PMI Global Insights

I think it's safe to it's well known that Gallup statistics indicate we are at very low rates of employee engagement - and have been for some time. And because engagement has been tied to motivation, productivity and organizational performance and profit, there are many engagement strategies being touted on the market. 

Many companies are shifting to employee-centric initiatives, to increase the happiness or satisfaction of the employee. Some offer a work-life balance style, including flexible hours, remote working options, options in benefits, and more.

Others have looked at creating a more comfortable work environment, with open spaces, lounge chairs and even nap pods, coffee areas, ping pong or games areas, and often included in this - free snacks.  

But are these the best strategies for increasing engagement?

Engaged employees are not necessarily engaged because you have improved their working conditions. It helps to remove stress, and likely increases levels of creativity as well, but won't always increase engagement in the work they are doing or with the people they work alongside. 

Research has shown there are three basic human needs that need to be met, if we ever want to increase motivation and engagement. These are autonomy, relatedness, and competence. And what is perhaps most important, is that all three need to be met - without even one, the others will diminish. 

Autonomy is...our need to perceive that we have choices, that what we are doing is of our own volition, and that they are the source of our own actions.

Relatedness is…our need for connection to the things we do, and to feel that we are contributing to something greater than ourselves, as well as connection to others without concerns of ulterior motives, our need to care about and be cared about by others.

Competence is…our need and ongoing pursuit of increasing knowledge, to feel effective at meeting every-day challenges and opportunities, to demonstrate skill over time, and to feel a sense of growth and flourishing.

What is beneficial about this is that, as a leader, you can create environments for your team where all of these needs can be met.  You don't need to wait for some HR initiative or organizational management strategy to roll out, or gain more training to make some shifts.

I will tell you that I have worked in environments at both ends of the spectrum, when it comes to having these intrinsic needs met. By sharing I hope to validate what research has shown, and help you reflect on your own situations throughout your career and the reasons you may or may not have felt engaged with your role. 

The Best

At the top end, I worked in a synergistic team, where we all worked very collaboratively when it came to strategizing our project plans and making decisions. We interacted at a personal and professional level, and exchanged ideas and feedback in a very open and trusting manner.

Although our team had a formal reporting structure, this didn't stop anyone from fully engaging and challenging each others thoughts, nor from correcting each others' mistakes or offering alternate suggestions. 

Our work was very satisfying, we got a lot done, with each of us finding flow on our individual contributions, and with those pieces coming together - because we had worked the overall strategy together.

We never faced work stoppages or delays because something was missed - we stopped only when there were differences of opinion - and this was to hash out and agree upon the best path forward, so we could carry on with the work.

Funny thing, when people ask me about what my role was within that team, my default response is to start with "we" - because it was, in fact, a "we" environment. 

In actuality, my role shifted from junior to senior to leader over the years I was with that team, with some distinct changes in formal accountability along the way. But when it comes to our work accomplished, I do actually struggle with defining responsibilities that were solely mine, and I am fine with that. We performed as a team, and we all contributed to achieving our goals. 

This was the most inspiring and engaging job I had ever had and would have it back in a heartbeat if given the chance. It is an environment I endeavour to create for any future team that I have. 

The Worst

On the flip side, I have worked with a micro-managing person (forgive me if I struggle to call him leader), who never offered insight as to direction of our team, nor our roles.

He distinctly kept us in our silos and had all work pass through him, and always challenged every proposed strategy or decision each of us made.

Looking back, I think he argued (like a lawyer) so that he was assured the choices made were right, but he always took things too far. None of us had autonomy in anything we did, and he made everyone feel incompetent.

I didn't last very long in this role. As a person who is naturally collaborative, and having had very autonomous roles through most of my career, this was not an environment I could survive in. I quickly became depressed and unmotivated. I dreaded coming to work every day. 

Where in the spectrum does your environment fall?

Companies have long been approaching motivation and engagement of employees the wrong way. Research over the past 60 years has not only proven this, but they have also shown better ways of doing this. 

Challenge your knowledge about engagement and motivation with this mini-quiz. Better yet, watch this webinar on the topic. Maybe you know it all already, and your team is doing amazing things…or maybe it will reveal that you could learn a thing or two!

Are you creating a space where your team can flourish and flow?

What will you do to improve?

Sources:

"Why Motivating People Doesn't Work...and What Does" by Susan Fowler

"Employee Engagement Insights and Advice for Global Business Leaders, State of the Global Workplace" www.gallop.com

Engagement. One of the primary keys to determining all of your project requirements. A way to bring people together to collaboratively solve the challenges your project may be tasked with. A way to energize your workforce, to motivate and increase productivity, workplace satisfaction and more.

Can there ever be too much of it?

I read a recent article in the Harvard Business Review which indicated that too much collaboration was one of the causes of burnout. But when you dive into the details of the article to discover what they meant by this statement, it becomes clear that their interpretation of collaboration is more aligned with micro-management and consensus. That, in order to progress with any work you are doing, everyone needs to approve.

Collaboration does not need to mean consensus, nor does it need to be embedded in every step of every task you are responsible for. But it is great for figuring out what the best solutions are, ensuring schedules and budgets are aligned and compatible, minimizing risks, and to keep everything on track.

In my opinion, getting a high level of engagement on your project or within your organization can never be a bad thing. Bringing minds together, when they are open, honest and free to voice their opinions, can result in some very positive outcomes. Some of the best ideas and solutions can be discovered, plans can be developed in a much smoother sequence, where potential issues can otherwise be avoided efficiently and effectively.

You do, of course, need to ensure that everyone comes to an agreement, and is aligned on the final scope of work to be accomplished. You also need to be sure that scope isn't creeping once a project has commenced - approved changes aside. And of course, you need to balance the right amount of collaboration with folks taking responsibility for completing their assigned tasks within the overall plan. But this is a regular part of projects, isn't it?

I find asking questions, and then listening, to be one of the quickest ways to engage people. Everyone likes to be heard, their opinions appreciated. And different perspectives contribute new knowledge for all of us - we become a little bit smarter with each share.

In my latest webinar, I spoke about the necessities to achieve soaring performance, an obviously popular topic since we reached near full capacity for the live session, and I've since been interviewed on the topic! 

It was about how collaboration, and using particular methods and tools, can facilitate bringing people together in an open dialogue. How collaborating, and engaging your team members to use their knowledge, strengths and capabilities, triggers their intrinsic motivators - satisfying their basic human needs.

I engaged my audience from the start, and at various points throughout my talk, and perhaps this should be cause to pause - since there were so many people engaged and responsive, we bogged the webinar system down! Slides were not progressing with my audio, and sometimes the chat would freeze. So perhaps just one instance where too much engagement can be a bad thing!?

At any rate, I loved this last webinar. With so much engagement, I gained positive feedback on the presentation, I found out some things I could improve upon, and also learned where more support could be provided. And I'll be able to follow up, now, with more value-add support for my followers - all of you!

Thanks for being such a great and responsive community, and as always, keep asking questions!

P.S. You will not find the evidence of the bogged system now - the recording which clearly indicated a problem - your projectmanagement.com hosts have now resolved the problem - a BIG THANKS!

Engagement can be such a tricky thing, don’t you think? 

In most cases, there are several common objectives to engagement:

1. You want people to interact with you and the topic you have brought up
2. You want feedback from everyone – both quiet and loud, both for and against
3. You want to create a healthy balance between those positive and negative perspectives that might come forth – without shutting anyone or any sub-topical theme down!
4. Most of all, you want to draw insights from the dialogue to derive the greatest value to all involved.

So, when it comes to engaging people, how do you do it?

A Challenge!

Last year, leading up to the PMI North American Congress, I was asked, along with a number of other people, to help engage our project management community. We were asked if we could blog on topics within our various areas of expertise to help people see the potential for support one could gain from attending the conference, and most specifically, by engaging with specialists at the “Ask the Experts” booth.

What ensued was a bit of a backroom battle around who could issue the most posts – before, during, and after the event. It started out without intent – no challenge had actually been issued by anyone. It just seemed to happen of its own accord. And I don’t know who ended up winning because that wasn’t what mattered.

What mattered was that it was all in good fun, we got to know each other a bit, we all learned from each other, and a lot of valuable content was shared. But I don't know how successful we were in ENGAGING all of you!

So for the reasons above,

I am throwing a gauntlet down!

I hereby challenge all our past conference bloggers to raise the bar – how will you engage our community this year?

Did you see last year’s battle? Will you support us this year, through reading, liking, sharing and, gasp! – commenting?? I hope so…

The Catch

Did you see what I did there?

The first step in any sort of engagement exercise, of course, is to gain some attention.  What is the topic?  Does it have appeal?  Will it draw everyone in, or will only one “side” (i.e. for or against) participate?

As a potential participant, we need first to have a reason to engage.  In the case of a proposed organizational change, the development of a project plan you might be involved with, or perhaps just a decision within a project, there is definitely a reason to listen in, and to fully engage.

If it were me, I’d want to know what my role might be, how my work might be impacted, and who’s work I might impact as well. And I’d want to be able to maximize my efficiencies, and minimize any potential upsets to getting said work done.

But what if the purpose of engagement is just for an opinion about something? 

Like a conference theme or focus area.  A discussion on common challenges in your industry? Or even to inform a survey or poll.

Maybe it starts with thinking about your own preferences.  What draws you in, and how best do you like to be engaged?  Do you prefer anonymity?  Online vs. face to face?  Private conversations or group dialogue?  There are many considerations.

For this post, I purposely threw a challenge out there to engage people as an attempted gain of attention…but all in good fun. If you’re still reading, well, I guess it worked just a smidge.

We’ll see who the winner ends up being!

Engagement Options

I have been exploring different avenues for engaging people, particularly in the online world.  It seems that this is often a way to engage a much broader group of people, it takes less time, and the engagement can be done from anywhere – at your desk, at home, on your phone, etc.  Some offer anonymity, some do not. 

I prefer that anonymity is avoided – people can be abusive when they are anonymous, and this can detract from the engagement significantly.

Two of my favourites tools right now include Twitter chats (Facebook chats exist too, I guess, but I don’t “reside” there…), and virtual coffees (hosted on a platform like Zoom).

Twitter Chats

A chat format typically involves an hour timeframe over which to discuss a particular topic, and these chats are scheduled on a regular weekly interval, always at the same time of the day so that people know when to attend, if they want to engage.

Throughout the hour, anywhere from 6-10 questions may be posted by the host. They ask their questions with a Q1, Q2, etc., and everyone who has joined the chat respectively answers with A1, A2, etc. until all thoughts are posed. 

There is no established order for attendees to provide their opinions – in fact, there is no requirement to answer any question at all! And, best part – if you can’t make the whole thing (or the topic isn’t keeping your attention), you can just join in and duck out as you wish. No hurt feelings by anyone, honest.

Anyone is free to respond to answers provided by others, like and share comments, and add their own quotes to others’ answers as well.  And with this, sometimes it can get difficult to follow all the different chains of conversation that might be occurring at once!  But really, that is more an issue for a host than it is for anyone else.

All questions and answers should include the corresponding and associated hashtag for the chat, so that anyone who chooses can follow the question and answer sequence – even if they could not attend live. A note that adding the hashtag to every question and answer is a learning curve – not everyone remembers, as you can see by snippets of conversation coming and going between participants!

One Twitter chat I have found useful for this community in particular is the #PMChat every Friday at 12:00 EST.  I try to attend regularly, and I have hosted a couple times now – here's a link for you to scroll through a chat around sustainability, if you want to see what it might look like.

Maybe you’ll join one of our conversations soon?! Or better yet, maybe you'll host a topic?

Virtual Coffees

This is just as it sounds.

Create a meeting on a particular topic, invite people to it, and host it online. Several platforms are available, and I choose to use Zoom because it allows me to see everyone on camera and chat with them live – as if we were in the same room. This encourages active participation and discourages behaviours like checking phones or performing other work during the meeting!

The way I have best managed these sessions is by having a particular topic or agenda to follow, and then having a roundtable on each question or discussion point. Setting an expected time boundary for either the entire meeting, or per subtopic, can help to ensure people stay on topic and bring forward key points. Having a bit of flexibility allows for the dialogue to occur on points that require it. And on that note, there is a bit of facilitation that does need to occur, just like any other meeting, so be aware of that going in.

I am involved with some individuals right now, using the Zoom platform to support a Study Action Team exercise. The SAT concept includes picking a book relating to an area of learning that you’d like to target within your team. Each chat session is based around one or two chapters of the book. The questions we are asking during each virtual meeting include:

1. What were the author’s main points?
2. What significance does this have for our endeavour?
3. What do I want to do with this knowledge? AKA: What actions will I take?  
4. Plus / Delta (of the session)

After the second session, we also added another to start each session off:

What action did I take and how did it go?

This is a great method of learning because you:

1. Are held accountable to prepare for each session (i.e. read the book & actually absorb the content!)
2. Hear other perspectives and takeaways, which often produce further insights for you.
3. Think about how what you are learning relates to your own challenges.
4. Think about corrective actions you can take right away, which benefits not only you but also your team typically.
5. Build relationships – because there is a focus on the dialogue with a common objective that will benefit everyone, it improves the level of dialogue, invites everyone to safely voice opinions, and builds trust, bringing team members closer together for future endeavours.

So, this provided a couple of tools and strategies to engage people.

Perhaps you have recommendations of your own that you might suggest in the comments below?...

(Psst! Your comments below support ME as the future winner on engagement! Ha ha!)

I’ve always said the most interesting things learned while at conferences, often come from conversations.  Yesterday I had one of those conversations - or rather this lesson came about from a number of snippets of conversation with the same individual, and a sleep following that. (My aha’s come when I’m sleeping - always!)

So, I’ve asked permission, and Larry was quite happy for me to share his name - Lawrence Cooper is one of my fellow experts attending the conference to answer your questions.  

Our conversations revolved around strategy and alignment, and I noticed throughout, every time I mentioned something about bringing projects in alignment with corporate strategies, he would "casually correct” me to say that projects are driven by strategy, initiated to achieve a set of outcomes - creating alignment isn’t something we should need to do.  If the outcomes weren’t driving the project initiation, then it wouldn’t be there to begin with.

Now, I absolutely agree with Larry - strategy should drive projects - portfolios of them, really.  And those projects within a portfolio should align and complement each other to bring the strategy to realization.  

But I was talking about another form of alignment, and that is when projects already exist, and do not work to support other strategic initiatives of the organization. Because we all know that organizations NEVER have only one strategic goal.

I’m not saying these projects necessarily push in an opposite direction of these other goals (although I have seen examples!), but that no effort is made to support achieving more than one goal, and I think that is a recipe for conflict, mixed messages to stakeholders, and overall reputation of the organization.

Our conversation made me realize that I’m not making myself clear enough on this matter.  Let me give an example from the industry I have worked in - mining (that is, resource extraction - not data mining, as many have assumed).

Most mining organizations will have a primary strategic goal around growth, such as increasing production by 10% by 2020, or double production by 2030.  As such, many projects are initiated to investigate, and further explore various potential deposits around the world.

In contrast, these companies will also likely have strategic goals around reducing their footprint - carbon emissions, environmental impacts, use of water, etc.  They may choose one or make efforts in all of these areas.  Projects that arise from this strategy might look like water recovery and recycling systems, energy efficiency improvements, or the introduction of waste management technologies - all applied to existing operations.  

Now, isn’t working on a new development altogether going absolutely in opposition to the footprint reductions initiative?

In my world, this is status quo, and it seems there are several projects that will be working towards growth in production, expansion of operations, and more.  So it has been my job in the past to get those project teams to not just think of that production target, or even just the goal of getting a new system built to support that goal.  But to also have them draw in the targets of these other strategic goals within the organization.

To at least support making the new developments as efficient as possible, to be proactive in prevention of environmental impacts, to make the physical footprints as small as is practical.  And to align with any other initiatives that may be present.

This can often be a challenge to make happen - if the project manager has missed these critical stakeholders who can and should be involved to help identify such risks and opportunities.  To ensure these aspects become part of the approved scope and plans.

As a project manager, do you ever ask what all of the corporate goals and targets are? 

Do you discuss which of the targets the sponsor would like to integrate?

Do you look for and engage the stakeholders who might inform you of these other initiatives (and what else other projects might be doing to support them?) 

And do you open the dialogue with your team and other stakeholders to find where the opportunities lie, to align your project with these other initiatives?

Attending the PMI Global congress in San Diego?  Come meet me with the “Ask an Expert” booth in the Solutions Center (exhibit hall).  There are several experts here to answer your questions on a variety of topics - I'm the one focused on risks and opportunities that can be investigated in planning, particularly for industrial projects like mining - that, and sustainability integration too!  I hope to see you!

How do you add flexibility and iteration into a rigid system? A defined management structure?  How do you manage stakeholder risks?  And how do you avoid the downfalls of assumptions?

I sat in three different sessions yesterday, each on different topics, and somehow all three came together quite obviously for me.  Maybe it will make sense for you as well.

So I will start with a great analogy I heard in the first session that rang true for me, as it relates to exactly how we might go about shifting to adaptability.  The session, delivered by Joy Beatty of Seilevel, was about the challenges of introducing Agile into Large Enterprises.  A bit of a mix around Agile methods and change management issues.

"Find your rocks in the river, and let the water flow around them."

The rocks, of course, are those non-negotiable aspects. Those required checkpoints, the gates, or those points where dependencies come into play when particular requirements need to be met.

The water? The process of how to get there, how to continue to move forward with processes that might require a bit more flexibility.

When we are thinking about adding adaptability and iteration into our PM structures, we need to understand how that may impact our stakeholders, and the dependencies that can kill agility.  We need to map out our processes, and explore how those tie in to other processes within our organization. 

• Which other teams might need information from us (or the system being altered), and what information that is, when,
• What impacts our changes might have on others' activities or capabilities, and
• What cannot be changed at all for those groups - sometimes full systematic change cannot be done all in one go, and we need to be aware of that.

From there, we mark those rocks in our system - lock them in, and ensure that the boat will not be rocked (excuse the pun).  Everything else that can be managed around those...let them flow.  Keep people informed of plans, progress, changes, etc., but let it flow. 

But be careful.  Make sure that map you've developed is whole, holistic.  Have you found all of your stakeholders? 

I listened next to a talk about stakeholder engagement, delivered by Rick Furino of Microsoft.  He spoke of all the categories of stakeholders to consider, their differing priorities and perspectives and why those exist, and how to better engage them.  And he did it in a way as to draw the audience in - a perfect demonstration of engagement processes at play!

Be sure you've worked through the many categories of stakeholders, and asked enough questions to flesh them out.  Ensure you understand what their needs and priorities are, how influential they may be, and how that might impact your project.   

Because guess what - there are likely silent stakeholders you might have missed.  Or you assumed they didn't matter, that you weren't upsetting anything for them.

Those are the ones that will come out of the woodwork after you have made a change that you assumed would not matter, would not impact anyone.

The last session of the day was delivered by Beth Spriggs.  Beth had the audience fully engaged throughout the entire session, asking questions, making statements or posting pictures up, and asking for our assumptions.

Helping us to understand just how many differing perspectives there might be in just one room. 

And then she would change the context for the same discussion, and ask us to reflect on our assumptions just made.  To demonstrate just how easy assumptions might change or can be wrong. 

She suggested several things we can do to reduce the risks of assumptions, and I would suggest that these strategies can be applied also to looking for and assessing other risks as well.

1. Always 'zoom out' - context is everything, particularly when dealing with conflict!

2. Explore your own assumptions - what are you taking for granted, put it in writing.

3. Share your assumptions and ask for feedback.

4. Ask for different perspectives, ask lots of questions. 

5. Ask others for their questions.  Q-storm...

6. Ask people what other people are saying - not to assume there isn't trust or things not being said, but to see how others' view others' stories - it may shed light on more potential risks.

7. Perform a 'checking assumptions exercise' - live collaboration where a list of assumptions are reviewed by all - if everyone is aware of one, it isn't necessarily a risk...but if only one person is aware of it, put it on the risk register to ensure it is addressed!

So, if you want to achieve success in introducing changes, whether they are agile-focused or something else, make sure you have a clear understanding of your stakeholders, their issues or concerns, the potential barriers to success, and any assumptions you or your team may have!

Attending the PMI Global congress in San Diego?  Come meet me with the “Ask an Expert” booth in the Solutions Center (exhibit hall).  There are several experts here to answer your questions on a variety of topics - I'm the one focused on risks and opportunities that can be investigated in planning, particularly for industrial projects like mining - that, and sustainability integration too!  I hope to see you!