Month: August 2011

Linky

5 Essential Practices for Explaining Projects to Stakeholder

By Guest Author: Jo Ann Sweeney

Are you frustrated you’re no longer getting the support from stakeholders that you need for your project to succeed? And you have difficulty in explaining your projects properly?

Perhaps you have hit resistance to the changes. Maybe you are working on a multi-site, multi-country or long-term project and, midway through, you’re struggling to keep key people interested and involved.

The fact is, keeping sponsors, senior executives and end users involved for the duration of our projects takes effort – experience also helps!

Over many years as a communications consultant working on complex and multi-site projects, no matter the size of your team or budget, I have learnt key lessons in winning stakeholder support.

Here are 5 essential practices for explaining projects:

1.      Simple and practical

When it comes to planning the communication aspects of any project, the simpler the plan, the more effective it is. It can be as simple as a bulleted list of things to do and key messages we wish to get across.

However, more useful is a communication framework that clarifies:

  • The objectives for communications activities
  • A prioritised list of key audiences
  • Which communications channels to use
  • A calendar of activities
  • Monitoring mechanisms
  • Who is responsible for delivery.

One of the biggest benefits of a simple structure is that we spend less time planning and have more time for managing each of the activities.

2.      Understand their perspectives

Project communication is about more than project updates. People want to be personally involved; they want content that relates to them and that they can relate to. This means tailoring content to their needs rather than presenting it from the project team’s perspective.

Here are some guidelines to tailor the content:

  • Understand who they are –  the obvious plus what they think and feel
  • Uncover what they are interested in – usually what their performance pay is based on
  • Relate to their view of the world – are they thinkers, people-focused, or action-oriented
  • Identify shadow issues – unacknowledged attitudes and behaviours that impact their support
  • Balance their needs – sponsors, senior execs and end users have different needs.

3.      Clear aims

There are four over-arching reasons for telling people about your project:

  • Knowledge – you want them to know more than they currently do
  • Attitude – you want them to feel more positive than they do
  • Support – you want them to say positive things about your project in public
  • Involvement – you want them to get involved in some way.

These reasons form a spectrum with ‘knows nothing’ at one end and ‘fully involved’ at the other. If you want an individual or audience grouping to be fully involved then you will need to move them along the spectrum using communication activities that build on each other.

Using this spectrum we turn communications activities into a stepped process based on business objectives. It ensures activities are linked to business need and the project’s core aims.

4.      Flexible schedule of activities

When we use a flexible schedule to manage communication activities we are able to respond to unexpected issues and to changes we aren’t able to predict.

A schedule is just a framework to show clearly what is going to happen and when; it can be complex and difficult to update or flexible and easy to change.

Being flexible means we can change any of the components – deadlines, audiences, delivery channels, responsibilities, monitoring – as and when we want without causing extra work or problems in other work streams.

5.      Take audiences on a journey

Communicating projects is all about taking our audiences on a journey from where they are now to where we want them to be.

We plot where each of our audiences is now in terms of familiarity and favourability; and where we want them to be. Then we map a journey that will help them to get there.

By following these essentials on your projects, you will win stakeholder support that will help your project to succeed.

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Jo Ann Sweeney is a communications consultant and mentor who helps project managers win the support of their sponsors, senior executives and end users.

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Three Steps towards Planning Excellence in Project Management

gold star awardThe purpose of this post is to share with you a balanced approach to project planning. Recently I finished a big project in the Government sector which was awarded a gold rating for project excellence. It was successful above all expectations and I thought it worthwhile to share some valuable lessons learned around planning excellence and what has worked well to make the project so successful.

Above and beyond doing the standard project planning activities, there are three steps you can take towards planning excellence:

1. Continuous planning (always be planning)

After scope agreement and sign-off, the project schedule needs to be developed, or if it existed from a pre-sales phase, it needs to be refined.

What the team members need to know about the project plan, and more specifically about the project schedule, is: ‘what they are responsible for and by when’. In order to gain commitment, I normally expect the team lead to verify the activities, durations and dependencies and by doing this, to take ownership of the deliverables of the project.

Then as the project progresses, the project manager always needs to be looking one to two months ahead. Always be planning and continuously track against the plan or update where required based on Change Requests or risk mitigation activities.

2. Consistent communication practices (always be communicating)

Through experience I have found that weekly project meetings work best for any size project that is longer than 2 months in duration. The normal progress items need to be discussed, including:

  • Progress made
  • Actions outstanding
  • What is due in the next week or two
  • Risks, issues or dependencies
  • Other matters relevant to the specific project

Regular team meetings, whether in person, or virtually, keep the project team informed and committed to the outcome of the project. It also enables the project manager to receive adequate feedback on a regular basis and to do proper progress reporting to stakeholders.

3. Team alignment is important (always build relationships)

Due to the fact that the project team was widely dispersed and from different companies (partners were sub-contracted in to assist with the work), a good on-boarding process is important. Every team member needs to be clear about the Goal and objectives of the project, as well as the expected outcome and business benefits. In addition to this they need to be clear on their roles and responsibilities, the project schedule and how every member fits into the team.

Team synergy, cooperation and trust is achieved through regular team builds at the project beginning, after major milestones and at closure with the key stakeholders (like the customer). A team working together as one team, no matter whether from different companies or in different locations, the project manager needs to maintain good relationships and manage the person and not only the task.

The gold nuggets to take away are:

  • Continuous planning
  • Consistent communication practices
  • Team alignment
  • Good relationships with all team members, because you manage the person, performing the task and not the task itself

For a balanced approach to project planning I recommend that you as the project manager should use your project management skills (technical skills), but at the same time be a leader who facilitates  team members to share your responsibility to ensure a successful project outcome (people skills).

On 9 August 2011, I will be a guest presenter on a Webinar from Roeder Consulting called:

“Plans are worthless, but planning is everything”

Please click on the link to register for the free Webinar, and earn a PDU for attendance.