A little while back, we wrote about the keys to improving employee performance. The issue of performance was discussed from the manager’s viewpoint.  Managers often have a lot to do with their employees’ performance, or so conventional wisdom goes. They’re responsible for motivating their employees to turn out quality and perform at their best, as well as for organizing, training, and so forth.

However, motivation is a “soft” skill that many managers just don’t come equipped with. Some have never been instructed at length on the topic of motivation, and it’s not a skill one easily picks up on their own.  Therefore, many employees need to motivate themselves from within. If not, they lose interest and momentum.

So how do you, as the employee, take the initiative when your manager is unable to provide it?

1. If your manager does not provide you the “what, when, and why”…ask! Valuable project time is lost when employees don’t have a clear sense of purpose or direction.

Ask your manager for an example of what the finished product should look like. What are the project objectives? Are they SMART objectives? What are the milestones? Do you understand what’s expected of you?

2. Continually ask for your manager’s feedback. Don’t allow your manager to isolate him or herself. The manager may say, “You handle it”, but do they really mean it? Project review should be a required part of every process — in fact, the quality standard, ISO 9001. mandates reviews! Always ask (of yourself and your manager) what can be improved.

3. Be honest about your skills and training. Do you have enough for the job in question? If not, can you get more — or more specific — training? Can anyone mentor you in this area? And does the company have a training plan in mind for you?

4. Assess your resources. Specify what you will need to complete the project. Ask your manager how resources will be allocated and be sure you will be adequately supplied.

5. If a problem (setback) occurs, tell your manager as soon as you have the facts to rationally discuss the case. Present the facts clearly and logically. Present opinions, too, but be sure not to pass them off as facts. Try to offer one or more potential solutions, as well.

6. Be an influential team member. Be part of the team. Don’t hold back on any of your ideas. Each team member must contribute something to the success of any project…otherwise, it’s not really a “team project”, is it?

7. At the end of the project, ask your manager for feedback. There is always room for improvement, so learn from the praise and the criticism and incorporate it in subsequent projects.

You can’t always rely on others to provide you the guidance and incentive you need to be an outstanding performer. Sometimes you have to take the initiative.

So, what do you think? What makes your employees outstanding performers? Is it that they’re strongly self motivated, or that they’re well managed? Or is it something else we didn’t discuss here?

Let us know what’s on your mind.

I recently posed this question to the “Bizmanualz Policies Procedures Network“, or group, on LinkedIn:

“The same teams (Brasil, Italia, España, Deutschland, etc.) are perennially among the top contenders for the FIFA World Cup. Do you think it’s the personnel or the system that makes these teams consistently great?”

I’d like to know what you think, and why. To me, it’s sort of a “Heredity or environment?” question: it isn’t one or the other. I mean, you could have one or the other and you might do well. However, if you have both good personnel and a good system that optimizes their individual skills and experience and blends them…

Look at some of the great individual performers of all time, in team sports – Pelé, Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, and Babe Ruth. As capable as they were, they didn’t reach the zenith of their respective sports until they were surrounded by other capable people and learned to work as a team, using a system. (I wish I could have John Facenda narrate those last two sentences.)

Strangely, we forget how much their coaches — and the systems they designed and implemented — had to do with their successes. Feola, Jackson, Sather, and Huggins — all devised systems that ensured quality and consistency. Management also scouted well and hired not just talented and hard-working player personnel, but those who understood the “team concept” and put the team ahead of individual accomplishments.

The same is true in business, of course. Some of your employees are undoubtedly star performers but until they have a system that coordinates — meshes – their actions with those of other capable people, and until everyone buys into the concept of “team first”, they’re never going to reach their potential. And as a result, neither will your company.

You have to have a management system that fosters quality, consistency, and ongoing improvement to the system and the people using it. And, you have to have the right players.

By the way, I may as well get a plug in for our LinkedIn policies and procedures group. We’re at http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=86367. If you’re not part of our group, or if you haven’t joined LinkedIn yet, consider this your invitation to join us.

I look forward to your comments — here, by email, and on LinkedIn. I’m especially excited when you challenge my “knowledge” or my way of thinking. (Or as they say in my favorite sport, ice hockey, “You wanna go?”)

Let’s get it on!

What is it about us that makes change so hard to accept and even harder to manage? Where does resistance to change come from and what can we do about it?

“There is nothing wrong with change, if it is in the right direction.”
Winston Churchill, 1874-1965

Well, there is no ready solution (especially not in the space of this blog post). The word “change”, in whatever context, has always made people react with varying degrees of fear, frustration, and/or anger (or “FUD”). Yet, change goes on all around us, all the time. Much of change (the expanding waistline,  for instance) happens so slowly and subtly that we don’t notice it until well after it’s taken place.

Some change is thrust upon us. We hear around the office that “change is in the wind” and we feel threatened and anxious.  Let’s say your company has elected to implement a quality management system. Even if the current situation is not good — your customers are letting you know your product quality has slipped by walking away — many of us would still rather have the status quo.  Better the devil we know than the one we don’t…right? (”We just have to make our stuff better…that’s all.”)

The organization has to deal with resistance on a personal and an institutional level. Each is difficult to overcome and, like it or not, both must be dealt with.

Personal Resistance

If I say to you, “We’re going to change the way we do things around here”, what’s your reaction?  You have an emotional reaction, don’t you?  Probably a mixture of shock, anxiety, apprehension, and a few other gut feelings.

“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again
and expecting different results.”
Albert Einstein, 1879-1955

You may feel unprepared. You may fear being left behind. Certainly, if you’re like most you don’t like the idea of leaving safe, familiar territory. (Besides, you haven’t done anything wrong.)

Experience may tell you to anticipate interpersonal conflicts in the course of change. It might also tell you to watch out for interoffice conflicts (power grabs, backstabbing…that kind of thing).

Institutional Resistance

Larger companies have a harder time with change, due to inertia (i.e., “It’s the way things have always been done around here”). With the current state of the world economy, there’s the question of where and how to expend your limited time and other resources, not to mention that as resources are harder to come by, the company’s focus narrows considerably. (”We need to increase sales now!“)

Then there’s that 800-pound gorilla in the room — office politics. Whenever — wherever — there is change, some stand to lose power and others, to gain and consolidate. People forget about what’s best for everyone and concentrate on self. “Office politics” is probably the single biggest obstacle to change. Let me amend that — office politics has a hand in change, but not the change we really need.

“Change is the only constant.“
Heraclitus, 535-475 BCE

Understand that resistance to change exists.  It may take unusually strong leadership — someone with uncommon vision and fortitude — to overcome individual and organizational resistance to change.

Make no mistake, though — change is a part of us. Are you taking an active role in change, or do you passively submit to it? Which of those will bring the kind of change you want and need?

Is change — or change management — a problem for your organization? If you were in charge, what would you do differently about the problem?

Last week, we identified “communication” as the most important means to achieving success, the one tool your managerial toolbox cannot do without.  Without effective and timely communication, project development and implementation will suffer and as a result, the organization will have a difficult time reaching its project objectives.

Of course, there are other barriers to project success.  Good communication will take care of a lot of problems but not all — human nature being what it is.  Whether you’ve been a project leader or part of a project team, you’ve undoubtedly run into one or more of the following problems:

1. Lack of Clarity. Some or all employees don’t know or don’t understand the project goals, objectives, roles and responsibilities, etc.  What are their individual goals and how do they relate to the goals of other team members, and to the project?  Stakeholders don’t see what they have to gain if your project plans aren’t clear, and everyone must have something to gain or they don’t cooperate.
2. Inadequately Researched or Defined Requirements. This is a major cause, if not the root cause, of lack of project clarity.  Be sure you and the user/customer agree on what is required.
3. Inadequate Resources. You considered and planned for project development and rollout costs, but what happens after rollout? What does it take to adequately inform, or educate, the customer?  Did you adequately address marketing, customer support, and maintenance needs?
4. Lack of Ongoing Customer Support. For some companies, contact with the customer ends with the sale. Did your plans account for the customer’s satisfaction and loyalty? Too many companies fall short in this regard.
5. Biases (Yours and Theirs). You’ve heard the phrase “overpromised and underdelivered”.  How many times does this happen in your business?  Why?  How likely are potential customers to believe you if they’ve already been burned.  What were their previous experiences?  Be sure to address these.  Also be sure to address your company’s attitudes toward existing customers (see “Ongoing Support”).
6. Technology Gap. Where is the customer on the technology continuum? If your solution is technology-based, consider the amount of training that will be required within your implementation process.  Also, be sure you know what their most pressing needs are and solve them.  Don’t give them more than they need and don’t shoot wide of the mark.
7. Resistance to Change. An individual’s degree of resistance to change is a major factor: While it may seem counterintuitive to you, many people prefer the devil they know to the one they don’t.  Be aware of that and have a plan for dealing with it.  Make sure the customer knows the benefits of your project early on and how they will far outweigh any temporary pain they might feel.
8. Lack of Time. See “inadequate resources”.
9. Not Invented Here. You still see a lot of this from customers: “How can you expect to come in here and solve our problems when you don’t have any experience in our business?”  That may be a purely defensive posture.  One of the messages often underlying that question is, “Once the project is complete, jobs will be lost, etc.”  You have to be able to answer that in your project plan.  Also see “biases” and “resistance to change”.
10. Political Barriers. You lack support from critical areas/functions.  Maybe people are unwilling to step forward for various reasons.  What’s the company culture like?  Are they historically proactive or reactive?  What are their real motives for seeking you out?  Is the project supported all the way from the bottom to the top of the chain of command?

We need to remind ourselves now and again that careful, thorough planning prevents most problems.  The problems you don’t prevent in the project planning phase – and you’re never going to prevent them all, but – they’re a lot easier to identify and correct when you have a sound project plan.

Project Management consists of managing your project plan, achieving your project objectives, and delivering the intended project results to your users, customers and management.  As a Project Manager, doing this effectively requires a disciplined project management approach using key project management methods, tools, and documents to guide your progress.  What are these important project management documents?

1. User Requirements & Project Assumptions:
   customer comments, stated and implied requirements, and project assumptions from the customer or management.
2. Feasibility Study:
   industry research, costs, and methods that provide the basis for the financial justification to management.
3. Business Case Justification:
   the financial justification to management derived from the feasibility study, user requirements and project assumptions.
4. Project Charter:
   the basic problem, goals, benefits, and schedule
5. Project Plan:
   the detailed schedule, budget, resources, risks, assumptions, and roles & responsibilities for all stakeholders.
6. Acceptance Plan:
   customer criteria for receipt of project deliverables.
7. Quality Plan:
   the project management policies, procedures, standards, and reviews used to ensure customer acceptance.
8. Communications Plan:
   the stakeholders, what they need to know, and when.
9. Procurement Plan:
   external resources and the tender management process for acquisition.
10. Post Project Review:
    important project achievements and lessons learned from project errors for future project improvements.

Top Ten ” Must Have” Project Management Documents:

1. User Requirements & Project Assumptions
2. Feasibility Study
3. Business Case Justification
4. Project Charter
5. Project Plan
6. Acceptance Plan
7. Quality Plan
8. Communications Plan
9. Procurement Plan
10. Post Project Review

As Chris Anderson said in his most recent article, “Top Ten Reasons Why You Need Project Management“, successful project management starts with a solid, stable foundation.  The foundation of project management is the “Initiation” phase.  One of the blocks in that foundation is the “feasibility study”.

Simply put, the goal of the feasibility study is to answer the question, “Should we undertake the project?”  By conducting a feasibility study, you’re trying to minimize risk.  Among the issues that determine a project’s feasibility are:

• What are the goals and objectives of the project?
• Is there more than one way of arriving at the desired result?
• Does the project fit with the company’s overall philosophy and long-term strategy?
• Will the project meet the goals and objectives of all stakeholders?
• What are the the project’s costs and benefits?
• Does the company have, or can it readily obtain, the resources it will need?
• How long will it take to see results?
• Will the project result in a product that generates positive cash flow?
• Does the project (i.e., the product) have long-term potential?
• Are the risks known, understood, and manageable?  If the risks are not manageable, are they acceptable?

As you see, there are an awful lot of questions the feasibility study has to answer, and each of these questions deserves a post of its own.  Of course, as many questions as you could ask — the questions above will naturally lead you to still more questions, potentially ad infinitum — your feasibility study must be finite.

You can’t possibly capture every bit of information on a given subject — there is no such thing as perfect information (ask Wall Street).  If you keep insisting that you need more information, you run the risk of paralysis by analysis.

At some point you have to say to yourself, “Knowing what we now know, do we proceed?”  It’s not a perfect world – and yours isn’t a perfect company – though with the right preparation, you are bound to experience many more successes than mistakes.

I’ll leave you for now with a quote from Alexander Graham Bell: “Before anything else, preparation is the key to success.”

A disciplined project management process is important to any project.  Project managers are expected to deliver results, on time (if not sooner) and on budget.  Solid project planning reduces the risks associated with any project you take on.  Here are ten reasons why you need project management:

1. Control Scope Creep and Manage Change

Small changes in demands occur on every project.  They come from management, the customer, your project team, suppliers, or other stakeholders.  Individually, they may appear acceptable, but collectively these project demands can add up to a significant project expansion (referred to as “scope creep”) that can overrun your budget.  As a project manager, if you effectively manage the scope of your project, you have a better than even chance of effectively managing project resources — time, money, etc. — and managing change.

2. Deliver Project Results On Time and On Budget

Project planning starts with a well thought out business case justification that usually includes some type of cost calculation associated with Return On Investment (ROI).  Once these measures are established, it is up to the project manager to ensure that on-time, on-budget performance is maintained; otherwise, the project will never produce the expected results.  That’s what good project management is all about.

3. Focus the Project Team on the Solution

The project team can easily drift off topic and spend too much time on the wrong tasks.  A good project manager keeps the project team focused by using a clear and concise project charter, resolving barriers, or shielding the team from unnecessary interference.

4. Obtain Project Buy-In from Disparate Groups

As President Lincoln once said, “Public sentiment is everything. With it, nothing can fail; without it, nothing can succeed.” A good project manager uses the tools in the initiation phase of project management to collect user requirements, project constraints, and a feasibility study to build a strong business case justification.  Using input from various sources, the project manager overcomes dissent and obtains buy-in by communicating the project benefits as the different stakeholder groups see them.

5. Define the Critical Path to Optimally Complete your Project

Every project is made up of a series of connected activities, each of which has its own constraints.  The project manager identifies the critical path of activities — the optimal sequence of actions that best ensure the project’s successful completion.

6. Provide a Process for Estimating Project Resources, Time, and Costs

Using project management software, previous project experiences, and a solid project initiation phase can provide the discipline needed to reduce project estimating errors, increasing the likelihood that the project will finish on time and on budget.

7. Communicate Project Progress, Risks, and Changes

As a project progresses, stakeholders must be kept informed of the outcomes, changes, stumbling blocks, or successes that the project experiences.  Project management creates a project communication plan to address these communication issues, provide a format, and lay out a process for execution.

8. Surface and Explore Project Assumptions

All projects are based on assumptions to some extent.  A good project manager delves into user requirements, project constraints, and management expectations to understand what is said and what is not said.  Relying on too many unconfirmed assumptions can invalidate a project schedule or, worse, sink the project.

9. Prepare for Unexpected Project Issues

Every project runs into unforeseen issues, such as changes in market conditions, and is hit with random cause variability.  Experienced project managers plan for the unexpected by lining up alternative courses of action.

10. Document, Transfer, and Apply Lessons Learned from Your Projects

The last phase of project management focuses on “closing out” the project.  The project manager reviews how well each prior phase — project initiation, project planning, project execution, and project monitoring and control — was performed.  As part of good knowledge management, all project review notes should be dissected and analyzed for patterns, trends, and opportunities for improvement.  These “lessons learned” should be documented and communicated to other project managers before starting the next project.

The Top Ten Reasons Why You Need Project Management

1. Control scope creep and manage change;
2. Deliver project results on time and on budget;
3. Focus the project team on the solution;
4. Obtain project buy-in from disparate groups;
5. Define the critical path to optimally complete your project;
6. Provide a process for estimating project resources, time, and costs;
7. Communicate project progress, risks, and changes;
8. Surface and explore project assumptions;
9. Prepare for unexpected project issues; and
10. Document, transfer, and apply lessons learned from your projects.