Speaking about Agile at PMI Event in Dublin

Posted on 28. Mar, 2011 by ger in Events

If you want to learn more about Agile & Scrum and you’re in Dublin on the 29th of March, I am one of the speakers at an event organized by the Ireland Chapter of the Project Management Institute (PMI).

The event is billed as “Agile Scrum – Everything you wanted to know, but were afraid to ask”. It promises to be a lively session.

Colm Ó hEocha will introduce Agile and the benefits. Ger Hartnett will be talking about what Scrum is and how it works with plenty of examples from Intel and Goshido. Richard Bowden will discussing some practical lessons learned from the use of Scrum on a number of different projects.

When: 2pm to 6pm on Tuesday 29 March 2011.
Where: Hilton Hotel, Charlemont Place, Dublin, IRELAND.

The event is free but you should register in advance on the PMI website.

9+2 things successful people do differently

Posted on 23. Mar, 2011 by ger in New Ways to Work

I’m usually wary of blog posts like “N tips to accomplish your goals”. All too often they’re filled with reheated motivational cliches. Heidi Grant Halvorson’s recent post on the Harvard Business Review Blog is different. Heidi recommends “9 things successful people do differently”. I’m going to add two more to her list.

First, here are some examples from Heidi.

Seize the moment to act on your goals

“… decide when and where you will take each action you want to take, in advance … Studies show that this kind of planning will help your brain to detect and seize the opportunity when it arises, increasing your chances of success by roughly 300%.”

Know exactly how far you have left to go

“Check your progress frequently – weekly, or even daily, depending on the goal.”

Be a realistic optimist

“Studies show that thinking things will come to you easily and effortlessly leaves you ill-prepared for the journey ahead, and significantly increases the odds of failure.”

Focus on getting better, rather than being good

“Many of us believe that our intelligence, our personality, and our physical aptitudes are fixed … As a result, we focus on goals that are all about proving ourselves, rather than developing and acquiring new skills.”

Mitch McCrimmon, one of the commenters on Heidi’s post, added a 10th recommendation.

Review and celebrate successes

“We need a sense of making progress, not just a feeling that there is so much more to do.”

Finally, to turn the volume up to 11, I’ll add another related recommendation.

Break a goal or project down into bite-size chunks

Richard Wiseman conducted a large-scale scientific study a few years ago into the psychology of motivation. The more successful participants broke down their high-level goals into a series of sub-goals. If you use this technique you’ll achieve small successes that build up to audacious accomplishments.

Learn more

  • Read Heidi’s blog post or check out her new book Succeed, which is getting great reviews on Amazon
  • Read Richard Wiseman’s book 59 Seconds
  • Try Goshido, a new cloud-platform, which helps people: focus, communicate, and do their best work.

Can you recommend other good ideas?

The Monk and the Knowledge Worker

Posted on 14. Mar, 2011 by donal in New Ways to Work

I heard a story recently that is anecdotal for how knowledge workers experience their work life.
 
A Buddhist monk was speaking about the early years of his training in Thailand. One day, an elderly Thai man came to his hut with word of a waiting visitor. The monk jumped out of meditation, quickly put on his outer robes and hurried off across the monastery compound. As he walked his head filled with thoughts. Who might it be? What might they want? Was there a problem? Why hadn’t he been given more notice?

Mid-way across the compound the old man caught up to him. “You don’t walk like your teacher”, he said. 

The monk stopped and asked, “How does my teacher walk”?

“One step at a time”, came the reply. 
 
Similarly, at work, our heads can be so full of things that we’re not able to give ourselves completely to the task at hand. There is so much to juggle, so much to keep track of, so much that’s unclear.  There are so many interruptions and distractions. Just like the monk, we could all do with someone or something to help us manage our attention better. Where our attention goes, ‘we’ go.  And all too often we’re not giving our best attention to the work that really matters.
 
It’s vital to have a tool that clearly shows the actions that need to happen for progress to be made in our work commitments – to be able to queue these actions is a systematic way – to have peace of mind knowing that what’s important won’t be forgotten – to feel reassured that information won’t ‘fall between the cracks’. 

We’ve built Goshido to be that tool – to help you and your teams succeed. Why not try it today at no cost? See for yourself how it benefits your experience of work.

Goshido Product Update

Posted on 02. Mar, 2011 by tom in New Ways to Work

Last week the Goshido product team delivered an exciting new release, and I’d like to share a few of the new features here. We keep working to make it easier for you to get to the actions and updates most important to you.

  • One click to all updates: from any action, you’re now one click away from all of the updates on not just that action, but updates on all subactions too.
  • Better work plans: we’ve made some changes to how plans work in Goshido, and you can learn more and watch a video in our Help center.
  • More information about a person’s activities: in addition to the actions you’re authorized to see, with one click you can now see a person’s updates across all of the actions and projects to which you’re subscribed.
  • Goshido bookmarklet: also new in our Help center, you can now grab a Goshido bookmarklet to add to your browser. Just select and bookmark things in your browser bar and it will create actions in Goshido.

As always, let us know what we can do to help you work better together. That’s our mission.

Organization Structure and Working

Posted on 17. Feb, 2011 by tom in New Ways to Work

We talk a lot at Goshido about new ways of working. And not only do we talk about what might be considered best practices – we actually put many of these concepts to the test every day in both our activities and our product development efforts. With this in mind, two blog postings last week caught my eye on the themes of organization structure and getting work done.

The first posting was actually a rather lengthy and thought-provoking article by Dave Gray of XPLANE ⎟ Dachis Group. Titled The Connected Company, Dave posits some well-considered arguments comparing long-lived companies to cities, which are in turn a metaphor for complex organisms. I’m a firm believer that building and maintaining a company’s distinct culture is step one in building a successful enterprise. Dave provides some much-appreciated depth on this topic.

The second posting focuses on Agile, and the challenges large development organizations face when it comes to release planning. While I’m probably not qualified to state that Release Planning is Evil, I’m enough of a common sense guy to buy into Erik Huddleston’s notion that planning methods need to better reflect the flexible and organic nature of work and teams in today’s company. Sometimes work involves 400 people on 1 project, but more likely, work involves 4 people on 100 projects, with those 4 person teams shifting dynamically based on the specific problems at hand.

Let us know what you think. We want Goshido to help empower you to work more effectively.

New Years Resolutions? It’s not too late!

Posted on 03. Feb, 2011 by tom in New Ways to Work

Punxsutawney Phil has made his annual appearance, but given the mountain of snow in my front yard, I hope you’ll forgive my skepticism regarding his prediction of an early Spring. By this time of year, many of us are happier to see our old classmate Ned Ryerson than think about the New Years resolutions we’ve already left behind. Fortunately, it’s never too late to learn about new ways to work.

Goshido is all about helping individuals, teams and organizations work more effectively. No matter where you sit in an organization – Enterprise 2.0, social business, or creating a Getting Things Done plan, can help make work better.

I’ve been involved in software-as-a-service (SaaS) businesses since 1999. One of the most gratifying things I’ve seen is the dovetailing of some of the best benefits of SaaS with trends in the workplace, such as Agile. SaaS gives you frequent product updates, tight customer feedback loops, and ad hoc collaboration giving superior service. The benefits of Agile are now extending beyond software development into areas such as sales and marketing.

The new ways of work are here to stay, and Goshido is designed to help you make the most of them. Take a look and let us know how we’re doing.

You can try Goshido at no cost today.

Seminar in Edinburgh SCOTLAND cancelled due to weather

Posted on 29. Nov, 2010 by ger in Events

Due to severe weather conditions we’ve cancelled the event scheduled for 30-Nov in Edinburgh Scotland.

Seminar – Lean & Agile for Project Success, in Edinburgh, SCOTLAND

Posted on 15. Nov, 2010 by donncha in Events

UPDATE: Due to severe weather conditions in Edinburgh, we’ve cancelled this event.

Goshido is delighted to announce details of our upcoming evening event which takes place in Edinburgh, Scotland.

WHEN:

Tuesday, 30th November 2010

    6.00 PM – Registration – Tea/Coffee & Light Refreshments
    6.30 PM – Workshop for one hour

WHERE:

COST:

There is no charge for attending, but numbers are limited, and attendance will be restricted to those who have pre-registered.

TO REGISTER:

Please send email to:  donncha.hughes@goshido.com

OVERVIEW:

This event will address a number of modern approaches for managing projects and team performance, including:

  • Change Management
  • Agile Project Management
  • Lean Techniques
  • Getting Things Done
  • Goshido – software, training & consultancy support that will help you introduce new ways of working in your organisation

NETWORKING:

This event will be of interest to senior managers and project leads in knowledge-based organisations.

SPEAKERS:

Kevin McPhillips of SentiaPlus will address successful business change. Kevin has been delivering and consulting on change projects for over 20 years, initially with PwC, and subsequently in both the public and private sector.  His company, SentiaPlus Ltd also provides coaching in successful change for businesses, and training on related areas.  He is also author of several published articles on business change and project delivery.

Gerard Hartnett of Goshido will introduce you to Lean, Agile & GTD Principles. He will also demonstrate Goshido – cloud software that helps you apply these principles to run successful projects. Ger spent 8 years at Intel as Architect and Project Manager on global teams which delivered three processors with revenues in excess of $1bn. Ger worked for Tellabs, Digital and Motorola, before Basis Communications, which was acquired by Intel in 2000.

Slides from the Cork seminar Oct 2010

Posted on 28. Oct, 2010 by ger in Events

You can view the slides from our recent seminar in Cork, Ireland.

Here are some followup ideas:

Free seminar – Running Projects using Lean, Agile & GTD, 27 Oct in Cork, IRELAND

Posted on 15. Oct, 2010 by donncha in Events

Goshido is delighted to announce details of our next Project Management Breakfast Briefing which takes place in Cork, Ireland.

WHEN:

    Wednesday, 27th October
    07.30 – 8.00am – Continental Breakfast
    08.00 – 9.00am – Workshop

WHERE:

COST:

There’s no charge to attend but advance registration is appreciated.

TO REGISTER:

Please send email to:  donncha.hughes@goshido.com

OVERVIEW:

This breakfast seminar will address a number of modern approaches for managing projects and team performance, to include:

  • Agile Project Management
  • Lean Techniques
  • Getting Things Done
  • Goshido – software, training & consultancy support that will help you introduce new ways of working in your organisation

NETWORKING:

This event will be of interest to senior managers and project leads in knowledge-based organisations.

SPEAKERS:

Brad Allen of Simply Organised will address how you can improve your skill in organising and managing your time and commitments. Brad is a talented organiser, analyst and project manager, whose experience spans over 16 years and reaches into organisational change, business optimisation and emerging technology adoption. The focus of Simply Organised is to help high performing individuals, teams and organisations get that extra edge through more effective adoption of process and technology.

Gerard Hartnett of Goshido will introduce you to Lean & Agile Project Management Principles. He will also demonstrate Goshido – cloud software that helps you apply these principles to run successful projects. Ger spent 8 years at Intel as Architect and Project Manager on global teams which delivered three processors with revenues in excess of $1bn. Ger worked for Tellabs, Digital and Motorola, before Basis Communications, which was acquired by Intel in 2000.


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