Projects as Performance

David Schmaltz is a project manager in Takoma Park, Maryland.

  Leadership   ProjectsAtWork  

The project leader is a performer, carefully crafting personas that range from empathic coach to autocratic taskmaster — and each act will seem necessary at some point, in some context. It is an intricate dance to drive results among the eggshells of skepticism and actual human beings. Best then to be aware of the stage and the curtain.

This is the third in a series of articles on the unspeakable element of projects, the philosophy of project work. While much gets published about how-to techniques and methods, much less has been written delving into the often curious ways we talk about this work. The words and the music often mismatch in practice. Much remains unsaid, perhaps unspeakable.

“Anna isn't a criminal, but she broke the rules!” — Countess Nordston in Anna Karenina

Most of any project’s rules remain unwritten, though quite well understood. The compliant receive rewards — most prominently, tacit permission to remain as part of the project. Difficult people get pecked back into compliance or eventually nudged out of the nest. Justice makes up in sureness what it lacks in swiftness; one must always get along. Contrary to the popular misconception, every team has many eyes in it, most of them watchful ones.

Probably no other element of any project more discloses underlying philosophy than the responses to ‘…

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