"Knowing your Sponsor" - Questions for "Understanding your working relationship"

Communications Management Leadership PMO

Markus Kopko AI Enabler for Project & Program Mgmt | Founder PMotion.ai / The PM AI Coach| PMotion.ai Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

Hello,

i am referring to the already existing discussion here:

http://www.projectmanagement.com/discussio...roject-Sponsor-

I have to ask a bunch of questions and to have more transparency and a better overview for your participation i will divide them in several postings.

What is this about?
In short: It is about what questions to ask your sponsor as a project manger in your very first meeting to set a baseline during initiation phase.

In long: please refer to the before mentioned thread fur detailed information.

Here are the questions about "Understanding your working relationship":

==========================================

Understanding Your Working Relationship

How do you (the sponsor!) view your role in regards to:
Decision making?

Funding?

Staffing?

Conflicts/Problems

Who else may be used?

How do you view my role in this project?

What reporting information is important to you?

Who will be responsible for deciding whether the project goes ahead or not after the initial investigations?

How should the escalation process looks like from your point of view?

For now a base line is established; it is all going to change anyway. As the project evolves and decisions have to be made, we need to agree on a protocol for on-going communication throughout the project: ...

=============================================

Please review them and leave your comment, correction, enhancement or addition. Any feedback is highly welcome!

And please lookout for the other sections also; thank you very much in advance.

Every participant will receive the result of this initiative if wanted.

Regards,

Markus

Posted: Nov 21, 2016 9:45 AM

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Thilo Wack Head of Existing Product and Test Lab| optimed Tholey-Hasborn, Germany

Regarding communication I would add the following questions:
"What should be the reporting frequency for the different types of information, like meeting minutes, status reports etc.? How should I make the information best available to you? How can I reach you in an emergency?"

Posted: Dec 6, 2016 3:13 PM

Markus Kopko AI Enabler for Project & Program Mgmt | Founder PMotion.ai / The PM AI Coach| PMotion.ai Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

Dec 06, 2016 3:08 PM

Replying to Thilo Wack

...

Though it is implicit to the escalation process I would explicitly ask about the decision making process and how much latitude/leeway the team and/or the project lead has (what the PRINCE2 guys probably would call tolerances):
"How do you want to handle project decisions? Where is the limit of what I/the team can decide on our own? Do I need to involve other people than you and if so, whom and in what cases? What issues would be so important for you that you need to know them immediately?"

Hi Thilo,

wow, THAT was exactly what i am talking about and what i have wished for. Thank you so much for this great additional inputs (also in your second posting!).
I have already added your questions to the map as additional questions for the project manager just to become more precisely with the feedback of the sponsor. It will be included in the next release/version.

Like i wrote in the "Tips" to the map (there is a description how to handle the map and how to work with included) the project manager should act like a "journalist" in this meeting/interview. The goal is to gather as much information as he can ... and your suggestions are exactly what is needed for the project manager to do so.

So, again thank you very much. It would be great to get more of this kind of feedback ... ;)

Regards,

Markus

Posted: Dec 7, 2016 5:13 AM

Thilo Wack Head of Existing Product and Test Lab| optimed Tholey-Hasborn, Germany

Hi Markus, I'm happy that you found it useful. It'll take some time to go through all topics in the map, but I guess I now know what I'll do this weekend ;-) Thank you for this outstanding initiative.

Best,
Thilo

Posted: Dec 7, 2016 1:28 PM

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