I have worked as an Intraway Project Manager for more than six years. I can say not a single day has been the same. Naturally, some structure prevails day after day, not as a dull routine, but as something that is always there.
As a good Argentinian, after saying “Good mooorning” to the whole floor, I start my day by preparing my mate (Editor’s note: Pictured above, mate is Argentina’s national drink. It is an infusion made from a leaf called yerba mate. Small amounts of hot water are poured into a gourd stuffed with the leaves and sipped out with a metal straw.) Rituals and energy are important! A great smile also helps!
First thing in the morning, my team, the PMO, has its huddle. It is a very short meeting (10 minutes) where we share good news and warnings from the previous day and our priority for the day ahead. It is a really good way for the team to regroup every day, know what everyone is doing, and get some help if someone is stuck with a particular issue.
So, at this point of the day, we have already discussed an essential element for good performance: FOCUS. We know what is important today and should be addressed first.
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Now that I am sure I know my north for the day, I quickly check my Google Calendar to have the appointments map in mind. Some of those meetings are periodic, such as the Scrum meetings for the Development and Professional Services team. Depending on the Scrum meeting, we discuss priorities, backlogs, and planning for each team.
Intraway has workforces all over the American continent. For this reason, most of our meetings are held on Google Hangouts or Zoom. Geographical distance, different time zones, and cultures are our daily reality. But we have managed these particularities with elegance.
During the day, the project manager coordinates follow-up meetings with the whole project team involved: Product managers, functional analysts, developers, professional services consultants, testers. In this space, we cover project risks, next steps, commitments, milestones, issues. As a result of this review, a status report is sent to all the stakeholders. We all need to be on the same page. Communication is key to improve teamwork and achieve our goals and objectives.
One of the PM´s primary responsibilities is to plan and schedule projects, tasks, and activities. We use various tools to schedule, track, and execute everything. Keeping all this information updated and available is essential for the Delivery team and the whole company.
The very few last minutes of the workday are dedicated to entering a few ideas for the next day’s huddle in Google forms. This form can be either completed at the end of the day or the beginning of the following one. It depends on what is more useful for each person. For me, doing this as the last activity helps me not to forget important subjects and, something not trivial at all, to empty my mental buffer. With this checked, I am ready to go home, to German lessons or my yoga class.
See you tomorrow!
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