I walked the LINE...

Walking the line between conflicting requirements

This week I will spend 16 hours in meetings discussing the development and roll out of lead scoring in our Kentico Enterprise Marketing Suite (EMS). We just rolled out the new website in June and we are pleased with Kentico, and our developers https://bitwizards.com. 

There is always more than one way to skin a cat, or peel a banana if you are an animal lover. Well actually there is only one way to peel a banana properly, and if I think about it there was only one way to properly skin a deer when I was a kid on a farm, so I would imagine the same holds true for a cat. (I promise not to fact check that)

Now back to the point, every project, and every process has a several layers to it, and several intersections that can be navigated differently depending on the desired outcome, and prejudices in perspective.
The Key?

• Ask Questions
• Why is this process, project important?
• Why is that answer important?
• Why is that important?
• And down here you usually find their "What", their esprit de corps, purpose behind their flywheel. For some it is family, and making a difference, for others it is money, retirement and making a difference in their own life. 
• Both are acceptable tools to connect members to purpose. This helps them remain engaged and dedicated to the big picture - drive organizational outcomes.
• What does success look like? 
• In your mind what was the step right before that success?
• How did we get to that point? 
• And so forth until you get to today. Stepping backwards through a problem is a great way to avoid the pitfalls of "We can't do that... We've tried that before... That won't work..." etc. 
• I think those involved are looking at each event individually rather than wondering if each event feeds their own goal. 

Remember that no matter where you work, everyone on the project is human. They all have a goal, and a motivation to reach that goal. I do not want to miss my goal when I remember the impact it will have on my family. I will miss my goal to protect my family, but I will not protect my goals to hurt my family. Keep priorities straight in your heart and your business will follow.

Seek to understand rather then be understood, do not come to scoff without further inspection. 

Check out next post where I share a story about 1,000% process improvement from re-engineering. 

Below is a great article about Requirements Elicitation.
http://www.bridging-the-gap.com/what-questions-do-i-ask-during-requirements-elicitation/