Learn from Project Mistakes

What's the biggest project mistake you've ever made?

I've been doing projects long enough to have made some big ones. But sometimes it's the little ones that cause the most grief. Little mistakes like forgetting to thank people for their work. Little mistakes like assuming that customer will be delighted by the brand new process or product my project is delivering. Little mistakes like failing to track expenses until they exceed the budget.

On second thought, those aren't small mistakes after all, are they? And yet, in each case there were valuable lessons learned that transferred directly into better projects later on. Learning from my mistakes (not that I'm done making them) has powered my projects into more creative areas and kept me on my toes.

When it seems obvious, it's probably not. When it seems too good to be true, there's probably a problem lurking under the surface. When everything is on schedule and under budget how can we be sure that our performance quality is up to the needed standards?

We can be more sure by paying attention, by owning up to our mistakes, and learning from them.

Your project's imperfections may provide the biggest longterm value -- when you learn from them.

-- Douglas Brent Smith

Front Range Leadership:

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A Promise or A Plan?

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The Benefits of Supervisory Training

When was the last time you had any leadership training? How often do the supervisors in your organization get training? If you are like most organizations, it's never enough. Some teams go without any supervisory training at all and expect supervisors and managers to learn as they go, on the job. Unfortunately, while it is memorable to learn from your mistakes, it comes at a high cost. People get tired. People leave. Important accounts go away. Customers complain. And teams struggle without the skills and knowledge it takes to build cohesive teams that are capable of solving problems, improving performance and achieving goals. Admittedly, I can be expected to support training since I'm in the business. Still, take a closer look at your own leadership career and decide for yourself. Are leaders better off with more training and development or with less? Supervisory training can generate benefits that pay off long after the training is over. Here are just a few of the things sup

Helping People Change

Resistance to change is our most natural and unproductive impulse. Helping people thru that change changes their lives positively. It's s something that high performance leaders do. -- doug smith

Listen to Their Story

"An enemy is a person whose story we have not heard." -- Gene Knudsen Hoffman Without contrary evidence it always seems like we're right. Even WITH contrary evidence we get stuck often defending our story, our view. The story may not be wrong, but it is surely incomplete. Listen. Ask questions. Understand. Learn. High performance leaders look for common ground. -- doug smith

Dump Anonymous Feedback

What's the problem with anonymous feedback? The list is long. When people can say anything they want, without any accountability, they are sometimes rude. The feedback becomes exaggerated. Not knowing what to do with it (who do you try to please?) it frustrates the person receiving the feedback. Anonymous feedback encourages anti-social comments. It opens up a level of venting that is not healthy for either party. And, rather than building relationships, it tears them down. The best place for anonymous feedback is the garbage. It's too easy to be negative when no one knows who you are. Hold people accountable. Teach them that two-way communication is responsible, respectable, and useful. Let's keep the trash talking on the basketball court and build relationships of worth at work. -- Doug Smith

Perception Frames Your Problem

How do you know for sure if something is a problem? If you see it as a problem, then it is a problem. Your perception will tell you -- not reality, but what you consider important about your reality. If you see it as a problem, shouldn't you do something about it? Centered problem solving sorts through our perceptions and checks in with the perceptions of other people who are effected by the situation. Emotions can trigger misconceptions, so centering ourselves and testing our assumptions is key. Then, if it's still a problem, it's time to do something about it. -- Douglas Brent Smith Bring our Centered Problem Solving workshop to your location and dramatically increase the problem solving skills of the people who attend.

Know Why You Do What You Do

Remember that advertising slogan for a very questionable publication that kept saying "Inquiring minds want to know"? We all have inquiring minds. We all need to know. And what we need to know the most is why. Why do we do what we do. What makes what we do cool, important, necessary? It's never just a job. It's never just an interaction. There is always a reason why. Know why. Figure out your why. Identify your mission. Then roll with it. -- Doug Smith P.S. My good friend David Spiegel has pointed out that Simon Sinek is a great source on WHY. Here's the video where I first was drawn to his thinking on this:

Change Quickly

How are you at keeping up? Change is so rapid that adjusting, and evolving, has become a full time job. We roll with the changes, we drive new changes, we let go of the old. It's not getting easier, and it's getting faster. I work at it. I keep learning. I keep adjusting, and still... By the time I have it figured out it's time to try something else. Instead of getting frustrated, here's how I like to look at it: change is growth. Faster change is faster growth. Getting better is growth, so the more change the better. Are you with me on that? Because the alternative is slow-motion decay, and we don't want that, do we? -- Douglas Brent Smith

Tough and Tender

It's better to be considered tough and show up tender than to be thought tender and show up tough. -- doug smith

How to Embrace Criticism

Taking a very long walk. Do you ever feel like simply avoiding some feedback that's headed your way? Sometimes I'd rather have someone keep their opinion to themselves. If they're not happy, if they are sounding judgmental, if they have a frowny face. Wouldn't be easier if they just kept quiet? Easier in that moment. And, sometimes maybe it's even the best thing possible if a harsh critic keeps a damaging opinion private. But I've also learned that sometimes the toughest message is what I truly need to hear in order to learn. Just because I don't like criticism doesn't mean it isn't good for me. I just might need to take a good long afterwards. How about you? Here's how to embrace criticism: Remember, they could be wrong. As my friend Dr. Jay Desko has said, "feedback says more about the person providing the feedback than it does about you." Stay curious. There is probably something useful to learn. Remember that a

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