A timeline is a retrospective representation of a linear sequence of significant events which have occurred during the accomplishment of some activity. A timetable provides a corresponding, forward-looking series for pre-arranged events, and is often organized as a tabular list. Such timetables are used to plan and track such activities for performing and reporting on future work. Each of the events associated with these timelines and timetables may be comprised of either top-level milestones or more detailed inchstones. Read more »

What is a lesson learned? Simply put, it is is knowledge or understanding gained by experience (whether positive or negative), and which adds significant, valid, and relevant new information that would be useful in accomplishing a business objective. Read more »

A Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG) is a clear, compelling vision that is intended to serve as unifying focus and catalyst for team spirit, volunteerism, and discretionary efforts. Such goals typically have long-term horizons, clear finish lines, and sufficient clarity to motivate participants to establish and sustain the commitments required to achieve the desired outcomes. Synergy often plays a role in pursuing such BHAGs, as sharing of assets (both knowledge and physical), coordination of strategies, and pooling & integration of resources and components are brought to bear in ways that would not otherwise arise from 'normal' market forces. Several notable examples of such BHAGs come to mind. Read more »

We shape our tools and thereafter they shape us.
-Marshall McLuhan

Tools are a popular focus for synergy projects. The hope seems to often be that if we just had the right tool, we would be able to perform our work more quickly, reliably, and accurately. In practice, tools rarely bestow such magic. They may not quite fit the situation we are in, being either more complicated than we need, or underpowered for the task at hand. They may need to work well with other tools in our toolbox, but instead force us into compromises for us to continue to use our other trusted tools. We might find the user interface complex, the workflow incompatible with how we are used to working, or the features we need unavailable where or when we need to use them. Finally, we might just be more comfortable with our old way of doing business, or think the effort to become proficient at using a new tool is more trouble than it is worth. Read more »