Three Tips for Getting Unstuck

Most of us have found ourselves in the following situation: you’ve got tons to do, the pressure is on and you want to crawl into bed and hide. Whether it’s in your work life or personal life, it’s easy to get stuck and hard to get out of it.

 When I see clients or see myself, for that matter, stuck with something I go immediately into discovery mode to figure out how to get moving. What’s interesting with this type of problem solving is you already know what the problem is but the why and how are often unclear. And we like to keep it that way, because staying stuck can be comfortable!

 Sometimes, simply working through this mental routine will be enough to get unstuck, sometimes external resources are needed. In either case, these tips will help get you into the mode of forward momentum.

Seek to Understand: The key to getting unstuck is figuring out why you’re stuck in the first place. This is all about self-examination. Are you being lazy? Are you out of your depth? Are you afraid? The next dimension here is to ask yourself whether this is a recurring or one-time issue. The resolutions could be very different depending on that answer. For example, do you always have trouble building PowerPoint presentations, or are you struggling with a specific one? Understanding the why will propel you into figuring out how to get unstuck.

 One caution, self-examination can expand quickly, so be sure to stay focused on the immediate problem. If you suddenly find yourself questioning your career choices or your feelings for your boss, take a breath and refocus on the matter at hand. Those larger questions are probably best dealt with through a conversation with a mentor, trusted advisor or therapist.

Plot Your Course: Now that you know why you’re stuck, the solutioning can move very rapidly. You’ve figured out you don’t have PowerPoint skills? Take a class, delegate, or hire a freelancer! You need content for your specific presentation? Go to a subject matter expert for input! Unlocking the underlying concern – the why – will drive you toward the appropriate and tangible solutions. The answers can be very simple and obvious but action without understanding is a recipe for getting stuck again down the road.

 Be sure not to over-solution. Having too many fixes in front of you can be paralyzing. Find ones that are easily executable and aligned with your deadlines. The point is to move forward, not bombard yourself with so many options you wind up stuck for different reasons. If that does happen, keep running this routine with some refinement to your solutioning.

Celebrate Yourself: When we’re stuck getting through a problem or a task it’s easy to get down and be our own worst critics. It’s important to look back at past successes or past moments of forward progress to remind ourselves that we CAN get ourselves unstuck. We can do it! If you’ve gotten unstuck before, chances are you can and will do it again. The more we repeat the process the better we will be at it. The more we train ourselves to understand what’s holding us back there’s no telling how far we will go.

 Do you have another approach for getting unstuck? Let’s discuss!

Three Strategies for Rapid Problem Solving

Consultants are often brought in to create a strategic assessment of a process or to solve a business problem. By the time the consultant is hired you can be assured that the team has been operating with sub-optimal processes in place and has learned to work around or work within its limits. No consultant ever hears the words, “Take your time figuring it out.” So how do you get to the heart of the problem quickly? I’ve found the following three strategies to be integral to swift problem solving:

Talk it Out: Stakeholder interviews are fundamental to information gathering. Talk to the people involved in the process, consumers of the process and observers of the process. These groups can provide a well-rounded view of what’s happening day-to-day, where the pain points are and how their own jobs are affected by the process issues. You’ll be amazed how in sync opposing groups can be when they’re offering feedback about what’s not working well.

Draw a Map: Whether you use the coolest flowchart tool or a pencil and the back of a napkin, laying out information visually will help highlight disconnects, redundancies and gaps in a way that talking through something never will. It will also help convey a problem to time-strapped execs in a succinct way. I once had a senior technology executive ask me to consolidate a 15-page analysis into three bullets. From that point forward, I’ve made sure I could articulate problems and solutions with pictures.

Find the Facts: Gather as much data as you can up front. Numbers don’t lie. Having solid data in your pocket will give you power to draw irrefutable conclusions and support your recommendations. In a data driven business ecosystem a gut feeling no longer carries the weight needed to secure buy-in for your recommendations.

When time and money are of the essence, the faster you can draw fact-based conclusions the better you position yourself as an efficient problem solver and invaluable resource to your clients.

Why Hire a Consultant?

Many employers struggle with the idea of hiring a consultant. Especially when a business is in cost cutting mode or looking secure assets to fund growth. Why pay an outside consultant when you are already paying your employees to meet the company’s goals?

As a former corporate employee, I understand the team angst brought on by the arrival of a consultant. “Why does so and so get $200 an hour when I only get $100 for the same job?” “Why does he get to make his own hours and I don’t?” “Oh, THEY’RE the expert? I thought I was the expert?” Those are the collective thoughts that can crop up when a consultant is brought into the mix. Once the consultant – employee relationship is forged, however, it’s hard not to admire the consultant’s fluidity, his or her ability to not care about politics, and what appears to be the genuine enjoyment of the work. A lot of us doing the same kind of work each day or those trying to find a way up the corporate ladder don’t have the luxury of that experience.

I see two main advantages of hiring a consultant:

Efficiency: a consultant is there to do a job, not to schmooze, not to climb. Get in, get out, collect a fee, move on. It’s pure and simple. When an employer is looking to get results quickly a consultant can take them there without the distractions of performance reviews, career development, or training that is required of and expected by full-time employees.

Objectivity: a consultant can take more risk in telling it like it is. Consultants are paid for their expertise. We’re obligated to speak up, make recommendations and find the problems that a full-time employee might be too close to see. We get to do all this without worrying that we’ll commit the dreaded CLM if we say the wrong thing to the wrong person. You hired us to analyze, assess and fix. We’re not afraid to do it.

Putting key initiatives into the hands of someone who is outside your work family can be daunting. There is a degree of letting go and trust that has to be present when hiring consultants. More often than not however, consultants can give you a perspective you can't get on your own. In today's business environment, why not have that advantage?

Valiant Mind

Many people have asked me about the origin of the Valiant Mind name. Rather than leave the mystery out there, I thought I’d take to my blog to explain. I grew up in Staten Island, NY. Anyone who’s familiar with the 5 Boroughs of New York City knows that Staten Island has a small-town feel in a quasi-urban environment. To this day, Staten Island remains the only borough without a subway and the only without an inter-borough rail system. The only ways off the island are the Staten Island Ferry, buses or cars.

And speaking of cars, my first car memory is of a brown Plymouth Valiant that my parents owned. As a young girl, I thought it was really exciting that the car and I had the same first 3 letters of our names. Valiant and Valerie, it was serendipitous to a 7 year old! When it was time to scrap the car,  my father took the logo off the side for me. I’m sure that classic, silver Valiant logo is tucked away in a box somewhere only to be uncovered when it’s time for an attic overhaul.

It wasn’t until I was in the early stages of forming my business that the Valiant name popped into my head. I was trying iteration after iteration of my first and last name with the word “consulting” attached. Nothing felt right. After a day or two of naming struggles, a trusted mentor and marketing expert suggested I forgo something literal and use a word that had special meaning. I started playing word games with myself. Still nothing felt right. One night while trying to get to sleep an image of the Valiant popped into my head. That was it! Valiant! The next morning, I scrambled to look up the meaning of the word Valiant. It’s defined as possessing or showing courage or determination. Valiant felt right. It was in the few moments after where Valiant Mind came to life. What resonates most to me is the tie-in to my company name and my brand promise: dependability, authenticity and empathy. Giving my clients the peace of mind to know that when something is in my hands the job will get done. Just like that trusty brown Valiant got us wherever we needed to go.

Putting Childhood Truisms to Work

As any parent of a pre-schooler will tell you there are a set of rules by which their children live inside the classroom and on the playground. Luckily for parents, most children feel very comfortable bringing these rules home with them. How many times has little Timmy, who can’t ever stay quiet, said that he’s just using his words? Classroom rules are there for a reason. Sure they keep order and help teachers manage a herd of 4 year olds but they also create a sense of harmony and community that helps get stuff done.

How then can these rules be applied to the workplace, or better still the project team? As the leader of the team you’re pre-ordained to control and move the effort along. It’s your job to influence, cajole and get people on-board to do your bidding. By applying the fundamentals of school-aged children to your project you can set down a path that runs more smoothly than your average project.

1)   Use Your Words: one of the most important things a Project Manager can do is to communicate. Whether it is to his or her team, the project stakeholders or to senior management. When I’m managing a project, it is my goal to get the message out before someone has to ask me for it. I take pride in being an excellent communicator and having the ability to anticipate someone’s question in advance of them asking it. Communication from the PM out isn’t the only way to use your words. Encourage your team members to do the same. Communication of statuses or feedback on what’s working and what’s not within the context of the team supports bonding and fortifies the group around the common goal of delivering results.

2)   You Get What You Get and You Don’t Get Upset: getting a complex effort off the ground takes a myriad of drivers and doers. What happens when your doers don’t want to do? From the PM perspective, you’ve been dealt an inadequate hand. From the doer's perspective, you’ve gotten a request that you don’t have time for or perhaps you don’t have the interest in. In this scenario, the PM has to be the first to have a good attitude, to not get upset if you will. As the project leader, the PM sets the tone and the best example for how the group will move forward. A PM who throws up his or her hands creates a dynamic of melancholy which will ultimately lead to disinterest on the team’s part. On the flip side, the PM has a chance to flex some empathy skills to encourage support from the defiant doer or has the opportunity to come up with a creative solution for getting the required tasks complete. Going head to head with a member of the team presents challenges and can cast doubt on one’s skills as a leader. Embracing this dynamic and managing conflict in a constructive positive way gives us all a chance to grow as PMs.

3)   Take Turns: differing points of view can help challenge a PM and boost idea generation and creativity. If the PM insists on being the single voice within a work effort he or she is short changed. Soliciting input, or giving others a turn to lead, comment, or provide a perspective helps build energy and enthusiasm around a project. Throughout my years in corporate America, my initial response when someone came into my office asking what should be done about a particular task or challenge was, “Tell me what YOU think we should do first.”

4)   Clean Up After Yourself: since most of us don’t have toys in the workplace, this maxim applies to owning your mistakes, fixing them and learning from them. There are so many points within a project where things can go wrong. Admitting you’ve dropped the ball and offering an answer to how things will get back on track is a brilliant show of competence. We’ve all had the Teflon project team member from time to time. That someone to whom nothing sticks. Ownership and accountability build your credibility and your good-will with colleagues and management, whether you’re the project lead or a supporting player on the team. I can guarantee there’s not one working person today who can say they’ve never screwed up at work. Cleaning up your mess after doing that will help you stand out in a good way.

If only work could be as much fun as going to pre-school or playing on the playground. Melding some of the rules of childhood with day-to-day project management can be almost as entertaining plus it comes without the scraped knees.

Empathy: The Project Management X Factor

What’s the difference between a good product manager and a great one? Project Management at its core is about planning, managing and closing a work effort. It’s all about the execution. Can I get from Point A to Point B on time and within budget? I’ve worked with Project Managers throughout the years that took their role literally. The drive and desire to get to the finish line was paramount. The colleagues or related tasks left in the PM’s wake were not given a second thought. Anecdotally, these driven and task-oriented employees were praised as “good PM’s” with a “but”. They were good BUT no one wanted to work with them. When these highly functioning PMs were assigned to big projects that involved multiple cross-functional stakeholders the announcements were met with silent groans and eye rolls. Observing “good PMs” helped hone my own personal management style. Very early on I learned to value how I got the job done over just getting it done.

The great PM looks beyond the individual tasks and execution components of the project. He or she manages not only the project but also the community involved in delivery. The stressed manager, the overworked technologist, the business analyst who is spread too thinly. Dealing with and respecting the personalities and emotions involved separate the great PMs from the pack. Empathy, simply defined as the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person, is key. Empathy, an element of Emotional Intelligence, is often dismissed because it is confused with sympathy. And who isn’t sympathetic? That is a basic perception we all have as human beings. However, feeling bad for Joe who just got chewed out by his boss is not the same as understanding Joe’s upset.

Practically and tactically speaking, the information we ingest through empathetic interaction makes PM’s better listeners and ultimately more successful. This is so for two main reasons:

• The empathetic ear can garner more support from stakeholders and the individuals required to complete project tasks. A PM without internal support and buy-in from the doers has greater difficulty closing individual tasks per plan.   

• The likability of the empathetic PM boosts the morale of the project team and rallies the doers to get their tasks completed.

Throughout my career I've seen PM's attempt to bring soft skills into their projects with mixed results. In my view, those who believed in the value of relating to their project teams were far more accomplished than those who never looked up from their project plans and opened their ears.