As is generally noted, project teams are engaged in the project to meet its objective. However at times, for reasons not in control of the project team, projects fail. How should a Project Manager convey this to his team? What should he be mindful of? How should he ensure he retains the trust of the team? Saving Changes...
Sergio Luis ConteHelping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based OrganizationsBuenos Aires, Argentina
Dec 23, 2018 11:18 PM
Replying to Keith Novak
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We do agree. I think I misinterpreted one of your previous statements and your explanation helped. I have found it very easy for people to find themselves in violent agreement, when they mean the same thing but use language in different ways.
I also hope you understand that when I challenge your opinion on a subject, it is from respect as another professional. There is a lot to be learned when we challenge accepted 'truths'.
Keith, believe me, I spend my extra time in two places only: here and linkedin. The reason is to interact with people because it helps me a lot to learn and improve myself. So, I do not take your comment or comment from @Adrian above as something without respect. In fact, I always make a comment into those discussion I found interesting. About the point, I am an open person but there are two or three things I firmly believe and sustain. One of them is: the only reason to hire a project manager is because she/he will stay in control of the whole project. Is the same than when you travel in a car or you fly in an airplane and you are not the driver. People that becomes nervous in those situation is because they feel the driver is not in control. Saving Changes...
I feel that the Sprint Retrospective Meeting (one of the ceremonies to be conducted if a Project Management Team use the SCRUM methodology) is a better way to communicate project failures.
In a Sprint Retro meeting, the following points will be discussed:
1. What went well.
2. What did not go well as expected (here the failure points can be discussed) and
3. What can be done to avoid failures in the future and improve the process.
The Sprint Retro meeting is usually conducted for almost 3-4 hours to capture the lessons learnt and do some brain storming on process improvement. Saving Changes...
Exit gate meetings and lessons learned documents at every phase closure could be the best ways to convey progress and remedies of the project.
Be diplomatic (may be not to call out names in group) but need to provide enough information about project failure to the team (as everyone is stakeholder and responsible for project objectives) and disappointment about project failure should be conveyed. Saving Changes...
Drew CraigSr. Agile & Product Coach| VanguardPhiladelphia, Pa, United States
Active transparency is essential during the project. So in this regard, surprises are naturally restricted. It is important to keep open communication with your team regardless. In this case, struggles are known, possible strategic changes are known, etc. On the flip side, openly discussing the team's progress and value from an output, team, and client perspective keeps all in the loop. If the project is canceled or 'fails' for whatever reason, would not be a complete surprise.
tl;dr - openness and honesty is the way. Saving Changes...
Totally disagree. Project manager always is in control. How? Control means risk and issue management and to escalate when is needed. Control is to use indicators to evaluate the actual and to predict the future if current conditions persists (EVM for example). Control means to prevent instead of to cure. I leaded software/IT project by more than 20 years too. Is not theory. Is practice. But to put theory in practice demands knowledge and attitude.
Are you sure that control means predicting the future? I though control means giving commands to humans or objects in order to reach a goal. The commands should in principle be dependent on the current state of the controlled system.
At University I studied Control Engineering, I was not good at learning it but the main principles are simple and I think a parallel can be made with controlling a project.
In Control Engineering you have a system that has an output and a reference which is the desired output. In a closed loop controlled system a sensor is reading the output, the output is compared with the reference and base on the error and the model of the system a controller generates a command to an execution element in order make the output as close as possible to the reference.
The reference can be seen as the project goal, the current output as the project status and the controller as the project team and sponsor.
Most PMs read the output (get the project status) compare it with the goal but don't act as controllers and as such they don't take the decisions needed to reach the goal. Most PMs present to the sponsor and team the "error" that is the difference between the current status and the goal but don't get to give the command needed for completing the project. As such most PMs don't really control the project but they just act as a component of the overall control system.
In control engineering you also have to deal with external disturbances which can affect the control the same is in projects where you can be affected by external events which are not on your control. Saving Changes...
Emotional intelligence is critical in these situations. A business reorganization or legislation change can make a project no longer viable and despite no fault of the team, the people on that team will soon need a new job.
Sudden change is difficult on employees in may ways. When you are communicating to the team that the project will be terminated, you must acknowledge that this may be extremely disruptive to some people on your team.
Keith, I agree with you. Many a geo-political projects are not needed abruptly and communication is challenging here. Saving Changes...
Deepa, It is always difficult to communicate the failures. The project delivery is a progressive activity and I am sure you must be highlighing the status in your weekly status reports. Hence It would not be anyways comes as a surprise to Team Members.
The question remains is offically declaring it to the team members. Best way is to call Full Team Meeting and break the news but make sure that you have to take your seniotrs in the confidence.
Ashutosh, I agree that the WSMs are forums to plan communication. Saving Changes...
Thank you and agree with you. Yet at times, much as the PM tries to salvage the situation, it is out of his sphere of control and that is when the difficulty arises.
Thanks Sergio for your detailed thoughts. Saving Changes...
If a project fail for reasons not in control of the project team then this is a project manager failure. It does mean that there was not communication with business analyst/business relationship manager which is accountable for the whole solution where the project is the mean to generate the solution.
Keith, I agree with you on the need where some projects end abruptly or the need of the project is removed abruptly and in my experience, geo-political and technology change influences are in majority for such issues. Appreciate your citing of the instances.
