Host Jeff Plumblee interviews Sameer Chopra, Director of Emerging Healthcare Opportunities at Microsoft. The conversation starts with Sameer’s novel, The Work Ahead, which portrays project management and problem-solving with a unique twist and lessons that apply in life. Sameer shares an overview of the virtual work he does with his team. He recalls his favorite project success and another successful project that was also his worst project management experience due entirely to extreme confidentiality constraints. Sameer tells why collaboration and simplicity are so essential. He also offers his counsel on disruption, failure, and documentation. Listen in for an enjoyable discussion about the ups and downs of projects.   Key Takeaways: Sameer and his team of nine help healthcare customers prepare to use emerging technologies. Sameer also has written a novel, The Work Ahead, involving a unique and complex problem. Sameer shares his views on simple, collaborative tools that improve teamwork. Kanban is one example; Teams is another. Sameer’s team works virtually using Teams. They use GitHub to present their code and Office for demos. They use Discord for user feedback, YouTube for videos, and Azure DevOps for project management. Sameer talks about optimizing processes and how you can plan for the best use of spare time. Sameer shares a story from a favorite Microsoft project for “a medical device in a month.” He shares how they delivered value on the first call with screen sharing and met every metric to deliver on time. Identifying metrics is a challenge. Know the metrics that the company/client cares about! Why was the project started? Sameer recalls a project he worked on with three stakeholders, each expecting a related but different metric. He compares it to the scenario in his novel with opposing stakeholders. Metrics are important and your stakeholders inform the tweaks you will need to make when capturing the metrics. Sameer shares his worst successful project management experience! It was a project so disruptive that, for months, its purpose was kept secret from the developers. They had no idea what was going on. Increasing collaboration helps. Decreasing collaboration hinders. Also, disruption is to be expected! Plan for it!   Brought to you by Moovila — Autonomous Project Management Website: Moovila.com/thisprojectlife Email: [email protected] Resources: Moovila.com The Work Ahead, by Sameer Chopra