I haven't started, but I have

It is very interesting to watch myself at work as I consider, contemplate, and reflect on my ARP ideas. I know that the ARP is now firmly rooted in the back of my head and is definitely having an effect much of what I do at work. I'm starting to bring up project management ideas during our design discussions and even during our casual discussions. I'm not calling them "project management" ideas but that is in fact what they are. I wonder, am I trying to prepare my teammates for participating in my ARP? Is this a fair thing to do? Hmmmm.. I guess if it was for purely selfish (OMET and ARP related) purposes... maybe it wouldn’t be... but I honestly believe that the ideas I'm putting out there have value for our group and, more importantly, they are timely ideas and I shouldn't wait until my ARP "officially" begins to bring them up. Plus - the ideas were always there to some extent... we just haven't been as diligent as we might have been about incorporating them in our daily routine.

Even more interesting though - is that I'm no longer jumping to do everything for everyone else (be the first to answer every question, look up every resource, find every document, etc.). I'm actually encouraging others to contribute and then supporting them in their effort to contribute - I don't think I actually realized that I wasn't doing that before (or wasn't doing it as much as I could). An example of this would be the recent search for industry standards on timelines for the kind of development that we do. I knew where to look that stuff up. I could have just looked it up and then emailed it to everyone else... but instead I encouraged those asking the most questions (and stressing the most over how they perceived our management judges things) to look up the information, compile it, analyze it, distribute it to the team, and then encourage discussion about it. I didn't tell them they had to do it, I didn't say that I wouldn't (or couldn't do it), rather, I suggested that having real data to back up our position would be a very positive thing and then I gave them a nudge in the right direction and continued to encourage them in their search and analysis.

It was very cool to be part of that process AND watch myself from the outside. What is most interesting to me is that I think I felt more satisfied about their achievement than I would have if I had simply looked up all the data myself and presented it. Nice lesson. Must endeavor to remember it as this year progresses.

More thoughts on Project Management

Scope creep. Working on the web-gift for MS and working on the timeline (still working on that one) - I begin to realize that one of my own project management issues is scope creep. I start out w/ a good idea but then I just keep adding to it, and often I don't know when to stop adding. I honestly believe that all the things I add are important, so it is difficult to be tough and leave some out, but this causes the project to take longer and longer to finish. I need to observe myself objectively at work (professional environment) and figure out if I'm doing that there as well. It is difficult because I'm not the only critical player in any of the projects I work on, so neither the scope nor the specifics are completely in my control... but I am still responsible for my part. Am I adding unnecessary steps? If so, how do I change this? How do I maintain a more narrow focus? And - how do I recognize when it really is appropriate to expand the focus? Will managing scope creep really result in projects getting done faster and/or better or will it result in more (but smaller) projects? Do other members of the team face these same issues? How do they approach them? One of the big questions lately is, "How can we express a clearer message about realistic timelines for all our projects?" Could looking at scope creep (and other project management challenges) help with this? My assumption is that it can... but how?

I think I need to start finding some references specific to project management AND instructional design/development of online learning. And then, some documentation on ARP and project management. eLearning guild can provide me w/ some documentation for the first part... guess it's time to start visitng the library. :) but not tonight.

Tutorial 1 - complete

Completed the Human Participants Protection Education for Research Teams tutorial today. That took a bit longer than expected. :) I'm not sure where to post my completion certificate... not even sure how long that page lasts... so, I printed it (guess I could scan it an put it on my ARP page..heheheh) ... here is the link just in case I need it: http://69.5.4.33/cgi-bin/cms/cts-cert5.pl

Interesting - the most significant reflection I have at the moment is that I really don't like "online tutorials" that are comprised solely of reading text on a screen and answering multiple choice questions.

Although the material in this "tutorial" was very important and I learned a lot of facts, I wonder how long the retention would be if I hadn't taken copious notes. If the tutorial had included more interaction (such as simulations w/ a variable path dependant on the learner's responses), I think it would have been more valuable. I know the basic advantage is that anyone who needs to complete it can access it online at any time ("just in time training") but I don't think that's a good enough excuse for turning an online tutorial into an "electron text book and electronic quiz." There must be a better way. The site even allows you to print the course material (I guess so that you don't have to read it all off a CRT or what ever monitor you use) - nice but again this seems to me to defeat the real potential of online learning. As it is - it is an expedient way to provide the material to everyone who needs it (and who has online access) but it doesn't do much more than that. Plus, the limitations of the assessment provided are obvious (only multiple choice... not even multiple selection or short answer responses). I know it's a pet peeve of mine, but I hate to think of online learning as text on a screen and some multiple choice questions. Hmmmm... am I an eLearning snob? hmmmmmm.

Project Management as a new focus?

Posted this a part of my personal journal/blog tonight and then realize that I should probably x-post it here.

Big revelation (for me) at work today: there are those on my team who, recently, have begun to feel like they are being pressured to work faster and therefore produce lower quality product (courseware). I (and a couple of others) have commented more than once during these discussions (ok… venting sessions) that I’m not feeling that pressure. Today, after discussing the situation with a couple of others, it occurred to me that some of this may be a result of our differing project management styles. On our team, each person (whether LD, LC, IT, or hybrid) hold some level of project management responsibility (beyond just managing their own specific tasks). I think I had been assuming that the projects I was working on were just not as high profile as some of these others, but now I’m not so sure that is the case. So – I’m beginning to think this may be an even better focus for my ARP (than the more general departmental changes I had planned to focus on). Most of my project management skills and style were developed “on the fly” – rather than through formal training, so I know I could benefit from learning about more formal approaches. I also think the whole team could benefit from a sharing of project management knowledge, styles, approaches, etc. Such an ARP could also provide a more controlled environment for setting up the 3 cycles necessary in the limited time I have because I wouldn’t have to wait for the corporate decisions on departmental change. Definitely worth spending some time mapping out. Hmmm… I should probably cross-post this part of my blog in my ARP blog.

First Post

This is my first post to my ARP blog. To date, I have created my ARP homepage, described my field of action, and created this blog. That's it for now, but not for long.