Ron Krukowski's Blog

As football season is upon us, I can't help but notice all of the interviews I have heard on the sports news, read in the paper or seen on the internet. If I had one dollar for ever time the words "game plan" were used, I would have a nice sum of money put aside. Many coaches credit their team's win or loss for the week as a direct result of the preparation and their game plan. Although execution on the filed of play is the ultimate in what makes a team win or lose, it is amazing to see the weight a football coach attributes to the game plan. In football there are budgets, salary caps, drafting to obtain the most talented players and goals set that map to the ultimate destination...the Super Bowl. Head coaches are appointed before the start of training camp and the coaching staff is selected. Team and individual assessments are performed to determine strengths and weaknesses in the team and where training or new personnel are needed. Prior to the start of the ...

During my career as a management consultant, I have witnessed many areas of corporate management practices that could be improved upon. One of the most important areas is along the lines of "transparency". All to o often I have encountered managers who are reluctant to report an accurate status out of fear. There is a general fear that upper management does not want to see or hear bad news. In fact, at a previous client of mine I was told not to report a RED status on anything (no matter how dire the situation) because it would get too much attention from upper management. So it strikes me as funny that although many corporate cultures embrace the traditional RAG (RED/AMBER/GREEN) Status, the only colors they want on a report are GREEN and AMBER. This is not only a bad management practice, it contributes to many failed projects. In my experience, it is my strong belief that you should Let Them See RED! Notice the dashboard sample posted with this blog. The RED gets attention...

Typical Project Management Challenges Day-to-day, project managers face some typical challenges in their quest to deliver successful initiatives. Some of these challenges include tracking budgets/resources, mapping outcomes to synergy targets, nailing down/documenting project scope, risk m anagement, motivating teams, controlling project assets, documenting processes, adhering to tight deadlines, effectively communicating, keeping track of the “big picture” and producing effective status reporting for senior management. Traditional Project Management Tools Many managers use traditional project management tools on their mission to tame these challenges. Such tools include handwritten notes, documents, calendars, eMail, to-do-lists, contact lists, spreadsheets, flowcharts, project plans and presentations. These are all great tools except for one main challenge…they only support linear thinking. And linear thinking is limited. Why not Let your mind run free and a dd Mind Mapping...