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aponwao ideas

VISION: Sight. Discernment.

A tranquil lake bordered by dense evergreen forested hills under a clear blue sky, with a weathered wooden log barrier extending from the foreground into the water and a small orange buoy floating in the lake.

Lizzie Lee October 20, 2026 “They consider me to have sharp and penetrating vision because I see them through the mesh of a sieve.”—Khalil Gibran ——————— THE POWER OF SEEING     According to Merriam and Webster, vision is “the act or power of seeing : SIGHT.” It is also “unusual discernment or foresight.”   […]

Where the Bullet Train Is Taking Us

Shinkansen bullet train at Tokyo Station platform in Japan; sleek silver train with a red lower stripe and blue undercarriage, with passengers and vending machines visible in the background.

Lizzie Lee September 21, 2026 “…the essence of being human. It speaks of the fact that my humanity is caught up and is inextricably bound up in yours. I am human because I belong to the whole, to the community…” Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Prize A Play on My Brain Stage When I want to […]

The Strategy is in the Room: Planning Projects on Human Connection

Smiling woman wearing sunglasses, a gray scarf, and a light jacket stands by the East River with the New York City skyline and the Queensboro Bridge in the background.

  “We build too many walls and not enough bridges.” — Isaac Newton An algorithm looks at a project and sees a set of data points to be optimized; we look at a project and see the complex human dynamics required to make it work. While AI can process information, it cannot capture the implicit lessons […]

Operating at the Limits: Deconstructing the “Reckless” Illusion

A climber, Alex Honnold, in a red shirt ascends a steep, textured cliff face surrounded by lush green forest. The image captures a sense of daring, risk, and adventure.

“There is no adrenaline rush. If I get an adrenaline rush, it means that something has gone horribly wrong.” —Alex Honnold Most people look at a sheer rock face and see an impossible hazard; Alex Honnold looks at it and sees a problem to be solved   A View of the Possible Since I was […]

Behind the Scenes: A Tale of Two Cities

A waterway scene showing Seattle skyline with skyscrapers under a clear blue sky on the left, and colorful, narrow canal houses in Amsterdam reflected in calm water on the right.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness…” —C. Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities Seattle & Amsterdam in Sync! For Aponwao, this feels uncannily familiar, not in revolutionary France, but in the conditions under which work succeeds or […]

Planning the Future: How Young Students Are Applying Project Management to City Design

City of Wenatchi diorama on a bright yellow display featuring a grid of tiny painted buildings connected by sticks, green hills and brown mountains capped with snow rising in the background. A blue river, representing the Columbia River, along the front, and a tall blue building on the right, with a round Wenatchi logo showing mountains and a sun in the center.

“Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.“ A. Einstein  City of Wenatchi Project On behalf of the Project Management Institute Educational Foundation (PMIEF), I had the pleasure of serving as judge for the Washington State region of Future City 2025–2026, the ultimate Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics […]

Finding the Path: How Strategy Becomes Impact

Aponwao Ideas founders Lizzie and Alejandra walking side by side through the woods

THE PATH FOR STRATEGIC PLANNING Like walking together through a dense forest, strategic initiatives require attention, collaboration, and adaptability, navigating complexity, assessing risks, uncovering opportunities, and moving towards a shared destination. Strategic planning is often seen as setting long-term goals, prioritizing actions, and creating a roadmap to guide decisions and allocate resources, but it can […]

Thinking Under Pressure

Airplane flying over Mount Shasta, California

Our most valuable approaches when thinking strategically under pressure are a systems-thinking lens and a deliberate, disciplined practice of critical thinking. They enable us to ascend to 35,000 feet, filtering out distractions, to pinpoint ground-level issues. Amid pressure, it’s vital to step back, assess, and dissect the situation, fostering calmness to devise optimal solutions. Chaos, […]

40 Years In: Project Management Fundamentals

Vintage photo of a woman in a white blouse, standing indoors, holding a folder with her right hand, her left hand on a doorknob. The door is decorated with a Santa Claus drawing, 1980s holiday setting.

My PM Beginnings: A Foundation Built To Last Just two years out of college I was fortunate to land a job in Marshall y Asociados (MYA), a new company, uniquely specialized in Project Management.  I started as a scheduler when MYA was only a year old. My first project? “El Menito”, the development of a […]

Managing the Digital Closet of Communication Chaos

Scattered documentation within a Cloud

Are your project documents scattered across platforms? Is your inbox overflowing? Ever felt overwhelmed by this mess? Managing digital communication can feel like taming chaos. In this post, we will share how disorganization affects communication, document accessibility, and time management efficiency, leading to a lack of alignment among team members. We will also share our […]