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LESS – Accomplishing More by Doing Less

November 16, 2009 /

I got a copy of LESS – Accomplishing More by Doing Less by Marc Lesser at Øredev 2009. The book is described like this:

Discusses the benefits of doing less in a world that has increasingly embraced more – more desire, more activity, more things, more exhaustion. This book is about stopping, as well as the possibility of finding composure in the midst of activity. It is also about the power of accomplishing more by doing less.

I like this book, it is well written and it’s summed up nicely in the epilogue:

This book is a collection of tools as well as a manual for doing more of what is important and less of what isn’t.

Another quote from the book that descibes what it’s about:

You will accomplish more of what matters to you. Doing less and accomplishing more is about aligning your actions with your values and your particular passions.

The book is about the Less Manifesto and has chapters on its five categories:
• fear
• assumptions
• distractions
• resistance
• busyness

I like the way Marc writes about these categories, I found inspiration and tools to work with. Marc brings up meditation and mindfulness as useful tools. The book also has some interesting exercises, questions to work with. Under busyness Marc writes that:

A life of busyness is often the result of trying to escape facing our fears.

One part of the book that stuck with me is about paradoxes, like Marc’s own example “I am shy and solitary, and I love speaking in front of people.” It’s an interesting way of seeing that it’s not either-or, we can be both without conflicts.

Embrace paradox and you increase self-acceptance, tolerance of others and your own possibilities.

A question from the book that’s worth thinking about:

What is one change you could make in your life today that would have an impact on the quality of your day?

Read more:
An 18 Minute Plan That Keeps You Focused
The jar of life – stones, pebbles and sand
Start Managing Your Attention

How about presenting naked?

November 10, 2009 /

Marion Chapsal, who helped me prepare my presentation at Øredev 2009, has posted about How to Give a “Presentation ZEN”. She mentions my book review, Presentation Zen is a great book.

Marion links to an older post in her blog, The Naked Speaker, which is really interesting. It’s about what happens when technology fails and presenting without slides, “naked” in the sense that it’s all about you.

Marion links to Make your next presentation naked at the Presentation Zen blog. That post has a lot of useful information, what stuck with me is this part:

try to share, help, inspire, teach, inform, guide, persuade, motivate

The intention with my presentation about coaching at Øredev 2009 was to share, inspire and motivate. Half of the time was presenting, the other half was questions and answers. I prefer the Q&A part since it becomes a conversation, it’s more interacting with your audience.

A Speaker’s Coach and Mentor

November 8, 2009 /

While preparing for my assignment as Speaker at Øredev 2009 I got help from Marion Chapsal who acted as speaker’s coach and mentor.

Marion switched between being a coach (encourage, challenge and support) and being a mentor (give advice, share experience and knowledge) depending on what was needed. She guided and supported me through my preparations which helped me get it all done and to feel confident when it was time for my presentation.

If you shall make an important presentation and want to improve your presentation skills then I suggest that you get in touch with Marion Chapsal.

Øredev 2009 is over

November 8, 2009 /

I was at Øredev 2009 November 2-6 and it was a terrific conference with lots of interesting presentations and around 900 attending. It was well organized and I really enjoyed it all.

On Monday I attended a full day tutorial with Marc Lesser.

On Tuesday I prepared the slides for my own presentation. In the evening it was Speaker’s Dinner at Rådhuset. Great people, great food and an impressive house.

On Wednesday I attended the track PM in Practice.

On Thursday I attended the track Aspects of Leadership where my own presentation was. In the evening we got an entertaining presentation by Ze Frank (an American online performance artist, composer, humorist and public speaker).

On Friday I spent some hours at the conference and then went back home.

Note! In the Archives at the Øredev site are videos from previous years.

Note! The videos from Øredev 2009 are starting to show up.

Aspects of Leadership at Øredev 2009

November 7, 2009 /

Thursday November 5 was the second day of Øredev 2009. I followed the track Aspects of Leadership which had this desciption:

Leadership is a fine balance between drive and the capability to efficiently and humanely manage people. The speakers invited to speak on this track have extensive experience of leadership in many different organizations and lines of business. You will learn to adjust your leadership style to reflect the circumstances you face, how to use coaching to improve collaboration in your projects and gain insight into the causes of destructive leadership behaviors.

The first session was No More Death by Meetings with Erik Lundh. The program said:

The Planning Pump is the emergent behavior observed for 10 years in and around agile teams that gets motivated to plan two weeks of work in just 60 minutes.

The essence of the presentation – as I understood it – was that if people know in advance what’s on the agenda (and that the meeting will only last 60 minutes) then they will prepare and connect in advance.

Next session was Understanding the origins of destructive leadership – Why bother with bad? with Leo Kant. The program said:

Studies explaining the causes of destructive leadership behaviors are very few. This presentation will cover two ongoing studies of such situational and individual antecedents of destructive leadership behaviors. One of the studies is conducted in a normal working environment. The second study investigates the antecedents of destructive leadership behavior in a crisis management simulation.

Leo Kant talked about constructive (good) leadership versus destructive (bad). Passive leadership is considered destructive. What’s interesting is that:
• Good and Bad are not opposites on the same scale.
• Bad and good co-exist.
• Bad is stronger than good.
• Most leaders do both.

My own presentation was titled Project success by helping project members realize their full potential and my core message was that Coaching brings out the best in individuals and in teams.

After me was Situational Leadership on Projects: Adopting Leadership Style to Conditions with J. Davidson Frame, PhD, PMP, Academic Dean at the University of Management and Technology, Arlington, Va. The program said:

On projects, you need to adjust your leadership style to reflect the circumstances you face.This presentation offers a framework for identifying appropriate leadership style, based on such factors as project size, time horizon, risk, complexity, novelty, and level of team cohesiveness. It also points out that you don’t need to have great charisma to be a good leader. Transactional leadership is often good enough. If you are really good at what you do, this will gain you followers.

We got an engaging introduction to Situational Leadership. He mentioned that Transformational leadership (think Martin Luther King) is 5% and Transactional leadership (think Jack Welch) is the remaining 95%.

Ending the track was Leif Dagsberg from Wenell Management AB who talked about ABC in Projects.

“A” stands for the activators and relates back to what actions we can take to make a preferred behavior happen. “B” is the behavior as a result of an activator. “C” means that we need to support the individual with consequences such as motivation. Psychological research tells us that If we want to change a Behavior, 80 % of the impact is related to our way of working with the Consequences of the changed behavior in comparison with working on different Activators.

Note! In the Archives at the Øredev site are videos from previous years. The 2009 videos will be there too.

PM in Practice at Øredev 2009

November 7, 2009 /

Wednesday November 4 was the start of Øredev 2009. I decided to join the track PM in Practice which had this desciption:

Project Management is about identifying and building effective relationships with the key people and groups on which project success depends. Project Managers focus on two sets of responsibilities; managing the team and ensuring tangible project deliverables and business value. Listen to a Case Study that describes and explores the learnings of old truths, combined with an agile approach, or to the true story of how large organizations have implemented Scrum and agile methods.

The first session I attended was titled Good is the Enemy of Great – a case study of continued success. It was presented by Hans Selén, Program Manager at IKEA. The program said:

As professionals we all strive for good results and achievements. But how do you accomplish repeatable project success and day-to-day operations in IT programs involving between 25 and 80 persons? And how do you improve when you have delivered reliable service of business critical applications around the clock and 6 projects, all with the agreed scope and quality, on time and on budget? And how do you utilize the agile approach and still use the good things you have learned over the years?

The enemy of all IT-projects is size, complexity. That led them to set a maximum complexity at 8-10 people and 8-10 months. I like this comment: Anyone can start a project, the trick is to finish them.

The next session I attended was The Manager’s Guide to Agile Adoption with Mike Cottmeyer (Agile Project Coach, Process Methodologist, PMP Certified Project Manager, Certified ScrumMaster). His presentation was about:

A roadmap for agile adoption that begins with teams and demonstrates how teams work together to deliver more complex projects & portfolios. Mike will expand the team concept to include capabilities & show how capabilities can be organized to optimize value across the enterprise value stream.

Then I attended Agile Adoption at Enterprise Level with Petri Haapio who now is Director Coaching at Reaktor Innovations in Finland. He talked about his experience from Nokia Networks and the desciption said:

The true story on how large enterprises have implemented Scrum and Agile methods and the result. Are there any metrics? Are the companies more effective? Who benefits? How to deal with resistance? Which roles are pro and which roles are negative to these methods. All these questions are answered from an enterprise view and with strategy in mind.

Note! In the Archives at the Øredev site are videos from previous years. The 2009 videos will be there too.

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