ManagingTechnicians and

Professionals

Software Project Management

Who are we?

• Julien Egle & Jean-Michel Radiskol

• We come from Nice, in the southern part of France

• We study at the « MIAGE » school: management and IT

• Project experience– small school projects– project management rarely applied

Introduction

• External factors affected this project– 20th of September: JC abandons us and is hired in

another team – 29th of September: too much work in SPM, Vincent

returns to his home country

• We will try to go to the essential (Anna style)– Keep project management simple– Captivate the audience, at least try!– Don’t forget you have a report

Introduction (2)

• Seminar vs. talk-show– Exceptionally you are allowed to interrupt! (we

want you to participate in the discussion)– Please, ask us questions

(ex: What is your personal experience on… ? How does this relate to… ?)

– If you won’t, we will…

• Discussion on Part II of Humphrey’s Managing Technical People

Content

I. Managing Engineers and Scientists

II. Professional Career and Age

III. Managing Motivation

IV. Discipline in SPM = Quality?

ManagingEngineers and

Scientists

• Staff according to Baker should– interact with one another– be a highly motivated community

• Surmount obstacles together– avoid routine– prone excitement/thrill of seeing results

• Enable people to voluntarily chose their tasks – it involves them in decisions– they know their technical skills

• Personal experience: act the same with your girlfriend/wife…

Work assignment

Hierarchy of needs

• The Maslow Pyramid:

Source: http://www.age-of-the-sage.org

Hierarchy of needs (2)

• Pyramid = tool for managers to understand emotional status (also used in marketing)

• In management, aim highest level: “self-actualization”

• People’s goals are ever-evolving: “hygiene-factors” (if a person is always congratulated with the same reward, this reward will progressively lose its value)

Locals vs. Cosmopolitans

• Scientists = cosmopolitans– discoverers that search meanings– different vision of the world– learn, understand, teach

• Engineers = locals– creators / builders– awareness of organization objectives

• The best work for themselves, NOT for others…• This must be taken into consideration in

management because you frequently manage both, and at the same time

The Need for Influence

• Exercise 1: give your opinion on the following sentence from Humphrey’s book

« If you don’t take responsibility for supervising others or for going after the money, doing all the things that you could care less about, then somebody else will do it, and you will be directed by that person » (Dr. Parker)

Professional Career and Age

Evolving Professionals Goals

• Humphrey’s view: “you should manage differently according to age”– Age 20-30: great ambition, missing experience, need

supportive management– Age 30-40: realistic appreciation of abilities, need less

guidance– Age 40 and more: difficult to challenge, must be

listened for their experience

• Easy to understand, but our experience never confronted us to this yet. Conny, “would you have an example to illustrate this ?”

Age &Creativity/Performance/Moti

vation• Technical people can be creative during their

entire life: Freud, Beethoven, Edison, etc.• Reasoning ability and efficiency does not

necessarily decline with age, though it may lose speed

• In late careers people tend to give more priority to their private life

• Peopleware “Vienna waits for you”: as they mature, people realize that they have a short life and that this life is their only chance

Burnout

• Burnout = « feeling helplessly trapped in a meaningless job »

• When employees are not given enough responsibilities considering the capacities they have

• Avoid this inevitable case: talented and implicated people are at the top and desired / the rest are trapped at the bottom

Burnout (2)

• Also, do not put too much pressure on your people. In Peopleware burnout is also caused by workaholism, it happens when people realize:

« Slow down, you're doing fine,You can't be everything you want to be before your time.Although it's so romantic on the borderline tonight.But when will you realize . . . Vienna waits for you? »

"The Stranger," Billy Joel

Burnout (3)

Exercise 2: answer and discuss the questionsProject management is as we all know, a very difficult job. – Do you think project managers are also

exposed to burnout?– In what way?– Why would it be a problem for them in

particular?

Managing the Older Professional

• Less opportunities in late careers

• ParadoxParadox: to excel you must take risks, though aging careers implies taking less

• When some people have lived with issues for a long time, they think they cannot change

• Avoid thinking in constrained patterns by stimulating imaginative and energetic work

The Management-Employee Partnership

• With the right attitude, almost every job can be rewarded• Work should be assigned meaningfully• Managers should create a partnership / complicity with

the elements of their staff. • Peopleware:

– “The principal role of a manager is to create and maintain healthy chemistry.”

– but, this is not always easy given the existing hierarchy, managers are rarely seen as peers

• Use curiosity to build interest, even in the dullest tasks

ManagingTechnicians and

Professionals

Software Project Management

Quick review

• Managing engineers and scientists – some rules are applicable to your couple,

management is also about human relations after all…

– the Maslow pyramid is a tool for managers, but it is just a theoretical model (Sebastian)

– managing is about dealing with different people (eg. « locals and cosmopolitans » Humphrey)

Quick review (2)

• Professional Career and Age– evolving careers : ages 20-30, 30-40…– age & creativity/performance/motivation– interesting discussion on burnout

Webster’s definition = « exhaustion of physical or emotional strength or motivation usually as a result of prolonged stress or frustration »

– the paradox of the older professional– “The principal role of a manager is to create and

maintain healthy chemistry” (Peopleware)  

Managing Motivation

The Power of Motivation

• Motivation is the uppermost important criteria. We can illustrate this in sports: personal experience in cycling....

• Personal involvement: aiming at personal achievement rather than rewards

• Comment: Humphrey is sometimes emotionally empty and cold (Judson’s son’s cancer who got him involved in developing a blood separating machine…)

Motivation and Technical Competence

• Motivation is different from technical skills• Motivation is fragile and even more fragile

as you get older• Technical competences are manageable

and valuable, motivation almost isn’t• Peopleware emphasizes that technical

skills are not always well evaluated, specially in the beginning (Ex: the untested juggler)

Theory X fromThe Human Side of

Enterprise (Douglas Mc Gregor)

• Because of their dislike for work, most people must be controlled and threatened before they will work hard enough

• The average human prefers to be directed, dislikes responsibility, is unambiguous, and desires security above everything

• These assumptions lie behind most organizational principles today, and give rise both to "tough" management with punishments and tight controls, and "soft" management which aims at harmony at work

• Both these are "wrong" because man needs more than financial rewards at work, he also needs some deeper higher order motivation - the opportunity to fulfill himself

• Theory X managers do not give their staff this opportunity so that the employees behave in the expected fashion

« Theory X = interchangeable pieces of a machine » Humphrey

« Theory X = selling a cheeseburger » Peopleware

Theory Y fromThe Human Side of

Enterprise• The expenditure of physical and mental effort in work is as natural as play or

rest• Control and punishment are not the only ways to make people work, man

will direct himself if he is committed to the aims of the organization • If a job is satisfying, then the result will be commitment to the organization • The average man learns, under proper conditions, not only to accept but to

seek responsibility • Imagination, creativity, and ingenuity can be used to solve work problems by

a large number of employees• Under the conditions of modern industrial life, the intellectual potentialities of

the average man are only partially utilized

« Theory Y = motivate people instead of coercing them » Humphrey

The Evolution of Management

• In PM the truth is generally between X and Y• Nicholas: you should adopt situational

leadership in choosing when to direct or delegate responsibilities

• Peopleware is very Theory Y oriented and deals a lot with the « people side of the problem »

• Good working conditions improve efficiency and quality

Examples in Peopleware: « No work is done between 9 and 5 » (managers must consider noise), office configurations and space allocation…

Building Relationship& Task Maturity

• People must learn to think for themselves and « solve their own problems »Example: personal experience of teammates who always ask others for their knowledge, instead of doing their own research…

• Personal problems can limit performance and PM’s should be aware of them

• Find the right balance between giving independence and directing in order to– not restrain a persons creativity– AND not give him too much independence… this is also situational leadership

Situational leadership

http://www.1000ventures.com

Building Motivation

• Motivation takes long to develop and can be destroyed in an instant

• Exercise 3: give your opinion on what James Mc Gregor Burns says

« People need appreciation, recognition and a feeling of accomplishment, and the confidence that people who are important to them believe in them »

MotivatingTechnical Professionals

Humphrey’s guidelines:

• Focus on the output• Frequent informal meetings• Be even more challenging• Help rather than direct• Be enthusiastic about good work• Favor involvement, even to other non-project tasks • Ask the young to present their work to outsiders• Ask professionals to plan and estimate their work

To resume

• Lead and support• Lead with a contingency approach (best-fitted) • Challenge your team• Humphrey: daily management contact is

important– sociological approach: good for the individual and the

manager– inform and be informed– most natural way of communicating

Discipline in SPM = Quality?

The Need for Discipline

• Discipline, in management, has not always the same meaning we would generally think of: military discipline, school discipline, etc.

• A more managerial definition: Discipline = a way to develop or improve skills

• Professional discipline is NECESSARY, people sometimes depend on it– medical machinery– transportation – money transactions – etc.

Intellectual Disciplines

• In aircraft design defect-free performance is vital…

• Maintain high standards

• Intellectual discipline is a way to anticipate the unexpected

• Visibility: the PM should be proved intellectual work which is sometimes invisible

The Importance of Discipline

• Your work maybe reused and should be reused, it must be developed with discipline (Example: Java API)

• You should use the work of prior professionals to favor your own creativity (like we are doing in SPM)

• Our additional thought: if we know everybody is disciplined, then we are more confident in the team and the goals are easier to achieve.

Software Engineering Discipline

• Is found in: – software quality– appropriate and detailed documentation– quality principals– testing

• Humphrey’s approach: personal software process = « brain pre-compilation »…

The Manager’s Role in Professional Discipline

• The PM can and should influence discipline BIG GAINS

• If we see our mistakes early enough minor consequences

• PMs should not ask « faster, faster! » sloppy work

More Guidelines for Managers

• When recruiting focus on discipline

• Train your staff to discipline

• Track performance

• Encourage your people

• Inform on the importance of anticipation

Conclusion

• General comments on Humphrey’s style– discusses issues here and there without really

giving his opinion– sometimes: too much show-off– no “story telling”, he goes straight to the point

Conclusion (2)

We will conclude in a discussion.

We have no professional project experience, and our first view is that what we have related to is perfectly applicable to France and Europe. We are interested in your opinion.

Do any of you see major differences ?

The End