 Finally, I think we're gonna just go straight to it and we'll do the networking break after hopefully everyone's okay on bathrooms Okay Like to welcome a mark jayvison arthur author. Sorry author author trainer and coach He helps companies as they speed up slow down created his own approach called calm And he had this in his bio why do smart people do dumb things one of the questions He's trying to figure out in his life. So I thought I would also put that up there So mark Success as many father's favorites and often August the 31st 1997 Who can remember what they were doing on that day on that day? It was what day of the week? Sunday, yep. I know it's Sunday Because I'm at work and I've been working every Sunday for the past 30 weeks and I'm in my 30s and I am riding this wave of success and taking over challenges and all of a sudden I'm dealing with the challenge that I didn't know whether I could cope with it or not and You might remember that day because that picture there is of the car crash in Paris when Lady Diana was killed and It was four o'clock in the afternoon in New Zealand I'm in my 30s. I've got two young children. I've got a mortgage I'm working for IBM and I'm a project manager and I'm Sort of in the spot where everything so far had been going really really well for me But I'm dealing with something that was in great big trouble and I'm running a team of 83 people So I know it's not the channel tunnel, but try managing 83 people when everything's going wrong And I'm the third project manager who's been brought into this particular situation Your first project manager typically that's the salesperson and so, you know Everyone's telling this really good story about how they want things to happen and someone sort of it's pretty salesy And he shows and it's going to happen Then you get in somebody knows what they're doing and we discover that the gap between what everyone was promised To what everyone thought what happened is quite a big gap and so this person generally tries to bridge it and it's pretty hard And generally they get their marching orders as well And then you have the third project manager who's the person who actually saves the whole situation and brings it into fruition So we're working away trying to make something work now in 1997. We had the internet might surprise you That's why that lady Diana death was one of the first events that actually Caused news agents to news sources to start running news feeds on the internet And it's actually the first big story that broken BBC and it's about Lady Diana die and I'm sitting there and it's Sunday And I know I should be with my wife and my two young children because that's important But you know what I'm so stressed They really didn't care that I was there or not in fact the best thing I said is you should be in work and I'm working on a Sunday because every other day of the week Because things are in trouble. You might have been in this place yourself Everybody wants a status report and a plan Yeah So what happens is you report on the Monday Then you get all this stuff on the Tuesday and the Wednesday and then you spend Thursday and Friday Spurning it so that by the time you get to Monday again, you've got half a reasonable story So the only time you get any work done is the Sunday because the other thing that happens is If you're used to this sort of thing and you've ever tried to run a big team of people Everyone that's coming in your door all the time and you're trying to be the school manager And you know which is giving time for everybody and helping everybody, but I'll tell you it's exhausting and Privately what's happening to me is that I am so so stressed I'm just thinking I don't know if I can actually cope with that sometimes I think I'm just going to burst and I remember Problems would come up to Sunday and what I would do is I go outside and walk in the evening and I'd walk around the block 10 times Just trying to get myself into some semblance of normality tough stuff But here's the thing We got the system live We had to take the system that was failing it had to meet a particular date Meet that date because it's a new commercial product. We wanted to beat the market first into netbank and in Australasia We had to make it launch on a certain day Because that's when we booked the advertising and the marketing people were in control everyone being there marketing. That's all right We've launched this we have all these issues of an issue list of 297 we work our way through this, but we made it we made it It was my time and it was the team's tribe. It was absolutely fantastic my crowning glory I was the absolute absolute hero fantastic Except After we've been live for two months the customer through The entire suspect because it never worked to their satisfaction So all of that effort everything that they've done Actually turned out in terms of result to be a great fat zero and the way the world goes That when everything is successful, there's all these people who have contributed to it if you've ever been in project management It's a bit like being an entrepreneur except there's no upside Seriously, that's why I'm now an entrepreneur You realize that you're the person who takes all the glory and you're the person who takes all the blame And I'm looking at this and I'm thinking this is not good Tell you how bad it is, right? We had spent 17 million dollars building the system and We didn't get paid any of it Yeah, and it didn't work and Of course, we lost one of the biggest customers in the country and I'm sitting there And I did sit there. I actually Went for a little drive into the hills and I went and sat down and I'm from Auckland. This is beautiful spot I remember it still I'm sitting there and I'm looking out over the city and I'm thinking What has happened? What can I do because by every objective measure and results is what they get measured by This is a disaster. This is a small town. I've failed publicly and I'm the guy He lost 17 million dollars Now I don't know if you've been in a tough spot now for me I Felt I had let the team down I felt that I'd sold them some some falsehood That we're all worked so well to actually make this work and then in the end all of their hard work Came to nothing. I felt like I had motivated them and jeep them along for something But if I've known this was going to happen, it's almost like I wish I'd known what was going to go wrong Because I've never taken them through this so I'm feeling pretty bad my professional reputation No matter how you look at this is in great danger because New Zealand's has walked out. By the way, this is 1997 and this is not the reason why I'm in Singapore now I only came here three years ago But here's a funny thing and I think you might have experienced it yourself It was odd that I ought to feel really terrible But at that time something else happened and and I find it difficult to explain But from somewhere something inside Somehow came to the fore and this something and I can't describe it, but I knew at that time that I would be All right, and it's difficult to describe But it's something that that feeling and that impression of being in a very tough place Actually swarming through so what do we got to do? We have to do damage limitation. Yeah, absolutely now Here's the really strange thing about this whole situation after it. I got promoted Yeah, I became the expert on Project failure because the one thing that drives you isn't it when we actually something doesn't work We really really want to know what happened because we never want to go through that again So I studied it and I learned quite a few interesting things And I think the one really interesting thing and in the IT market failure is the norm Yeah, people have been studying project failure for so so long Yeah, and this is some nice small figures that I don't expect you to read But basically you have still a let's get this right 74 percent of chance of fucking up on any IT project Yeah, it will either fail. Yeah, or it will be so challenged in the average that these challenge projects is I think they go over time by 180 percent and money by 160 percent These failed investments. We're wasting money and money and money and money. So here's the first thing if you're in IT You're going to have some pretty tough times. So you better learn how to deal with it. Absolutely. Here's the other really interesting thing So I got promoted I started getting a reputation for turning around trouble projects That was my reward because I knew an awful lot about it. The last project that I worked on 50 million dollar initial estimate 250 million dollars it cost to deliver the customer was happy Yeah, this world is not what they teach you in business school, right? This sort of stuff goes on all the time and companies are really really smart They're covering these things over. So if you want to survive you want to start being a bit smart and realize the situation that you're in Now this talk would not be complete unless I actually quoted a dead white mate Leo Tolstoy is that dead and white enough for you When I start looking at why things why we fuck up all the time because it's actually it's a it's a way of life What he says is this happy families are all alike? Yeah, when things are going great Everything's going great. Yeah, I mean, there's no sense looking at it every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way Yeah, so when things start going wrong, you can look at all these multitude things of what's wrong There's tons and tons of things that are wrong. So when you start to study this and say why do things go wrong? Because this is my by the way my my key subject We discover that the reason why things go wrong is that people keep on doing really dumb things all the time And they do dumb things that are to do with people and not with technology. Yeah, it's about people Yeah, they don't talk to each other Politics egos Disputes about competencies you've all been there right everybody's sitting around and they're all arguing about It's just a good person is that a bad person's nobody's actually focusing on the job In sufficient project planning. Well, you know, it's important But tell me what sort of person if they're running a major project doesn't actually plan it all right I mean, you know dumb dumb and so I became my lifelong study not only a project failure But why do people do dumb things now firstly stuff themselves come up? We all know we've done really dumb stuff and we've had lots of people talk up and we keep on doing it So I started myself and then I started looking at other people so I Discovered a few things One is that they what they don't teach you in business school and publishing the press is that failure is a way of life Yeah, any business event any tell me anybody's had a perfect life Yeah, perfect relationships perfect children that will grow up fine your jobs being fine your careers being fine Just doesn't work. This is life, right? So we can try and aim for success, but we actually have to acknowledge that you know life's tough And so here's the rule don't make it any harder than necessary. Yeah, and ourselves, right? What happens we do some stuff that's okay. You don't need to make it any harder than necessary on yourself It's a fact of life One of my key mentors told me look here's the trick life is a contact sport Yeah, like rugby on from New Zealand. It's a contact sport. There's no way you can avoid it. You can't talk from it Here's the thing That saved me and hopefully will save you This whole thing is only personal When you make it personal Yeah, if you make it all about you then you're standing up your ego is out there for display And you're going to come a proper and this is my big lesson that I'm pleased I learned in 1997 in a painful way Yeah, if it's about you boy, are you going to be in trouble? Absolutely, if it's about ideas and doing great stuff and great concepts Everybody looks at that and they look past you I got hired again by IVM six years ago, right the same organization, which I lost all this money Because it's the way that you are Yeah, it's not actually what you do. You're always going to problems people remember the way that you deal with them Not that they were Here's my favorite smart people can do dumb things when you give them the right conditions anyone I'm sitting. This was not my own failure, right? I'm sitting there with two CEOs from leading organizations and a vice president from the US and the head of the Bank from Australia We're all in this together Yeah, doing really dumb stuff, but that's one reason why we don't talk too much about it But it's in my book so it's all right. It's out for you. You can make smart people do really dumb things What you need to do is get them really stressed. Yeah That's all you have to do. You just have to wind them up And get them really busy if you do that That's the short right our beautiful horizon our big picture just goes down and down and down and we start working away And we miss the entire picture our relationship supper. It's all bad. And here's my favorite Because I am not Tony Robbins at all. I am the anti Tony Robbins seriously Passion is not enough the world's full of passionate people the world is full of really really bad advice Yeah Was only just what passion would all be wonderfully successful Yeah, it'll be great, but it takes a lot more than passion. You got to get everything right It takes passion and it takes motivation and you got to be smart Yeah, what people are really buying from you is the fact that you're smart and you're keeping your head and Your car so here's the deal. Um, I've worked in corporate for a long time. My customs are still corporate I love it. I love the big spice papers. I love the waterfalls. I love the pot plants It's cool. That's where I live. That's okay. I like it. I still wear suits But I'm not an entrepreneur Yeah, so let's look about how this works for us in entrepreneurs, you know, here's some figures They're easy. I think you believe him, right? First time entrepreneurs here only 18% work Right, this is a fact of life. So don't do dumb stuff. Yeah mortgage your house Rune a relationship Work too hard. Hey, this is the world we're in. It's full of things that don't work Don't do really dumb stuff. Now. Here's the here's the one that I love Don't give up your day job if you've got a wife and a family Seriously, there's ways of following your passion like I do. Yeah, well still Keeping your day job. We all want to live a passionate life. I've loved talking about this. I don't do it full time That's all right. I do it enough to follow my passion and Here's the thing here's the thing Failure made me Yeah This terrible thing that happened to me when I was sitting there and I was thinking what am I going to do? something happened Something happened inside. I discovered this thing that anybody who's been in a terrible place knows the thing that comes to their rescue and I kept on looking at that thing Yeah, and I kept on looking why people did dumb things and I kept on looking at how we do smart things And I not only made a career about it I'm an entrepreneur about it and if you want to know it's all in my book. So thank you Go ahead Better late than never I'm so afraid I didn't hear me. I can say Better late than never Okay, we'll be trying. We'll be trying. Just for the sound test purpose. Another time. We'll have to shout. In these stressful situations, what do you do to stay calm all the time? Can you repeat the question Mark? Yes, you sit in these stressful situations. What did you do to stay calm all the time? Well The reason I wrote the book is that I did discover a way to be calm all the time and it's to do with mindfulness And it is about how you actually find that state. Now my first plume was when I was in a really tough time and something came to my rescue and I kept on wondering what that is and I talk about that and That is actually our natural nature And so everyone says if you want to do things to look inside to find that so while I'm working in the stressful situation No, I didn't have it. I'm doing what everyone else is doing and it's just not working But I did find a way And this is what I talk about with with clients now But it all boiled down to this really basic thing that people were getting so busy and worked up in their heads But I kept on doing dumb stuff Whereas if you can just be calm and centered inside and we call it mindfulness we call it awareness We call it balance. We call it that really nice place. We call it whatever it is peace if we can find that and actually It can be found and it's actually based on a psychological understanding and I talk more about that Significant to a particular geography like India designers or view ass or Singapore Because when you watch the movie social network Zuckerberg seems to bust out of the Facebook, you know, yeah Yeah, I haven't seen the movie Where we look at success rates, there seems to be a couple of things I'm not an expert on this But when I look at these people who we normally quote like Steve Jobs or Bill Gates or Facebook and Who who of us wouldn't actually like to in our carriage Become so rich. We don't know what to do with the money. It'd be fantastic But they seem to be outliers or it seemed to be that everything seemed to have to happen at the right time So maybe they got lucky It's difficult for me to see any other reason in terms of project failure my other pet subject There's not much difference across geographies There is a difference across size of project So if your project budget was more than 10 million dollars, you are almost certainly going to fail Yeah, the success rate is about 5% If your project is under $500,000 it's got about a 70% chance of working So, you know, one of those rules in the agile world is just make it small Yeah, like just things get really complicated people are good and talented. We all do our best But once that things start getting big then it's just really hard To make it work. So it seems to be more There's no real pattern or geographical pattern to it and even Putting a PMO in or project management expertise or the rest of that most of those factors are not to do Project management disciplines bad to do about people and their decision-making and not being clear about what they wanted or being political or Not giving it's it's human stuff seem to be the key factors not the not the practical techniques of project management No, I really really don't Sunday is my Day of rest and rejuvenation Absolutely, absolutely I want to make sure it's all sinking in so could everyone please turn in their seat to the right Everyone turns or your