Project Managerisms

I freely admit that I was once firmly in the camp of those who believe that Project Managers (PMs) and their minions are merely superficial sycophants sucking money from unsuspecting business hosts. But don’t repeat my mistake and assume that PMs are nothing more than Poseurs who simply like telling other people what to do. They are, but they also possess special talents (I’d say skills, except that no one actually teaches it). I am convinced that one is born a PM. They have subtle powers that you would do well not to underestimate. Now it is within the realm of possibility that this line of reasoning is a Captainesque mental construct, that my ego simply finds it more palatable to pretend that PMs make so much money because they have unique talents. Heck, even made up competency is better than none at all. But there is empirical evidence that PMs do share some common traits, what I call “Project Managerisms,” which are outlined below for your reading pleasure.

• An almost psychotic ability to manufacture self-importance. For example, a PM needs only to attend one companywide teleconference with the company CEO to feel empowered to reference said CEO by his or her first name in casual conversation, as if they’ve been bosom buddies since Kindergarten.

• It is second nature for a PM to invent superfluous terminology with meaningless acronyms and get everyone else to adopt their random creations. I am now known to total strangers at work as something called a SME, which seems to be just a notch above Smurf. The only difference is that I actually know what a Smurf is. I have been told that SME stands for Subject Matter Expert, but the fact that gaggles of PMs giggle behind my back whenever someone calls me a SME leads me to believe it stands for something more sinister, perhaps Suck the Money from this Entity. Just sayin’.

• They practice the art of meeting their fellow PM buddies all day for coffee and creating the appearance that they are hard at work. This isn’t as easy as it seems; rumor has it that PMs spend hours upon hours in front of the mirror talking to themselves and pulling faces. In fact, PMs have documented at least 66 different serious facial expressions and a dozen voice tones with gravitas for use at real pretend work. There are even apocryphal stories circulating on the corporate street about the rare PM Savant who can even channel Linda Blair from The Exorcist. I like to call these the Rasputin PMs. Scary…

• They start young. As an innocent boy growing up in the blue collar hamlet of Torrington, CT, I collected baseball cards. I played, learned and loved the nuances of our national pastime and spent years compiling a pretty nice collection. One summer, I organized my collection using a complicated rating system that took several years to devise. Each card was proudly displayed in the appropriate category based on years of study. Then, one fateful afternoon when I was out on the sandlot with my friends from the hood, my sister entered my room without permission and reorganized my collection by uniform color. Aghast upon my return, I noticed that a number of cards were missing. In tears, I confronted my sister, who stated matter-of-factly that she did me a favor by organizing my mess and throwing out the cards of left handed players because they apparently didn’t fit into her organizational plan. So long Sandy Koufax and Ted Williams!! Ah, my sister. Future Project Manager of America.

• PMs have an exceptional ability to create complicated spreadsheets with questionable purposes that only the initiated few can understand; I hear that they actually give out awards at the annual PM Convention for the most elaborate spreadsheets that purposely track items that offer NO BUSINESS VALUE WHATSOEVER – the greater the content of irrelevant information, the greater the value added. Sometimes I think I would make an excellent PM, since I have a knack for creating spreadsheets on the fly that no one can understand (including me). But I’m pretty sure that I’d never make it out of the convention alive. I learned my lesson after being invited as a “special guest” to attend the International Coven at Stonehenge, where I was slated to make a special appearance in a cauldron of boiling water. Never again…

• Venn Diagrams. PMs love them, though I suspect that PMs just randomly throw some lines and shapes on a screen, attach some made up PM descriptors, and pass them off as complex theoretical models that only a Borderline unemployed engineer on Ecstasy can interpret. I can’t prove this, of course, but the repetitive use of acronyms like LSD and STD and PCP makes me wonder. It’s like me and my High School Algebra teacher Mr. Z. I’m convinced he just scribbled random numbers inside lengthy parentheticals on the chalkboard, but, lacking a basic understanding of algebra and constantly having my drugs taken from me by bullies, I couldn’t really be sure.

• A cult-like loyalty to their own kind; nothing illustrates this like the wave of PMs who are laid off simultaneously by a bankrupt company paralyzed by lack or execution due to confusing spreadsheets and labyrinthine project plans designed only to meet artificial deadlines meant to procure bonuses for PMs. It only takes one parasite to attach itself to a new corporate host and before you know it that body is covered in leeches brought along for the ride.

To all my Project Manager friends reading this (if there any left after this post), I challenge you all to compose a rebuttal, possibly your own critique of the foibles and fabrications of those you call your “Business Customers.” I have no doubt you’d have a lot of entertaining observations!

So Believe The Captain when he says: Talking to a mirror beats talking to your teenager!

Yours wearing a Phrygian Cap,

The Captain

Ps: Trivia Challenge – why the reference to a Phrygian Cap????