Downside
We have to admit that we found the title of the book a little off-putting. A "lazy project manager"? Surely this cannot be a serious text? And so it was that this book languished for several months on our bookshelf - probably because we were even too lazy to read the second line on the cover of the book that states: "How to be twice as productive and still leave the office early".
And now we have another confession to make. We've always dreamed of getting our projects so well organized that we can calmly lean back in our office chair and put our feet up on the table and contemplate the world at large. But it never happened. That's because general management likes to see activity. I suppose they think that this is the best indication that the company is getting its money's worth, indeed, that's how I thought when I was a part of senior management.
And that is exemplified by what I learned as a member of Her Majesty's army. If you ambled across the parade ground without any apparent destination in mind, you would be quickly hauled up by the military police and closely questioned and scrutinized. However, if you carried some formidable looking document in a brown envelope and marched determinedly across to the other side, you could go anywhere you liked without being apprehended.
Of course, that was in the days before they invented "knowledge workers".
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Understanding People
