Voices on Project Management

By Conrado Morlan

About five years ago, I made a New Year’s resolution that I renew every year: become a SMARTer project practitioner. This annual resolution is how I strive for excellence in my professional life.

What is a SMART project practitioner? It’s a project professional — project manager, program manager or portfolio manager — who plays multiple roles within the organization and contributes to achieving goals emanating from the organization’s mission and strategy. It stands for strategic, mindful, agile, resilient and transparent.

The SMART project professional goes beyond just managing projects. He or she helps achieve business objectives by exploring new ways to lead, execute and deliver projects supported by dispersed and diverse teams. Technical expertise is not enough — SMART professionals must adopt a business-oriented approach.

Time has proved the concept of this more expansive definition of the project professional valuable. In the 2012 video “Are You Ready?” PMI President and CEO Mark Langley discusses the new skills and capabilities required by project professionals to fully support projects. Companies are struggling to attract qualified project professionals with strong leadership and strategic and business management skills, Langley notes.

Since technical expertise is no longer enough to drive high performance,the SMART concept includes a portfolio of skills the project professional must master to meet the needs of the organization in the coming years.

Being SMART means being:

• Strategic. Demonstrate an understanding of the organization’s business goals to help it get ahead of the competition.

• Mindful. Develop cultural awareness and leadership styles to influence and inspire multicultural and multigenerational project teams. Foster strong relationships across the organization’s business functions. Adhere to the organization’s values and culture as well as the professional codes of ethics.

• Agile. Business strategy is not static and is frequently impacted by internal and external factors. Projects will need to be adjusted to remain aligned with the business strategy, so embrace change.

• Resilient. Remain committed and optimistic, and demonstrate integrity, when realigning or repairing projects facing hardships because of miscommunication and problematic behaviors as well as cross-cultural issues and conflicts.

• Transparent. Whether the project is in good shape or facing challenges, the state of projects needs to be shared promptly with relevant parties.

In summary: To become SMARTer, you need to continually strive for excellence and master new skills to support professional growth and help your organization achieve its business strategy.

Did you make (or renew) New Year’s resolutions for your professional life in 2015? If so, share them with me.

By Jen L. Skrabak, PMP, PfMP

As you reflect on 2014 and prepare for the New Year, consider these eight resolutions for your project portfolio in 2015.

1.     Be a portfolio leader. Don’t just manage the portfolio — lead it by thinking in terms of profits and losses. In that sense, how does it compare to other portfolios or business units? What was your 2014 return on investment, and what is your 2015 estimated return? Is this within your organization’s expectations? What projects/programs were a drag and should be stopped? What projects/programs have the potential to generate the most returns and can be a calculated risk? (A calculated risk has a reasonable probability of generating a return; of course, what is “reasonable” depends on your organization’s risk appetite and threshold.)  If you were an investor, would you invest in your portfolio? Asking these questions may help you decide what to do differently in 2015.

2.     Accelerate the business. Ensure strategic alignment by thinking about your portfolio as dynamic and agile — an accelerator to business goals and objectives. How can you free up resources to innovate rather than just keep the lights on?

3.     Sell your portfolio’s value by understanding your audience. Speak the organization’s language while remembering the 5 C’s: clear, concise, credible, creative and compelling:

Clear— Frame the discussion in terms the other party can easily relate to and understand.

Concise— Long decks and presentations will lose your audience. Think elevator speeches: If you can’t sum it up in a sentence or two, it’s probably too complicated to understand. And if it’s too complicated, then you will not have the opportunity to influence, let alone reach agreement.

Credible— Know what you’re talking about and be prepared. This means doing your homework before coming to the table.

Creative— Look beyond the obvious to find the solution.

Compelling— Always know what’s important to the other party and what will drive them to action. Tease out the underlying need instead of only the stated desire. Understand what your bottom line is, and theirs.

4.     Establish a culture of innovation. Do this, and you can deliver long-term as well as quick wins. 

5.     Make data-driven decisions.Look at the facts to drive decisions, not emotions. Don’t get attached to pet projects.

6.     Engage with the world.Go beyond stakeholder engagement at work. Don’t forget about yourself, your home and your community.

7.     Trust your instincts. If something doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t. That little voice is an early indicator — listen to it. Sometimes when we forge ahead against our instincts, we find out later that it would have been better to take another course.

8.     Find meaning in your portfolio. Your portfolio delivers the impossible — innovative projects and programs that have not been done before. What achievements in the past year were key to the organization, in terms of values, culture and feeding creative juices? How can you do more of that in 2015?

With an 85-year history, Ming Hua Yan Arts and Cultural Group is one of Taiwan’s artistic treasures.

But in recent decades, the Taiwanese opera group has faced a big challenge: how to modernize a traditional folk art and introduce it to a modern audience. Since project managers often struggle to bring innovation to historic industries, Ming Hua Yuan provides a successful roadmap to follow.

Blending Innovation With Tradition

Chen Sheng-Fu, who oversees the family-owned organization, said its success began with committing to building on its reputation; the group needed larger audiences if its art and way of life was to survive. Taiwanese opera is marked by an emphasis on stylized singing and posture, showcased through simple, slowly paced stories. This is antithetical to modern audience expectations, so over the past 30 years, Chen and the organization have been working around this fundamental problem. He has introduced the director system from the movie industry, and extensively applied the elements of modern theater to the production of traditional repertoires.

For the modernization of the form itself, Ming Hua Yuan has been adopting more complex stories. They usually consist of multiple storylines juxtaposing the past and present on the same stage.  Ming Hua Yuan also introduced contemporary stage design such as lighting and sound effects, acrobatics and 3-D background panoramas, which are more typical in large-scale live concerts. In addition, more contemporary language was incorporated into the performance.

Using Process Analysis and Cycle Time Application

As a program manager overseeing this modernization, Chen relied heavily on process analysis. He strives to ensure each performer, prop or stage design can fulfill multiple tasks. For instance, quick scene changes are made possible through costumes and set pieces that can be easily changed or modified between scenes, and that can conceal the smaller props and costumes. For example, a tree trunk can be part of a forest for one scene, then turned around to reveal an imperial throne in the next scene.

This allows on-stage performers to be as responsible for scene changes as stagehands and technicians. If 20 performers each spend eight seconds to complete the tasks, then nearly three minutes of work can be accomplished, with the audience experiencing only a brief musical interlude with dramatic lighting. Such a cunning application of “cycle time” enables Ming Hua Yuan to change scenes without dimming the lights and bringing down the curtain.

The challenge of running a traditional performing art group is no easier than running any modern business. But with modern techniques and professional management, Ming Hua Yuan has successfully reformed itself—and introduced a traditional art form to a global audience. 

By Vivek Prakash

While high-performing team members are assets for us as project practitioners, we struggle with underperformers. Generally, we have two options with underperformers — get rid of them or help them become better performers. The first option is easy, while the second requires hard work, patience and persistence.

However, the unavailability of skilled employees nowadays can make even thefirst option difficult. So helping the team member improve is often preferable. It’s a challenge, but the rewards are great: We not only convert a underperforming asset into a performing asset but also gain power and respect.

I believe that underperformance is more a perception than a reality, more an expectation mismatch than an incapability. For example, a software company might recruit team members mainly based on technical skills like programming. But all software engineers do not work alike, because their background, behavior, style and beliefs differ.

Imagine giving two different but equally capable team members, A and B, the same task. You believe A is more of a planner, while B is action-oriented. Neither approach is wrong. Employee A will create a meticulous plan before starting, while B will work with a broader plan. A’s action will start later, while B will make a couple of course corrections during the work.

If you are a planning person, you might like A, but if you are an action-oriented person, you prefer B. For urgent work, B is suitable; for quality work, however, A might be better. Based on the type of work, urgency, expected outcome and your own nature, you would pick A or B.

So if a team member is not performing well, the reason may not be his or her incapability. What if your expectations were not correctly explained to the employee? What if the employee has no motivation to complete the task? 

To improve someone’s performance, I suggest changing your role from that of a boss to mentor. Why? Because a boss gives further challenges, while a mentor provides support. A boss applies pressure while a mentor tries to find a solution.

People often cannot understand their own underperformance. Providing constructive feedback with a helping hand is the first step. If the employee did not understand expectations well, clarify them. Suggest a reward for improved performance. Money is the lowest award, and you can offer it to anyone. Instead, if possible, create milestones and praise the person for reaching them.

Always try to understand the employee’s natural inclinations. Perhaps the job doesn’t align with his or her natural abilities. Consider another assignment, offer some alternatives and do not ignore the person’s own suggestions.

One more tip: Beware of labeling a person as having a negative attitude. A negative attitude is often created by the environment, an objective mismatch or employee concerns. As soon as the environment improves, objectives align or concerns are addressed, a team member’s attitude will often become positive.

You may have faced a similar challenge in your projects. What was your experience? How did you resolve it?

A Level 5 Leader (L5L) is an individual who blends extreme personal humility with intense professional will. The characteristics and success of these leaders were first identified by Jim Collins in 2001. They formed a central plank in his best-selling book Good to Great.

The discovery of Level 5 leadership derived from a research project that Collins began in 1996, when he set out to answer one question: Can a good company become a great company and, if so, how? The answer was the concept of a Level 5 Leader.

The L5L sits on top of a hierarchy of capabilities and is, according to Collins’ research, a necessary requirement for transforming an organization from good to great. Individuals do not need to proceed sequentially through each of the lower four levels of the hierarchy to reach the top, but to be a full-fledged L5L requires the capabilities of all the lower levels, plus the special characteristics of Level 5. The characteristics are:

• Level 5 Executive:Builds enduring greatness through a paradoxical combination of personal humility plus professional will.
• Level 4 Effective Leader:Catalyzes commitment to and vigorous pursuit of a clear and compelling vision; stimulates the group to high performance standards.
• Level 3 Competent Manager:Organizes people and resources toward the effective and efficient pursuit of predetermined objectives.
• Level 2 Contributing Team Member:Contributes to the achievement of group objectives; works effectively with others in a group setting.
• Level 1 Highly Capable Individual:Makes productive contributions through talent, knowledge, skills and good work habits.

When Good to Great was published in 2001, the concept of Level 5 leadership was counterintuitive, even countercultural. People generally assumed that transforming companies from good to great required larger-than-life leaders with big personalities like Lee Iacocca and Jack Welch, who made headlines and became celebrities. And while Level 5 leadership is not the only requirement for transforming a good company into a great one—other factors include getting the right people “on the bus” (and the wrong people “off the bus”) and creating a culture of discipline—Collins’ research showed L5L to be essential. 

Thirteen years later, what’s this got to do with project management?

The answer is that rather than focusing on being the “project management hero,” project managers can apply the lessons of Level 5 Leadership to take a project from good to great!

Some of the key traits of an L5L are:

• Humility. Whenever your team members have success, make sure credit goes to them for their hard work. But as a leader, you need to take responsibility for your team’s efforts, particularly when things go wrong.
• Asks for help.Knowing when and how to ask for help lets you call upon the expertise of someone stronger in an area than you are. The result? The entire team or organization wins, not just you.
• Takes responsibilityfor the team’s mistakes or failings.
• Discipline.When you commit to a course of action, no matter how difficult, stick to your resolve. It’s always important to listen to differing opinions, but don’t let fear be your driving motivator when you make, or change, a decision.
• Takes the time to find the right people.And then helps them reach their full potential.
• Leads with passion.When you demonstrate to your team members that you love and believe in what you’re doing, they will too.

Becoming a L5L is not easy. But rather than being a hero fighting to make your project a success, shifting to Level 5 leadership allows you to be successful while benefiting your organization and team.