PM with no Team, resources belong to other management
John ScottProject Manager| World SynergyWarren, Oh, United States
Good Day everyone,
I am having some struggles with Managing projects that I do not have direct access with the resources completing the task. and Lack of communication for things being done and not being done
Sergio Luis ConteHelping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based OrganizationsBuenos Aires, Argentina
I´d like to comment on that but my question is: are you talking about the project team belongs to a contractor and you are in the customer side then you need to obtain information?.
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1 reply by John Scott
Jan 23, 2020 11:35 AM
John Scott
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this is in house to a company, there is 3 separate departments. all the resources that work on projects work in the departments an the projects are for clients of those departments.
Saving Changes...
John ScottProject Manager| World SynergyWarren, Oh, United States
Jan 23, 2020 11:31 AM
Replying to Sergio Luis Conte
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I´d like to comment on that but my question is: are you talking about the project team belongs to a contractor and you are in the customer side then you need to obtain information?.
this is in house to a company, there is 3 separate departments. all the resources that work on projects work in the departments an the projects are for clients of those departments. Saving Changes...
Sound like a very rigid organization. I would look at what are my role and responsibility according to the company, your mandate. Are you able to achieve them in the current context? if not use that to open discussion with your sponsor. Saving Changes...
Sergio Luis ConteHelping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based OrganizationsBuenos Aires, Argentina
Then you need to manage a group of people that belongs to separate departments to integrate them into a project. If I understood then is the same I am facing each day of my life. I do not have a special team for doing projects. That´s could be into a projectized organization as the PMI call it but not in other type of organizations. My challenge is to make the people work in the project while I do not have formal authority on them and they are making lot of other things each day where most of those things are directly related to their performance management evaluation and their boss performance management evaluation. Saving Changes...
Thomas WalentaGlobal Project Economy ExpertHackenheim, Germany
Sounds like a weak matrix where the power of the PM is very limited. The responsibility assigned should align with the power, otherwise it is an unfair and probably doomed appointment and I would talk about this with the sponsor.
- You could try to invite the 3 department managers to the/a steering committee and there agree about ways of working (assignment of resources, reporting by resources, escalation path). Measure compliance with this agreement. Understand their stance toward your project (1:1 talks).
- try to borrow power from the sponsor or other executives. Someone should want your project succeed and may be able to support you.
- you may be not the only one in your company with this problem, talk to others how they handle this situation
- try to build a core team from the 3 departments, e.g. one from each. With EI you may be able to convince them of your project and change their motivation to support. Saving Changes...
Stéphane ParentSelf Employed / Semi-retired| Leader MakerPrince Edward Island, Canada
You have to treat each department as a managed work supplier. Establish a "contract" that identifies scope, schedule, and costs. Let them manage the work but ask them for regular updates. I'm dealing with about five or so such departments in my project. Every month, I ask them to update their milestones. I tell them if they don't provide an update, I will report no progress from them. That usually gets something back from them! Saving Changes...
In large organizations for small and medium size projects this is what is usually happening. Each functional department deals with many projects at a time and each employee from each department may work on more than one project at a time.
In these environments in this kind of projects many times the PMs don't even get to know who is working on the projects and the team members don't even get to know who is managing the projects they are working on.
If the project is carried out by a single department and the functional manager is also the sponsor then the PM is doing just some project administration and ensures that the organizations project standards are followed. The responsibility lies with the functional manager.
If more departments are involved the PM acts as a coordinator between them but even in this case he may deal just with management and many times may never get to actually talk to the project's team members.
There is not much you can do to change this as this is how the organization works and for small and medium size projects this is probably the best option. You have to learn to deal with it and try to do the best out of it. Organizations expect the PM to be able to deal with this kind of situations and get the people to work together and achieve results. You can't do more than imporoving your influencing skills and use them. Saving Changes...
Deepesh RammoorthyICT Project Manager ( PMP®AgilePM®Certified ScrumMaster® (CSM®))| Australian Red Cross Blood ServiceTarneit, Vic, Australia
Senior Projects Manager | Field & Marten AssociatesNew Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
John
Our colleagues here provided great feedback so here are my comments, nothing much for me to add:
Thomas: Spot on feedback and solid recommendations, totally agree.
Adrian:I hear you but I think it has to do more with the organizational structure more than the size.
RK
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1 reply by Adrian Carlogea
Jan 25, 2020 8:47 AM
Adrian Carlogea
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Hi Rami,
I think the size of the project does play a role. I have seen functional departments in which a large share if not most of the work was performed as projects. These projects were relatively small taking a few months to complete and not requiring a lot of people or huge budgets. The members of the functional departments were working simultaneously on two or more projects.
In the above scenario I think it is very inefficient to have dedicated project teams for each project and each team member to be dedicated to a single project. You would need much more staff for this to happen and also a lot of team members would be doing nothing for days and days.Sharing the resources between projects would be very hard.
In my opinion the best way to execute these projects is by using the functional organization. I have seen some organizations creating functional projects teams inside the functional department. For example one company has divided its Windows team in two teams: Windows Operations and Windows Projects. A functional projects team deals with many projects at a time and is under the control of the functional manager.
Dedicated projects teams are efficient only in major projects in which you need team members for long periods of time and you can fill their work time.
So I think the size of the projects does play a role in choosing the type of organization. In practice a hybrid is being used according to the type of work. But even in large projects with dedicated teams usually the team members, if they are permanent employees, belong to other management and don't report to the PM.
So as the PM you must be able to handle projects when the team members don't directly report to you. This is probably the most frequent case.
Saving Changes...
Deepesh RammoorthyICT Project Manager ( PMP®AgilePM®Certified ScrumMaster® (CSM®))| Australian Red Cross Blood ServiceTarneit, Vic, Australia
PM Is not a scapegoat and a catch all . They are human beings that live and breathe like anyone else .
They have a voice . They need to speak up and ruffle the feathers or cut their losses and move on .
I would suggest speaking up in this instance, getting stakeholders together or Speaking to your sponsor like Thomas suggested . You have impediments and you have to deliver the work that you are hired to do. So rattle the cages as much as you can.
If all attempts fail , update your resume because Project Management is too valuable a skill to waste in a Weak matrix.
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1 reply by John Scott
Jan 24, 2020 6:20 AM
John Scott
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I ensure you that my Resume is always kept to date. Never know when the next great opportunity arises.
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