kpmrd blog

An interesting view on how sponsored content on Instagram works, or, how, often this is 'Content' not 'Sponsored Content'. The article observes how this could in fact be destroying Sponsored Content and causing brand damage. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/12/influencers-are-faking-brand-deals/578401/

Interesting blog article from Trello:  https://blog.trello.com/remote-team-communication-cheat-sheet . I particularly like the points on: Assume positive intent Don't rely on chat decision-making Don't keep your emotions on chat ... and be real: One of the failure modes of chat is treating it like Formal Communications, since it’s editable, its record persists (up to Mandated Retention Policy Period™) effectively forever, and it can be copied and pasted or grabbed as a screenshot. As far as I can tell this ends up in folks not having real conversations, or not giving the same amount of themselves they’d otherwise give in person.

Apollo 17 at Shorty Crater Image Credit: Apollo 17 Crew, NASA Via: APOD I came across an interesting article on the wrike project management blog about  Project Management Lessons Learned from the Apollo 11 Moon Landing . Unlike a lot of these kind of posts, the ten things listed seemed a sensible account of things to consider - with interesting quotes and research. Of course, it's not often that an eCommerce implementation project runs to a thousand team members, and is quite such high stakes (with such a senior sponsor!), but the points are still valid even to smaller projects. Unrelatedly,  my feeds show me that yesterdays APOD (Astronomy Picture of the Day) from NASA showed Apollo 17 on the moon. Which was the last mission to the moon...

Perhaps this is why project management is about doubting every element of the plan until it is proven to be right?

Via a rather strange route that I don't normally get my news from, an article by  Vikram Mansharamani floated over my news feed this morning entitled  Sometimes It’s Best to Do Nothing . In it he tells how sometimes it is best to not react to a situation, and to take the time to see what happens next before reacting. It's an approach I agree with. Whilst from the outside it might appear that you're not actually doing anything about a problem, in fact it can be that the 'right solution' presents itself at the 'right time'. The trick is to keep it at front of mind; and to have the experience to know when the 'right solution' comes along... Of course, some problems are best solved by going straight at them...

Earlier in my consulting career, when arriving at a customer with one of my Directors to give a presentation, he stopped me and asked me "where are you going to sit?". We were in the days before projectors or screens, so I was going to be running from handouts. I hadn't given it much thought before then, but he gave me advice on where to sit. I think about it always now. Nowadays, I prefer to sit on the opposite side of the table from the door, towards a corner of the table facing down towards the presenter and the screen. And yes, you need to be in the room on time or early to choose. This article made me think of it:  Where to sit in a meeting ,  Joseph Crepaldi ,  LinkedIn.

There was some trouble on the train journey home today; somewhere between Stockholm Central and home there was an 'incident' on the track. I decided to stick it out, as these things usually clear before much fuss, but after sitting still for quite a while at one of the stations on the way, I decided to go back and take another route via the underground and two buses. It's quite a long way round. It made me think... what drives us to make these kind of decisions on which way to go? For me, it was taking an alternative that might be slower, but was at least getting me closer to where I wanted to be. Sitting still didn't seem to be achieving anything! I noticed on the travel app on the phone that everything seemed to clear up with the trains while I was on my alternative route. So which way was faster; did my gamble pay off? I don't know, and I'm not sure how I would find out. The only option would have been to put someone on the other route and race them -...