What do you think of when you think of a sharp thinker? What do you think a sharp thinker is? When I think of sharp thinking - I think of one person....
Carol V is sharp. You fling her some numbers and letters....and she will cook you a 3course dinner, and give you a knife and a fork and a dictionary to go with it!
As a TPM....you dont have to have super human...bruce lee, lennox lewis, incredible hulk mental agility to be able to do your job...but you do need to be able to catch things quite quickly.
Ever been in that situation when someone is talking to you quite rapidly about their thoughts or perhaps something they want you to do? They'll often ask you at the end "did you get all of that?". And you almost always reply "yes". In actual fact...you havent got it. In TPM...make sure you've got it. Dont gloss over things you dont understand.
Use a notepad and pen, or if you're posh, use a blackberry or some other PDA to take note of the MAIN POINTS. You dont need War and Peace. Just listen keenly....Concentrate.....zero in on the subject that your client is talking about.
Some (like me) have found that it helps to draw pictures to catch the main points of whats going on and show how each idea links to the other to make a whole.
For example, i was talking to a customer today who wants to modernise some of his architecture. It currently consists of :
-15 workstations that are running NT4 and
-a server running NT4 server software.
This particular customer doesnt talk fast, but his thoughts come out quickly - and sometimes he deviates, not really knowing what he wants. For me to capture his requirements quickly without spending loads of time trying to workout what is what and getting mixed in the cocophony that is....his head...i mapped out his main ideas using a Mind Mapping tool. At the end i was confident I had captured his ideas fully. I ran my capture back to him and he was confident that i had fully understood what he was after.
As it turns out his server will be virtualised using VMWARE Server software and his clients will also be virtualised using VMWare also. The client workstations will each run a VMWARE Player which will play a virtualised client image. This client image will 'talk' to the virtualised server. Sounds deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. This is quite a simple solution.
So.....Sharp thinking...Yes...necessary....not to Carol V's level but definitely required. Needed because you need to understand your customers requirements. Needed because your customer will sometimes deviate, but you need to be able to stay on track...to reach the goal...or as i like to say..."cut through the chaff, keep on the path". This applies to the idea for the chosen solution, for the kind of project team you need, for the different parts of the project...and so on....
So....dont deviate...concentrate...
...and to use a modern street colloquiallism...."Stay Sharp".
Along with sharp thinking you need creativity. Have you got a good imagination?
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