Episode transcript The transcript is generated automatically by Podscribe, Sonix, Otter and other electronic transcription services.
Hi everyone. Welcome to the 5 Minutes Podcast. Today, I'd like to discuss one thing about project failure. Most of the time, we are paranoid and focus a lot on these very big, large, complex projects to take care of and make sure that they do not fail. But what happens with the tiny, simple, quick, and easy projects that fail to? I just want to make an analogy with our personal lives. How many times we have simple projects like for example, assemble an Ikea furniture, and then suddenly that project that would require 15 minutes becomes a nightmare and drags one week of your evenings trying to figure out how to assemble it, why this happens, why? What is the root, and how can we avoid that? The first thing is we are very selective in our attention and our dedication. So we tend to see, okay, this is complex, this require much more time. This is simple. This does not require time. This does not require dedication. And that concept is absolutely true. However, there is a limit because many times, when you disregard this simple thing, it becomes a thorn in your side. They just create such a compound devastating result because, for example, you go back home, and then there is this unfinished Ikea furniture there for a month, you know, dragging. It's not only the visual aspect of not benefiting from that furniture, but it's also the psychological effect of having one pending item drag you and removing your focus on the actual things.
And before I say, what are my suggestions? This happens everywhere. Okay, I am a victim of this absolutely all the time, and this is why I always try to bring my mind to focus on how I can get rid of all these tiny projects and make them in such a way that they do not become a nightmare for me. The first piece of advice I can give you is to plan them. And of course, you will say, Riccardo, are you crazy? Do you want me to build a WBS chart, a Kanban board, a Gantt chart of a tiny Ikea assemble, or prepare a new dinner for someone? The answer is obviously no. But before you do, even mentally put in your mind what you need to do, try to figure out a sequence the materials, the equipment, and everything you need so you don't start cooking rice for your dinner without rice and then you open the flames on your stove, put your pan, and there is no rice. And this happens, and this happens a lot. You start assembling this Ikea furniture, and then you forget that you do not have a screwdriver or you do not have a hammer that is needed.
So you need to plan. You can plan in a different way, but it's impossible for you to do it without planning, even a mental plan. Many times I just use a piece of paper and I just write. Okay, what are the five steps that I need to do here? And just mentally? For example, just to give you an idea, when I'm preparing my luggage to travel, sometimes I see myself dressing up and wonder if I am forgetting the belt. Am I forgetting the socks? Do I have the socks, the belt, the tie, everything? So then, I avoid bringing myself into trouble by arriving in a place without a belt or without socks. The second piece of advice is commitment. Commit to get it done. Take them out. Remember, the worst thing that could happen in your life as a project manager is a work in progress, a work in progress, or WIP or WIP. It's something that you need to get rid of. You need to reduce it to the minimum possible. And in order to do that, you need to commit to getting it done. It's not because it's simple that it will be executed automatically. It will require your time. It will require your focus and your dedication. If you don't put in a minimum amount of focus and effort, it will not happen so many times. How do I do that when I have these tiny projects that happen in my life? What I do sometimes is I put a lot of time and say, now I will spend the next two hours and get absolutely rid of that tiny.
Project. Get rid. I'm not saying in a bad way, okay? But I want to get rid of and remove that. Send that to the person who requests it and get absolutely rid of that. So I can dedicate my mind to different things. And this drives me to another concept. It's avoid multitasking. I said this 100 times here. You need to avoid multitasking because it is a fallacy. There is no such way as multitasking. You know you cannot handle 20 tiny things and find a way of getting all of them done at the same time. Just because there is more, it will not happen. Take one. Get it done. Take the second, get it done; take the third, get it done. And the last piece of advice that I cannot finish this episode without mentioning is communication and streamlining communication. Because most of these tiny projects have other stakeholders. Maybe it's your wife, husband, or partner; maybe it's your boss, or maybe it's a tiny project in your company or in your personal life. You need to streamline communication in a simplified way, and you can send a WhatsApp message or an SMS. You can update because sometimes people think that it's so simple that communication will happen automatically.
This is where we create the nightmare. Remember, when these tiny projects combine, they create a devastating compound result. You know, it's like a thorn in our side. You know, it's just a nightmare because you have so many tiny, tiny problems, tiny, tiny problems creating, I would say, disruption in your workflow that you do not get the real job done. Look, I'm telling you because I am also a victim of this. Many times I just disregard a little bit tiny projects and they become a nightmare a few weeks later because, you know, the combined effect of all these delays become really something big. And this is why I want you to make sure that every time you have this tiny project, you just plan, it can be three lines in a piece of paper. It can be three thoughts in your mind. But you think before you do. You think quickly before you do, and you commit to getting it done, ensuring you communicate with these stakeholders. With that, you will get rid of this tiny thing that goes around our life, these tiny projects that just parachute into our life. Get your time and focus on the real, relevant, and big things. Think about that, and see you next week in another 5 Minutes Podcast.
