The Project Song

Sung to the tune of Ballad of Thunder Road

You might have heard the story
and maybe lived the tale
about a fateful project
that was driven off the rails

The business passed on planning
The budget was a SWAG
The PM says ‘Go faster,
don’t you let this project drag!’

The BA got canned early
But no one’s sayin why
We think he quoted Covey
and the sponsor hit the sky

CHORUS:

And there is scope creep, scope creep
everywhere we go
Planning is for pansies and
the budget is a joke
And there’ll be rework, rework
till the day we die
Don’t bother with requirements
We’ll invent them on the fly

The PM and the architect
Threw angry words today
It seems she took exception to
the phrase ‘No freakin’ way!”

Designer’s in a funk now
His feature got the axe
He took a month’s vacation and
we hope he’s comin’ back

The engineers are fuming
The schedule is too tight
Release was planned for April
Now it’s due on Friday night.

* CHORUS *

We had a QA lead, she was
the best we could afford
When she fin’lly saw the schedule
she ran screaming out the door.

The testers went to job fairs
The sponsor can’t be found
But the PM’s gonna ride us
till we run into the ground.

* CHORUS *

Let Me Sum Up

Books I cared enough to quote from.

TitleAuthorSummary / Sample
Purple CowSeth GodinBe remarkable or be invisible
The 22 Immutable Laws of MarketingRies & TroutLaw #2: “If you can’t be first in a category, create a category you can be first in.”
The DipSeth GodinPress through the tough part to leave your competitors behind.
Free Prize InsideSeth Godin1. Ideas are plentiful, but champions — people who can bring an idea to life — are few.  
2. Edgecraft: Pick one way that your business touches the world and supersize it.
E-Myth ContractorMichael GerberProfessionals make promises, not estimates.
If you can’t stick to your number, you don’t know what you’re doing.
The Invisible Touch, and
Selling the Invisible
Harry Beckwith“Services are experienced.” Create a fantastic experience for the best kind of customer.
Raving FansBlanchard & BowlesDiscover what your customer wants and deliver that plus one.
BoundariesCloud & Townsend“Do not let an out-of-control person be the cue for you to change your course. Just allow him to be angry and decide for yourself what you need to do.”

Feeling Clever

These two quotes just belong together.

After dining with both William Ewart Gladstone and his rival Benjamin Disraeli a week before a big election, Jennie Jerome (Churchill’s mother) had this to say about the evenings:

“When I left the dining room after sitting next to Gladstone, I thought he was the cleverest man in England. But when I sat next to Disraeli, I left feeling that I was the cleverest woman.”

Which is a fairly good proof for one of my favorites from Maya Angelou:

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels