All That the Nature Shows Me

This is all about what the nature teaches me, through people, nature itself or consciousness.

How Project Management Helps Me Taking Care My Baby (Part 2)

Previously I talked about how getting used to with jeopardized plans in projects helps me get through the ups and downs of my baby's development. Now, I want to share how communication management I learned from projects help me with the baby.

* Communication Management: Listening to The Unspoken and Speaking Their Language *

Communication management is all about ensuring TIMELY and APPROPRIATE generation, collection, distribution, storage, retrieval, and ultimate disposition of project information (PMBOK). I used capital words to emphasize TIMELY and APPROPRIATE because no matter how sophisticated your strategy on collecting and presenting the information is, it won't be useful if it's outdated or cannot be well understood.

So, the first thing I learned is information has to be communicated on time. It shouldn't be sooner, to avoid unnecessary hustle and bustle; neither should be later otherwise it won't be useful. What does it have something to do with a baby? Babies talk by crying. Everyone knows that. They have many kind of cries to indicate different kind of needs but only one kind of angry cry (at least to  me) which happens when they are throwing a tantrum. And every other cry will become a tantrum cry unless their needs met on time. So, to avoid the tantrum, I need to response on time. If I give her needs too soon, she will get used to with fast response and will have the same kind expectation later which will become a problem when I'm busy. Also, by giving her enough time to "tell" me what she needs, I expect she'll develop her ability to communicate and make me me understand her other subtle cues.


Communication's goal is to understand each other. Then, the question wuold be "how to understand what people say?" It comes to the second point: listening to the unspoken. Listening is about paying attention to the speaker. There are a lot more said by people's gestures, facial expression and choice of words than what is actualy said. Thanks to my woman-tendecy to always decipher meaning behind everything, it helps me to capture what is actualy happening beyond words. (Even though sometimes, I over-analyse simple things). I often see people who say "yes" in meetings but their eyes are completely blank. Or, people who tell us certain thing but he's sweating a lot even though the room is cold (I suspect that he's hiding something). And many other examples. Babies also show those kind of signs. Besides cries which from time to time I can recognize, they also give some cues. Rubbing eyes and slower motion mean that they are sleepy. Playing with their tounge indicates that they are hungry.

Besides listening to people's unspoken words, we should also understand their interest and speak their language.Never give a lengthy explanation of process to get things done to a result oriented person, he won't listen. Especially if he's your boss asking for quick update when rushing to a steering committee meeting. Trust me, you'll have a bad day. Instead, talk to him with a yes/no answer followed by a clear short explanation. If you are taliking to a person whose interest is saving money, give them insights how your progress update will affect the cost of project. Now, with the baby. We know that babies' interest in their very young age are basic needs: eat, sleep and *sorry* poop. Since babies are very intuitive, "talk" to them about their needs through their body. By creating a habit, you "talk to their body". For example, in letting her know that we do most of our activities during the day, I set the room bright and louder and doing more interaction with her. And at night, I set the room dark and silent, and do less interaction so that she knows she should sleep more at night.

The ultimate goal of effective communication is we understand each other. Basically what we do is listen and talk. So, I learned that to listen means to pay attention and to talk is to let people understand things the easiest way to them.



P.S: I am neither a communication expert, nor a baby whisperer. I just want to use my experience to help me and share it to help others.

(Jan'15)








How Project Management Helps Me Taking Care My Baby (Part I)

 I have now another reason to be grateful for having been doing project management these past couples of years: it helps me dealing with my baby. Of course, you can always implement the concept in everyday life. But, I want to emphasize specifically on how it helps me to embrace motherhood. 
  
I am talking about Project Management in practice which may or may not in accordance with its theory. Since I'm not a PMP-certified, all I get mostly is from experience as a PMO in several IT projects.


*Related to Planning: Always Have Plans But Be Flexible Enough to Maneuver*


The word management itself has clearly identified that there has to be an "order" to manage things. The order is usually proposed and agreed upon in the beginning of projects. Although some of the projects didn't have it in a formal form. It includes how the project will be conducted, how scope will be defined, how communication will be done, how schedule will be established and updated. All aspects related to a project will have its own "order" or governance.

 However, as the project goes there will be some unexpected things occurred which require team to take immediate actions. Often is it against the governance. To keep things going on, certain ways of conduct will not be followed. That's how things are: you should be prepared that they will not be they way you think they should be. You can have plan A, plan B until plan Z, but chance is you can still face the unexpected. So, you should be ready to maneuver and quickly identify the next plan for it.
  
Leaving the project without governance means that you as PMO does not do what you are paid to do. But being too rigid on it, can also impact the end result because there are times when everything is very chaotic in the project and require quick and new planning.

 The same goes to having a baby. As a parent, I feel that it is my responsibility to prepare and plan how I raise the baby; how to build a good sleeping habit, how to introduce her to new things, what to eat and not to eat, and many other things. However, more often than not all the plans are jeopardized. 
  
I managed to have the baby sleeping by herself on the crib after a few tiring nights of taking her in and out of the crib, until she was comfortable on her own and slept well in it the whole night. It went well until she was having problem with digestion which made her so fussy and just wanted to sleep in our arms. That goes for the next few days and I have to teach her again how to sleep on the crib. Another example is on breastfeeding schedule. She naturally followed every 2-hour breastfeeding time after teaching her the habit for a few days. Then, something which I think growth spurt came to the picture. She drank almost everytime and my plan to have me-time in between her feeding time was gone.

 I could just give up planning and just do what people say as "go with the flow". To me going with the flow does not mean that you let the baby does whatever she wants to do. For example, if you just follow what baby wants she could just sleep 4 hour straight. But you know that in such young age (less than one month) she has a very little tummy and she needs to be fed often, at least every 2 hour. Otherwise it may be dangerous because the body doesn't get what it needs.


So, the idea of planning is not about controlling but guiding. It is about accepting that things can go wrong and being prepared to have another plan.


(to be continued)
On Part 2 --> Related to Communication Management


(Jan'15)





About me

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Cie
- writes everything coming to her mind - loves sleeping - wants to own a library - hates routine - loves the pleasure of discovery
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