Blog

This morning I woke up to an ant in the bathroom. Then another. And another.

This isn’t the first year my husband and I have had ants—though why they typically first appear in our second-floor bathroom is fascinating to me. Ants are irritating when they make their way into your home, but in an impr...

If you’ve been a project manager for any length of time, have you noticed how much communicating you do?

I’ve heard it said that project managers have 3 priorities: communication, communication, and communication. I don’t disagree.

It begs the question, however: are we supposed to do ALL of the co...

Once I was supporting a project that lasted about 18 months. About a month away from the project deadline, I was feeling proud that I’d built trust with a new team on this project and led them through all the required decisions in a timely fashion. Most of the big project deliverables were nearing c...

I was perusing r/projectmanagement on Reddit and I found a post from a new IT PM who asked, “How do you gauge severity of testing issues that you don't fully understand?”

I didn’t weigh in on the conversation because I agree with a lot of the advice already provided: Lean on the technical experts o...

I was chatting with a friend whose role is transforming more and more into a project-management-type role. Occasionally, even as somebody with the responsibilities of a project manager, she feels confined to tasks such as scheduling meetings for others that are traditionally associated with an admin...

This blog was inspired by this post on Reddit, and is an expansion on the comment I wrote in response.

So you’re a project manager. Do you also think of yourself as an educator?

In my nearly 8 years as a project manager, I’ve had mounting experiences that show me I will be a more effective projec...

A RACI chart, or RACI matrix, is a tool used in project management to track the people involved or invested in your project (your "stakeholders"), and particularly what is expected of each person and when they need information. It’s a term you’ll likely come across while studying for your PMP or ano...

What does time off work look like for you? Does your company encourage you to take all your vacation time, support you in totally unplugging when you’re off, and maybe even offer sabbaticals? Is your company on the other end of the spectrum, rewarding employees who don’t use their vacation time or w...

Do your projects include a kickoff meeting or another type of kickoff experience? Out of all the elements of a process for our projects that we’ve tried at my current company, we’ve been able to drive the widest adoption of kickoff meetings.

If you work at an organization that has very little sense...

Today, I’d like to share a project manager pro tip with you…I didn’t learn it until year 6 or so, and there’s no reason you need to wait that long.

Here it is:

Don’t always respond to everyone right away.

What?? Why not? Isn’t it a huge part of my job to communicate and manage communications on m...