As Project Managers What Can We Learn From David Bowie?

As the world comes to grips with the news of David Bowie’s passing in the early hours of this morning (11-JAN-2016) it may seem strange to find this posting on LinkedIn about what we can learn as Project Managers from someone like him. After all he was a musician, singer/songwriter therefore what parallels has he got to our profession?

As a young teenager I was enthralled by his music, he was like no other and he definitely did not conform to what society wanted. This of course was the ideal recipe for young impressionable teenagers like myself to find someone to align themselves with. As the years went by and I grew up I realised that this artist was more than just a pop idol he was the proof to Darwin’s theory of evolution, “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” In some ways we can say the same about Project Managers, after all change and their response to it is what will dictate whether they survive or fail. Projects, as we all know are filled with ambiguity, uncertainty and evolve as they progress, how we adapt to those situations is what will dictate our success rate. So with that in mind I would now like to reflect on the parallels our profession has with the enigma that was David Bowie (née Jones)... Read more

Author: Raymond Poole, Managing Director of PMIS