ello Everyone.. I was wondering if anyone new of a good white paper or case study that addresses comminications in project management. I would greatly appreciate any help on this matter... thanx... Saving Changes...
Or perhaps you can narrow down your request.
Communications to who? About what?
To upper management about status?
To stakeholders about status? about project product impacts? Saving Changes...
Rob MartinConsulting (Contract)| Microsoft (Thailand)Lam Luk Ka, Pathum Thani, Thailand
Communications are a critical part of any Project Implementation. The other respondents are quite right in asking for more information, as the breadth and depth of this subject could take up many many reams of paper.
The first thing to do of course is a communication plan. Figuring out who you want to commmunicate with, what you want to communicate and how often. A Simple plan like this can then go off in many directions both detailed and summary to give you and your stakeholders and management an excellent view of what you will say, to who and when. Getting this signed off by your sponsor is a major step forward.
Without decent communications, you will almost always fail, as there will be someone who cries "foul" before the end of the project, or as you implement.
Check around, there are some great resources as Dave said.
Even without extra information, I would recommend a non-PM organization that has helped me tremendously with my communication:
Toastmasters International (www.toastmasters.org)
It is a volunteer-based group, over 250,000 members, organized into clubs of around 20 people, where you get to practice public speaking, running meetings, recruiting, and leadership. You learn by doing, and there are volunteers to help you learn and grow.
The only area it does not address in detail is written communication skills. I strongly recommend a good business writing course, a form/report design class, or another type of training that will help you improve your written-word skills as well as your report-design skills.
I see project managers spend much more time communicating verbally than in writing, so I always recommend Toastmasters first. Also, I believe many people are stronger writers than speakers, and Toastmasters will help even out those skills. Saving Changes...
Bill DowPMO Director| University of WARenton, Wa, United States
Hi everyone, I am happy to announce that I just finished writing and publishing a book on communications in Project Management.
Come see my site and you can find the book on Amazon.
Regarding how important project communications is on a typical project, I would say it is the most important aspect of managing a project. If you read last's July's PMI Network, they had a survey saying # 1 reasons projects fail is lack of project communications.
Warwick KowalczykEngineering Manager| Scentre GroupNorth Ryde, Nsw, Australia
I spose comms can be looked at in terms of formal and informal / ad hoc.
Dave Garrett is right, on the formal side you'll find a lot of good resources on this site by searching.
But a method for the informal? Everyone has a different way of approaching this. My method is to ask myself, anytime there is a milestone achieved, action required, issue raised, "Who needs to know about this? Who do I inform?" In my brief experience as a PM I can say if you make it your method to keep all stakeholders informed and up to date, you're well on the way to mastering communications in projects.
I'd also second Alex Brown's advice on Toastmasters. This will be a great help to you for your presentations and meetings. Saving Changes...
we have a white paper called "How to Start and Finish a 'No-Fail' Project: Part II - Improving Team Communication" on our web-site:
http://www.easyprojects.net/whitepapers.asp Saving Changes...
PMI Team Member
