When to think clearly- 5 key observations on selected corporate scenarios and actions as project manager

5 min readDec 13, 2020

A lazy weekend, one week to go for the Christmas Holidays on 2020 (Coronavirus year!) and I was thinking which book to read, when I came across this book -

I started reading the book which is composed on numerous small 2–3 page chapters and started realizing so many similarities with the corporate world, rather the so called Agile world, hence this blog from a project manager’s view.

I need to put a disclaimer first, hence it’s -

Views expressed are my own, no one else would say such truth or non-sense.

In this blog, I tried to correlate how the observations outlined by the author are so connected to corporate world and what actions you should take as a project manager to overcome those.

Picture: My current notebook and Logitech MX Master keyboard

IF 50 MILLION PEOPLE SAY SOMETHING FOOLISH, IT IS STILL FOOLISH: Social Proof

This is very common in the corporate world, specially in the so called, Agile world. Let’s see two designers comes to you with a proposal for one of the solution and one will always support the other because they have already aligned among themselves. At end, the same will become the team’s view as well.

Action: You as a project manager need to question them if it seems to be something foolish to you. If you don’t, none will after you.

It will be a foolish thing, whether 2 designers or 10 designers or 10 product owners say the same.

It’s foolish if you think it’s a foolish, so always question the solution if you think it’s not abiding what it is supposed to do.

Don’t go with the social proof. Go forward and ask to get yourself clarified. You will wonder on how many times a simple thing gets slipped just because you are afraid to question.

WHY YOU SHOULD FORGET THE PAST: Sunk Cost Fallacy

Do you see that “it will get bad before it gets better” is often our go-to view when things go wrong. It’s very often that when you come across a project which is in a “middle of nowhere” you start to think that we have spent so much of time, money and effort on this till then, so why don’t we try to get going and complete it. That’s wrong approach.

Action: Pick your decision based on outcome.

Based on what is expected to come and what will be the eventual outcome and how much cost you have to spend on the remaining part. Based on future investment, decide the next step of action. You should completely forget about past as “whatever is gone” is gone.

If the decision is it’s not worth for it, then don’t go for it. Think early, but think based on future not past.

WHY WE PREFER A WRONG MAP TO NO MAP AT ALL: Availability Bias

A blank page is always a big problem. People doesn’t know where to start and where to end hence it’s a problem. Even if it is wrong, people like to start with something and that something may be relevant may not be relevant to the current problem statement.

That’s why more often people like to start writing with a “save as” of previous document, rather that to start with an existing template rather than starting from a blank template. The problem with this approach is that you learn what is available to you. But what about something which is not available but relevant ?

Action: As project manager, I do believe in writing down the things, it’s #biasforaction.

Write down your problem statement and write down your known and unknowns. Then try to find the clues to satisfy the knowns and unknowns. Don’t just go for available with a blind eye.

DON’T TAKE NEWS ANCHORS SERIOUSLY: Chauffeur Knowledge

This one is my favorite one. At corporate world most people actually learn from other people, and echo the same to another person. The problem with this approach is often the information gets diluted over a period of time. Those people are often termed as messengers who loves to pass on. The fallacy is they fail miserably when an unique problem comes.

Action: The best way to deal with such instances is to identify them quickly. Often, start with a question which is a rainy day scenario to the problem, follow-up with a cross question and evaluate the nonstandard hypothesis question.

The messenger knowledge will stop there and the lacuna will open up immediately. Next step is to ask the chauffeur knowledge holder to explore more options and pro vs cons of multiple solutions and the recommendation.

As project manager, most often, you will not know the recommended solution. Rather, you will help or guild others to get to solution.

NEVER PAY YOUR LAWYER BY THE HOUR: Incentive Super-Response Tendency

In software corporate world there are two kinds of working model — (1) Time and money- T&M (2) Fixed price- FP

The problem with T&M is if the problem needs to take one month, most will wrap it around with extra processes to cover it and the work will be expanded. As the business is around T&M, this model may not not encourage automation or a reduction or optimization because they get paid by the hour. Every hour spent is “every hour earned and every hour on the profit” hence the type of automation we see here is limited.

Action: In contrast, encourage for fixed price projects when out outsourcing which is much more beneficial for the overall health of the solution.

How? It’s here where the teams are forced to come up with optimization or automation way to make profit This keeps the quality bar high yet delivered something with low cost and that forces you to come up with innovation.

Summary

In summary, you will come across this kind of above observations in the real world and corporate world is no stranger to it. It is up to you, as project manager, to act with your intelligence and think about the best solution to come out of it.