“Project Management” is a concept, an idea. It’s a tag to a unit of information, a meme. Same goes for “Agile”. Or “Rudolf The Red Nosed Reindeer”, as Jurgen points out in his recent post about “memes”.
Memes travel from one person to another. Memes influence each other. “Project Management” and “Web 2.0″ merged into the “Project Management 2.0″ meme.
I recommend reading “The Success Of The Agile Memplex” for a great explanation.
Last week, my friend Ali Anani looked at how emotions “travel”, how they influence each other.
The concept he introduced is very interesting and exciting. It is also very counter intuitive. It is a bit similar to memes, where ideas are separated from the people to have a ‘life’ of their own.
It’s very interesting to see what happens when you look at the interactions between emotions itself. My first thought was that it isn’t enough, a lot more variables are into play when humans are interacting and so, but, as he points out, all other variables are already included in the emotions, either direct or by proxy, so why not just focus on the emotions?
Hi Bas,
I am indeed falttered by your comments. A new definition of friendship is inspired by your comments. Rightly, you say, and I quote from your comment, “Memes travel from one person to another. Memes influence each other. “Project Management” and “Web 2.0? merged into the “Project Management 2.0? meme”. Your memes influence me and inspire new ideas. I feel the strength of a friendship is proportional to the number of memes you get from a friend. I may even introduce a new idea, that is “Emotion’s Memes” Emotions influence each other as people influence each other to generate new ideas and grow. Emotions influence each other and grow.
I thank you again, Bas, for explaining my idea on emotions so clearly
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Ali, not sure if you’ve seen Whitty’s (Australian Academic) material on Memes, Project Management, Emotions, and Networks. A paper out earlier this year ties nicely (for me) the emotional drivers of aspects of project management. Some things that resonate well with me (as a practitioner) is the idea that artefacts such as the Gantt chart enable my manager to feel more secure about the turmoil I manage. It hides it nicely from them and enables me to get on with my work. Another is that projects have an addictive quality (like computer gaming). I complain a lot, but I also get a buzz out of it. And the memetic aspect of the ideas that underpin project management (being in control and being organised) – displaying these traits (by drawing the charts and showing you PRINCE2 cert) gives us a competitive advantage over those who don’t (as these traits are seen as important) and this behaviour gets selected for and passes on. You’re right when you say these ideas are somewhat counterintuitive. I have to take 10 minutes to warm up my brain on these ideas before it all starts to gel together. Whitty’s paper is here: http://www.usq.edu.au/users/whitty/Project%20management%20artefacts%20and%20the%20affective%20emotions%20they%20evoke%20whitty.pdf his talk on networks/project management is here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9010523214247487421#
Will, will you accept my apology for responding late as I have just returned from a week-long trip. For now, I want to thank you for your insightful comment and its richness with ideas and challenging thoughts. Being physically fatigued, I would rather elborate more very soon. Thank you again.
Hello Will, I went again thorugh your concise comment and I am pleased with its depth. Also, the linked reference is of great value. I read it before, but out my unidentified shortcomings, I missed the real value of this publication till I read your comment.
I strongly advise readers of this blog to read your comment and the linked references. I have a suggestion for you that you may want to consider. Let me first copy and paste part of your comment, “You’re right when you say these ideas are somewhat counterintuitive. I have to take 10 minutes to warm up my brain on these ideas before it all starts to gel together”. I suggest that you share with us this ten-minute time lapse experiences. What do you do? How do you warm up? How do you find the sweet spot of the interacting factor? I am sure you have a lot to say and share.
Bas,
When I click on the uberVU above I get the message webpage was not found.Is there a cure in your magical hands?
yeah, I moved domains so that is a bummer. But, the link above next to 1 that says “ubervi – social comments” works and that is the more important one.
Ali, Bas,
It was one of Bas’ posts back in 2008 that got me into Whitty’s material.
http://www.basdebaar.com/project-management-code-214.html
What I mean when I say “I need to take ten minutes to get my head around” is that I have to try to stop seeing project management from the inside out, and see it as whitty presents it from the outside looking on. I think we (in project management and perhaps management in general) are heavily indoctrinated with a particular way of viewing the world. There’s a saying….fish discover water last….which alludes to the fact that fish can’t see the water because they are so heavily immersed in it. We have accepted tools like the Gantt chart because we hope that whoever invented them figured out how to make them work and help us deliver the project – and they are popular (eg ms project) BECAUSE they work. But what if all that (or most of it) is wrong? What if the Gantt chart is popular for other seasons? And for me Whitty’s material takes me outside project management and gets me to look at it with fresh eyes. I spend the 10 minute forgetting I’m a project manager and imagining I’m sort of outside myself observing me in my role, and examining as honestly as I can why I do what I do.
Back to the original post that Bas put up about the PMBoK Code. I wrote to Whitty a few months back and asked if there was a video lecture on this topic. He sent me this link to the original talk in 2006:
http://www.usq.edu.au/users/whitty/The_PM_BOK_Code/index.htm
Will
Hi Will, Bas,
How could I resist the temptation to respond to this deep response? I could not agree more with you, Will. Familiarity leads to blind acceptance. For how many years did people believe in Aristotle and his theory till Oxygen was discovered? Or, people indulged in using tools that do not satisfy the emerging needs. I myself dared to question the validity of Maslow Pyramid of needs. So, your approach in reversing your thinking, Will, is smart. Reverse thinking takes us out of our comfort zone.
Bas, Will gave us an idea in his thorough response. I quote, “….fish discover water last….which alludes to the fact that fish can’t see the water because they are so heavily immersed in it”. Wow!! Great idea to build on for our fish pond book.
Will, you have been an inspirer. I am genuinely glad to correspond with you
Ali, Will,
Wow. “fish discover water last” thanks for that quote it is perfect and describes the essence of what we are trying to talk about!
And I am going to check out the presentation this weekend, thanks for the link!
Very happy you guys are taking the time to talk here. It’s a pleasure.
This has been a tremendous exchange and one that has actually generated a level of embarrassment, if I can be so transparent. I feel I am a life-long learner, always looking for new insight, and that I am pretty good at what I do. But I have never really taken the time to have this sort of reflective thought on the profession I enjoy so much. I think I may have just discovered the water. Very excited to check out the links this evening.
Hi Robert, your self-transparency is very much appreciated as much as your unfailing search for new insights. Would it be possible to share with us the results of your new insight of self reflective thoughts? Has it led even to more insights?
Robert, are you sure you want to go down the rabbit hole?
Once you start looking from outside in, there is no way back … but it’s worth it. Enjoy and yes, please, I would appreciate if you share your experiences.
Talking of rabbit holes, I fell down a major one yesterday after reading this.
http://www.usq.edu.au/users/whitty/21st%20Century%20Project%20Management%20=%20Open%20Source%20BOK.pdf
To date (for me as a practitioner anyway) the whole memes view of project management has been a great philosophical exercise, but this paper rescues me from not knowing how to apply it. I feel as though I’ve found a big piece of the puzzle! In Alice in Wonderland (inspired by Bas’ rabbit hole metaphor), Alice finds a bottle with the words “Drink Me” on it. I think for all project managers this paper should have “Read Me” on it. Will.
Will, I want to thank you for the link on PM. It is a fascinating reading. It departs from conventional thinking that leads to conventional management. How often people protect practices they feel deep down they are wrong; yet they defend them because these people enjoy the benefits they get from established norms. People need to get into the rabbit hole to think differently/
Will. thanks for the fascinating reference. Appreciated.
You wrote over a year ago: “When I read his papers, it’s like watching star wars 4 and 5. I have a sense that he’s got episodes 6 and 1, 2, and 3, up his sleeve somewhere, or at least know what they should be about.”
(here in the comments: http://www.basdebaar.com/project-management-code-214.html)
I think this is another one. Not sure if it’s 2 or 6
This post by Bas spurred viewership and comments. In acknowledgement I made the following comment on slideshare, where the presentation was published first
The embed http://blog.softwareprojects.org has generated some very useful discussions. For those who may be interested the active link is
http://www.basdebaar.com/memes-and-emotions-2521.html/comment-page-1#comment-2456
Gentleman:
It has been a while since I read this post and started thinking at PM from a different angle. I think I still have a re-read ahead of me before I fully grasp this, but it has had a great impact already.
I currently work for Lenovo (old IBM) and much of the project delivery has been developed over the past 20 years of hardware development, so who would question big blue processes, 20 years of lessons learned, etc. Thanks to your post, I am starting to! I am in a Services Development group and our challenges, documents, approach, requirements and so forth are very different from hardware.
The biggest problem is that I did not come from the old IBM culture and I am finding myself swimming with a lot of fish. Changing thoughts on how you do things is always difficult, but in a global enterprise with 20 years of success is even more interesting.
You have me on the right path and I am waiting for the ah-ha moment when it all clicks. Just an great discussion that will have an effect on my career going forward.
Hi Robert,
I am happy you took something away from it. For everyone it is something different. It’s not about doing thing different perse, it;s more about remembering and reevaluating why you did it in the first place
I am still waiting for The One Click that snaps it all into place … if it exists
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