Being a project manager of
anything of significant scale and importance could be one of the most
challenging things you
ever do in your career - It could also be one of the most rewarding. Projects can be very challenging and
the role of the project manager is crucial. An effective project manager can make all the difference.
The following is drawn from decades of experience of working within and
managing projects – if you are an experienced project manager already, ask
yourself “‘how often do we really do this (well)?”:
Terms of reference (ToR): for the Project Manager and the team
The first thing to make crystal clear is the ToR for the project manager
and the team – if you ask more than one person in any business what the
job (responsibility) of a project manager is you’ll get significant differences
in their answers
– so, one of the first things to do is to make this clear – especially,
making it clear to people like the project sponsor. Also, it needs to be
stated in clear and meaningful terms that relate to your business (not
just “deliver project on time, to budget etc”). New project managers
sometimes get to fully understand their responsibilities gradually – if
this is allowed to happen it can cause big issues.
The same principle applies even more to the team – as team members are appointed (or
even if they have been already) one of the most valuable things you will
ever do is to define each core team member's responsibilities (not just
their role). Again, this means in clear terms. You should pay particular
attention to their role in defining key project inputs or reviewing project outputs,
specifications, documents, deliverables, or anything else. You should try
as far as possible to get what we call input oriented comments, rather
than comments after a development activity.
The most important stage in every project is
the first major phase of the project.
Whether it’s called definition,
initiation, PID (project initiation document), business case or whatever,
all the important decisions regarding the project happen in these early
stages. It is also the point where we have maximum opportunity to
influence any aspect of the project and we sow the seeds of success or
something far less attractive.
One of the biggest challenges and most important tasks the project manager
will ever do is to get all stakeholder groups to engage in key activities
effectively during this stage – any project that is struggling to achieve
this should consider very seriously whether the project can proceed to the
next stages, if
this issue cannot be resolved.
And this is a massive point - rushing through or
skimping the crucial activities of communicating and agreeing
unambiguously what the objectives / outcomes/ key requirements / expectations etc
are for a project will not save time or effort - but it will
without doubt
significantly raise the probability of disappointments and rework downstream. Neither should it ever be looked upon as a weakness
- (i.e." if I have to ask a question I may appear not to know/ understand
the answer").
Managing stakeholders: where necessary bring challenging discussions
to the front-end of the project
Another key task in the definition stage is to identify and manage stakeholders. Once you know who
they are, this will involve engaging with stakeholders, particularly over
the objectives of the project. You should expect that there will be
different and even conflicting expectations and needs among the
stakeholders. The time to understand and formally recognise this is at the
start, as part of project initiation and definition. This is one of the
main tasks that the project manager must manage, and ensure
that where issues or conflicts have arisen, that these are being
addressed, formally.
Goals and Objectives:
Defining goals and objectives: there’s a lot written quite rightly about
deliverables on projects, and this is entirely correct in many ways.
However, much less is written about defining, categorically clearly, the
goal, objectives and expected outcomes of a project. This is without doubt
the most important task on any project, especially on internal business
projects, where too often it is assumed that they are clear (when in fact
this is far from true). Once again,
without testing this formally at the start of a project, damaging
assumptions, which have not been shared (tested) across all stakeholders
groups are very likely to prevail - potentially catastrophic in itself.
It is also crucially important to communicate the target objectives and
outcomes very clearly to all core project team members – especially those who
are responsible for defining and designing the project solution.
Project Delivery Strategy – develop ownership through understanding
Firstly, this is not the solution or the project deliverable (or end
product). It’s how these things are going to be defined and delivered. The
project strategy should contain: goal; objectives; outcomes; key
responsibilities; key project targets; key strategic decisions; key
project assumptions and risk mitigation strategies.
The project strategy should be captured in a format that can used easily
as a mechanism to communicate to anyone: what the project is about; and
how it is going to be delivered.
Risk and assumptions
There are numerous clichés surrounding projects and risk - many of which
are 100% true. All project carry uncertainty and hence risk. Every
project on the globe faces risks and assumptions - for example, dependencies can be big drivers of risk.
Good project managers will always look for these in all early
conversations about the project. Understanding the key dependencies and
risks is crucial to being able to develop a project delivery strategy that
stands a good chance of being successful. Recording and sharing the key
assumptions, risks and dependencies within the definition phase of the
project is a hugely valuable exercise, followed by effective mitigation of
significant risks. The project manager should be very
much in the middle of this activity and preferably never delegate this task
to someone else.
Ensuring effective management of risk on a project is
one of the most productive things any project manager can do. Again,
this must be done in the definition stages of the project - we can't
define, plan and launch a project and then start to give serious attention
to risk - it must be considered as an integral part of the project and
most especially at every key point of commitment in the project lifecycle
- the project manager must make sure that this is done.
Otherwise, they may come home to haunt you later.
The unlimited power of assumptions
There are numerous proverbs relating to project management and many relate to
the incidence and power of assumptions. They happen all the
time. Consider this simple example: 2 managers are talking about a project; one says “I
thought that project X was intended to solve this issue” – the other
replies “no, afraid not” - classic conversation relating to projects that
you hear all the time. The room for assumptions relating to projects is
immense, especially among the project team members and stakeholders, because projects are new or are changing something. This
principle becomes extended in practice, and can relate to any aspect of
the project, being: the objectives; outcomes; solution;
benefits;
deliverables; especially the responsibilities; resources, and any other
aspect of the project you care to imagine.
The trick of course is to recognise (capture) key assumptions, analyse
them and decide which ones you need to deal with or test. If you cannot
deal with them at the time, they become risks to your project - at the
very least, they are primary inputs to the risk management process on your
project.
Note: we have witnessed many instances on projects when one significant assumption,
which
could have been shared with stakeholders and was not, and has
subsequently damaged a project
severely. Be aware of major assumptions and share
them with the appropriate parties professionally and as early as possible.
Develop a plan that people can understand:
Much has been written over the years on subjects such as critical path and
scheduling. These are key skills and processes in project planning,
however, the world of projects has sometimes confused the world of tools
with the job of management. A great deal of the responsibility of
management requires and relies upon effective communication.
Part of the responsibility of project managers is to ensure that all core
team members understand and are very aware of the ‘plan’ for the project.
It would be fundamentally useful if in doing this, we
also develop commitment or ownership towards the targets within that plan.
Every project should have a means of communicating, graphically
preferably, what the key targets are, and relate the major
responsibilities and actions that are required to achieve the plan.
Detailed Gantt charts cannot achieve this aim and were never really
intended to – summary Gantt charts perhaps, or perhaps even better, a
series of major and minor milestones that connect the whole wok of the
project, which the project manger could talk through regularly with the
team.
The target should be to capture and communicate the big picture of the
project on one page (it may be a big one), for the purpose of face-to-face
communication.
Communication and key project events:
It is often said that communication is the lifeblood of projects. Communication is also, however, one of the biggest challenges
on projects.
One key area that project managers should consider is the degree of
face-to-face communication that is employed, versus other more passive
forms of communication (e.g. email, video conferencing and other written forms). Relying mainly on passive forms of communication, where
face-to-face is limited, is one of the biggest risks you can have on
projects – over reliance is highly likely to cause delay, re-work,
issues, and stifle the ability of a group of people to get to the point
where they operate as a “team”.
The project manager should ensure that all parties are working effectively
by formalising ‘ways of working’ on a project. Ways of working can
cover a multitude of areas, driven by the circumstances of your project.
Ways of working should always cover areas like communication, defining
principles are practices for effective communication and teamworking.
Be on the look out constantly for scope creep:
Through the whole life of the project, unofficial scope creep is one of
the most common challenges that projects face. It comes in a number of
forms: take a good idea and many people will try and add to it all
the ideas they've had waiting in the wings, many of which will
bear no relation to the strategic objectives of the project. Also,
requirements gathering phases need to be managed with great discipline, to
ensure that again, only requirements that support the project's
strategic objectives are signed off in the projects baseline requirements.
Exactly the same principle applies to the design and definition of the
project 'solution'. In this area, the project manager will have to
work very closely with others to achieve this.
Know exactly where you are relative to the project plan
throughout the project
This requires that there is regular effective
communication between all stakeholders groups - choose the most
simple but effective means of doing this - don't call meetings just to
understand status - call meetings that decide how to go forward,
agreeing responsibilities for actions that support the aims of the
project plan.
To do this, all meetings must be held with a clear
understanding of: current plan and status; (significant) issues;
changes in key risks status; and most important of all clarity around
responsibilities for key activities and actions in the coming periods.
Issue resolution process:
On bigger projects especially, this could easily save your bacon
downstream. Decision making on projects can often be one of your biggest
challenges – if you’re not in front of the curve on this one you could be
swamped very quickly during the delivery phase. One of the biggest factors
in being able to maintain a project’s schedule is the ability to resolve
issues – much of which of course is dependent upon decisions.
An issue/ decision management process should address who has a stake in key
decisions and who has the final say over the same. That way, when it
becomes necessary to escalate or resolve an issue, you have the framework
ready to do so. The aim must be to resolve issues effectively and as
quickly as you can.
If you have committees involved in these decisions, get to know how
they operate, the key players, and make it as clear as you can to them
what you require (timescale wise) relating to all key decisions. It
would often be prudent to manage this aspect via the risk management
process.
As with conflicts, it is the project manager’s responsibility to ensure
that all significant issues are being managed in line with the needs of
the targets and requirements in the project plan.
Managing conflicts:
There will be conflicts on almost every project. Often those conflicts will involve
stakeholders – it’s the project manager’s responsibility to ensure that
these are: out in the open; understood; clarified; and are being managed.
In a sense, he or she must cut through the politics and get the best
solution for the owner of the project. Clearly, this can be a very
challenging time, and clearly the project manager may not be able to deal
with these issues on their own – but the project manager must ensure
they are formally recognised and are being managed.
This is where value and function of the project sponsor must come into
play. You may need to work with the project sponsor, and perhaps other
senior people in the business, with and or through the project sponsor, to
highlight these issues and propose the mechanism for their resolution. In
this event, the project manager must highlight to all involved what’s
required to maintain the project schedule.
For more information on PM and how it is applied.
