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Common Mistakes That Project Manager Needs To Avoid?

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Igor Zdorovyak Director of Projects| Immunovant Fair Lawn, Nj, United States
Common Mistakes That Project Manager Need To Avoid That Even a Senior Manager Can Learn From – What Order To Place Attendees On An Invite?

As a Project Manager or Business Manager or a Process Manager. Sending an invites is part of the role. It’s a no brainer. It’s not even listed in the job description.
Sending an invite to attendees. What could be so complicated?
Well.
Alphabetic order seems to be reasonable. Until a high level stakeholder complains to your manager of why he was placed after someone else with lower title.
Sending an invite based on the highest title order. That seems a good way. Until you have to figure out who to enter first if there is more than one person with the same title. Do you place the name based on alphabetical order or on the years in service?
How about - you discovered that the Senior SME is not returning your calls because he/she was offended when you placed his/her name at the end of the invite list. When he/she was always been placed first.
Don’t forget about your boss. When the performance review time comes and you get a below stellar evaluation. Remembering that you might have entered him/her not in proper order on an invite would be a little too late.
As a Project Manager it is your job to communicate with your boss and other stakeholders to get a feel of what order the attendees need to be placed on an invite.

Do you have a common mistake that a Project Managers Makes?
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Kevin Drake Perth, Western Australia, Australia
Hi all,

It is quite obvious that people with different backgrounds have different perception about it.
I like this thread and it supports the unit that I am teaching in university (International Business) in addition to Project Management.

In cross-cultural communication between high and low context people a lack of understanding may preclude reaching a solution, and a conflict can arise.

Low Context, low power distance, informal culture, monochronic and equality driven culture; Americans and Aussies; They do not care and only follow practicality.

High Context, high power distance, formal culture, polychronic and hierarchical (seniority) nature: Pakistan, India etc ; They care and follow seniority in positions.

Both ways are correct in their own cultures. However, in order to avoid ethnocentrism in a global concept, it is advised to use the more (conservative) approach to avoid any issues in communications.
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Suzi MS United Kingdom
May 03, 2018 11:52 PM
Replying to Drake Settsu
...
I have never ever given any thought about the order of invitee names for a meeting. I just select the players in no particular order. I just make sure that I don't miss anyone who should be attending the meeting.

If a person is that hung up on title or rank they need to go back to preschool and grow up.
Absolutely respect your last statement Drake! Yes, agreed completely with you.
Hi Igor, I don’t feel it’s even worth the effort to be blunt it’s just petty, I group this as energy wasters unless it can be shifted to some sort of solar panel to my workplace then its completely a different matter al together :-)
I have came across some people who make it a big fuss, definitely worth to point out, thank you!
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Sergio Luis Conte Helping to create solutions for everyone| Worldwide based Organizations Buenos Aires, Argentina
Just follow a simple rule: if it can be avoided it is not an accident. Follow that rule you will perform as the stakeholder expect you perform as a project manager. No matter that, it could be interesting to debate about what "mistake" meants.
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Stéphane Parent Self Employed / Semi-retired| Leader Maker Prince Edward Island, Canada
I only worry about the order of the distribution list for short lists. The order is always highest to lowest project impact.
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Eduard Hernandez
Community Champion
Product Operations Program Manager Barcelona, Cataluña, Spain
A typical mistake I frequently see is insufficient risk management. Some PMs tend to create a risk log during project initiaiton phase, and then let it "rot". That could also be applied to other logs (e.g. issue log).
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Karl Twort Senior Project Manager| Fresh Egg United Kingdom
I don't consider order at all. In my career, no-one has ever challenged me on a hierarchy in terms of a meeting invite.

Maybe this is a cultural thing, but I would be concerned as to the motive of a member of staff at any level wanting to be higher up a meeting invite list than someone else....
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