Quick, in 30 sec, define how you carry out your business?  

 If you do not mention "Methodology" or "Management System", then how are you instilling confidence?  How can I truly trust  that you can "do what you said you would do!"

It is amazing how we still try to instill confidence by saying:  Sure.... I have done it 100 times so this will be no different - it is all about my experience.

 Now granted, that is very important, but the world is wayyyy to dynamic and year over year, using an Analogy of the past is fine for budgetary purposes, but it will not give enough accuracy anymore for planning and delivery of the solution.  Also, if you don't have a best practice framework, what if you have been doing it inefficiently for the past 10 years, and just getting by, or riding a bubble? 

 How well can your business grow without you, how well can it operate when you go on a 4 week vacation?

The video below emphasizes the importance of a common platform from which all your business work (both project, operational and strategy) stems from in order to deliver successful solutions.  

The video also lists a list of the major aspects of a business framework/methodology that you should be very comfortable talking about at any time, between customers, employees, investors, alliances, regulators, associations, academics, etc.   

Note: if link does not work, go direct to blog to view   www.jasontratch.com




How fast can you gather and present well organized "Formal Documentation" of the guidelines, processes, tools, templates, techniques and overall framework/methodology that is followed (collectively and collaboratively by the business as a whole).   The scary thing is when this documentation is stored in the brains of a select few.

Things happen to people all the time, we are all replaceable.  People get sick, take vacation, get pulled into other jobs, quit, new people join the team, people also can have delayed/faulty memories based on what else is going on in their life/work at that point in time!  Know your systems, then create a culture around those systems.  Then you can pursue the ultimate goal:  be creative, innovate and evolve (in a systematic way :)  

 This is now becoming very common in Saskatchewan, every major Association has a Standardized Course they teach to the Public and their Memberships.  The really cool thing is that each Association (Construction, Manufacturing, Innovation, Agriculture, Mining, etc.)  are all using the same common platform methodology -  which is the Project Management Institute and it's Manual called the PMBOK (www.pmi.org).

A simple article helps explain the importance of a methodology and also I really liked their last bullet, how they emphasize to align your methodology with:
1) Strategy,
2) Software,
3) Community Learning
PS: the only other two I would add to this list is...
4) Operational work,
5) Project work)

The link to the full article is below....
sixdisciplines