ketevan kipshidzeHead of Commercial Operations| Proxylive SolutionsTbilisi, Georgia, Georgia
I was a PM of the project and had a project coordinator, young guy with too much ambition. He had no experience in project management, but was the lower and head of legal department in our organization. He doesn't wanted to follow my orders and we had disagreement very often. what would you advice me in such cases? Saving Changes...
Sergio Luis ConteHelping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based OrganizationsBuenos Aires, Argentina
The first thing is to undersand why is that behavor. Remember the action-reaction principle which it mean you have a responsability in that behavor. Nobody react in a way if an action was not happend. When you understand that then you can work on that using some technique you use when performing stakeholder analysis. If after that the situation persists and because of that the project is impacted then you must remove that person. Saving Changes...
Ketevan - what you have mentioned are 'symptoms' ...not root-cause of the issue. Communication problems do result in lack of trust. As Sergio mentioned understanding member's behavior is key here. Btw, high ambition/motivation can be exploited positively.
A member's attitude to not follow valid orders is major issue. That needs immediate one-on-one meeting. Saving Changes...
Senior Projects Manager | Field & Marten AssociatesNew Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
I totally agree with Ashok, those are symptoms and you need yo get to the root cause of why he is being so.
First of all, people do not like to follow orders, except i nthe army, that is probably too harsh of a statement so maybe follow instructions is smoother. Ive seen so many ambitious new graduates who have their ego high in the sky but as long as they realize that they are actually learning from you, rather than just following orders, they will start adjusting. This is part of the learning curve for any new graduate and/or new employee so with your soft skills, you need to deal with the situation.
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3 replies by Shweta Pai, Wade Harshman, and ketevan kipshidze
Sep 18, 2018 1:52 PM
Shweta Pai
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Totally agree with Rami here! People like to be heard and value that more than we give credit to that quality. That will also help you gain their trust. Use data to resolve your disagreements. When you do that then perhaps he would realize that he would back down. If you have a tech lead in your team, perhaps also bring them in the conversation to support/resolve this. If none of these team-based solutions work out and your team members agree with you, only then escalate it. Perhaps that person may not be a good fit for your team and if your team also feels the same way then you can definitely raise this to your manager.
Sep 18, 2018 2:16 PM
ketevan kipshidze
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Sep 18, 2018 2:51 PM
Wade Harshman
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Even Army leaders are taught (in my country, at least, but I assume in many others) that it's not enough to give orders. You have to give the what and the why- the task and the purpose- so that Soldiers understand the importance of the orders.
Saving Changes...
Allan SamarooProjects SpecialistManhattan, KS, United States
Hi Ketevan - I would recommend that all projects have a document which outlines the roles and responsibilities of each person on the project. This will help to smooth issues in communication.
In your specific scenario I would remind the project coordinator of his role on the project and I would also inform the Project Sponsor because he/she may need to get involved to resolve the issue. Yes, you do need to get the conflict resolved ASAP because it can damage morale and motivation of project teams.
Hope this helps. Saving Changes...
Shweta PaiScrum master| ResMedHalifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
Sep 18, 2018 10:53 AM
Replying to Rami Kaibni
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I totally agree with Ashok, those are symptoms and you need yo get to the root cause of why he is being so.
First of all, people do not like to follow orders, except i nthe army, that is probably too harsh of a statement so maybe follow instructions is smoother. Ive seen so many ambitious new graduates who have their ego high in the sky but as long as they realize that they are actually learning from you, rather than just following orders, they will start adjusting. This is part of the learning curve for any new graduate and/or new employee so with your soft skills, you need to deal with the situation.
Totally agree with Rami here! People like to be heard and value that more than we give credit to that quality. That will also help you gain their trust. Use data to resolve your disagreements. When you do that then perhaps he would realize that he would back down. If you have a tech lead in your team, perhaps also bring them in the conversation to support/resolve this. If none of these team-based solutions work out and your team members agree with you, only then escalate it. Perhaps that person may not be a good fit for your team and if your team also feels the same way then you can definitely raise this to your manager. Saving Changes...
ketevan kipshidzeHead of Commercial Operations| Proxylive SolutionsTbilisi, Georgia, Georgia
Sep 18, 2018 10:53 AM
Replying to Rami Kaibni
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I totally agree with Ashok, those are symptoms and you need yo get to the root cause of why he is being so.
First of all, people do not like to follow orders, except i nthe army, that is probably too harsh of a statement so maybe follow instructions is smoother. Ive seen so many ambitious new graduates who have their ego high in the sky but as long as they realize that they are actually learning from you, rather than just following orders, they will start adjusting. This is part of the learning curve for any new graduate and/or new employee so with your soft skills, you need to deal with the situation.
Saving Changes...
ketevan kipshidzeHead of Commercial Operations| Proxylive SolutionsTbilisi, Georgia, Georgia
thank you very much, I will take into account this great advice. thank you for your time to find for my post's comments, I appreciate it very much.
Senior Projects Manager | Field & Marten AssociatesNew Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
Sep 18, 2018 2:37 PM
Replying to ketevan kipshidze
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thank you very much, I will take into account this great advice. thank you for your time to find for my post's comments, I appreciate it very much.
You are very welcome Ketevan and Good Luck Saving Changes...
Wade HarshmanScrum Master| GDITIndianapolis, In, United States
Sep 18, 2018 10:53 AM
Replying to Rami Kaibni
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I totally agree with Ashok, those are symptoms and you need yo get to the root cause of why he is being so.
First of all, people do not like to follow orders, except i nthe army, that is probably too harsh of a statement so maybe follow instructions is smoother. Ive seen so many ambitious new graduates who have their ego high in the sky but as long as they realize that they are actually learning from you, rather than just following orders, they will start adjusting. This is part of the learning curve for any new graduate and/or new employee so with your soft skills, you need to deal with the situation.
Even Army leaders are taught (in my country, at least, but I assume in many others) that it's not enough to give orders. You have to give the what and the why- the task and the purpose- so that Soldiers understand the importance of the orders. Saving Changes...
Agree with Ashok that after identifying the 'symptoms', need to conduct one-on-one meeting with the coordinator to analyze the root-cause(s) of the issue. Understand the project coordinator's perspectives and evaluate any positive inputs. Then explain to him why need to follow instructions and the negative impacts of not following. After ironing out the perspectives and understand each other, evaluate any avenues to collaborate and resolve the issue. Explain to him that the project is about teamwork and how each member's contributions will affect the project outcome, company's goals, as well as his/her own credibility. Hence, everyone to perform their roles and responsibilities.
Matrix structures are organization structures that blend departmental employees, duties and resources together on a common project. The project manager shares responsibility with the functional managers for assigning tasks and directing instructions to project members Depending on number of projects a team member is participating in, he/she may have to report to multiple project managers as well as to his/functional manager. Thus, also can take into consideration of the types of Project Matrix Structure.
1) Weak Matrix structure maps closely to functional structures. The project team may come from different departments, but the project manager reports directly to a specific functional manager. Hence, project managers in weak matrix organizations have limited authority and may be managing a part-time project team and have limited authority.
2) Balanced Matrix structure is similar to a Weak Matrix, but the project manager has more time and power in the project. It still has time-accountability issues for all team members, because their functional managers will want reports on their time within the project. Project Managers in a balanced matrix typically have a full-time role as project manager with reasonable authority.
3) Strong Matrix structure means strong project manager. Many of the same attributes for the project team exists, but the project manager gains power when it comes to project work. The project manager has a reasonable-to-high level of power.
4) Projectized Structure is the pinnacle of project management structures. This structure groups employees, collocated or not, by tasks of a particular project. Project managers typically have complete or very close to complete power over the project team. Hence, they have the highest level of autonomy of managing project when compared to other structures. At the same time, they also have a higher level of responsibility regarding the project's success. They typically work full-time on the project with the team.
These are purely theoretical models in reality most companies don't perfectly fit to any of these models.
The general rule is that each employee has only one line manager, and this line manager is the only person that can give orders to that employee. Sometimes the line manager of the line manager and upper line mangers can also give orders to employees but this rarely happens.
PMs are not line managers so they can't give orders. But anyway even those that have formal authority rarely give orders to their direct reports, the era of giving orders has started to disappear from the business world and can only be seen in armed forces.
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