This week in the pm-clinic discussion forum: Topic #31 - Working with programmer/architects.

We’re talking a situation where there is an senior architect new to a project, and how to figure out the best way to work with/ lead / manage them.

Posted in Management, Software/Web development | 1 Comment »

Was away camping, and returned to a great Memorial day present - a mention on slashdot. The timing is sweet since the book is just out. But its funny than an essay almost two months old surfaces again. Somehow it showed up again recently on kottke.org and then made it’s way over to slashdot.

Posted in Essays, On writing | No Comments »

Steven Makofsky of furrygoat is just getting into the book, and hasn’t fallen asleep quite yet.

Posted in The Art of PM book, artofpm reviews | No Comments »

For kicks i’ve been tracking the amazon ranking # for the art of pm. For most of this week it’s been hovering below 1000. Right now it’s in the 400s. Which I understand to be fantastic. 2o minutes into the marathon, I’m out of breath, but still on camera and waving.

I’m trying to figure out if there’s some way to map rankings to sales figures. I mean, even the NYT bestseller list is entirely misleading. If Book X is in the top twenty for two weeks, but drops quickly after a month, its total sales will be less than a book that never makes the NYT bestseller, but hovers at the equivalent of a top 50 or 100 ranking for years.

So the same goes for the amazon ranking. It’s hard to map that number to actual sales, and it’s hard to connect the ranking number to book quality. The best book in a category is unlikely to stay highly ranked in hourly sales figures, but would score very well in lifetime sales ranking for its category.

For example, Mythical Man month is currently ranked #1386, but is the best known book on software project management ever. Its lifetime sales per category is probably #1.

Now amazon does track per category top 20 lists - but what i can’t figure out is its correlation to the master amazon rankings. I’ve seen the #5 book in a category have a higher amazon sales ranking than the #2. Not sure if this is a timing issue - those stats are updated at different times, or if there’s some funky math in what constitutes a sale in a given category.

And of course, the bigger question that renders all this number watching useless: what percentage of total book sales are through Amazon? I have no idea. I suspect it’s higher for tech-sector books, but what is the baseline? Do the amazon trends jive with other online sellers? physical in store purchases? I haven’t found anyone who’s written about or researched this. All these questions are a big motivator to not spend much time watching little numbers go up and down.

Posted in The Art of PM book | 4 Comments »

Ok - here’s my notes from my first radio interview experience. I was on air for about 15 minutes on the 5/22/2005 Business of Success radio show.

1. Calm down. If you listen carefully to people that speak well on air, they speak slooowly. They hit all the syllables. And more importantly, they sound calm or in control. My first 10 minutes were not calm, and I didn’t sound particularly in control. I smoothed out later on, but had the interview only been 5 minutes… I thought I’d be fine here since I’m a good public speaker and have tons of experience. The difference here was control: I wasn’t the host, I was the guest. I didn’t have my hand on the throttle, Alan did.
2. Practice. Whenever friends have job interviews, I always offer to do a practice interview with them. Well, my wife offered to do a practice radio interview with me, which I declined. With a “I don’t need that kind of help” shrug. Well, in retrospect, it would have helped a ton. It would have forced me to run through things and recognize mistakes or bad habits. Since I didn’t do this, the live interview now serves as the place I learned from.
3. Know the 3 things you want to say. The questions I got were open enough that I had lots of room to decide how to respond. If I were smarter, I would have related things back to the book, or back to the 3 or 5 key things I wanted to try and say. I’d have been ready to say 5 second, 30 second and 1 minute versions of those key things. I’m not suggesting spinning or manipulating questions: only that in this case there was plenty of room to answer questions and hit key things I wanted to hit. (This would have been a good thing to practice).
4. Listen to other interviews. I listened to 3 or 4 other interviews from the same show just to get a feel for Alan Rothman (the show’s host) and take notes on how other people handled the interview. Especially if you do a practice run, it’s easy to catch good and bad things in other interviews.
5. Know the format and how much time you have. I was lucky to have a 15 minute slot all to myself. It’s typical to get shorter slots, or be part of panel or talk show on some other specific topic. Either way, make sure you know exactly how much time you will have, whether you’re sharing the time with others, who is interviewing you, and what the focus of the interview will be. Use this to help practice.
6. It goes by very fast. I expected this but still felt it all went by very quickly. This is another reason to practice - to help it seem familiar and slower. The commercial breaks, as annoying to listeners as they are, were great for me. It gave me a chance to calm down, consider what I’d said, and what adjustments I needed to make. Make sure you know how many commercial breaks there will be and how long they are.
7. You are on your own. One surprising thing in being interviewed was how little guidance there is. Alan was kind enough to chat with me the day before which helped me know what to expect. But the day of had no prep at all: you call in a few minutes before you go on, then you hear him announce your name, and then before you know it, it’s all over.
8. Consider what you are representing. Many of the better interviews I listened to were focused on one of 3 things: a company/service, a product (e.g. book), a person (CEO of JetBlue, rock star, etc.). Some people who were on because of their book spent more time talking about their company/service. Others went the other way. I think next time I need to be clearer on what the audience value proposition is: the book? me as a consultant? me as a person and my experiences? A combination of these things? Why are they not going to turn the dial? And within the things they’re interested in, what i can say that serves my own interests as well? I don’t have answers to these questions, but they’ll be what I’m thinking about before the next interview.
9. You are on your own. One surprising thing in being interviewed was how little guidance there is. Alan was kind enough to chat with me the day before which helped me know what to expect. But the day of had no prep at all: you call in a few minutes before you go on, then you here him announce your name, and then before you know it, it’s all over.
10. Ignore host responsibility. This is a minor one, but 2/3rds in I stop myself short because I heard the commercial cue music. Big Mistake. First, you can talk over the cue for a few seconds. Second, it’s not my job. The host will interupt when it’s time - because I cut myself off there’s a good 2 seconds of dead air for no reason. Let the host manage the show and you - keep going.
11. Relax. . Even though all the other bullets are super analytical, none of the analysis matters if I’m not relaxed enough to make use of it. Personality counts, and I probably can’t be me if I’m doing interview calculus in my head while trying to carry a conversation. So practice a few times, consider the above list, but on the day just let what happens happens and try to have fun.
12. No ums, or other bad speaking habits. This comes straight from any guide to public speaking. Watch out for bad habits you use when speaking under pressure. Common ones are: using um, like, or well, between words. Repeating the same introduction or endings to sentences such as “In other words” or “.. of that nature.” Sluring, slang, absences of any pauses are other common bad habits. The only way to get rid of them is practice.

If you listened in and had any comments or advice for me, feel free to leave it here.

Posted in On Tour, On writing, The Art of PM book | 5 Comments »

The previous post had it wrong: here’s the correct link for the radio interview. Jump to 27:30 if you want to skip the first guest.

For those keeping score, I give myself a C (a passing grade) on this interview. Watch for “radio interview lessons learned” in an upcoming post. Made some obvious rookie mistakes, despite trying to avoid them :)

Thanks Faisal for catching this.

Posted in On Tour | 4 Comments »

Here’s the first online book review I’ve found, from 43 folders’s Merlin Mann:.

Where so many Project Management books fetishize GANTT charts, waterfalls, and abstract planning methods, most of Berkun’s book lives much further down in the trenches—where misunderstandings happen, dates slip, and bad decisions threaten to derail your project. The book is full of really practical advice on handling these challenges in the real world. And, yes, I really wish it had existed 7 or 8 years ago.

Full review here

Posted in artofpm reviews | 2 Comments »

This week in the pm-clinic discussion forum: Project status meetings. We covered meetings many weeks ago (do you believe this is week 30? amazing).

We’re talking about what goes wrong with status type meetings, how to make them less painful, and strategies for keeping them on-time and less bloody.

Posted in Management, Software/Web development | No Comments »

The business of sucess radio program is interviewing me on Sunday to talk about the book - They’re syndicated nationwide. I’ve been on TV once before in 1997 (don’t try to find the footage - its been happily destroyed) - but this is my first radio thing.

I’m the second guest on this archive recording of the 5/22 show (mp3)
(jump ahead to 27:35 if you want to skip the first guest, Joe Vitale author of “The Attractor factor“)

Posted in On Tour, The Art of PM book | No Comments »

My multi-day interview on the Well is winding down - but the transcript is now publically available. Lots of stuff about my thoughts on XP (Extreme programming), where teams go wrong, and the important things about leading teams that don’t often make it into books.

A conversation with Scott Berkun

Thanks to David Edelstein for making it happen.

Posted in On Tour, The Art of PM book | No Comments »

Here’s my notes from my first book tour (one city, 3 days, 6 appearances). Here’s your chance to learn from my mistakes:

1. You will be overwhelmed. There are too many logistics to juggle at the same time with too many different people not to screw things up. It’s ok, it’s fine, but prepare to leave things, forget things, and make mistakes. As Durden said, if you want to make an omlette, you have to breaks some eggs.
2. Make a daily ittenerary. I had a daily ittinereray set up with address, directions, and contact info. Before you go to bed, make sure everything is set and confirmed for the next day. Margins of error are small, and people expect you to arrive at certain times.
3. Don’t trust technology or anything else. Things always break. Murphy’s law is alive and well in 2005. Expect presentations not to work and video equipment to fail. Transportation will be late. Compatability is a myth. Be ready to talk about the book without any technological support, even if just for 10 minutes - that’s enough to give people some context and ask you questions.
4. Get everyone’s business card. I have a decent memory for faces, an excellent memory of ideas, but a horrible memory of names. I didn’t get nearly enough business cards from people. I love questions and thinking about them, but there’s never enough time. E-mail is better. And I know the routine, grab card, write note/comment/question on back, put in secret special non-forgetable place in clothing, review later. But I was overwhelmed (see #1) and unable to remember to do this nearly enough. I’d have asked people to do this, hand me a card with their question on it, but historically this never works - people won’t do it. The whole business card thing is awkward, but I’ll just have to suck it up next time.
5. Be friendly and open. This is basic presenting advice, but I’m there to invite people to spend more time with my book. If I can’t do that in person, I don’t blame people for not placing much hope in the book. I tried to think of myself as a host for the book, and the talk was the tasty appetizer. If I seem smart, and the appetizer good, they should want, all on their own, to buy the book. Smart good books are rare.
6. Two talks a day is enough - The most valuable, interesting part of the whole experience was talking to people before and after the actual talk/seminar thing. That’s when there’s some shared context and the chance to get to know people. If you do more than two talks a day you will running from venue to venue, and not get much interactive time with people. If you don’t want that, fine - go for 3 or 4. But if you do want to go deeper into people’s questions or learn something, 2 seems about the maximum
7. Have free things. Free books helped get people to stay for Q&A. The flyers and postcards I had gave people something to take with them if they didn’t get a book. In a pinch business cards can work, but I think ideal would have been a sample 4 or 5 pages from the book itself.
8. Rest your voice. If you go 2 or 3 lectures a day, plan quiet time. Drink lots of tea. Last thing you want is to lose your voice before your last few dates. You can go out, but warn people you won’t be talking much.
9. Plan a social event. As a total no frills impromtu thing I invited everyone I met out for drinks at a pub. Was fun. About 15 people showed in the course of a few hours. Most didn’t stay long (and a few grabbed a book a left), but the whole experience was positive. Unlike the run and gun lecture experience, at the pub everyone is chatting and the environment is social. If you’re not as attracted to risk as I am, you could get confirmations from a small nugget of people to insure against drinking alone.
10. Everyone matters. Crowds are over-rated. No matter who is there or how many people show, your performance should be the same. The smaller the group, the bigger a slice of your energy you can give to everyone that’s there. I’ve presented to 1000 people (umm, not on this tour) and 10, and sometimes I think my time was better spent with the 10. Don’t worry about numbers - worry about who’s in front of you, and how effective what you’re saying is interesting to them.
11. Gigs are network dependent. I spoke at places where my network reached. I asked friends, aquiantances, people I interviewed once, old managers, websites I’ve read, you name it. I sent mail to baychi and other professional groups, and just asked around until I found enough gigs to fill 3 days. I was told NO many times, and didn’t get responses at all from various places. Hiring a PR person might help, but I didn’t have one. See the previous bullet - if you can only find 3 gigs of 10 people, that’s 30 people who will know of you and your book that won’t if you don’t do a tour. And in theory a great way to grow your network is speaking - hopefully for my next book, it will be a little easier to find places to speak.
12. Consider tag-teaming the tour. Given 1,2 & 3 there are good reasons to have a supporting person around to help/share with various kind of logistics. I imagined at a certain moments how much easier and more fun the whole experience would be if I was sharing it with another author (or had a friend willing to be a roadie for a few days). The costs might be lower or the same, but the logistics would be much easier, the social would draw more people, etc. Not sure it would work, but it was a thought I had several times.
13. Remember Walt Whitman. The man known as one of America’s greatest writers used to go door to door selling his poems. Yes door to door. Imagine: knock, knock. Door opens. “Who’s there?”. There stands a strange poor looking man, in ragged wrinkled dirty clothes, with a big white beard and crazy eyes. “Hi, I’m Walt. I’m a poet. Can I…”. Door slams shut. Repeat. If Walt could do poetry door to door, it’s within your talent and pride to tour and talk about whatever it is you’re writing about.

But the big question is: does this help sales at all? I have no idea. I have to say yes, in that I’m an unknown and this got me (positive) exposure to about 300 people in 3 days. So I’d say this gets the book on the playing field with people - whether they buy it or not is based on so many factors that I have no control over it’s not even funny. But a book tour is one tool I have, so I used it.

Total score:

Cost: $800 (plane ticket, 3 nights lodging, rental car)
Time: 3 days
Gigs: 6 (3 different lectures, which paid off as I saw some people twice. Hope they were impressed :)
Total attendence: ~350 (Google: 100, Baychi: 100, Sun: 30,Adobe: 40, Yahoo: 40, Macromedia: 40)
Fun had: much
Pints of beer: many
Books given away: 70 (Thanks to O’Reilly)
Power cables lost: 1
Roadside assistance calls: 1
Bad meals: 2
Forgetable meals: umm
Good meals: 2
Moments of extreme existential angst: Once per day
Moments where I felt like a vacumn cleaner salesman: Once a talk
Desire to write more books, despite all this hard work and unclear returns: High

Posted in On Tour | 5 Comments »

On Thursday May 12th I Left Macromedia at 1:35pm. Just enough time to make back down to San Jose by 3pm.

I’d been to Adobe once before - when they were in their old offices back in 1994. I interviewed for a software engineer job that I didn’t get. But I still have the nice black and red adobe mug they gave me, my sole prize for the two days of interviews I had.

Anyway - Adobe is headquartered in two towers (hmmm) on Park Avenue, San Jose. When I saw them, and the adobe logo on top of the 20th floor, I sad “wow”. By far the biggest most archiectually dominant building I’d seen on the tour.

Katja, my most excellent host, met me downstairs and we headed up to the conference room. Highlight of the walk up was the gorgeous basketball court on a large patio between the towers. Awesome (although it seemed like a windtunnel - not a place for an afternoon picnic - long range gamers would suffer).

At the talk: spoke to a mid-sized group of 30 or 40 people. Met Tarjin, a usability engineer I knew back at Microsoft, who’s now at Adobe. By 3:05pm we were underway. The group was fun - most receptive to jokes on the whole tour (or maybe my jokes were better? who knows). Talked about schedules and teams, and how to make things go well on a timeline. Got a few questions about design process and managing ideas on a timeline, and I pulled out some diagrams from Chapter 6.

I said goodbye to the adobe folks, and finally headed back to my hotel and my first dip in the swimming pool that’d been teasing me throughout the book tour.

Thanks to everyone that came out to see me - check out the book and let me know what you think.

Posted in On Tour, The Art of PM book | 1 Comment »