Learning Solutions for Increased Project Performance

Welcome to Our May Issue

Our focus this month is on Project Teams. Project managers often do not have the luxury of time to work their project teams through the normal stages of team development. The added stress of the project environment, with its deadlines and constraints, makes it even more of a challenge.  Effective tools and processes can help, but a perceptive, intuitive project manager will be the key to building a high performing project team.

Included in this issue:

• Creating Your Core Project Team
• Project Management Q&A
• Mentoring Junior Team Members
• Building a Self-Sustaining Team Environment
• Keep an Eye Out for Project De-Motivators
• Managing an Established Team
• Do You Know Who’s Responsible?
• Reading Room: Teams & Team Building
• Developing Team Norms
• Making the Most of Talent

Next Month’s Topic: Project Scheduling

Early Alert: Sign up today for our free, 1-hour webinar: Best Practices in Scheduling Using Microsoft Project, June 22, 1-2pm Eastern

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pmPractitioner is published as a service to the project management community. Each issue provides practical project management solutions and tips adapted from a variety of business publications and resources.

Creating Your Core Project Team

A typical core team for a project consists of about 4-7 individuals and is often composed of the project leader/manager, subject matter experts, quality consultant, and facilitator.

The team is created in the early planning stage and full-time commitment from its members is often required during planning, design and implementation of the project. The team stays together through project completion, meeting at regularly scheduled times to discuss issues and review progress.

There’s a lot for a project manager to think about in creating the right core team for a project. Draw up a “core team checklist” to help guide you as you put together your group and ensure that you’ve thought about everything you need for a successful team.

Sample Core Team Checklist

• Have I considered the ideal size for my team?
• Have I considered all the subject matter expertise and skills I need on my team?
• Have I considered my own strengths and development needs in defining what skills are needed to ensure a strong project management structure?
• Have I considered a Quality consultant for my team?
• Have I identified organizations/other sources to obtain the right team members?
• Do I have an alternative plan for resourcing my team if I cannot get the “ideal” members?
• Do I have a plan to negotiate with functional managers for my team members?
• Have I estimated the time commitments I expect from team members?
• Have I considered the physical locations of my team members?
• Does my team appropriately represent the diversity of knowledge, skills and cultures that are most relevant to project success?
• Do I need to consider specialized training for any of my team members?

Adapted from Creating Collaborative Project Relationships, Action for Results, Inc., 2003

May Project Management Q&A

Test your project management knowledge with these questions or use them as an exercise to help prepare for your PMP certification exam.

1. Two members of your team, one from engineering and one from marketing, have been in conflict almost since the first day of your project. While the conflict has not been disruptive thus far, lately it has escalated. You have not spoken to either of them about it yet.

As early as is feasible, your best approach is:

2. Which of the following provides a documented basis for making project decisions and for confirming or developing a common understanding of project scope among stakeholders? 

Answers appear at the end of the newsletter.

Mentoring Junior Team Members

In any project team, there’s always the possibility that one or more members are more “junior” than the rest. The project may be the chance they need to further develop and build their skills. How well the skills are built, though, is very dependent on the quality of supervision that they receive during the course of the project.

Even though there may be no formal expectation for the project leader (or senior team members) to provide mentoring, it is reasonable that junior people are entitled to the following:

• When tasks are assigned to them, they understand thoroughly what is expected of them.
• They understand how their work fits into the overall objectives and goals of the project.
• Help is available when they have questions.
• They receive prompt feedback, good or bad, in a constructive manner.
• They are kept informed of decisions that affect their job.
• They have the freedom to make the necessary decisions to do their work properly.
• They are actively encouraged to volunteer new ideas and make suggestions for improvement.

It is good team practice to establish a system where each junior member has a mentor to call on when needed. Some senior members may balk at the extra time this may take. However, have them think back to how they wish they were treated during their inexperienced days!

Adapted from First Among Equals, Patrick J.McKenna and David H. Maister, Free Press, 2005

Building a Self-Sustaining Team Environment

Project team members very often work independently of each other, focusing on their piece of the project, and coming together periodically to discuss and review overall progress. Therefore, it is important to create an environment that helps the team to be self-sustaining, as well as self-motivating.

Here are some actions you can take to build the right environment for a motivated, independent team:

• Clarify expectations with your team members’ functional managers.
• Involve your team members in the planning activities as a group (develop a truly integrated project plan).
• Support collaborative goal setting and the definition of objective metrics.
• Help team members see how they individually contribute to the project’s success and how their decisions and actions impact others.
• Have your team members to do periodic one-on-one check-ins with you: Do the project goals and timeframes make sense and are they within reach based on the available resources? If not, what can you do to make them more realistic?
• Remember that formal communications practices are not all that counts. For a team to be effective there needs to be an ability to have ad-hoc, or informal, discussions on key topics, and educating each other.
• Provide the right support so that even a “stretch” challenge can be achieved (engage your sponsor in ensuring support as needed).
• Allow mistakes and tolerate failure as part of the process.
• Show your appreciation and recognition often.

Adapted from Strategic Project Leadership, Action for Results, Inc., 2004

Keep an Eye Out for Project De-Motivators

Projects can come off track when the project environment does not support high performance. Project managers must keep a watchful eye out for things that can create discord for a project team and take active steps to correct them.

Some of the more common project demotivators include:

• Unclear expectations and goals
• Poorly designed work and processes
• Lack of follow-up and follow through
• Inefficient meetings
• Competition between team members for attention or resources

Project demotivators also come in human form. Perhaps there is a team member who is consistently missing deadlines, skipping meetings, ignoring status requests and otherwise not contributing towards project success.

You may hear these phrases quite a bit:

“Something else came up.”
“I’ll get back to you.”
“I haven’t forgotten about it, but . . .”
“I haven’t gotten around to that.”
“There’s not much I can do about it.”

Here are some techniques you can use to get the person back on track:

• Document key agreements (via a short e-mail).
• Ensure status reports are received (tie them into performance metrics, if necessary).
• If you know that there is a historical problem with a team member, build in additional “check-ins.”
• Clarify expectations and priorities (again if needed).

From Action for Results, Inc.

Managing an Established Team

There are times when you may be asked to manage a project in progress with a team that is already in place. This can be especially difficult if you have no previous experience working with anyone on the team. This type of situation demands immediate evidence of your ability to take charge and recognize team strengths.

The team’s first impression of you is influenced not only by you, personally, but also by the reputation of the previous project manager, team dynamics and whether the project is going well.

Things to do:

• Find out about each team member’s background, purpose and progress ahead of time. This will aid you as you assess the team’s abilities later.
• Soon after taking charge of the team, set up time for one-on-ones to discuss the project and any input or ideas the members may have. If you ask for advice, be prepared to accept and act upon it – or let them know why you can’t.
• Show your authority and knowledge from the outset with confidence –otherwise, you may find yourself being undermined. Be assertive, not aggressive.
• Socialize, at least occasionally, with the team to show your willingness to work together and to prevent being excluded later.

Adapted from Managing Teams, DK Essential Managers Series, Robert Heller, DK, 1999

Do You Know Who’s Responsible?

A project usually involves team members that belong to other departments, functions, or even companies, so it’s important to be very clear about individual responsibilities right from the start. Be sure to create an outline of who is responsible for what and keep this list with the other project documentation.

You can define areas of responsibility for the project in three ways:

Type of Work: Certain members will always be responsible for related types of tasks.

Skill & Knowledge Set: Certain individuals, who by virtue of their special knowledge or training, will be better suited for specific tasks.

Project Phase: Because several people are involved during any given project phase, one individual should be given primary responsibility and everyone else involved should agree to that decision. Otherwise, it may be difficult for various members to perform as a team.

The document you create may be very simple or extremely detailed and extensive, depending on the size of the project. However, its main purpose is to help you and your team to know exactly what to expect from each other.

Adapted from The Little Black Book of Project Management, Michael C. Thomsett, AMACOM, 2009

Reading Room: Teams & Team Building

Contagious Success: Spreading High Performance Throughout Your Organization, Susan Lucia Annunzio, Portfolio, Inc., 2004

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable, Patrick Lencioni, Jossey-Bass, 2002

How NASA Builds Teams: Mission Critical Soft Skills for Scientists, Engineers, and Project Teams, Charles J. Pellerin, Wiley, 2009

Leading Self-Directed Work Teams, Kimball Fisher, McGraw-Hill, 1999

Leading Teams: Setting the Stage for Great Performances, J. Richard Hackman, Harvard Business School Press, 2002

The Team Handbook Third Edition, Peter R Scholtes, Brian L. Joiner, Barbara Streibel, Joiner/Oriel Inc, 2003

Developing Team Norms

It’s good practice for a project manager to lead his or her team in developing a set of team norms at the start of a project. This is particularly helpful for teams whose members may not be located in the same facility or even in the same country.

Here are some examples of team norm categories and statements:

Communication

• Check your voicemail and email at least twice daily and respond within 24 hours.
• Communicate with those outside the team using an established communication plan.
• E-mail messages are to be used for updating and exchanging information only. There are to be no surprises over e-mail about problems.

Meeting Management

• Attend all mandatory meetings.
• Link times and dates to a certain time zone (for example, Eastern Standard Time in North America).
• An agenda is sent out via e-mail 48 hours in advance of every meeting and minutes are sent out via e-mail 48 hours after every meeting. Rotate taking minutes.

Decision Making and Problem Solving

• Strive for consensus but realize that consensus takes time and is not always necessary. If we cannot reach consensus, go with our expert team member’s opinion.
• Balance the local interests of team members with those of the entire team.
• Keep the interests and goals of the team in the forefront of all decisions.

Conflict Management

• Resolve differences in ways of doing business using the organization’s code of conduct.
• Realize that conflict is a normal part of the team’s life cycle and conflict that is focused on the task and not on another person is healthy and productive.
• If you are having difficulty with someone, go to the person first, not the team leader or other team member.

Document Production and Review

• Keep confidential documents within the core team and do not allow external team members to review them.
• Move the document through the established review system in a timely manner. Give one another feedback when promised.
• The project manager is the only person who has the authority to release documents to the stakeholder (or specify other levels of authority as applicable).

Adapted from Mastering Virtual Teams, Deborah L. Duarte and Nancy Tennant Snyder, Jossey-Bass, 2006

Making the Most of Talent

Great project managers realize that it’s better to nurture individuality than ignore it. They are adept at spotting a glimpse of talent in someone and then repositioning him or her so that the talent is used to its best effect.

Talent is defined as a “marked, innate ability.” For instance, you could say that most accountants have a love of precision. If they don’t, it’s doubtful that they will excel in their chosen profession. A love of precision is not a skill. Nor is it knowledge. It is a talent. Talent can be broken down into three basic categories: striving, thinking and relating.

Striving talents explain the why of a person. Why she is motivated to push just that little bit harder than others. Why he is intensely competitive or altruistic or both.

Thinking talents explain the how of a person. How he weighs alternatives. How she comes to her decisions. Whether he is a linear or strategic thinker.

Relating talents explain the who of a person. Whom she builds relationships with. Whom he confronts or ignores. Whether she trusts first or wants people to earn it.
A person’s combination of talents and the recurring behaviors they create, usually remain stable throughout their lives. The trick is to make the most of them.

Adapted from First, Break All the Rules, Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman, Simon & Schuster, 1999

Answers to May Q&A

1. The correct answer is (d) Address it in private, using a direct collaborative approach.

Answer “b” is incorrect. It is far too early and even more divisive at this point to report the problem to senior management.

[Monitoring and Controlling], PMBOK Guide Fourth Edition, p. 239

2. Project Scope Statement (a) is correct.

The Scope statement provides a documented basis for making project decisions and for confirming or developing a common understanding of project scope among stakeholders. 
Project Scope Management Plan (d) is a likely choice but that is a document that provides guidance on how the project scope will be managed and controlled by the project management team.

[Planning], PMBOK Guide Fourth Edition, p 115