Project Management
I’m not very good at it. It’s got to be said. There are things I can do well, like finding elegant simple solutions to difficult technical problems. Black and White stuff I suppose. But managing projects is a huge grey area. Goalposts move, priorities shift around and it’s hard to keep focused on the goal. I always expect projects to be perfect. A crystal clear goal, simply make a plan, stick to it and voila. It never happens like that and when it starts to get complex and muddy I panic and get stressed out, get into a bit of rabbit in car headlights situation and screw things up through inaction. I’m trying to learn. Trying to keep calmer and deal with problems quicker. It will take a while, but I’ll get there.
Seeing as this blog is all.work.all.the.time at the moment, I thought I might write a little bit about the industry I work in. This web-software-development thing. I’ve worked in it for years. There are many types of jobs and many types of characters that you find in those jobs. At one time or another I’ve tried to pass myself off as one or several of these roles;
- project manager
- technical project manager
- designer
- creative director
- business development (salesperson)
- java/other low level programming language developer
- flash developer
- guru developer
- freelance consultant
- business owner
- managing director
- Internet marketer
- entrepreneur
I think I’ll do a little profile for each. What the job is, the kind of person that is found in that kind of job, the kind of things you’re likely to hear them say, and the kind of things they do which really wind people up. As I say, most of these roles I’ve tried my hand at at times, so I’ll try to include an example of people I’ve come across who actually do the job well alongside how I’ve screwed them up.