Project Lifestyle

Issue lists are the unsung heroes of the Project Lifestyle. This is the last of a series of three posts on how a new look at issue list might radically impact your project outcomes (in a positive way I hasten to add).

In Part 1 I opened the discussion by looking at why issues are such slippery things to manage. I then got perspectives on managing issues from various colleagues who know a thing or two about them.

In Part 2 I applied the Getting Things Done productivity process to derive a workflow for handling issues in a project setting. The key idea here is to introduce a robust, repeatable process to capture and work through project issues. I make the point that

• Issues running around in the wild are the dangerous ones.
• Once you capture them, you can tame and manage them.
• So doing, you exercise a lot more control over the unknowns in your project.

In this post I want to look how some concepts from the social sciences seem to offer proof that a robust issue management process will contribute to improved project outcomes overall, and that this is the secret life of issue lists.

I took Bas De Baar up on his kind offer to do a guest post over at his Project Shrink blog. It took a couple of weeks longer than planned due to some other things going on in my day-job and a spell of fantastic summer weather (one has to prioritize!).

Bas kindly published it today. The post deals with the concept of project rhythm. Follow the link to read it.