Voices on Project Management

By Dave Wakeman

My editors always say I bring an interesting perspective to project management and leadership. I like to think it’s because I come to project management from fields that are not often associated with project management, such as marketing, politics and sports.

Even though project management touches every field. 

As I’m writing this, I’ve been at home acting as chief teaching officer to my 9-year-old son, chief sounding board for my partner, chief shoulder to a lot of mentees and chief play toy to my bulldog, due to the spread of the coronavirus and the actions of governments around the world to protect their citizens and mitigate the damage of this new virus. 

While many of us are physically distanced from each other, I’ve had a lot of time to watch the responses and observe them as an exercise in project management. 

And, to be quite honest, if many of the leaders around the world were working as project managers for the organizations I work with, a lot of them would be fired. 

But … I think all of us can also learn a lot from this moment, and I hope we do. Here are three things I’m learning about project management from the coronavirus crisis: 

1. Leadership matters: I was in Australia in November, and I remember standing in the airport in Melbourne with my colleague the first time I was made aware of the coronavirus. 

Since then, we’ve seen many leaders around the world downplay COVID-19, lie about their knowledge of the disease or try to pass the buck for their poor response as the people impacted by the coronavirus continued to grow. 

Across the globe, this lack of vision, urgency and direction has marked the response to the coronavirus.

That’s a lack of leadership. 

In normal situations, we know that leadership matters and that having vision, providing guidance and supporting your team is important. In a crisis, the importance of leadership multiplies exponentially. 

This is why we have to recognize that our role as managers is to lead—to bear the brunt of knowledge, direction and action. That’s been missing in so many places throughout the pandemic. 

2. Communication is king: In general, 90 percent of a project manager’s job is communication, up and down the stakeholder map. That doesn’t change no matter what kind of project you are leading.

As we work through the impacts of the viral pandemic, we must consider what makes communication effective, and that includes things like timeliness, consistency and truthfulness. 

We’ve seen the timeliness of communication from leaders be pretty good, at least over the last few weeks. Though, if I were the leader of these projects, I’d default to communicating and explaining things earlier. 

As far as consistency, we’ve seen a number of leaders around the world change their messages and directions to citizens almost daily, which isn’t a very effective way to generate the best results. 

Finally, truthfulness. I know from experience that you can’t tell your teams and stakeholders everything all the time, due to legal exposure, security or other issues. But the malleability of the truth in the face of a once-in-a-lifetime event has been quite alarming. 

All three of these inputs are extremely important to the success of your communications with your team and stakeholders. 

3. Teamwork is essential: As project managers, we lead teams of people with diverse skills, agendas and needs. Our ability to get these folks moving in the same direction, if only long enough to complete their part in our project, defines our success or failure. 

In the global reaction to the coronavirus, we have seen a disjointed response with each country and continent going their own way. 

Lack of teamwork is harmful in this case, obviously. We haven’t taken coordinated efforts to reduce travel, slow infections and increase production of necessary medical equipment. 

But the larger point is that if you are leading a team and no one is working together, your ability to achieve your goals and positive results seems to deteriorate rapidly.

That’s on display today. 

Overall, I’ve been disappointed with the way leaders around the world have responded to the coronavirus outbreak. We mustn’t discount the lessons learned as we witness governing bodies across the globe either rise to the occasion or falter in response to the coronavirus pandemic. 

What do you think? Let me know in the comments. 

By Soma Bhattacharya

56 million. That’s the estimated number of millennials currently working or seeking work—making individuals born between 1980 and 2000 the largest generation in the U.S. labor force, according to the Pew Research Center.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

By 2025, millennials will comprise 75 percent of the global workforce. Companies like Accenture have already reported that millennials represent over two-thirds of the company’s entire employee base.

As of late, agile has been sparking more and more conversations—about how it has worked wonderfully well for some organizations and failed for others. 

If you look at the profiles of the organizations or teams reporting their project progress, their successes and failures often point to the workforce and, of course, company culture. For many startups and young organizations, where the workforce is mostly millennial, agile seems to be accepted more easily. I know this personally because I have seen companies—small companies that are very open and motivated to make it work—with huge support from management make it successful.

I believe that agile works better for teams of millennials simply because the approach focuses on many of the same qualities that are among the core values of millennials.

Let’s look at some of them:

Empowerment: Agile is all about empowering individuals. From holding team ceremonies to the team structure, it’s all about interacting as a group, coming together every day and making decisions as a unit. Nearly 50 percent of millennials believe leadership signifies the empowerment of others, according to a Workplacetrends.com survey. They also seem to value traits of humility, openness and continual learning, promoting the importance of recognizing both strengths and weaknesses. 

Transparency: Transparency, another pillar of agile, is easier said than done. Millennials believe in looking at the bigger picture of their organizations and teams. They want to participate in that shared vision. There are companies that have transparent salaries, are candid about their roadmaps and quickly own their mistakes. This leads to teams that are transparent among themselves about what’s going to work and what’s not going to work. 

Visibility: Visibility is also critical, because it impacts how teams distribute work. It fosters quicker decision-making and more effective resource management. Unless the value is explained and showcased in clear terms, it’s natural that certain tasks will seem like a boring chore. This means the role of mentors and leaders is of high importance in how the team is trained and how team members communicate. 

Trust: Trust in the team, leadership, and, yes, estimation. If you look at the root cause analysis of why it doesn’t click with some teams, there’s a larger story to tell. It could be people who prefer to work in silos or a lack of trust. By pivoting, you can probably get the team to rethink their estimation based on asking the right questions or pairing up team members so the experienced ones can help their juniors. You can mentor the team to get things done quicker. It’s all about how you communicate without damaging team morale. 

Acknowledgement: Communication is an art, and millennials use all forms of communication to get things done. Smaller teams, as used in scrum, also mean better communication, faster decisions and acknowledgement. Millennials thrive on acknowledgement more than anything. They need to know their work matters. 

Perspective: Learning and having a growth mindset is essential to adopting any new process. That’s why the way you approach the team about change or how you handle and mentor the team is so important. Don’t introduce every change on day one, and don’t blame those changes on agile. Give everyone the time to doubt, adapt and see it for themselves. Meanwhile, be with them, give them the right information and take the journey with them. There’s nothing more apt than using the Goldilocks rule in this scenario. 

Motivation: Give them a challenge with a difficulty level that slowly scales up and allows them to feel accomplished. Telling them to run a marathon when they have never walked a mile before is not only foolish, but a huge demotivator. 

Gratification: Millennials also look for immediate gratification. There’s a talk by the author Simon Sinek in which he mentions that millennials are used to having everything immediately: You want a phone? You can order it online and get it delivered in a day or two. You want a shoe? You have so many shops and online stores to choose from. Unsurprisingly, millennials in the workforce also crave immediate feedback and want to feel confident at work without waiting until they hit the six-month mark. They want to be happy, get things done faster and work for something they truly believe in.

True agility is also a test of how the organization forms itself. If you really want the team to have the right dynamics and bonding, appraisals should put more weight in team performance than individual performance. For extrinsic motivators, this will have a great impact. 

As it also turns out, at companies where managers show sincere interest in millennials as people, the organization sees an 8x improvement in agility and a 7x increase in innovation, according to a Great Place to Work survey. Now that’s something to think about. 

What has been your experience with agile and millennial team members? Share in the comments below.

By Conrado Morlan

In a previous post, “The Impact of Unforeseen Risks,” I described how two major events have impacted projects I’ve lead in the past: the eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland in 2010 and Fidel Castro’s death in 2016.

Many project professionals don’t include unforeseeable circumstances in their risk log, unless their projects are being executed in an area where natural and unavoidable catastrophes are known to occur. Due to the dynamics of geopolitical events, they may not be included during the initial risk identification process. As the project progresses, however, the risk log should be updated to identify the impact of these risks on project progress and the enterprise as a whole.

Risk management strategies help project management practitioners forecast and evaluate risk, while also identifying ways to avoid or minimize their impact on desired project outcomes.

Conducting SWOT on COVID-19

Late last year, news of a novel illness affecting a city in China failed to capture the attention of most people and businesses around the world; many thought the impact would be similar to SARS or swine flu—a blip on the breaking news radar and no real threat to the global economy. They were wrong.

Many organizations failed to consider the COVID-19 outbreak an enterprise risk and continued their business-as-usual operations. Around mid-February, I met with colleagues and friends who work in the telecommunications industry, and they expressed their concerns about how their projects would be impacted if the factories in China that produce the electronics needed for their work shut down. They wondered if that would break an important link in their supply chain and if it would jeopardize the final delivery of their projects.

Those in the telecommunications industry were not alone. Supply chains in multiple industries have strong ties to China. By the time they were primed to react, the risk was already an issue and without the procedures to avoid or minimize the impact, industries and countries were facing a pandemic with no plan in place.

Sharing enterprise risks identified during the planning and strategic phases of a project isn’t always a common practice within organizations. But not being aware of such risks has a direct impact on project success, and important assumptions may not be considered for the projects and programs that lie ahead.

People in charge of developing the multi-year strategy at an enterprise can use SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) Analysis to identify potential risks. This analysis uses a matrix, in which the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats are listed and prioritized. 

The SWOT matrix can be evaluated and updated as the enterprise strategy is reviewed or on an ad hoc basis. Moreover, threats identified during the SWOT analysis may have an associated opportunity. For example, in the event that the plant producing vital electronics in China shuts down, it will impact the supply chain. An opportunity to avoid that threat would be identifying another country where the vital electronics could be produced in order to reduce supply chain disruptions.

As we’ve learned, the importance of communicating the risk identified by the enterprise risk management process needs to be shared with business units to achieve strategic alignment and empower teams to achieve strategic objectives.

As a project professional, how do you interact with the strategic team within your organization to learn about enterprise risk?

By Mario Trentim

In a previous article, I discussed the COVID-19 crisis from a risk management point of view. As PMOs around the globe work through the pandemic, unexpected challenges continue to arise. Countries are implementing several restrictions, as extreme times call for extreme measures to contain the disease.

It is expected that many teams will be working remotely for at least four to eight weeks. In a push to stay connected while working remote, PMOs are relying on communication and collaboration tools. But is it enough?

Working from Home Is Different Now

Although many organizations are accustomed to flexible and remote work, this marks the first time that we have seen virtual teams operating on a global scale. And we’re not talking about the traditional home offices we once knew. Project professionals are quarantined, which means they are working with their spouses and kids nearby—and sometimes even babysitters, nannies and home maintenance staff are part of that equation. Keep in mind that your team members are very concerned and stressed at this time. And while they may be out of the office, they are part of a completely different team at home, which comes with its own set of challenges and needs.

In a meeting with my team this week, I level set with them. I don’t expect my team to put in exactly eight hours each day. It is okay if their kids show up during conference calls and meetings, and they can set an unavailable status in case they need to take care of personal or family duties. Cultivating a great team spirit and reinforcing an environment of accountability strengthens team morale.

Operations and Projects Must Go On

If we all stop working, companies may not survive. In fact, a number of companies have already shuttered their doors for good ahead of the pandemic’s peak. Everyone is forecasting difficult times ahead. And it is our duty as directors and managers to make rational decisions and to plan diligently for the future. That said, what happens to our projects?

From a portfolio management perspective, we are going through deep reevaluation due to major strategic changes. Projects were canceled or paused and investments were postponed. But we also have incoming and extremely urgent projects.

Organizations implemented their business contingency plans, and many resulted in additional projects. It could be a project related to supply chain and vendors, IT systems to enable remote work or new product development, among other initiatives. As the crisis looms, these projects become even more urgent.

Be Realistic When Planning for New Projects

As we plan for these urgent new projects, we must be very careful. We must take into consideration high risk and uncertainty and pay attention to the estimates.

Remember that people are not only working remotely (which is already a challenge for some organizations), people are quarantined. I advise you to develop a solid plan based on requirements and deliverables prioritization, understanding you might have to adjust planning to overcome bumps along the way.

Estimates and buffers are crucial. Something that takes two weeks to get done when we are collocated might take more time virtually. Therefore, during this period of quarantine, plan for more execution time.

Capacity Planning and Resource Utilization Are Crucial

During this crisis, capacity planning and resource utilization are extremely important. Imagine your team as traffic on a highway: When traffic is high, a minor crash might severely impact traffic flow. Now imagine all the people are distracted and in a hurry at the same time. You might end up with multiple minor crashes that add up to total failure in delivering the urgent project you need right now to overcome the coronavirus crisis.

In order to be successful, PMOs and project managers are tracking resource utilization with more details during the pandemic. Here’s what you can do:

1. Determine capacity of resources available
   1. Calculate the number of people available to do project work, taking into consideration qualifications and skills (categorization).
2. Determine hours of availability
   1. Convert the number of people into working hours and derive a true representation of availability. For example, let’s say you have:
      1. 10 Engineers part time (50%) = 800h/month
      2. 20 Technicians part time (50%) = 800h/month
      3. 50 Developers full time = 1,600h/month
3. Set utilization targets
   1. Calculate utilization targets for all project resources below 80 percent as a best practice. Use that data to limit the number of active projects. While resources working below the target may seem inefficient, resources working above that target are likely to introduce costly delays and errors into the projects.
4. Limit or modify the queue
   1. After conducting careful planning and estimates for every project, you are good to go with the authorization if there are resources available. Monitor and balance the portfolio as needed.

The aforementioned steps aren’t some big secret. They are more sensitive now. Unfortunately, some organizations are responding to the crisis with too many uncoordinated initiatives that will result in more harm than good. If we want to overcome the project impact of COVID-19, it is time to conduct:

• Realistic planning
• Diligent prioritization
• Careful resource management
• Frequent monitoring, controlling and balancing

To conclude, do not forget that your team members are quarantined. It’s not business as usual. That means lower productivity and some availability obstacles.

How is your PMO navigating the COVID-19 crisis?

By Lynda Bourne

Last November, my partner and I spent a lovely day in the country attending the Dunkeld Cup at Mt. Abrupt in Victoria, Australia. The location is very picturesque, and we had a thoroughly enjoyable day. To add to the pleasures of wining and dining, my partner developed a “foolproof method” that allowed him to pick five winners and a placegetter (among the top three) out of seven races with a total of eight bets.

So, should he give up his day job to exploit this newly discovered skill?

The Dunkeld Racecourse with The Grampians Mountains behind.

The horses he chose were not random picks: My partner used a selection method based on a guide that rated horses on their form from 0 to 100. Using a portfolio management approach, he first recognized that the difference between a 97 or 98 rating and a rating of 100 was too small to matter. Every assessment process has a range of error, and a difference of 2 to 3 percent is likely to be well within this range. This approach reduced the panel of potential winners to three or four horses in each race.

The second step in the selection process was to look at the variables. The form guide is printed well before race day, and it had recently rained. A soft track would benefit horses carrying a lighter weight. So out of the prospective panel, we placed our bets on the horse with the lowest weight.

Voilà! Six winners in seven races—a winning formula that would allow us to retire from managing projects and make our fortunes as professional punters … But not so fast.

The probability of repeating a six out of seven winning ratio in the future is very low. How much of our big day boiled down to effective process—and how much was pure dumb luck? That is a risk management question.

Step One: Consider the Probability: The first consideration is how likely was it that someone would pick six out of seven winners? There were several thousand people at the race, and it is highly probable, simply based on random chance, that someone would have a “winning streak” and back six winners using their own system. On this basis, there is a several-thousand-to-one chance of a repeat outcome. Someone will have a similar winning streak in 2020, but probably not us. There is a strong tendency for winners to ascribe the results of random chance to their skill. But pragmatic managers look deeper.

Step Two: Assess All Available Data (Not Just the Highlights): We placed eight bets: Five came in first, one finished third and the other two were placed sixth and seventh, respectively. All we can say for sure is we were likely to select horses that would finish between seventh and first. But as there can only be one winner and two placegetters, horses finishing fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh mean a lost bet. The median position is 3.5—which also means a lost bet. The mean is 2.6, so we may have been slightly in front, but “place bets” do not pay much. Adding in the range options, no horse can do better than first place, but there are many more places between seventh and last. Factor this in, and the margin of success in our small sample becomes doubtful.

So, what are the lessons learned from our day in the country? My take is that good processes help build success—but you should not confuse luck with skill. When Napoleon Bonaparte was criticized for winning battles simply because of luck, he famously retorted: “I’d rather have lucky generals than good ones.” I think we were just lucky.

We may well return to the Dunkeld Cup in 2020. It’s a great day out, and more data is needed to round out this research. In the meantime, applying simple probability analysis to my partner’s winning methodology suggests he needs to keep his day job. That’s a safe bet.