We may think we will be here forever but the truth is we will not be. Life insurance is something we all should have.

There is nothing easier than a lump sum life cover policy. Finding the right coverage amount and plan options can be tricky.

Before you apply for life insurance coverage there are a few things you should know. Be cautious not to take out too little of an amount of life coverage, you should ensure the amount you choose is sufficient. Remember to factor in all the bills including the mortgage. You can use an online calculator if you need assistance on how much coverage you need. It is a common mistake to be under-insured. It is not a good idea to become over insured either.

You have to determine the time frame they should be in place. Usually the life insurance policy remains in effect until all financial responsibility has been paid and children have left the home. One popular idea is to have the cover in place until retirement. The important thing is that the cover be in effect long enough to meet your needs. Be sure to answer all questions correctly when applying for life cover. The insurance company can deny your application due to non disclosure if you have not answered every one of the questions or were dishonest on your application.

You won’t go wrong with putting your policy in a trust. A trust will take care of paying the loved ones after your death.If the cover is not in a trust it is considered part of your estate and will be subject to a larger inheritance tax liability. You can ask your insurance agent about a trust form.

Do not pay more than you can afford. You can expect to pay a higher rate if the insurance company sees that you are prone to accidents.

One of the more common policies is the Level Term Assurance (LTA) this means your policy amount will stay the same throughout the length of the coverage. If you only need cover for payment of a home loan or other decreasing debt you could check out Decreasing Term Assurance (DTA) for a lower rate.

You should always review your policy when any life changes occur. Things that could possibly change your coverage needs are a new child, a new home, or even a change in job. Many people do not understand that their cover needs will change as their life does. Make changes whenever it is sensible that you may need more coverage.

Always remember you can shop around for cheaper policy prices even if you already have coverage. Ensure that no valuable benefits will be lost if you cancel your policy. If your health has went downhill or there have been any other considerable changes since you opened your policy you may find that a new cover could be much more expensive.

Keeping your project on schedule

Keeping Your Project on Schedule

As both an active project manager and a  project management trainer, people often ask me what are the fundamental aspects to successful project management. Whilst there have been many great books written on the subject, I always summarise what I believe to be the best practices at the heart of good project management.  

Define the scope and objectives

For any project to be successful you need to understand what the project is supposed to achieve. Suppose your boss asks you to organise a campaign to get the employees to donate blood. Is the aim of this to get as much blood donated to the local blood bank? Or, is it to raise the profile of the company in the local community? Deciding what the real objective is will help you to determine how you go about planning and managing the project.  

The project manager also needs to define the scope of the project. Is the organisation of transport to take staff to the blood bank within the scope of the project? Or, should  staff  make their own way there? Deciding which activities are within the scope or  out of scope of the project has a big impact on the amount of work which  needs to be performed during the project.  

An understanding of who are the stakeholders is also crucial if you  are going to enlist their support and understand what each person expects to be delivered from the project. Once you’ve  defined the scope and objectives, you will need to get the stakeholders to review them and agree to them as well as agreeing who should be on the list of stakeholders.  

Define the deliverables

To achieve the desired outcome from the project, you must define what things (or products) are to be delivered by the end of the project. If your project is an advertising
campaign for a new chocolate bar, then one of the deliverables might be the artwork for a newspaper advert. So, you need to decide what tangible things are to be delivered and document in enough detail what these things are. At the end of the day, someone will end up doing the work to produce the deliverable, so it needs to be clearly and unambiguously described.  

Once you have defined the deliverables, you will need to have the key stakeholders review the work and get them to agree that this accurately and unambiguously reflects what they expect to be delivered from the project. Once they have agreed, you can begin to plan the project. Not defining the deliverables in enough detail or clarity is often a reason why projects go wrong.  

Project planning

This is the time when you define how you will achieve the desired outcome of the project embodied within the objectives and definition of deliverables. Planning requires that the project manager decides which people, resources and  budget are required to complete the project. You will need to decide  if you will break up your project into manageable phases, decide which products will be delivered in each phase, and decide the  composition of your project team. Since you have already defined the deliverables, you must decide what activities are required to produce each deliverable.  

You can use techniques such as Work Breakdown Structures (WBS) to help you to achieve this. You will need to estimate the time and effort required to complete each activity, dependencies between related activities and decide on a realistic schedule to complete the activities. It’s always a good idea to involve the project team in estimating how long the activities will take since they will be the ones actually doing the work. Capture all of this into the project plan document. You also need to get the key stakeholders to review and agree to this plan.  

When developing the project plan, a project manager is often under pressure to produce a plan which meets the (unrealistic) expectations of some of the stakeholders. It is important here that the project manager comes up with a realistic schedule — one which he/she thinks is realistic to achieve. You will be doing nobody a favour if you succumb to pressure and agree to deliver the project in a totally unrealistic schedule.

Communication

Even the best made project plans are useless unless they have been communicated effectively to the project team. Everyone on the team needs to know exactly what is expected of them, what their responsibilities are, and what they are accountable for. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by big colour print outs of his latest plans. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn’t shared the plan with them. Needless to say the project hit all kinds of problems with people going off and doing the activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assigned by the project manager.  

Tracking and reporting project progress

Once your project is underway and you have an agreed plan, you will need to constantly monitor the actual progress of the project against the planned progress. To do this, you will need to get reports of progress from the project team members who are actually doing the work. You will need to record any variations between the actual and planned cost, schedule and scope. You will need to report any variations to your manager and key stakeholders and take corrective actions if the variations get too large.  

There are lots of ways in which you can adjust the plan in order to get the project back on track (rearrange the order of tasks, assign tasks in parallel if the variation is small, or add more staff to the project or reduce the scope if the variation is very large).  

All projects require the project manager to constantly juggle three things: cost, scope and schedule. If the project manager increases one of these, then one of the other elements will inevitably need to be changed as well. So, for a project which is running behind schedule to recover so it can be delivered to it’s original planned schedule, the budget might be increased by employing more staff (although this invariably never achieves the desired result of reducing the time left to complete the project), or the scope will need to be reduced. It is the juggling of these three elements — known  as the project triangle — that typically causes a project manager to tear their hair out in frustration!  

Change management

All projects change in some way. Often, a key stakeholder in the middle of a project will change their mind about what the project needs to deliver. On projects of longer duration, the business environment has often changed since the start of the project, so assumptions made at the beginning of the project may no longer be valid. This often results in the scope or deliverables of the project needing to be changed. If a project manager simply accepted all of these changes into the project, the project would inevitably be delivered late (and perhaps would never ever be completed) and  would inevitably go over budget.  

By managing changes, the project manager can make decisions about whether or not to incorporate the changes immediately or in the future, or to reject them. This increases the chances of project success because the project manager controls how the changes are incorporated, can allocate resources accordingly and can plan when and how the changes are made. Not managing changes effectively is often cited as a major reason why projects fail.  

Risk management

Risks are any events which can adversely affect the successful outcome of the project. I’ve worked on projects where some of the risks have included: staff lacking the technical skills to perform the work properly, hardware not being delivered on time, the control room being at risk of flooding in a major thunderstorm and many others. Risks will vary from project to project but it is important to identify  the main risks to a project as soon as possible and to plan  the actions necessary to
avoid the risk, or, if the risk cannot be avoided, to at least mitigate the risk in order to lessen its impact if it does occur. This is what is known as risk management.  

Do you manage all risks? No, because there could be too many to manage, and not all risks have the same impact. So a simple way is to identify as many risks as you can, work out how likely each risk is to occur on a scale of 1 to 3 (3 being the worst), estimate its impact on the project on a scale of 1 to 3 (3 being the worst), then multiply the two numbers together. The result is the risk weighting. A high risk weighting is the most severe risk. Just manage the top ten risks i.e. the ones with the highest risk weighting. Constantly review the risks and constantly be on the lookout for new risks since they have a habit of jumping up at unforeseen moments.  

Not managing risks effectively is also often cited as a major reason why projects fail.  

Summary

So, in a nutshell, these best practices are the main things that I would  expect all project managers to do. They are applicable on all projects big or small. Project management is not rocket science.  Applying best practices on your project cannot guarantee that your project comes in under budget, on time and exceeds  all the expectations of the stakeholders, but applying them will  certainly give you a much better chance of delivering your project successfully than if you don’t apply them on your project.