The Zen Approach to Project Management: Working from Your Center to Balance Expectations and PerformanceProjects are often more complex and stressful than they need to be. Far too many of them fail to meet expectations. There are far too many conflicts. There are too few moments of joy and too much anxiety. But there is hope. It is possible to remove the unnecessary stress and complexity. This book is about how to do just that. It links the essential principles and techniques of managing projects to a "wisdom" approach for working with complex, people-based activities. Project management becomes a metaphor for how we can live our lives and, if we follow the wisdom traditions, the way we live our lives becomes a metaphor for how to manage projects. The book guides readers in exploring how to: .Remove unnecessary stress and complexity from your projects .Apply mindfulness and open mindedness to cut through the barriers to personal self-actualization .Manage expectations to ensure that people get what they need, when they need it and for the cost they expected to pay and that they accept what they get .Manage performance to cut through interpersonal and intrapersonal issues that get in the way of excellence .Break free of self-imposed barriers to creative thinking, conflict resolution and problem solving .Remain calm and energetic while being active and effective in the face of chaos, fear, resistance to change, unrealistic demands, conflict and the other aspects of project life that cause stress |
Common terms and phrases
ability accept activities Alan Watts analysis analytical assessment avoid aware become behavior best practices big picture cause centered chapter complex concentration conflict consciously constraints continuous improvement cost create criteria critical cultivate decision defined process definition degree deliver discipline documentation effective effort Emotional Intelligence emotions enables evaluation example experience explore fear feelings formal goal healthy team identify impact individual inner Insight Meditation Society interpersonal relationships issues koan managing expectations means meditation ment mind negotiation nondual objectives one’s organization outcome perfection performance excellence Peter Senge problem proj project management Project Management Institute project performers reactive realistic recognize relationships requirements response risk management self-actualization sense Six Sigma Six Thinking Hats skillful stakeholders Stephen Covey systems thinking Taoism team members teamwork things thinking thoughts tion tive uncertainty uncon unrealistic wisdom
Popular passages
Page 168 - We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. Through this work we have come to value: • Individuals and interactions over processes and tools • Working software over comprehensive documentation • Customer collaboration over contract negotiation • Responding to change over following a plan. That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more.
Page 93 - Quality you know what it is, yet you don't know what it is. But that's self-contradictory. But some things are better than others, that is, they have more quality. But when you try to say what the quality is, apart from the things that have it, it all goes poof!
Page 121 - EVEN IF HE WERE MEDIOCRE, THERE ARE A LOT OF MEDIOCRE JUDGES AND PEOPLE AND LAWYERS. THEY ARE ENTITLED TO A LITTLE REPRESENTATION, AREN'T THEY, AND A LITTLE CHANCE? WE CAN'T HAVE ALL BRANDEISES AND FRANKFURTERS AND CARDOZOS AND STUFF LIKE THAT THERE.
Page 147 - O wad some Power the giftie gie us To see oursels as ithers see us! It wad frae monie a blunder free us, An' foolish notion: What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us, An
Page 234 - It is the man who carefully advances step by step, with his mind becoming wider and wider, — and progressively better able to grasp any theme or situation, — persevering in what he knows to be practical, and V Concentrating his thought upon it, who is bound to succeed in the greatest degree.
Page 234 - The application of knowledge, skills, tools, and techniques to project activities in order to meet or exceed stakeholder needs and expectations from a project.
Page 54 - In short, I conceive that great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by the false estimates they have made of the value of things, and by their giving too much for their whistles.
Page 201 - A boss creates fear, a leader confidence. A boss fixes blame, a leader corrects mistakes. A boss knows all, a leader asks questions. A boss makes work drudgery, a leader makes it interesting. A boss is interested in himself or herself, a leader is interested in the group.
Page 138 - Personal mastery: learning to expand our personal capacity to create the results we most desire, and creating an organizational environment which encourages all its members to develop themselves towards the goals and purposes they choose; • Mental models: reflecting upon, continually clarifying and improving our internal pictures of the world and seeing how they shape our actions and decisions...
Page 24 - When that is done successfully then everything else follows naturally. Peace of mind produces right values, right values produce right thoughts. Right thoughts produce right actions and right actions produce work which will be a material reflection for others to see of the serenity at the center of it all.