The Future-Ready Project Manager Transcript (Part 1)

Segment 1: How is AI Going to Impact and The Role and Responsibilities of Project Managers?

Idris Manley:

Welcome to Future of Work 2.0. I'm your co-host Idris Manley.

Ross Martin:

And I'm Ross Martin. One of the questions that we get a lot from our viewers is, how is AI going to impact my career? And so we've got a treat for you today. That is the topic. The topic is, how is artificial intelligence going to impact the role and responsibilities of project managers? So Idris, what's the big thing here? How is AI going to impact project management professionals?

Idris Manley:

The project management career is going to go away, cease to exist as we know it.

Ross Martin:

Oh my God, the world is falling.

Idris Manley:

No, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. Just kidding. Just kidding. No, it's not. It's not. It's not. No, no, no. But it will change. It will change. There is a place for us. But yeah, it definitely will will change. I think, you know, certainly it's one of the it definitely is the most, if not one of the most common questions I get regularly over email and talking, speaking to people is the anxiety and fear that they have around how AI is going to impact their career. And there are a lot of people that are really stressed about this concept. So I think it's really good that we're taking some time to really discuss it and to really share our thoughts on where the industry is headed.

Ross Martin:

So is it something to be fearful of or is it an opportunity? Both.

Idris Manley:

I think it's something to definitely have a healthy respect for. Yeah, that's a good way to put it. You should have a healthy respect for the impact that AI will have on your career. But it isn't something to fear because I think it's important to view AI in the context of project management as really an assistant, as a trusted assistant, right? Someone who will be able to help you by doing some of the more mundane tasks And those tasks would be whether it's planning or scheduling a project plan, or taking meeting notes, or scheduling meetings, even doing some level of risk management and some of these other things as well. But it really will be able to do a lot of these more repetitive tasks. that are consuming 80% or more of your time a week, it'll be able to do those things pretty effortlessly. And so it really will provide project managers an opportunity to begin to focus on other types of activities that perhaps either they didn't have the time to focus on or weren't necessarily in their mind maybe the highest priority when they were focused on tasks and getting deliverables done. It'll really give them a chance to focus on those higher order sort of activities.

Ross Martin:

And often those types of activities are handled as an entry-level position called a project coordinator, at least in some companies, right? Sure. And so I think that particular role is going to get automated, mostly. all the project management 101, the basic stuff you learn, and that some people who don't understand the value that project and program management can provide to a company think that, or have only encountered people who take meeting notes and schedule meetings and create project plans and that sort of thing. So yeah, I think that that's gonna that's going to get automated by AI. But like you said, it's going to create a capacity situation for project managers, as those things get handled by your new AI assistant. Absolutely.

Idris Manley:

And I think it's a good thing. I think just to touch on an earlier point you made, I think, you know, you know, we both have been in the industry for longer than I would like to say, but, you know, certainly, you know, I've been in industry for more than 25 years. Yeah, same with you. And one of the things that we can say as PMO leaders is that the executives have oftentimes viewed PMO and project managers as really more of a marginalized sort of function that they can replace or minimize. With AI, it really provides project managers an opportunity with that extra capacity to begin adding much more strategic value in ways that we haven't historically, which will allow executives to begin viewing project management in an entirely new light. If we get this right, you can really begin to provide insights and information in a way that is highly valuable and useful to the business goals of the company and to the strategic discussions that they're having or considerations that they need to have in order to make sure they're making the right strategic decisions that will ultimately impact the business.

Ross Martin:

Well, and that makes me think about what we've learned as we move through our careers as project managers and then in the director and senior director levels and then eventually up into VP, head of PMO, those types of levels, is That's the kind of thing that we had to do to move our careers forward. You have to have the leaders of the company have to start seeing you as thinking strategically and providing more value than the basic project management. You know, chasing down tasks and deliverables, that sort of thing.

Idris Manley:

And project managers, they really struggle in that area. You know, I haven't had a chance to do it yet, but I have an action item to really quantify the ratio of senior level project management positions, like say, senior director, VP, head of PMO, relative to all of the other project management positions, senior project manager, project manager level one, two, three, et cetera, and compare that to engineering, marketing, Product management to understand the ratios. And I would, and I, my, my thesis is that the ratio between executive level, project management positions or senior leader, project management positions to other project managed positions is much, uh, is, is much less than in other functions. Meaning, you know, there are far more VP of engineering or VP of product management positions than there are, you know, relative to the project management function. And I think there's a reason for that. And I think the reason is what you highlighted earlier, which is because we don't tend to be viewed as really strategic players. They don't necessarily see a need to have an executive-level, senior-level role defined for many companies.

Ross Martin:

Actually have an anecdote on that which which you made me think of at at a big tech Silicon Valley company that I worked at one of my friends was a senior director of project management and she was trying to get promoted to VP and what her SVP did is he moved her into a product role So she could get promoted to VP because the company did not see VP of project management as a thing as a thing Yeah, it wasn't even an option and if she was ever gonna move up in her career she had to switch lanes yeah, yeah, and I can't tell you the number of project managers over the years that actually moved out of

Idris Manley:

of, you know, project management in order to continue moving up in their career, because they felt that they had really hit a ceiling in project management. So they moved into operations, or they moved into product management, or they moved into other adjacent functional disciplines in order to continue growing in their career.

Ross Martin:

Yeah, absolutely. So what's interesting is, is we're talking a little bit about sort of the opportunities and what needs to happen to grow your career. Let's talk a little bit about if someone chooses not to go that route. No, you know, because, because, you know, Some of that might be scary, especially if you've never felt like you really completely understand strategy or any of that stuff And you're really what you're really good at is you're really good at getting people to get their stuff done To hit their deliverable dates. You're really good at organizing people and chasing and taking meeting notes and all that kind of stuff and What are those people have to fear

Idris Manley:

Yeah, no, I think fear may be an appropriate word in this particular instance, right? I think that when we look at AI, we can look at it from an opportunistic sort of lens. It presents a tremendous opportunity for PMs to up-level their careers and to really redefine their careers in entirely new ways as leaders and strategic thinkers in companies. But there is also the sort of the opposite end of that, which is it also It also will create competition for certain PMs based on what they value or what they have decided to specialize in in terms of their value contribution. And so if your value contribution as a project manager is really on those sort of repetitive tasks that, you know, we said more the more mundane tasks that are relatively simple in the in this sort of the portfolio of activities that a project manager can perform, again, those are gonna be the skills and the activities are gonna be replaced initially by your AI assistant. And then, so then the question becomes, okay, as a project manager, what are you left to do? If your assistant is actually planning your project, evaluating risks for you, actually taking meeting notes and sending meeting notes out and tracking and monitoring and controlling, your project, what is left for you?

Ross Martin:

I suppose a little bit of oversight. That's maybe not worth a full-time role.

Idris Manley:

Not a full-time role, absolutely. So perhaps as a company, they may decide to have half the number of project managers that are responsible for project coordination. So that person is taking on more responsibility in terms of more projects because they're you know Their AI assistant is able to do you know a good portion of the task that they were that they have to perform So in that instance, then the question becomes, you know, who are they going to select if a company is left to To reduce, you know the project managers that they have on staff who would they select versus not and more than likely the person it is able to offer more value to offer a

Ross Martin:

More insight more strategic capability other than just providing oversight They're probably gonna be in better position to keep their jobs or to continue to excel And I think of people like I'm thinking of of another woman that I worked with at at my previous company where I could you can tell like she had she had the the desire and the drive to move her career forward but felt stuck and And I think one of the reasons she felt stuck is she was an IT program manager and she couldn't get past the mundane, the volume of stuff she had to track. Was keeping what made it so it was very hard for her to be strategic even though she wanted to be so for people like that I think this is nothing but opportunity. Yeah, you know now you have the opportunity She's gonna have the ability to have her AI assistant take care of all that stuff free her up to become more strategic and to provide more value and drive her career forward. And I think they're going to really love this. Yeah, no, I agree.

Idris Manley:

I think it's definitely a mindset sort of pivot. You know, over the course of my career, when I think about the various project managers I've managed, I would say that a good portion of them are sort of, as you described, where they really are opportunistic, they really want to be able to thrive and excel and really take on leadership sort of roles. But then there have been a fair share of project managers that they really find value in the mundane. They, for whatever reason, it's comfortable. It's a very comfortable space to take meeting notes and send out, take, you know, send out status reports is like, is their thing. And they really get a lot of enjoyment and pleasure out of performing those kinds of activities. Now, you know, for some of them, they just, you know, again, because it's a mindset, they just maybe haven't had the opportunity to challenge themselves in other areas or to really explore sort of other ways to add value. But for others, they're very content. And so I think for individuals that are particularly content, With that being their unique value proposition, I think those are going to be individuals that are going to have a bit more of a struggle. But again, having said that, you can still pick the pivot. There's plenty of time to be able to still sort of evolve and to shift the mindset and to be able to begin seeing value and opportunity in some of these higher value sort of contribution and more strategic contributions that I think will be critical for your success.

Ross Martin:

Yeah, I was about to say like, you know, your boss and your company aren't yet making lists of who to keep when they cut their PMOs into half. But then I paused for just a second when I thought about some of the recent layoffs that just happened with some of our biggest names, tech names in Silicon Valley and up in Seattle. And some of what they're saying in this case, now this was not about project management, but in these cases it was about they wanted to shed some cost in order to reinvest in AI, but in this case building their generative AI capabilities. What that says to me, though, is maybe it isn't yet time for companies to start deciding what to do with their PMOs because AI isn't quite ready to take all this project coordinator thing, all the tasks away. But they're going to be thinking about these things in the context of AI with all their areas pretty soon. When people are making decisions about cost-cutting in any company, in any scenario, you always want to be the one who they say, oh, we can't live without that person.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, and the way that that happens is by offering greater value than your peers. Exactly. And the way that you do that is by being more strategic, thinking about business outcomes, understanding concepts around value delivery management, agility, et cetera.

Ross Martin:

Exactly, exactly. And then you become someone who is really helping drive your company towards being a delivery machine. Absolutely, absolutely.

Idris Manley:

But it is a different mindset. And so it is important to, to really establish a clear vision for yourself. And you know, and for your career to really start to reimagine what your career would look like with AI and how you could perhaps add, you know, greater value than than previous with the additional capacity. I think it's important to be able to then establish a strategy that aligns with that vision. So how are you going to strategically approach achieving that vision that you have in mind? And then establishing a plan, which I would expect every project manager to know how to do very effectively. But then you establish a plan where you really start to lay out over what time frame, what are the key milestones, what am I trying to accomplish? There may be a need to learn new skill sets, play around with certain tools, but really put that into a project plan so you can really hold yourself accountable for how you're going to progress. to achieving that strategy and then ultimately think about how you measure it. How do you truly hold yourself accountable? How do you essentially ensure that you're going to be successful in your execution?

Segment 2: What does it mean to be More Strategic as a Project Manager?

Ross Martin:

You could call it project my career in the face of AI. Absolutely. In the context of project managers now having AI assistants taking care of the mundane tasks, we said, what are they going to do with all that capacity? And what they need to do is be more strategic. And so what exactly does it mean to be more strategic as a project manager? One of the areas is to focus on business outcomes instead of tasks and deliverables. So what do you think about that?

Idris Manley:

Yeah, no, absolutely. I think when you're thinking about being more strategic, one of the first areas that comes to mind is being more business outcome focused. And so what does that mean? Well, I think it's important to maybe start by understanding the history of project management and why we have such a preoccupation with tasks and deliverables, right? And so if you look at the evolution of project management, as a discipline, as a function, it really sort of originates from construction, engineering, aerospace, a lot of the sciences. Automotive in the beginning of the 1900s. Yeah, the industrial era and, you know, there being just an innate focus on manufacturing. And so, you know, you know, developing widgets, getting widgets out as efficiently as possible. And so, you know, as a result of that, it was really critical to be very focused on the tasks and achieving the deliverables. And so I think as a result, you know, as project management has evolved, there has been just an innate sort of focus for project managers on that, and at times to our detriment. because it has really limited our ability to be able to think about some of the more strategic aspects like business outcomes. I can't tell you the amount of projects that I've seen supported where project success was defined by completing the deliverable as opposed to the business outcome. being able to, you know, defining a project based on simply completing the specific deliverables that were in scope, regardless of whether the project itself actually achieved the business outcomes that were specified in the charter or by the executive sponsor and how the executive sponsor was ultimately measuring success.

Ross Martin:

I would even take that a little bit further, Idris, which is I've been in a number of situations where I don't think that the team themselves, including the project manager, even really knew what the business outcome was supposed to be. And I could even go a little further and say there's been a few situations where I'm not entirely sure the executive sponsor knew exactly what it was we were trying to do. So it's like, you're now in charge of Project Moon, And your job is to deliver these things by this date, and that is what the project manager focused on. No one stepped back and said, what is the ultimate business outcome? What is the point? What is the goal trying to be achieved to drive the company forward in this way, to achieve a certain amount of revenue? What is the point? And it's lost a lot of times, either in translation or never really written down.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, no, no, I agree. I mean, you're right. To be fair, executives oftentimes aren't asking, at least they're not asking the project managers. Yes. Now, behind closed doors and boardrooms, I'm sure there are questions being asked. You know, we made this $10 million investment. You know, where are we at with our ROI? Those questions are being asked, but they don't oftentimes get down to the project management level. You know, for whatever reason. And so I think it's important that project managers understand that that it's actually an opportunity for us. That is an opportunity to be able to begin to understand the business goals and outcomes and how your projects relate to them. and to be able to begin tracking and holding teams accountable, not just for completing the deliverables and the tasks that they are assigned, but really starting to track the KPIs and metrics associated with the business outcomes. And sometimes it requires you to organize your project plans in new ways, where instead of just organizing your project plan based on the specific deliverables that need to be performed, really starting to think about the outputs You know, or what are the KPIs or the business implications of these deliverables? Can you, and this starts to get into agility as well. Yeah. Can you start to organize your, the development of those deliverables in a way where it may be front load some of those deliverables early on so you can begin to track some of the output metrics that they are responsible for. So by the time you complete the project, you have. a bit of history in some of those KPIs that you can then use to be able to evaluate if the project is actually delivering to the business outcome. So it definitely requires a new way of thinking about project plans, how it also requires in your initiation sort of stage really beginning to understand what those business outcomes are and making sure that they're explicit and also making that a part of your communications and your governance and the accountability within the team. So it becomes really part of the structure of how you're planning, executing, and monitoring and controlling your projects.

Ross Martin:

Yeah, I think, you know, as I think as we've moved through our careers, one of the things that's helped us as we moved into the director and then eventually into the VP roles that we had is starting to really focus instead on things like business outcomes instead of just tasks and deliverables. I think one of the reasons that project managers and project teams don't often know what the ultimate business outcomes that they're going for are, is if the senior leaders don't think that they think that way. So if the person thinks of themselves, if you as a project manager think of yourself as a taskmaster who gets things done and makes sure that they happen and follows up very well, your executive sponsor may not see the need to go into what's the business strategy around why we're trying to implement SAP in Europe or something like that, because they can see that's not the way you think.

Idris Manley:

I agree. I mentioned in the earlier segment that having worked as a PMO for over 25 years, I probably know hundreds of project managers. I've worked with hundreds of project managers over my career and I can tell you I probably have only encountered less than 10, less than, I can count on both my hands, the number of VPs or heads of project manager that I've encountered in that role. And I think that is because as project managers, we don't tend to think that way. We don't really tend to think about the business value of what we're working on. We don't tend to emphasize that and we get very comfortable. just focusing on the deliverables. And so I think as a project manager, if you're looking to really take advantage of AI in ways that will benefit your career, and not just allow you to sort of sustain, but actually create new opportunities that can translate into compensation, to titling and more responsibility, I think it's important to understand how your projects relate to the business goals and specifically business outcomes that they're producing and really take the same level of accountability and responsibility that you place on the deliverables and the tasks, making sure that they're completed on time and scope and with quality. using that same mindset to apply to the business outcomes, and holding the teams accountable for what may be necessary to successfully achieve those business outcomes.

Ross Martin:

The way that it works usually is at the end, when you're done, there's a desire to have a certain amount of measure and measurement around whether you achieved what it is that you were trying to achieve. Obviously, if the business outcomes that led to doing the project in the first place are lost along the way, then the team can just celebrate whether they hit their date. But even if they do know about the outcome that they're going for, what I've found is, first of all, if you're now measuring at the end after it's over, it's a hindsight thing, right? Oh, we were going for that, and we didn't hit it. Oh. And then somebody maybe writes a lessons learned document for the future people, and then the question is, does anyone actually look at that? So, I think, and we'll touch on this when we talk a little bit more about Agile, but the idea is to make sure as a strategic project manager in the future, when you have your AI assistant taking care of the mundane, one of the things that you can then be doing is make sure all along the way the business outcome or outcomes that you are trying to achieve for doing this program or project or initiative in the first place, why you are doing it, is a touchstone all along the way through every step, through every phase, through the initiation, through the planning, through the execution, measure and adapt, even in the close, you're constantly thinking about Did we achieve the why? And what course corrections do we need to do along the way to get there if you're not?

Idris Manley:

Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely. Definitely have to ask the why, you know, I would take it a step further. And I would encourage if like if I were a project manager right now, individual contributor, and I was trying to take advantage of AI and business outcomes, I would actually encourage Business leaders to allow me as a project manager to take responsibility for the project not just at the completion of the deliverable I would insist that I would like to take some level of accountability For post the deliverables being complete to actually which now you're moving into operations And now you're saying hey, I would like to have some level of oversight into this project even at post Completion from a deliverable perspective and to monitor and control and to help support the achievement of the business metrics that are needed even as it moves into the sort of that from the change management to the operational sort of ongoing sort of steady state of I've never seen that in practice in I totally agree with you.

Ross Martin:

That's a great idea and But what I always see happens is at the end of the project, the project manager is immediately put on something else. And the operations person in charge of that part of the business is told, this project went in, you now have this new warehousing software. And it's supposed to drive your efficiency up by X percent, go measure it, and that's sort of lost to the project manager.

Idris Manley:

My last role as VP of PMO for a technology company, I actually insisted that my team start to take on that responsibility. Why? Because they actually, because, you know, because they were responsible for creating, initiating the project and managing the project, they had more context, insight, and understanding of what was needed to be successful. And that could be, that was of use to the, on the operational side, the operational leader, to be able to take advantage and have another set of eyes that already understood sort of the background and the history of the project that was being put together to really allow them to support them and really help drive and be accountable, or at least not accountable, but at least be aware and have some level of responsibility to help ensure that they're actually achieving the KPI. What senior leader wouldn't appreciate that extra help and that extra insight that could help them successfully deliver on those business outcomes?

Ross Martin:

Well, and I like that idea, Idris, as well, where, say, for example, we're talking about an operations situation, an operations initiative that this project manager is working on, is having them spend some time being a bit embedded in certain parts of the business. I think project managers are good at being jacks-of-all-trade in some ways, but sometimes when they are, you know, like I said, they're specifically working side-by-side with an executive in sales or marketing or operations or some sort of frontline customer-focused part of the business, then that helps them become better at understanding what a strategic outcome is. Because if you are in operations with the person that you worked on that thing with, trying to figure out how to measure the performance of what you implemented in driving their efficiency, and you're sitting side by side with them, then the whole point of why you even did it in the first place really starts to sink in.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, you have a better appreciation for the value and the why. You have a better appreciation for the why. Why are we doing this? And really understanding it more deeply. And I think, you know, it's interesting because I don't think a lot of project managers or PMOs are going to have senior executives coming to them and knocking on their door and saying, hey, we would like you to be accountable or to start to drive business outcomes. Why? Because culturally it's just something that hasn't happened before. And so I think it's going to require, you know, to a certain extent, you know, project managers become more visionary and to really sort of help set, you know, help sort of define the precedent, help to help business leaders really reimagine and understand your role in new ways. But it's going to really require you to have that vision, and you to really encourage this sort of new approach that's to be taken. So you're going to have to insist and make recommendations and request those additional responsibilities. And you're going to have to sort of, it's going to be a little bit of give and take, where you're going to have to demonstrate that you have the capability and the competency to be able to manage things at that level. And over time, they will see the value, they will recognize the value, and you'll see that they will start to embrace that. But initially, it may take some prompting and some pushing to be given the opportunity to make a difference. But I ensure you that if you're able to do it successfully, the value will be recognized. It will be appreciated. And you will likely be compensated. And given all the accolades that comes with being a more impactful player, that's more closely aligned to business goal value versus just deliverable and task value.

Ross Martin:

Yeah, you made me think of a situation where one of the ways that project managers can be marginalized, I'm thinking of a situation where the finance function at one of my companies, they are going to be implementing a new accounts receivable platform, and they asked for the PMO to provide a project manager. to help create a project plan, schedule meetings, take notes, follow up on action items. The head of the accounts receivable function was the executive sponsor and owner of the whole project and really was just looking for an AI coordinator, which in the future would be an AI assistant, right? Because he, in this case, didn't really have really very many, he's an operator, so he didn't have, and a finance guy, so he personally didn't have a lot of project management skills. but This is a situation. I think according like what you're saying is where? It would be important as the PMO to to insist that that the role be defined as more than that Yeah, so it's like yes will help you and we need this person to actually be side-by-side with you know, understanding the business outcome that is being sought here, and really understanding and helping put together the business case and the strategy around this. So your project manager then is also thinking about, is this even the right thing to do? Or is the package that you selected, or has it been selected? Should it have been selected? What was the method for that?

Idris Manley:

Versus just rolling up your sleeves and delivering and without asking.

Ross Martin:

Whatever this person says to do sounds good to me. I have no reason to question it. I'm not a finance expert, right? And so really thinking about these higher order effects, that's the kind of thing AI can't do.

Idris Manley:

Right. No, it's interesting. You know, whenever I join a new team or department or even company, one of the things I'm usually pretty clear on, both within my team and the sponsors that my team supports, is that we are not note takers. Yes. I'm usually very clear and emphatic about our value add is not right. you know, scheduling meetings and writing notes. If that is what you're looking for, you know, we're not it. You know, I think that, you know, everyone on the project team is capable of scheduling meetings when necessary. Everyone is capable of picking up a pen and writing notes. I'm not saying that there isn't value, there isn't a role for us to play in those areas, certainly, but I'm trying to make really a larger point, which is, We have to make sure that we're not being boxed in as project managers and marginalized as just project coordinators, or at least those basic activities, because then you're going to find yourself limited from the onset. And so it's really important early on to frame properly to your point what we're capable of doing, what we see as valuable, so that the sponsors and other senior leaders really begin to internalize and see us in those ways. But that won't happen if we're quick to pick up a pen and be the first to take notes and schedule the next meeting and not allow other team members to take on some of that muscle memory and some of that.

Ross Martin:

Well, and that's interesting because you think about it, At early in our career as a project manager in the manager level right like this this Hopefulness this I'm willing to to work What do you miss? What do you this eagerness? You're right like you got a shovel. You have some paint rollers. I'm sure I'll do it.

Idris Manley:

Yeah Yeah, no, that's and I think when you're early in your career, you think that your role is to just add value wherever wherever there's a need I will add value and I just want to you know Whatever you need and I think as you start to mature in your career, you realize that you know all value isn't created equal and so you don't necessarily want to be quick to add value in the areas that really aren't high impacting to the business and At the end of the day, we have finite capacity, and so we have to pick and choose. It is preferred to use your finite capacity in the areas that will deliver the greatest amount of impact to your stakeholders, and to the business, and to the company.

Ross Martin:

One of the things, speaking for myself personally, I remember distinctly at a Silicon Valley company that I worked at, Being in a situation, I was a senior manager and I wanted to be promoted into director and I was finding that to be a hard leap to make. And I remember a couple of times being in meetings where people are like, can you take notes and follow up on action items? And I was like, no, I don't take notes, take your own notes. And and I remember getting some you know, some some looks that and they made me feel uncomfortable Yeah, I like I was thinking am I doing the wrong thing here and then strangely enough within the next cycle I got promoted to director because I think what happened is my SVP at that point started to realize ah He's starting to get it which is he needs to think about the bigger picture of the success of the project and the outcomes that we're trying to get at and is not worried about the tasks and the note-taking and the action item follow-up. Instead, as a project manager, you start to think more about Are we on track? Are we achieving what we're trying to achieve? Are we doing why we're doing this? Are we getting towards the why? And that's what, all of a sudden, the career started going in the right direction.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, I mean, everyone on your project team, on your racy, has a different sort of interest, right? And it's important for you, particularly as you begin to mature in your career, to understand that those varying interests, that you need to be mindful of those varying interests, rather. And so an individual that you're supporting in your team may really want you just to take notes and to be able to schedule that meeting because it makes their life easier. While that VP or that SVP or C-level individual really wants you to be able to provide great insights on risks and how you're tracking to specific goals, etc. And so it's really important that you're able to delineate between the different needs and interests that exist and to make sure that you are always aligning yourself with the needs of the most senior individuals at the company. If you want to thrive and if you want to grow your career. Now, if you just want to just sort of maintain, then perhaps keeping your project team happy and taking those meeting notes, that might serve you well. But if you're really looking to sort of rise above your current level and you want to move into more management or more senior sort of responsibilities, you definitely want to make sure you're doing the things that senior leaders are going to value and appreciate.

Ross Martin:

Exactly. I think at this point it's time to no longer be the one who orders lunch. The other thing that made me think of, it's not a project management anecdote, but I remember a situation at a big tech company where a engineering team on their own worked really hard over two weekends to deliver some functionality that they thought would be useful to the product. And they were surprised that senior management was mad at them for doing that. And the reason was that wasn't what senior management would want them to have spent that time on. So that it wasn't and I saw this before as well when I was in big consulting where people are like But I'm working really hard. I put in a lot of hours and Senior management is looking for people that again work smart and are working on what is most impactful to the company what delivers the outcomes the business outcomes that they're looking for and not just the people that put in a lot of hours and

Idris Manley:

And people say the same thing when they're trying to be promoted as well, right? Yes. People that that is the kind of manager for X years. No, but I've worked really hard. Oh, yeah. I deserve to be promoted. I've worked. Look at what I've done. So, you know, and the response oftentimes is, well, you know, it's not just it's not just working how much you work. It's really working in the right way, working on the right things. And so it's important to be able to to make that distinction