Philip Diab's Thoughtstream
Blog Post, Articles, Podcasts, & Videos
Corporate Culture, Projects, & Transformation – Podcast
Peter Drucker famously said that strategy eats culture for breakfast. Best practice typically has dictated that new strategies and project management methodologies must be created with the corporate culture in mind to ensure adoption. In this episode we explore the...
Project Teams and Organizations – Podcast
Building teams that enhance project success by their strong performance is a worthy goal for any organization. Deliberate work on building teams that perform at a higher level can foster success in projects and beyond, but then what? Some organizations approach high...
Innovation in Project Management & Methodologies – Podcast
Innovation remains a hot topic across industries, with organizations and professionals trying to find the key to finding an innovative new product or service. This is just as true in project management as in every other profession, innovation on projects and in...
How does traditional risk planning fail us?
I was listening to a news program last night about current events. One of the commentators said something that caught my attention and I thought that it is a perfect way of describing the challenges that project management practitioners have with risk planning. While...
Executive Sponsors & Project Managers – Podcast
Get any group of project managers together and ask about the importance of the executive sponsor and you will get likely get two reactions. First, they will say that a great executive sponsor is a key for success. All Project Managers will typically agree with this...
Accidental Project Managers Versus Intentional Project Managers – Podcast
In the world of project management, there are two types of professionals, those who choose the profession intentionally and those who find it by accident. Much has been made of the accidental project manager, often an exceptionally strong performer who is rewarded...
Is Cultural Diversity Bad for Projects?
Conventional wisdom in today's business environment is that diversity is good for business. If your organization is marketing a product, it would benefit greatly from having cultural diversity within its team because it would be more aligned with potential cultural...
Shifting assumptions, big picture or details?
Last week I had an out of town meeting, about an hour away from my house. About 45 minutes out my car started making a funny noise and my dashboard flashed the low pressure tire sensor light. I found a place to pull over into a run down gas station. When I checked my...
Project Managers & Industry Knowledge – Podcast
Project Management Debate Podcast Introduction
I am pleased to announce the launch of a new podcast titled Project Management Debate Podcast that includes weekly episodes exploring different topics related to project management, transformation, strategy, and leadership. The format of this 15-20 minute...
Puzzles and Project Management
A few days ago a friend of mine shared a post from "puzzled" which includes a picture with hidden words that readers are encouraged to find. What fascinates me about this type of picture is not the fact that it was shared over 800K times on Facebook, although that...
PMO Structure or Process
The reasons behind setting up a PMO are diverse but often are linked to a set of challenges related to organizational projects. Many of my clients have articulated an inability to keep track of progress on projects and a lack of visibility to enable proactive...
Project Management Tools & Usage
A couple of days ago I saw an interesting and challenging question regarding a Project Manager's skillset. The inquirer had a genuine need to understand the appropriate level of expectations when it came to Project Managers. He asked: "How can anyone call themselves a...
Leadership Development
Shortly after I graduated college I realized that there was a huge skills gap between the knowledge I had gained in my business program and the skills that I needed to enter the workforce successfully. I had graduated ready to join the ranks of business leaders and...
Boy Scouts Training Program
Over six years ago my family and I attended a Boy Scouts of America (BSA) Court of Honor ceremony in celebration of our friends' boys reaching Eagle Scout Rank. At that time my only familiarity with the program was extremely limited but I remember that it made quite a...
RapidStartPMO Explained
Over the past twenty years I have been involved in designing, building, and aligning PMOs in a diverse set of organizations ranging from startups to multi-national blue chip organizations across four continents and in over fifteen countries. These PMOs have served...
The Fear of Failure
I was watching some TV today and came across a highlight reel from over 25 years ago of Michael Jordan scoring the winning shot at a playoff game against the Cleveland Cavaliers. In this shot Jordan squares away to shoot at the free throw line directly in front of an...
What does Customer Centric Mean?
My early years in project management coincided with the IT revolution in the US. This resulted in technology professionals and sectors replacing construction and engineering disciplines as the most prevalent consumers of project management capabilities. I saw first...