Hi Vivek,
I strongly agree with the wise advice provided by Mssrs. Sanders and Jordan. However, I do feel there are select instances when milestones should "not" be conveyed consistently to all the team members. And, I see your question having two parts and three dimensions:
- Part I , should milestones be conveyed to all the team members..?
- Part II , should milestones be consistently conveyed to all team members..?
- Dimension I, what kind of projects - IT, Non-IT, Human Resources (RIF)..?
- Dimension II, what kind of teams - internal, vendor, contractor, outsourcer..?
- Dimension III, what kinds of milestones..?
For most projects, the answer to the above two questions is likely to be "yes" for the excellent rationale offered by Mssrs. Sanders and Jordan. And this is especially the case for normal internal IT kinds of projects where consistent project execution, teamwork, morale, and management of the PMO requires a high performance, transparent, process and metrics oriented culture.
In certain kinds of projects, say an HR RIF project, there may very well be project milestones that would be inappropriate to even discuss with the project team. Let's say you are an HR project manager leading an RIF project as the result of outsourcing your call center. Your RIF project team will likely consist of many members who will no longer be employed after the project. And based upon business needs, management assessment, leadership skills demonstrated by the project team members, some of these team members may be targeted for retention, others may not. And management may, or may not, have flexibility built into the project charter with respect to RIF targets. Hence, only project information and milestones appropriate to discuss with the team can be.
Or you might have a project in which you will be using a external consulting firm for a Phase 0, but you may or may not be committed, or even want, to use them in future phases of the project. Hence, you might prefer to provide visibility into only those project matters and milestones that they have a business need to know. Additionally, you may need to take care to not reveal confidential matters.
Likewise, high risk projects, particularly those that involve external resources, may very well have risk mitigation strategies, risk goals, and risk review milestones with the leadership team, above and beyond contractual items, of which some or all of these matters would be inappropriate to reveal to the performing project team members.
The key points of course are the nature of the milestone and to a large extent the nature of the project. As project manager, you must clearly communicate the project to the project team members and project team members must know those things that they have a project need to know. In some instances, however, you might need to follow the cautionary advice of the Navy, "Loose lips, sink ships..!"
