TABridge Webinar: Managing the Unexpected

MANAGING THE UNEXPECTEDBe Ready for Change in Digital Strategy

TABridge Webinar | August 27, 2013Jed Miller, T/AI

@jedmiller | #TABridge

Agenda

I. What Do We Mean by Digital Strategy?

II. Moving from Strategy to Activities

III. Expectable Challenges

IV. Surprises and Changes

V. Managing the Unexpected

VI. Stories from the Field

VII. Discussion

VIII. Key Lessons

Digital Strategy

Key Elements:

• Big-picture goal (“How will the world look different?”)

• What is the specific change you seek with this strategy?

• Who is your audience?

• Match the tools to your audience.

• Check your capacity: Is your organization ready?

• Create a roadmap.

• Create a technology vision.

Moving from Strategy to Activities

• Technology plan: your tech vision, in actionable steps

• Shared expecations: Are campaigners, techies and managers

in sync?

Key Elements:

“code”

Moving from Strategy to Activities

• User-driven design for tools and user experience

• Timeline based on realism and shared expectations?

• Technology plan: your tech vision, in actionable steps

• Shared expecations: Are campaigners, techies and managers

in sync?

Key Elements:

• Feedback: User tests, previews for team, before launch.

• Enthusiasm: You will set the tone.

As with any challenge, the best remedy is prevention.

Expectable Challenges

Bureaucratic obstacles


Technology glitches


Scope “creep”


“Human” delays



• Bureaucratic obstacles

• Technology glitches

• Scope creep

• Human delays

The UnexpectedThe Unexpected

The Unexpected

Where did the surprise come from?

Within the project(e.g., technology or team)

Within the organization(e.g., budget or management priorities)

The outside world (e.g., political changes or current events)

The Unexpected

Understand what the change was.

• Slow Progress

• Reduced (or Increased) Resources

• Change in Outside Context

• New (or Shifting, or Drifting) Mandate

Managing the Unexpected

Understand what you cannot change.


Understanding the change doesn’t change anything, but it lets you know who to talk to.

• Managers

• Vendors

• Team

• Advisors

• Yourself


Communicate before, during and after you adjust the plan.

• Be realistic: If something has changed, don’t “kid yourself”

that it hasn’t.

• Be honest: Most problems don’t begin as mistakes, and

the ones that do get fixed sooner with clarity.

• Be flexible.

• Look forward.

• Lead.

Understand your role:


Understand your role:


teacher

Stories from the Field

Global Witness

Social media doesn’t just need consumers, it needs creators.

www.globalwitness.org | @Global Witness

Stories from the Field

Sarah Schacht

When expectations differ, the first step is getting on the same page.

www.smore.com/kfc0 | @SarahSchacht

Discussion

Please ask a question. Share an anecdote.

• When was the last time you faced the unexpected ina tech project?

• Have you ever realized you’d chosen the wrong tool?

• What do you do when people aren’t “on the same page?”

• When was the last time you realized your assumptions needed to change?

Lessons

Strategy is more than a message, a tool and a plan. It’s

a series of assumptions, relationships and conversations.

Expect change. Change is the norm.

If your assumptions, relationships and conversations are

flexible, it is much easier to manage the unexpected.

Lessons

Changes are resolved in the realm of conversation.

Conversation isn't the follow up to the adjustment. It's the primary tool for shifting your strategy effectively.

Lessons

Failure is feedback.

So listen carefully and adjust

accordingly.

@TAInitiative@jedmiller#TABridge

Thank you!

http://tech.transparency-initiative.org

p. 8 Philip Roeland/Flickr

p. 10 Airplane! (1980, Paramount)

p. 11 Alain Delorme, Totems, 2010

p. 12 willytronics/Flickr

p. 17 Virtusincertus/Flickr

p. 20 Al Jazeera English/Flickr, Mauricio Lima/NYT, World Bank, J. Miller

p. 21 See More Do More/Flickr

p. 23 Washington State DOT

p. 26 The Big Durian/Flickr

p. 9, 14 attribution unknown

Image credits