Mastery Point

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We’ve all heard the saying that “life is a journey, not a destination.” Well, hopefully, you’ve heard that...

Have YOU lived with that in mind? If you’re anything like me, we sometimes forget and lose focus on the daily enjoyment of living. We start to focus on where-we-are-not rather than having gratitude for how far we have come from where we started.

But, I suppose that depends on whether you feel that where you currently are in life, mentally, physically, emotionally and financially is better than where you started. This is, exactly, why I would like to suggest another idea:

“Success is a direction.”

The way to feel the best about progress is to be “aimed upward.” Our sole focus should be on being better today than we were yesterday, we must set our sights on being better tomorrow than we were able to achieve today. I call this a “Continuous Improvement” mindset.

The true value in this approach is that you can be a “successful” person because of how you are taking actions in the present, despite not being, ultimately, in a great “place” in life. A person that has gone through a bankruptcy, has failed in the short term, but can begin successful financial practices the very next day. Even when starting with nothing, it is a Continuous Improvement mindset that can most quickly change your prospects.

I have seen Project Management departments that have become so enamored with their own “success” that they stop developing and improving. They start to decay into burdensome practices that no one quite knows how to explain fully, nor entirely understands why they were put into practice. Successful project management practices are living and breathing organisms; they take attention and intention. 

If your PMO or Project Management team has become static, let’s look at ways to overcome stasis. If your PM manual is 200+ pages that has been edited 3 times in 20 years, but none of the new blood has ever read it, perhaps it’s time to refocus and simplify. Has your management team become so focused on profit that they have no understanding of performance goals otherwise? I could go on, but I know this applies to most of you.

The successful direction is better. Your process gets better. Your projects get better. Your profits get better.  Your team’s performance gets better. Their job satisfaction gets better. And the success cycle will keep rolling. There is NO END to continuous improvement.

If you have been sold the story that your workplace is a “success,” but you look around your team on a daily basis and can’t identify a “growth” to your peers capabilities and the sense of confidence in their actions, it might be time to shine the light on improvements. There is no such thing as perfect.

The algorithm of successful project delivery has a multitude of variables. Sometimes, the process is old and withering. Often, pruning and tending to the process can reinvigorate growth.