{"id":7994,"date":"2011-12-12T07:00:57","date_gmt":"2011-12-12T14:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/?p=7994"},"modified":"2011-12-10T10:10:19","modified_gmt":"2011-12-10T17:10:19","slug":"the-hitchikers-guide-to-the-pmbok","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/?p=7994","title":{"rendered":"The Hitchikers Guide to the PMBOK"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe Guide is definitive. Reality is frequently inaccurate.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/h3>\n

\n

\u201c<\/span><\/em>I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.\u201d<\/em><\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"cover<\/a>\u2018The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy\u2019 by Douglas Adams, would be over 30 years old today, a phenomenon born in London around the same time that the Project Management Institute (PMI) was created in a kitchen in Philadelphia. The four books in the Adams trilogy became so universally famous, that they were frequently shortened to simply, \u2018The Guide.\u2019<\/p>\n

One wonders what Douglas Adams, or more interestingly, one of his amazing characters would make of the current version 4 of the PMBOK\u00ae Guide?<\/p>\n

His terrific intellect, sharp sense of humour and strong science background allowed him, before his untimely death in 2001, to tackle a wide range of topics from a \u2018universal\u2019 perspective. Perhaps he would even have stretched all Project Management standards into areas beyond the reach of their contributors.<\/p>\n

Adams had brilliant ideas about our physical universe, expounded by the twin headed \u2018 Zaphod Beeblebrox\u2019, \u00a0the nerdy \u2018Ford Prefect,\u2019 the amazing \u2018Marvin the Paranoid Android,\u2019 and several others. He helped many people, including the eminent scientist, Richard Dawkins, to make sense of this complex world and also to just simply enjoy the humor in his stories, as a way to get through a frustrating day.<\/p>\n

He wrote in a time before Dilbert, The Simpsons and The Office – but his books and quotes are still as readable today as when he first created them. One of the most famous ideas from the original book is the answer given by \u2018Deep Thought,\u2019 the biggest computer in the universe, to the question \u2013 \u2018What is the answer to life, the universe and everything?\u2019 If you remember the book well, you would know that the answer was an illuminating – \u201842\u2019.<\/p>\n

Perhaps, as a project management community, we are finally coming close to the answer to our own universal question – \u201cHow do we get something big done in this complex world of ours?<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

As many old timers reading this blog will know, the first PMBOK in 1996 had 37 steps and Version 2 in 2001 had 39 steps. Version 3 in 2005 increased the number of steps to 44 and now finally Version 4, 2009 has reduced the steps and appears to have aligned with the answer to \u2018Life, the Universe and Everything\u2019.<\/p>\n

And so finally, our PMBOK\u00ae has 42 steps too.<\/p>\n

Could there be a fellow hitchhiker deep inside the organization of the PMI? Or is it perhaps a belated coincidental example of the \u2018Infinite Improbability Drive,\u2019 that Adams used to power his ships across the galaxies.<\/p>\n

Perhaps if we look deeper into the \u2018tools and techniques\u2019 sections of the individual\u00a0 PMBOK\u00ae steps we will find a mirror to \u2018the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster,\u2019 a drink with the alcoholic equivalent to being mugged. It certainly could have uses in the HR area. Maybe we could also find something like \u2018The Total Perspective Vortex,\u2019 which humbled all great men except Zaphod himself. It would come in handy during the stakeholder analysis.<\/p>\n

The \u2018Point of View Gun,\u2019 which does exactly what it says on the label might be useful during the \u2018Collect Requirements\u2019 step. Perhaps we should even copy the transient idea of renaming our elevators to \u2018Happy Vertical People Transporters\u2019. Altering our vocabulary would make a nice diversion if included in our bullet ridden, PowerPoint driven, status reports.<\/p>\n

A \u2018Crisis Inducer\u2019 would certainly come in useful during the \u2018Acquire the Team\u2019 step, as would a \u2018Thinking Cap\u2019 (lemon powered), during the decision making part of the \u2018Define the Scope\u2019 step. And finally before I go absolutely crazy here, we should consider the use of \u2018Vogon Poetry,\u2019 or at least the threat to use it, as an acceptable form of torture in \u2018Manage the Team,\u2019 and \u2018Manage the Stakeholders\u2019 steps.<\/p>\n

I hope that this article inspires you to read any of the 4 books in the Hitchhiker trilogy, or at the very least to look at our PMBOK\u00ae Version 4 in a new light.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe Guide is definitive. Reality is frequently inaccurate.\u201d \u201cI love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1531,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[845,6,849,851],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-human-resources","category-communications","category-team-leadership","category-global-leadership-leadership"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1531"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7994"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7994\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}