I'm Not the Best Program Planner

I'm in the midst of Program Planning, and after another discussion with my good friend Micah (see here), I've decided that I'm not into this class as much. 

I’ve decided, Program Planning isn’t my milieu. I’ll do it, but I’m not going to enjoy it. I think it comes from my foundational business and operations experience in the Army. I was in a unit that excelled at fast raids and attacks. We rarely ever held ground. There are plenty of units that advance, secure, and hold. We didn’t do that. We hit then we left. We carried very little with us. There was a planning phase, a recon, an infil, the attack, then an exfil. All those phases of the operation usually took place within a day or two. Some units plan for weeks and months in advance, that’s just not what I was trained to do, and certainly isn’t something I’m comfortable doing, nor do I like doing it.

There is a saying, by General Pershing who was the American leader on the Western Front in WWI who said, “Infantry wins battles, logistics wins wars.”

Folks who specialize in logistics are very much the program planners of the military world. They obsess on the details and every iota of the plan. We have folks like that at work too. People who will dwell on the mot juste. We have one of those in my project team. She is an EXCEPTIONAL project manager, but she could spend hours on the proper definition and delineation of “is this an objective or a goal.” 

Me? I don’t care if it’s an objective or a goal, I just want to get moving. We have another young lady here at work who has that same issue, although she seems to have a bad case of  “paralysis through analysis.” She refuses to get her butt in gear ever. She can linger on a project for years, whereas I, have to move forward. I hate being stagnant.

If I had my way I would not have worked in a project team. I’ve gotten used to doing my own thing and working on my own deadlines, so it’s been killing me to have to work with others. That being said, so far I’ve been blessed by having great teams. Andrew and Daron are terrific for our self-reflection group meetings. Anna was a terrific counterpart for the partner project in our last class, and right now I’m working with Emily and Anne, who are both amazingly competent and fun to work with. So I’ve been blessed in that regard.