management
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The Art of Asking Questions Effectively to Get the Best Answers Asking effective questions is a powerful skill. It can help you better understand your client’s problem, work with your staff more effectively, gather better information, defuse volatile situations, and reduce mistakes. So to get the most useful answers, think carefully about what questions you ask. |
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Creating an Environment that Supports Self-Organizing Teams Self-organizing agile teams leverage some basic qualities about what motivates people to help teams deliver. Since these qualities often run counter to traditional management structures, it takes effort to create an environment that supports these kinds of teams. |
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What You Can Learn from Sony about Cost Versus Value Sony is now worth a fraction of what it was ten years ago because the company started asking, "What will make us the most money right now?" Your question should not be how much something costs; you should be asking, “How much value will this project provide?” Learn to tell the difference. |
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Good Project Managers Don't Move Employees Like Chess Pieces When you move people from project to project before they've finished their work, you deny them the opportunity to learn domain expertise. You want to leave people to finish projects, learn the product, and create solid teams. Good managers don't move employees like chess pieces. |
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Make Sure You Aren't Killing Your Employees' Morale Poor morale is an energy zapper and leads to lack of cooperation, raw nerves, unproductivity, and, often, the loss of your best employees. But many managers either don't know or don't care that their behavior has a strong—and potentially negative—impact on their employees’ attitude and motivation. |
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What to Do If You’re on an Overworked Team The potential toll from being overworked includes fatigue, insomnia, anxiety, stress, and difficulty concentrating. The team effort can suffer, too. Here are some tips on what to do if you're a boss who has to overwork employees for a time, or if you're a team member dealing with being overworked. |
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For Agile Program Iterations, Short Is Beautiful For programs, the risks are too high to have longer times between integration points and demos. Waiting too long increases potential delays, which increases risks. You want feature teams in your program working together, so you want short iterations and small stories connecting often and everywhere. |
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How to Make Meetings Less Boring So You Get More Out of Them Of course, the goal shouldn’t be to make meetings less boring but to make them more useful and productive. If you struggle to stay awake at meetings, seek ways to participate more. Offering input will help your brain stay engaged. For more suggestions (and some fun if all else fails), read on. |
