Fritzerland

Sharing my excursion through life

Uncomfortable Truths for Project Managers

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Project managers are often optimistic and confident in their abilities to deliver successful projects. Armed with our methods and tools, boundless optimism, and can-do attitude, it sometimes feels like we can do anything. However, we must also acknowledge and address the potential limitations and challenges because there are quite a few. Just keep in mind these observations are mine, and there are many other examples out there. 

1. Stakeholders decide if your Project is successful or if your Project failed

No matter how well you manage your Project, ultimately, success is not down to you. It will be your stakeholders who decide whether to:

  1. Adopt the processes you build
  2. Use the systems you create
  3. Use the assets you deliver

Of all the project management processes and disciplines, stakeholder engagement is paramount. Tim Lister and Tom DeMarco said, “Risk management is how adults manage projects.” The effective management of risks is all about being proactive; you need to identify and tackle potential concerns before they become problems. I would respond, ‘ Stakeholder Engagement is how sophisticated adults manage projects.’ The only way to regain control of your outcomes from your stakeholders is to invest your time in them. Understand their perspectives and needs, and work to meet them. 

2. It’s all about communication

Poor communication is cited as the second most important factor for project failure, behind the lack of clearly defined and/or achievable milestones. And — just between us — failure to establish clearly defined and/or achievable milestones sounds like a communication problem more than anything else. So you could say that ineffective communication is the biggest contributing factor to project failure. Project management is all about communication. In itself, it this is an uncomfortable truth for me. Up to a point, I had always assumed that two things were enough to make me a good project manager:

  1. I was a cool, calm, rational and logical thinker. I could see the big picture and also drill into the detail.
  2. I was an assertive and achievement-focused professional. I knew the value of hard work and perseverance.

These two together were enough to succeed as a project manager. Well, that’s what I thought. Truth be told, they are for some projects. But as the stakes for individuals grow and the political dimension gets more important, they no longer suffice. In fact, they can be a blocker to real success. You need the willingness and talent to communicate with a wide range of stakeholders. Your job is not to be political in your approach, but you absolutely must engage with the game of project politics.

3. You will get the Project Team you deserve

Stakeholder engagement is all about communication. But my discomfort grew when I realized that so is project delivery. Because the uncomfortable truth here is that you get the team that you deserve. This isn’t to say that, if you’re a good person, the universe will reward you with a good team. And if you are bad, then the universe will punish you. If only that were true! Here’s what it means: the investment you put into developing and nurturing your team will dictate the quality of teamwork and individual commitment you will get out.

Communication Again

So, how do you invest in your team? You guessed it—communication. I only recently concluded, somewhat reluctantly, that project management is 80 percent communication. Something I have noticed in myself and in almost every project manager I have known is this: what project managers crave, above all else, is control. We are not control freaks. But our job is simple. It’s to bring control to uncertain, complex, shifting, and sometimes confusing environments. And we have designed many of our methods and tools to help us do just that.

4. The universe is not on your side

The uncomfortable truth here is that the universe doesn’t take sides. And it certainly won’t respect your plan. For many project managers, a favorite quote comes from a Prussian General. Helmuth von Moltke said: “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.” But, as the eternal optimist, I find myself more drawn to a quote from US General and President Dwight D Eisenhower: “Plans are nothing; planning is everything.” What I take from this is that we cannot control the outcomes. But we can control our preparation and readiness for the unexpected.

5. You can’t please all your stakeholders all of the time

I’ve paraphrased the classic quote that’s often attributed to Abraham Lincoln. It reflects my experience. In any complex project, you’ll have many stakeholders. You’ll have different agendas, power bases, and styles to deal with. And each will have different wants and needs from their colleagues. This is why Project scoping is the hardest part of project management. This is where you need to reconcile all the different points of view. But the uncomfortable truth is that you can rarely do so completely. No matter how hard you work and how ingeniously you negotiate, there will often be some stakeholders you leave unsatisfied with.

Projects Are Political

This takes us back to the point I made with my first uncomfortable truth. Project managers cannot avoid politics. Scoping is only partly about negotiating the best mix of functionality, specification and quality. It is largely about finding the right political compromise. This is one that respects the relative power of competing stakeholders.

6. An absentee Project Manager is a contradiction in terms

There was a time when I went from being seen as a competent project manager to being regarded as a good one. “What you do in this world is a matter of no consequence. The question is what can you make people believe you have done.” – Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet. I went to give advice and support less-experienced project managers. And at that point, my firm would sometimes ask me to visit other projects. For some reason, those were the days when things went wrong, back on my own Project.

The Monitor and Control Cycle

The more frequently you monitor what’s happening on your Project, the sooner you pick up problems. The sooner you pick them up, the smaller they are. Consequently, they are easier to resolve. And, because you are often monitoring, you can check on the effect of the intervention and tweak it quickly if you need to. But, if you fail to monitor often enough, the first you’ll sometimes learn of a problem is when it’s already big. So, you’ll need a sizeable intervention to fix it. But then, if it’s a while before you can check it, any residual issues can quickly blow up out of control. A project manager must be present to monitor and control your Project. If you are not, you aren’t managing your Project.

7. Shift happens!

I’ve already implied the universe carries no candle for your Project. Indeed, the reality is worse than that. Your Project exists within a wider context of:

  1. Shifting politics
  2. Evolving technology
  3. Unstable economics
  4. Commercial disruption
  5. Legislative and regulatory churn
  6. Threats to security

Is it any wonder that your plan is out of date on day two?

It’s what I came here for… As someone who likes predictability, that’s an uncomfortable truth. But I found that I am also someone who relishes the challenge of constant problem-solving. There’s a sense of achievement when you do something. And there’s even more when you do something against the odds. The reality is that sometimes, a little bit of scary last-minute-man-ship is exciting. And that’s what a lot of us, me included, love about projects.

8. Attention to detail makes the difference between success and failure

Project managers are mostly can-do people. So, when it comes down to the last stage of a project or sorting through the final details, we’d rather be off, starting something new and more exciting. For us, JDI (short for “Just Do It,” the Nike tagline) is one adjective short of our favorite mantra (JFDI). So, the uncomfortable truth here is that we can’t just ignore the project closure process. Or, more accurately, we mustn’t. And it hurts. Because your team will want to be off, part of your role will be to manage their exits from your Project and into new placements. You will be no less impatient than them. But the devil is in the details, to use a cliché. If you abandon your Project before it is finished, or ignore the details because they bore you, there’s a price to pay. And it will be a big one. You’ll have put in 80 percent of the effort. But your Project could be only 20 percent of the success it should have been. Attention to detail is crucial. Without it, you could turn a successful project into a sad failure. Truths don’t get more uncomfortable than that.

Bad management habits, are they any good?

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Being a (project) manager requires you to be a master of all trades. You need to have a handle on accountancy while being an expert strategist, motivating a team, and managing the time of many people. No one says it is easy, and managers often fall into bad habits. Self-knowledge is critical to taking control. Find out how to set yourself apart from the (project) managers your boss considers the worst performer on the team: don’t let that be you! I found a great video from Jennifer Bridges PMP, CHPC, founder of PDUs2Go.com and director of ProjectManager.com. You can have a look at the video right here. 

Nobody’s perfect. But imperfection is not the same as perpetuating bad habits or behaviors. Here is a list of eleven bad habits Jennifer identified which make a “worst” (project) manager:

  1. Playing favorites
  2. Allowing favors
  3. Becoming the bottleneck
  4. Demeaning your team
  5. Micromanaging experienced people
  6. Ignoring the team
  7. Pleasing everyone
  8. Avoiding conflict
  9. Selling out the team
  10. Circumventing process
  11. Eliminating tracking

Many people find themselves running projects and leading teams without formal training. There are also plenty of people who are highly certified and experienced project managers who perfectly embody the “worst” in (project) management. I handpicked one of my favorites.

Micromanager

What is a micromanager, and why do people micromanage? Micromanagement is one of the worst, most damaging, and morale-sapping ways of managing people. This sinister way of managing employees can infiltrate any workplace or organizational culture. It can seriously affect productivity and employee retention and, ultimately, damage people’s health. A project manager’s job is to provide guidance and support. Their role is to facilitate a healthy environment where employees can perform at their best – reaching their potential by having true autonomy and building their confidence. Unfortunately, micromanagers achieve precisely the opposite.

People Pleaser 

When you look around you can divide managers into several categories. You find some who truly adhere to the definition of leaders, have the vision for the team, are business people, with clear understanding of what needs to be done and doing it even when it is unpopular. Then you have those who abuse the management position, the jerks, who go after their personal goals regardless the costs. Finally, you have the people pleasers. Managers and leaders who subscribe to the notion that their main task is to make their teams happy because that will produce results, and make the manager popular.

Happy people are productive people. That is probably true. Various studies has shown that happy people are more likely to be more productive than unhappy people. However, happiness is one of many paths to strong company culture and high-performing teams. There are better ways to achieve great results than focusing on keeping people happy. Happy people won’t leave. That is to some extent also true. Until the moment they stop being happy. The problem is with keeping people in the company by trying to make them happy with various perks, fancy office space, or not telling them the hard truth. This approach leads to creating a culture of entitlement. You are building no resiliency. The moment business doesn’t go as planned, and you need to do something that will make people unhappy, you are done. These things are complicated even in cultures with resilient people and will destroy the team’s productivity and atmosphere in a culture of entitlement for months or even years to come.

Conflict Avoider

Managers must respond to the conflicts that arise within their sphere of influence. Yet, some avoid conflict at all costs. There are numerous reasons for this, such as:

  1. Lack of confidence and skill in addressing conflict.
  2. Being an absent or laissez-faire manager leaves team members to fend for themselves.
  3. Wanting to be a “people pleaser” or perceived as “nice,” or similar need for acceptance.
  4. Fear and anxiety about confronting conflict.

Naturally, there are costs to the organization for unattended conflicts, such as loss of productivity, strained communication, and turnover as the “best and brightest” leave. That should motivate any manager, but the personal and intangible consequences should also give leaders pause. When managers stand by the wayside and leave employees to their own devices to address unproductive conflict, employees lose respect, and the leader’s reputation, credibility, and relationship capital diminishes. Good judgment and appropriate action to intervene when warranted are hallmarks of effective managers. 

Favoritism 

Favoritism in the workplace is exactly what it sounds like favoring someone not because they are doing a great job but for reasons outside of the job performance. For instance, a manager consistently offers an employee the best and most highly-regarded projects, even though that employee does not perform well enough to deserve them. An employee may be offered a promotion over someone who has been at the company longer and has more experience. Often, favoritism occurs when a manager and an employee have developed a friendship beyond the workplace.

Being the bottleneck

The term bottleneck refers to the narrow opening at the top of a bottle. It is the part that lets the liquid out and controls the flow rate when you pour from the bottle because it’s the tiniest opening. If we think of this in terms of leadership, it’s different. We are limiting the flow to or from our team. If a leader is being a bottleneck, they usually limit productivity or communication and slow things down. A few issues can arise when a leader becomes a bottleneck for the team. Firstly, the leader may limit the productivity of the team. This could happen when a leader wants to review everything the team produces before releasing it into the organization. Being a bottleneck can also cause issues by limiting the team’s communication with the outside world. For example, the leader may choose to be the only person who speaks to senior executives or other important stakeholders instead of allowing team members to communicate with them directly. Bottlenecking can occur in decision-making too. When a leader decides that they need to be involved in every team decision, this limits team members’ potential. When all decisions need to be made by a single person, team members might need to wait for sign-off before making any progress.

Inexperience causes many young managers to exhibit weak manager skills. However, managers of any age are prone to personality flaws and bad habits. Plus, bosses are human, and humans have bad days. However, when the bad days outweigh the good, chances are that the manager is not a good boss. The good news is that self-improvement is possible and almost all flaws are fixable. With self-awareness and hard work, bad bosses can become better. The only truly bad boss is one who is unwilling to change.

Deadly Sins of Project Management. Well at least my favorites!

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We all make mistakes. Project managers are certainly no exception – though, as a profession, we tend to be placed under much scrutiny at times. Therefore those mistakes may become big news and can be, depending on the mistake, quite damaging and costly to the projects we are running. In the world of project management, so many things need to be done; when they aren’t done, they can damage our project engagements. Or things that we do or actions that we actually do take, that can really mess things up, too. Sometimes we dip into our past or into our professional past, where we witnessed someone else’s project go south to gain this type of insight. Either way, it makes an impression, likely because of the chaos and destruction it caused on our projects.

I have worked with, for, and hired many project managers throughout my career. Along the way, I have noticed that many challenges PMs face are shared across the industry, vertical, professional services, and in-house PMO organizations. A project manager is supposed to be a leader, a facilitator, an advisor, and an advocate, not only for the project but also for the team, the business, and the cause. However, clients and stakeholders see project managers as utility people rather than leaders. This led me to wonder how we got into this situation in the first place.

On Time, On Budget, and On Scope

I interview a lot of people for project management positions, and one question I always ask is: “How do you define project success?” Eight times out of ten I get “on time, on budget, and on scope.” This is a canned answer that in the heads of most project managers who have gone through PMI or any othwer Project Managemnt certification. I would argue that it is not about on time, on budget and on scope. It is about managing expectations, delivering on business outcomes, and ensuring both client and team satisfaction. The reality is that things change. Very rarely is anything delivered on time, on budget and on scope. The business climate changes, the details are revealed, complexity increases, priorities shift and new stakeholders are introduced (to name a few). A great project manager understands the business objectives and drives the project to deliver on those objectives, all the while proactively anticipating needs, managing expectations, facilitating engagement, and fostering satisfaction. It is about driving results and making people feel good about the results.

The Journalist

I recently read a book that portrayed project managers as Journalists. Journalists are people who detach the goal of accurate reporting from the goal of project success. We all know these project managers. They are so focused on accurately reporting the news (the report’s detail, the report’s cadence, the report, the color of the report) that they completely lose sight of the why, why are we doing this project, and how success is defined. Project Managers know that they have to understand their projects’ true state and report accurately on them. Sometimes, however, they lose sight of the reason for all this attention to detail: making sure the project achieves its objectives. They adopt, as their goal, the accurate portrayal of the state of the project at all times. They become, in effect, journalists. Like film critics, project journalists believe — if only subconsciously — that they can succeed even if their project fails. Great project managers don’t just report on the news, they drive the news. They drive the direction of the project toward a successful outcome. They are active participants in the process and not innocent bystanders. Next time you write a status report, make sure you are reporting the news and taking an active role in making the news. Be a leader who helps solve tomorrow’s problems, versus just reporting on yesterday’s problems, and take accountability for outcomes.

Say No

No one likes to be told no. Project managers have a tough job; sometimes, a “no” answer is the most reasonable response. After all, they are stewards of budget, time, scope, quality, and experiences for their clients (or internal stakeholders) and their teams. They constantly toe the line, managing expectations and trying to make everyone happy. So when life happens — there are hiccups on a project, changes are made, new stakeholders become involved, etc. — the “no” answer that was once expedient becomes a killing word in a world that is always in flux. The dialogue ends, collaboration falters, and innovation is stifled. Instead of managing expectations by saying “no,” think about using the “yes, and…” principle. For example, a stakeholder says, “I’ve done some research, and I would like to add a new module to the system.” The answer should be, “Yes, I understand how that can help you achieve your business outcomes sooner… and we may be able to de-scope some additional functionality that may not have as much impact on your goals. As a result, we would need to increase the budget by only 100K,” versus the normal freak out: “What? Do you want to add scope? No, we can’t do that. It will make us go over budget, impact our timelines and introduce an additional scope.” The idea is to get people to collaborate and understand that any idea brought to the table can be accepted, added upon, and made better. “No” shuts people down; “Yes, and…” gets people to collaborate and build upon an idea, suggestion, or request to improve it.

Flying High

Effective project managers cannot get stuck in orbit, hovering over the project like an observer and a reporter. When they do, they never truly understand the drivers behind a project and never truly understand the intricacies. I always say the devil is in the details, and project managers who don’t dive in and get their hands dirty shouldn’t be surprised when things go haywire. An effective project manager has to be able to go micro and then elevate to macro. You have to understand the ins and outs of the project, however, you can’t get stuck there. You also have to be able to elevate yourself above the project, staying ahead of your team, anticipating your client’s or stakeholder’s needs and addressing them proactively, versus reactively. You have to keep the team connected to business outcomes and drive decision-making to align and support those outcomes. When you “fly high” and are not really connected to outcomes and don’t understand the details, your team doesn’t need you and your client doesn’t need you either. You become an administrative artifact, just reporting the news (as mentioned above). Get connected. Get engaged. Submerse yourself. Elevate yourself. Don’t get tangled in the web of details, but don’t skip out of orbit either. It is a careful balance and one that is mastered through artistry and experience, not science.

Make it big: The Problem

Your team is miserable. You are up against tight timelines. Your client or stakeholders have unrealistic expectations. Everyone is complaining, including you. You are not doing anyone any favors, but rather you are contributing to the misery. As a project manager, you are seen as a leader (whether you are one or not), and you are held to those expectations. Leaders do not sit on problems; they are problem solvers. They help contribute to the solution. You may listen, you may sympathize, and you want to develop empathy for your team, but at some point you have shift your team away from problems and toward a solution. You are empowered and should have the skills of influence and persuasion to help shift your team’s thinking and mindset. Next time your team is sitting around and complaining, elevate yourself and drive them to take accountability of the situation. Ask your team, “What is one small step we can take to change the current situation?” When all is said and done, perhaps the problem lies in the title. Perhaps “manager” is the wrong word. After all, “manager” has had centuries of connotative and pejorative meaning attached to it. Could it be that simply changing the title could change the way others perceive the position? Advisor maybe? Facilitator? These things might be a start, but I think the most effective and immediate answer is for project managers to change the way they think of themselves and start to change their behaviors. They should cultivate the habits, attitudes, mannerisms and leadership qualities that will make them valuable assets to the team and not mere artifacts.

The secretary

I once had a project manager on my team complain to me about how business stakeholders only saw him as a note taker, and treated him as an administrator. My advice to him was to stop taking notes. His eyes widened, and he looked at me in shock. I imagine this reaction was because he’d been taught throughout his career that one of the major responsibilities of a project manager is to take notes, capture decisions and document, document, document. I don’t disagree that creating alignment and visibility to decisions is critical, but in today’s world there are better mechanisms for capturing this information than to waste the time of a highly paid project manager taking notes. Rather, I always give my project managers this simple advice: do things that empower you; do not do the things that relegate you. When you are taking notes in a meeting, you are not actively engaged in discussion nor are you actively listening. You are not seen as a leader, you are not offering insights and opinions, and you are not being strategic. You are being tactical and administrative. Project managers need to elevate their game and start driving value for their customers, whether internal or external. Think about your clients, stakeholders and users, and make them the center of your story. Do they get value from your notes, or are your notes only valuable to you ? Your value stems from your voice, your experience, your ideas, your planning, and your ability to lead a team. That is what drives value, not taking notes.

The Daily Stand-up: it’s time to ditch it 

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The daily stand-up has been the talk of the town in recent years. Seeing the buzz around it, you might have the fomo (fear of missing out) feeling if you haven’t heard about it before. Words of wisdom: Daily stand-up meetings might be the quickest way to waste your time as a leader. Here’s why this meeting doesn’t work and what to do instead.

Why a daily stand-up meeting doesn’t work

The original intention behind a daily stand-up meeting is exceptionally sound. Popularized by the Agile methodology of project management, daily stand-up meetings are meant to share progress and identify any blockers the team is facing. For the few teams who strictly adhere to only sharing status updates and blockers, a daily stand-up can serve them well. However, it’s a different story for most of us in practice. We get overly excited and cram other intentions into our daily stand-ups: We want them to be an energizing morale booster for the team, a time to reflect on what went well, an opportunity for team members who don’t regularly talk to each other to feel connected…. No wonder daily stand-up meetings start to run over, with folks rambling and people disengaging. The best meetings focus on sharing information, making decisions, or building rapport. Try to do all three simultaneously, and you end up having too many oars, and rowing in too many directions. A bloated, ineffective meeting manifests.

20 hours down the drain per week

Say you can miraculously, consistently hold 10 – 15 minute daily stand-up meetings with your team. “Great!” you think to yourself. “That doesn’t feel like a lot of time.” Is the cost of the interruption worth it? A study by the University of California, Irvine, found that it takes an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back on track after being interrupted. This means the time a team member needs to recoup from the daily stand-up is longer than the daily stand-up meeting itself. That’s an irreversible 25 minutes taken away from every single one of your team members every week. So if you have 10 team members, that’s 20 hours poured down the drain.

Lack of recorded history

Someone calls in sick and can’t make the daily stand-up meeting. A remote employee can’t participate in the daily stand-up because it’s 1 AM their local time when it’s 9 AM for the rest of the team. How do you ensure everyone is on the same page, especially as your team grows and becomes more spread out? With daily stand-up meetings being in-person or over Teams, you need a shared recorded history of progress. This particularly becomes apparent when someone new joins the team. You’d love to be able to share the week-to-week progress the team has made to give them full context on a project… But with daily stand-up meetings, that history is scattered in a series of random notes at best and doesn’t provide the new hire a complete picture.

So what to do instead?

Automate status updates with a tool

Status updates are critical to ensuring everyone on the team is on the same page. But they don’t need to happen during an in-person daily stand-up meeting. (Remember the 20 hours down the drain!) Instead, you can ask folks to take 30 seconds to write a few bullet points on what they worked on yesterday, what they plan to work on today, and any blockers they have. They can answer on their own time when it makes sense for them – and it doesn’t interrupt their workflow. You can use MS Teams, Slack, and Sharepoint; the automated status update is easy to organize.

Use a monthly all-hands or weekly staff meeting to focus on other functions

You’ve likely realized that, although well-intended, you have too many varying purposes for your original daily stand-up meeting (e.g., you wanted to align the team around a vision and help build rapport in the team). Decide what specific functions are most important in your team to foster, and then devote other meetings, processes, or tools to fulfilling these functions. For example, here are functions you could incorporate into a monthly all-hands meeting or weekly staff meeting…

  • Reflection: Use a weekly staff meeting to encourage shared reflection about what could be better. For example, you could pose the question, “Knowing what we know now, what would you change about how we approached this project?”
  • Recognition: Take time during a monthly all-hands meeting to highlight positive progress that’s been made. You could ask, for instance, “What’s something you’ve been surprised or encouraged to see us accomplish?” or “When is a moment you’ve felt proud of working on this project, and why?”
  • Connection: Carve out some time during the all-hands or staff meeting to enable people to connect with what they enjoy most about working on the team. You could ask fun, non-work related questions like, “What’s the thing you bought with your own money?” or “Who’s the most famous person you’ve met?”
  • Vision: Use an all-hands meeting to align folks in your team around the vision and how each team member contributes to that vision. For example, you could ask your team: “If someone were to ask you what our company’s vision is, would a clear answer come to mind? How do you feel your work is contributing to that vision?”

Naturally, there is no one right way to share progress in your team – and you’ll know best what will work for your team. But least of all, I hope you don’t continue with daily stand-up meetings merely because you’re “already doing it.” The best process results from what is deliberate and thoughtful – not what is convenient and familiar. Daily stand-up meetings are an antiquated relic. It’s time to sunset them.