World Bytes

Passages

by Terrance Malkinson

A Thought to Chew On

The beginning of a new year marks an important passage in time. Living out our dreams in a rapidly changing world demands flexibility to adjust to shifting realities. The traditional daily, weekly, monthly and yearly rhythms of life provide some predictability. However, we must always be prepared to cope with the unplanned and unexpected. For it is through the process of coping that we transform and grow.

Such researchers as Daniel Levinson, George Vaillant, Roger Gould and Erik Erikson all contributed to our understanding of life stages and passage milestones. The 1976 bestseller Passages by Gail Sheehy was based on a body of research that suggested that as we age we experience progressive, predictable stages. Each stage offers challenges that must be met before we move on to the next stage.

This notion holds true today. Unpredictable events such as the Great Depression, the Kennedy assassination, the fall of the "Iron Curtain," the advent of the computer, electrification, and the events of 11 September modulate life stages and have a profound effect on groups of people born in the same time period.

Why not take a few moments now, at the start of this new year, to reflect upon your current life stage and on the passages you expect to make ahead. Think about who you think you are, what you expect to get done, your timetable for doing those things, and the satisfaction with what you have and will yet accomplish. Set some attainable goals and then schedule the steps you'll take to achieve them. And always, be sure to put a seed of boldness in everything you do.

Other Bytes and Tydbytes

Here are just a few of the many things going on in and around the global engineering community.

• "Dimensions and the Current Status of Project Management Culture" is the title of an article by Xiaojin Wang in Project Management Journal (32(4): 4-17, 2001). This 2001 International Student Project Management Institute award-winning manuscript used exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis to establish a model project management culture consisting of four key dimensions: professional commitment, project team integration, work flexibility and viewing others in terms of work performance.

• "Going Global" is the title of an article by Betsy Harter in PM Network (15(12): 33-36, 2001). By their nature, global assignments are intrinsically complex. To be successful you must develop strong virtual project management processes. The author discusses recruiting skilled local resources, standards interoperability, teamwork, coordination, communication and logistics. In the same issue, "Techno-Babble" (pp. 43-47) by Mark Williams tells of the importance of planning communication strategies to ensure project success. The communication challenge is almost always underestimated, even if stakeholders come from the same culture.

• "Thinking Beyond the One-Size-Fits-All Pay Cut" is a commentary in BusinessWeek Online (3 December 2001) that discusses the compensation practice used by a number of companies to view salaries and bonuses as a tool to shape a better workforce and motivate future leaders.

• "The Real Reason People Won't Change" is the title of an article by Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey in Harvard Business Review (79(10): 85-92, 2001). The authors discuss the concept of "competing commitment" and how understanding this concept helps employees overcome resistance to change. By uncovering competing commitments appropriately, managers can address them emphatically and bring about change effectively.

• In "Truth in Feedback" (Training and Development 55(11): 78-80, 2001), author Chris Clark-Epstein discusses 12 misconceptions about giving and receiving feedback.

• The importance of intellectual capital to the organization is discussed in two articles. In HR Magazine (46(10): 66-68, 2001), Bill Leonard describes how employees can forge business partnerships with employees who leave the organization to start their own companies. In Harvard Business Review (79(10): 104-112, 2001), Neeli Bendapudi and Robert Leone describe three strategies to retain the customers of "star performers" who leave the organization.

• "Where Leadership Starts" by Robert Eckert in Harvard Business Review (79(10): 53-61, 2001) provides information-gathering tips on how to make the transition to a new job easier. This article serves as valuable reading for anyone taking up employment with a new organization.

• "Genius at Work" by Mark Morris in Harvard Business Review (79(9): 63-68, 2001) provides strategies on working effectively with gifted people, whose insight and imagination change the way we live and see the world. The author suggests that unconventional sensitivity and honesty are the best policies.

Terrance Malkinson is a proposal manager/documentation specialist with GE Capital IT Solutions Inc.