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Experienced Project Managers Stop Learning

May 6, 2008 @ Project Shrink: The Blog from Bas de Baar

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Today Better Projects posted an intriguing article debunking the myth of “experienced project managers can deal more effectively with complex software projects". They refer to a recent article in HBR magazine, “The Experience Trap”, that basically says that experienced project manager do not outperform less experienced PMs because they stopped learning.

“…people form a hypothesis about a relationship between a cause and an effect…, [t]he problem is that the approach seems to be effective only in relatively simple environments, where cause-and-effect relationships are straightforward and easily discovered. In more complex environments, such as software projects, the learning cycle frequently breaks down” as quoted on CrossDerry.

There are a couple of approaches one can take to tackle this problem:

• Getting project managers to think and talk about why they do what they do
• Explaining and discussing with project managers which problems certain methods and techniques are trying to solve
• Train in "complex relationships between cause and effect" by providing different mental models and applying a systems view for analysis.

Download here the first part of my book "Surprise! Now You're A Software Project Manager"

Experienced Project Managers Stop Learning

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