Just overheard this on Twitter: “Ability to GSD constantly thwarted by the presence of others and their “issues”. How am I supposed to “do” if they can’t “do” without me?”
I hear you with this one! I recently spoke at Qualcomm for Refresh San Diego on group productivity. I covered two concepts that may help.
1. Create Feedback Loops. Communication is a necessity of project work. If it is done on an ad-hock basis, you will surely be overwhelmed quickly. This is especially true of the person leading the project. Set up feedback loops that your team members use to feed you information and to air questions.
For my video production business, I had each of my employees send me an update email at the end of every day. They told me the latest status of everything as well as the issues or questions that I needed to answer for them to make forward progress. This was an agreement between me and them. It made a HUGE difference in allowing me to GSD! I could concentrate on my deliverables and then batch process their emails at the end of the day. There’s a reason that banks “batch process” their transactions. We should do the same!
Now, if you are not the project lead, and it’s your boss or superior bugging you, they have Infoenza and you need to help them kick this condition. The best way to combat Infoenza in a manager is to feed them relevant information on a consistent basis. Doing so will shorten status meetings and keep them from coming to your office or cubical with that empty stare and the question of “Where are we at with the ________ project?”.
2. Have a scrum every morning. Having a quick huddle every morning can help significantly with eradicating Infoenza in a group situation. Meet for no longer than 15 min. and review status and issues. Let everyone know that this is the time to get it all off their chest. Otherwise, it needs to wait till either the end of the day or that next morning. Now, some things do need to be dealt with right away, but they should be the exception, not the rules.
3. This is a Bonus! Check your email at specified times during the day. If you have a “ding” going off with each new email, you are screwed. Bottom line. Turn it off, check it a specified times and GSD!
Thanks for piping off. These issues exist EVERYWHERE!
Kill Infoenza and truly GET SH&%T DONE!
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