Over the past year, I have been part of about a dozen
different projects. I will share with you what I have learned about project
management from two perspectives: the project manager and the managed. If you
can nail down these 5 main issues, you project has a much better chance of
going smoothly.
#1 Content is king
You have probably heard it before but here's why it's true in this context. You can have all of the plans in the world. You have have a
wireframes, sitemaps, javascript, jquery, php, etc. but if your content is either
of low quality or doesn't exist, you will never realize the finished product
the way you envisioned.
Say you are working on a website and you are going to do all
of the web design and coding but the client would prefer to have someone else
take the images. How is that going to effect the timeline of project
completion? Can you rely on the photographer to take good pictures and share
them with you in a way that is usable for your purposes?
The same could also happen for content writing. Maybe the
client wants to share existing content with you and have you write the rest, but
what happens if the information on the site is so specialized, that either a) it would take you a long time to do the
proper research to write the content yourself or b) the client will have to
provide more content than they had initially though?
The point is that if you aren't thinking about where the
content is going to come from, who is going to produce it and when it will be
completed by, it could seriously affect the rest of the site design or any
other project process. Based on the waterfall model, content is supposed to come before
design and coding and there is good reason for that.
#2 Trust
Trust is important. If you follow Aaron Draplin's advice,
you'll work with your friends, in which case you can trust the people you work
with on a project. The challenge comes when you are working on a type of project for
the first time and you are figuring out how well your team works together. If
you're lucky, you'll end up with a team that just clicks and excels at
everything you need for the project.
On the other hand, if you are working with people you
haven't worked with before, it is very important to build up trust amongst each
other to keep the project running smoothly. What does that look like? It
involves a balance between communicating together as a group and communicating
with each individual team member. This is about developing expectations for people and familiarity as a way to motivate each team member during the
project.
Alternatively, if you don't meet deadlines on time, or you
don't check-in when expected, you can bet that you will lose trust from you
team members and disrupt their ability to form expectations about how the
project is going to unfold.
If you say you are going to do something by a certain time, one way or another, do it.
#3 Communication
If you don't communicate your needs clearly, few people can
help you. I'll give you an example. You're working on a project and you come up
against a problem with part of your task for the week. When is the best time to
bring that up?
Do you wait until the next team meeting to explain the
problem to the whole group? Or, do you contact the project manager or a
colleague before the next group meeting to address the problem. You might be thinking a) I don't want to
contact the project manager because then I will seem incompetent and he or she
will think less of me, or b) I don't want to ask my colleague because they are
busy doing something else and I don't want to distract them from their own work
when I am expected to do this by myself.
In my experience, both of these assumptions are mistaken.
Ultimately, everyone that is part of team needs to work together to complete a
project. If you have a legitimate problem and you need help, it is an
opportunity to learn from your colleagues and it shows the project manager that
you are comfortable communicating your needs clearly to them. The last thing
anyone wants is to arrive at the next group meeting with an expected piece of
the project missing, especially if they are hearing about it for the first time
at the meeting.
It costs everyone that much more time and confusion to have
to adapt to that situation than it does for them to help you when you need it and almost as soon as you know you need help. This will keep things running
smoothly for sure and you can build relationships by getting help and giving
help in return.
#4 Reasonable Expectations
What happens if you have initiated a project and you are not
sure how long the project is going to take or what is required to complete it?
So far, this has happened to me more than once, and usually it is because I have
a bold vision for a project I would like to undertake and I am so focused on
the finished project, I overlook how I am going to get there.
Fortunately, these projects usually don't involve paying clients and
I can use these experiences to build reasonable expectations in the future.
This is why it is important to log your hours for the work you do. It is not
always about getting paid to the dime as much as it is being able to gauge in the future
how long something will take you. If you
are really accurate, you will be able to see improvements in your projections over time so that you
can write better project proposals without going over the amount of projected
hours for each phase of the project. Your whole team will appreciate that.
It also helps to have your team log their hours because over
time, you will have a sense of which team member can do what the fastest.
Whether you are working in a scrum or a waterfall model, this can be helpful.
For waterfall, you will be better able to decide who to hire for specific jobs,
based on how fast and how well they complete a project. For scrum models, having your team
log their hours will enable you split tasks up into reasonable chunks. You
don't want something that might take an hour to take four hours or vis versa.
There are always going to be unforeseen circumstances but it possible for your expectations to
become more reasonable over time.
#5 Planning Planning Planning
Nothing ever goes to plan. At least not exactly. That's
fine. That doesn't mean you shouldn't plan.
If you are project managing and you get to a point where
people are asking for direction and you have no plan, it is an odd state to be
in. Your primary job as project manager is to be able to give direction at all
times. It is not about bossing people around as much as it is about being able
to think ahead and process multiple variables to keep the project running
smoothly.
So, if the team is super busy and you feel the need to jump
outside of your role as project manager, it should rarely be at the risk of
being able to assess the progress of the project and think ahead. If you are in
scrum workflow, that is a different story because you are completing tasks as
part of the team while helping the team to complete theirs.
Planning also involves recording the progress of the project.
Keep good records of progress and make them available to the group if
necessary. Noone should be duplicating eachother's work as a result of being unaware of what is complete or currently being worked on. Spreadsheets are the
most basic tool for keep track of progress.
Take planning another way as well. If you are at the initial
stages of a project, take your time. Do your research, and some thumbnails. It
might seem like you don't have time to waste in the planning stage but it is
more time consuming to plan halfway though the project because of a bad initial
strategy or idea.
Even if it involves creating digital thumbnails or using technology
to brainstorm ideas. Even if it involves familiarizing yourself with new
technology or making sure the project had the right specifications, the point
is that planning at the initial stages will relieve you of having to duplicate
too much of your work if and when you have to change course a little or a lot.
Send me your suggestions
Do you have any tips for successfully
completing projects? Maybe you have resources you would like to share or a
great story about lessons learned? Send me your feedback!
A team that has similar mindset is also a factor :)
ReplyDeleteGreat advice! There are of course TONS of ideas, suggestions and warnings when it comes to project management; these are definitely some key ones. From a leadership perspective, there are two further areas of reflection that I might add.
ReplyDeleteThe first is delegation and clear delineation of roles. Often, this has nothing to do with people fighting over tasks (I wish!) but rather things falling through the cracks. If it is not clear who is meant to take responsibility for a task, typically, no one will do it. This is especially true when you're working with people who have other priorities (i.e. students, volunteers with full time employment elsewhere). As much as you can split up clearly defined roles - do it! This does not disqualify flexibility, someone who has completed their task is easily assigned to help out someone who is struggling, but ensures that there is someone responsible for each element of your project.
Associated with this point (and not to sound cynical) is the importance of rhetoric. The points made about communication above are apt and excellent, but it's not just what you say, but how you say it. When delegating, rather than telling someone to do something, I find I usually suggest that they are 'put in charge of it'. Make sure to always acknowledge 'good points' and 'excellent suggestions', even when they're headed for the chopping block. Leadership is just as much social skills and keeping people happy as it is getting things done. Make people WANT to help you, and (quite frankly) feel guilty when they don't come through. It's not just planning, it's personality. You're dealing with people as much as projects.
I commend you for your ability to write such detailed and well expressed and explained content. Great job and I look forward to reading more posts from you.
ReplyDeleteCheers.
Good write-up. :)
ReplyDeleteI agree that content is important, and my biggest pet peeve is not up-to-date content. (ie. sites that look stale). And this is where the technology side of things becomes key for content: Make portions of the site auto-update and/or be VERY easy to update (ie. the most non-technical individual could be in charge of content generation/posting, so make their life easy), And pull in content automatically from things related to your project. (eg. news feeds, other websites, other parts of your web presence, etc.).
Another point I have to add, is around reasonable expectations. Whenever possible do NOT allow feature-creep. It will bog you down and kill you. Lay down the law, set explicit deliverables and milestones, and set new deadlines for new features (don't just keep adding them onto existing ones, even if it just seems like one little thing extra...they add up).
This is great Gord! Very well thought out, and I'm sure very helpful...
ReplyDeleteAs far as feedback goes, I would also add consistency under content (slightly elaborating on the above response) - consistency in timing (of messages), style, content according to a mandate, etc.
Under communication (or even a separate section called 'team'...) I would mention that managing too many volunteers / staff can turn messy! (particularly volunteers). As a project manager, oftentimes you fall behind in your own work and the volunteers can feel lost and / or unappreciated. So long story short - don't think that more help = less work. Because sometimes it's the opposite! But you can determine what is best through a well thought out plan, as you so articulately mentioned :)
Finally, I would add a section called 'celebration'. It's important to celebrate when projects are finished! or even when a hard work day is finished sometimes...
Overall, very well done! It seems as though you're learning a ton.