Good morning everyone,
I hope you’re excited about the upcoming FVE!
Before we get to that, here are some general comments about Assignment #3. Not all comments apply to everyone or every team.
Schedule and Risks:
– Taking out integration time because the schedule is tight is not a good solution. Real alternatives are: (1) refocusing / reallocating resources; (2) descoping; (3) allocating more resources (i.e. everyone’s time)
– It’s OK to show that you are in control of your WBS and your schedule in detail. Now, when you want to communicate status, progress, and goals, you need to summarize all that information. If we can’t read it, can’t see it, then we can’t follow it. Be clear about what comes next, what your are working on, what is lagging, how everything ties together.
– Do not delay integration and system-level testing too much. Re-hearse your FVE enough time in advance. And do not forget to record your performances if your FVE happens outdoors!
– As you get closer to the FVE, the severity of many risks go up. Why? Because you have less time to solve issues if they materialize. Reassess your risks very often (i.e. multiple times a week).Presentations:
– Identify your pet words and pet phrases and drop them.
– Do not end your sentences before you finish them. If what you’re saying is of no value, don’t say it. If it is, it deserves the same amount of time as any other sentence.
– Use a slide to show the agenda for your presentation. All presentations are not equal, and showing an agenda helps reduce the cognitive load on the audience. That’ll set their expectations.
– Present yourselves clearly, work on your transitions, and be on stage and show yourselves when you talk.
– Speak clearly, control your volume and your pace. Broken voices do not project well to the back of the room.
– Look and talk to the audience, not the board nor the floor nor the ceiling nor your hand.
– Avoid the use of “I”/”me”/”my”/”he”/”she”/”him”/”her”/”his” and use “we”/”our”/”us” instead, specially during Q&A.
– Use colors with purpose. That could be to mean: (1) to do / doing / done; (2) different people; (3) different sub-systems; (4) Fall / Spring; (5) etc.
– Unify fonts, colors, shapes, styles, everything. The goal, again, is to reduce the cognitive load on the audience.
– The screen aspect ratio is 4 to 3. If you use 16 to 9, you are wasting a large portion of the screen that you could use to increase the size of your fonts.
– Increase the size of your fonts.
– Taking out integration time because the schedule is tight is not a good solution. Real alternatives are: (1) refocusing / reallocating resources; (2) descoping; (3) allocating more resources (i.e. everyone’s time)
– It’s OK to show that you are in control of your WBS and your schedule in detail. Now, when you want to communicate status, progress, and goals, you need to summarize all that information. If we can’t read it, can’t see it, then we can’t follow it. Be clear about what comes next, what your are working on, what is lagging, how everything ties together.
– Do not delay integration and system-level testing too much. Re-hearse your FVE enough time in advance. And do not forget to record your performances if your FVE happens outdoors!
– As you get closer to the FVE, the severity of many risks go up. Why? Because you have less time to solve issues if they materialize. Reassess your risks very often (i.e. multiple times a week).Presentations:
– Identify your pet words and pet phrases and drop them.
– Do not end your sentences before you finish them. If what you’re saying is of no value, don’t say it. If it is, it deserves the same amount of time as any other sentence.
– Use a slide to show the agenda for your presentation. All presentations are not equal, and showing an agenda helps reduce the cognitive load on the audience. That’ll set their expectations.
– Present yourselves clearly, work on your transitions, and be on stage and show yourselves when you talk.
– Speak clearly, control your volume and your pace. Broken voices do not project well to the back of the room.
– Look and talk to the audience, not the board nor the floor nor the ceiling nor your hand.
– Avoid the use of “I”/”me”/”my”/”he”/”she”/”him”/”her”/”his” and use “we”/”our”/”us” instead, specially during Q&A.
– Use colors with purpose. That could be to mean: (1) to do / doing / done; (2) different people; (3) different sub-systems; (4) Fall / Spring; (5) etc.
– Unify fonts, colors, shapes, styles, everything. The goal, again, is to reduce the cognitive load on the audience.
– The screen aspect ratio is 4 to 3. If you use 16 to 9, you are wasting a large portion of the screen that you could use to increase the size of your fonts.
– Increase the size of your fonts.
We hope they are meaningful and useful to you, and that you’ll apply some or all of these recommendations in the future.
Good luck.
Vega, J. P.