Part 3: People
Manage Conflict
Managing conflict is the responsibility of all stakeholders. The direction and handling of conflict is heavily influenced by the project manager. Interpersonal and team skills such as empathy and emotional intelligence are primary examples. In agile projects, the project manager may assist in facilitating conflict resolution sessions, or the team is empowered to resolve conflict as they best see fit unless it will affect the project. As a servant leader, a project manager can assist in removing impediments or sources of conflict to support the team’s performance. Working as a team and with a variety of stakeholders, there is bound to be conflict. It is natural and inevitable. It can be a positive benefit to the project and its outcomes if managed properly. When there is a continuous disagreement, the PM should conduct a meeting with the project team to solve this disagreement. The following order is the most successful in conflict resolution Investigate the conflict Decipher the source & stage of conflict. Determine the root cause. Analyze the context. Implement and track solutions
THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IS TO DEFINE CLEAR AGENDA FOR THE MEETING.
Effective conflict Ineffective conflict
understanding Destructive behavior
Performance Animosity
Productivity Poor performance
There are five general techniques for resolving conflicts:
Withdraw/ Avoid
Retreating from an actual or potential conflict situation; postponing the issue to be better prepared or to be solved by others.
Smooth/ Accommodate
Emphasizing areas of agreement rather than areas of difference.
Compromise/ reconcile
Searching for solutions that bring some degree of satisfaction to all parties to temporarily or partially resolve the conflict. This approach occasionally results in a lose-lose situation.
Force/ Direct
Pushing one’s viewpoint at the expense of others; is usually enforced through a power position to resolve an emergency. Often result in a win-lose situation.
Problem-solving (Collaborative)
Incorporating multiple viewpoints and insights from differing perspectives; requires a cooperative attitude and open dialogue that typically led to consensus. Result in a win-win situation. Leads to a long-term resolution.
Lead a Team
The project manager is the best one to transfer the vision and the goals of the project because he serves as a visionary leader who helps by educating the team, collaborating, removing roadblocks, and communicating the project’s mission. Not all team members are motivated and inspired in the same way. The project manager must adapt the leadership style to the situation and the stakeholders. Many ways to lead a team, but no one approach is perfect for every situation. Set a clear vision and mission, support diversity and inclusion, value servant leadership, determine an appropriate leadership style, inspire, motivate, and influence team members/stakeholders’ influence, and distinguish various options to lead various team members and stakeholders.
Servant leader
Focuses first on the growth and well-being of their employees, as a means of achieving success for customers, shareholders, and themselves (especially in agile teams) by providing coaching and training, removing blocks that impede work progress, and focusing on team accomplishments rather than team misfires.
Participative (Democratic)
Leadership style invites team input and feedback on decisions. This leadership style values group discussions, collaboration, and teamwork.
Team building
Project teams perform better when there is increased cohesion and solidarity. Good project leadership facilitates the bonding between project team members. Facilitating team-building activities builds unity, but also builds trust, empathy, and focus on the team over the individual.
Reward plan
Tangible, consumable items that are given to a person based on a specific outcome or achievement. Have a defined start and finish, or fixed time. Expected when the specified goal is achieved or attained. Example (Receiving a bonus after a successful year).
Recognition plan
An intangible, and experiential event that focuses on behavior rather than outcome. Recognition is not restricted to a set time, is unexpected by the receiver, and is intended to increase an individual’s appreciation. (Receiving public acknowledgment and appreciation through a project team meeting to a skilled employee). (Giving him an award that is related to what he needs).
Guideline to Manage a Team
Use emotional intelligence and establish good communication among team members. Monitor the performance of team members on an ongoing basis and listen hard to what people are telling you. Monitor the progress of team members by speaking with them one-on-one. Don’t wait for the emails or reports. Develop a set of metrics for each project to measure team performance. Provide constructive feedback to team members frequently. Team members need to know they are either on track or need to take steps to get back on track. Consider additional training for those team members who need to improve their performance. Encourage both sides to find a win-win resolution to the problem. Focus on the reasons that the group has come together to find a resolution to the problem. To help avoid unnecessary conflict, set expected ground rules in the beginning.
Support Team Performance
KPIs (Key Performance Indicators)
Way of measuring the effectiveness of an organization, employee, etc. in meeting objectives for performance. One way to evaluate the relevance of performance is to use the SMART criteria (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound). Every team needs to constantly evaluate and make appropriate adaptations in the following four areas - Product Value, Product quality, Product status, and Team performance. Decentralized coordination is where the project team self-coordinates without interference from management. Ability Tests and FGDs (Focused Group Discussions) are often used to appraise team members' skills
Personal growth is an intrinsic factor that motivates workers and employees. Reward & recognition is an extrinsic factors.
Team culture and empowerment
In projects, the team is the most important part. Without a good unified team, the project falls apart and project management becomes insufficient. The team needs to be empowered to make decisions without burden and on time. Encourage the team to foster team collaboration and decision-making. Team building activities are the specific functions or actions taken to help the team to develop into a mature, productive team. They can be formal or informal, brief or extended, and facilitated by the project manager.
Performance assessment to accomplish several tasks, including
Comparing performance to goals. Re-clarifying roles and responsibilities.
Delivering positive as well negative feedback. Discovering unknown or unresolved issues.
Creating and monitoring individual training plans. Establishing future goals.
Effective teams
The team members should work in a collaborative way to ensure project success. PM should build an effective team and foster teamwork. Managers should use effective communication methods, and develop trust among the team. Manager conflict, and promote collaborative decision-making and problem-solving. This will help improve people skills, advance technical competencies, build a good team environment, and increase project performance.
Team development stages (Tuckman’s stages of group development)
Forming
Team members meet and learn about the project and their formal roles and responsibilities.
Storming
There are disagreements as people learn to work together.
Norming
Begin to work together and adjust their work habits and behavior to support the team. The team members learn to trust each other.
Performing
Team members work effectively together as a well-organized unit.
Adjourning
Team members complete the work and move on from the project.
Feedback
Learning, adapting, and growing require constructive feedback.
Regular feedback is crucial for the team in all project management methodologies and team environments.
Discovering the most appropriate and timely feedback is a responsibility of a PM.
Agile methods follow iterative and incremental development, and within each iteration, the project improves.
With every iteration, the team members provide feedback and assistance to each other and a working product is demonstrated to the customer for feedback and direction.
That feedback feeds the subsequent iterations and the product backlog.
Regular customer input allows the team to improve on the product before the final deliverable is sent to the customer, instead of when it may be too late.
Performance tracking tools
Scrum/ agile/ Kanban boards/ Earned value/ Bar charts (Gantt)/ Velocity
KANBAN method
Using cards, physical or electronic boards can track work as it progresses across various stages or categories. Originated at Toyota. Japanese word meaning “signboard”.
Retrospective and lesson learned
Gather lessons learned constantly and /or at set times throughout the project.
Helps to improve the performance and project environment.
In agile projects, retrospectives are the most important practice for gathering lessons learned from the team on how to improve and recognize success.
Retrospectives occur after every iteration and at the end of every project.
Conduction of a retrospective encourages the team to review what went well and what could have been done better.
Retrospectives are not just about capturing those lessons learned; retrospectives are also about how to take those lessons learned and analyze and apply them moving forward.
The output of the retrospective is a plan on how to make improvements in the ensuing iteration and beyond.
Prepare some notes with some ideas or areas of focus in case the team needs some inspiration or ideas. Place two large sheets marked” what went well” and “what could be improved” on a board. Ask the attendees to Identify items that went well in the iteration and add them to the first sheet. Ask them to identify items that could be improved and add them to the second list.
Allow each participant to identify the reason for improvement.
Get team consensus on the planned improvement. Update these tasks to the product backlog after a discussion with the product owner. Implement changes. When the team is not equipped to work in a hybrid environment you must request training from the PMO or Consider building a center of competencies to help provide guidance and build domain knowledge. This will help an even distribution of competency levels within the team.
Empower Team Members and Stakeholders
Team strength
Teams require certain skills and competencies to carry out their work and produce their deliverables. When forming teams, it is critical to understand the needed competencies and to ensure the team members have those. SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analysis might be used to identify team strengths and weaknesses that may be addressed during the project.
Team decision-making tools
All project teams are tasked with making decisions about activities, risks, estimates, and many other challenges. Part of forming a team is identifying how the team will make decisions together, and how they handle conflict resolution. As the initial team charter is produced, the team needs to address decision-making and conflict resolution. For example, it may be highly desirable to seek consensus, but the team may want to identify how they will respond when consensus can’t be reached.
Estimating
Tasks should be performed by the people doing the work; they are the ones closest to it and have the best knowledge of (Risks, Level of effort, and Potential pitfalls associated with the task). Traditional project managers use hours of effort to identify the length of a task will take. Three-point estimates, which estimate the best-case, normal-case, and worst-case timescales, might be used to provide a clearer sense of the level of uncertainty. Agile projects tend to avoid using absolute time estimates as the level of uncertainty in the work is often high. Story point estimating is used.
Team task accountability
Effective project managers encourage the team member to determine (The work that must be done to meet an objective, identify how to perform that work, and who should perform it).
Guidelines to evaluate demonstration of task accountability
The project manager should determine how task accountability will be tracked and managed.
As part of developing a work breakdown structure (WBS), tasks to produce the deliverables should be identified, preferably by the team members who will be performing the work.
When a WBS dictionary (or work package) is produced, each of the relevant tasks and assignees to produce the deliverable is identified, tracked, and managed.
In a more agile approach, task identification and tracking are generally handled by the team themselves as part of iteration planning.
Guidelines to determine and bestow levels of decision-making authority
Tasks should be identified, planned, and managed as much as possible by the team members themselves. They are the ones closest to the work and will have the best visibility into what needs to be done to perform the work and deliver the needed result.
Estimates should be done by the teams performing the work.
Train Team Members and Stakeholders
Identify and understand the required competencies that the stakeholder will require. It may be knowledge or skills. To contribute to the project outcomes. Training is an activity in which team members acquire new or enhanced skills, knowledge, or attitude. Can cover management or technical topics. It can range from a multi-day, formal workshop in a classroom to a five-minute, informal on-the-job training demonstration at the employee’s desk. There must be a training and mentoring plan.
Training Gap analysis
Based on the stakeholder analysis, you will need to assess current skills, and the needed skills based on the project’s deliverables. The result should enable you to identify any missing knowledge, skills, or required attributes. Virtual instructor-led training, self-paced e-learning, and document reviews. Training costs must be identified. A specific calendar of training dates and locations must be published, and how to register, so that they can avoid delaying the project’s time delivery. PM might ask each of the veteran employees on the team to partner with a less experienced team member, offering coaching as needed and sharing knowledge (working collaboratively toward a shared goal. These relationships can be informal, created by individuals themselves. The baseline technique is to measure training effectiveness. Certification is important to demonstrate the knowledge and skills gained.
Build a team
Set of individuals who support the project manager in performing the work of the project to achieve its objectives. Project management staff: perform activities such as budgeting, scheduling, reporting, and control. This role is supported by a PMO. Project staff: perform the work to create the project deliverables. Supporting experts: perform the work to develop the project management plan. User or customer representative: provide requirements and accept project deliverables. Buyer: may be called (client, customer, prime contractor, acquiring organization) Seller: external companies issued a contract to provide a product or service needed. Business partners: external companies that provide specialized support through a partnership. All of them are considered stakeholders and should be identified early in the project so that their needs and expectations can be met. The stakeholder list should be reviewed and modified throughout the project. Documents like business cases and benefits management plans should describe the lists of the stakeholder.
RACI chart
A common type of Responsibility Assignment Matrix (RAM) that uses responsible, accountable, consult, and inform statuses to define the involvement of stakeholders in project activities. The RACI matrix helps identify who is responsible for making decisions and how the people are supported. Used to provide clarity on the roles and responsibilities assigned to each project team member. RACI captures the change when recruiting another team member to replace the one who resigned. Also called the RACI chart where the s stands for support.
Pre-Assignment Tools to support skills appraisals.
Attitudinal surveys, Structured interviews, focus groups, specific assessments, and ability tests.
Resource Management Plan
Component of project management plan, describe how project resources are acquired, allocated, monitored, and controlled. Encompass identification of resources, roles and responsibilities, authority, competencies, training strategies, team development methods to be used, recognition plan, and how they are rewarded and recognized. Resource calendar (working days, shifts, hours, holidays, physical resource activity, when and for how long resources will be available, attributes such as skills, experience level, and geographies. Also, disciplinary actions as a result of performance assessment.
Address and Remove Impediments, Obstacles, and Blockers:
Impediments
Actions that slow down or hinder progress. (Not responding to an email)
Obstacles
Barriers that should be able to be moved, avoided, or overcome with some effort or strategy. (Construction crew is unable to arrive at the work site before permits are signed).
Blockers
Conditions that cause stoppages in the work or any further advancement. (Company has halted the use of any products in a certain firm until a new contract is signed).
Backlog assessment
Product backlog, scheduled activities, and other lists of work items must be assessed in terms of value and priority. Backlog assessment and refinement can also explore alternatives to overcome or avoid the risk.
Tracking impediments
Impediments task boards can be as simple as sticky notes denoting impediments, potential causes, responsibilities, and status posted on a whiteboard or wall near the project team’s co-location to sophisticated software capturing greater detail and communication features. The board must convey the status and efforts associated with the identified impediments.
Risk Reviews/ Risk List
Risks that are raised during the standup meeting, iteration review, and other meetings, are added to the risk list. A rigorous review of project risks ensures that risks are identified and documented. Newly identified and existing risks on the project risk list must be updated based on the current knowledge and situation.
Negotiate Project Agreement
Negotiations are discussions that are aimed at reaching an agreement
Service level agreements
The contract between a service provider (internal or external) and the end user describes the level of service expected from the service provider.
Performance report
Part of the negotiation is defining how project performance will be captured and reported. (Percentage of work completed, start and finish of scheduled activities, changes requests, defects, actual costs, and duration. Agile projects may include (stories completed, stories accepted, and progress through a product backlog).
Negotiation Strategy
Generally driven by the procurement manager, the project manager and project teams may be engaged as part of the negotiations.
Traditional approach
one important objective is a clear designation of the project’s intended deliverables and how they will be measured and compensated
Agile approach
The exact deliverables will be variable as the customer modifies, adds, and reprioritize items in their product backlog, and so clearly delineated ways to ensure agreed performance levels must be identified.
Lessons Learned
The lessons-learned register is a project document used to record knowledge gained during a project so that it can be used in the current project and entered into the lessons-learned repository. This register will improve the team’s performance and potentially other teams, and other projects as well. In agile called retrospective.
Collaborate with stakeholders
A stakeholder is an individual, group, or organization that may affect, be affected by, or perceive itself to be affected by a decision, activity, or outcome of a project. May be internal or external to the project, they may be actively involved, or unaware of the project. Project stakeholders may have a positive or negative impact on the project, or be positively or negatively impacted by the project. Internal stakeholders such as the sponsor, resource manager, PMO, portfolio manager, program manager, project managers of other projects, and team members. External stakeholders (customers, end users, suppliers, regulatory bodies, and competitors. Before planning the project, stakeholders must be identified so that their needs and expectations can be met early. Stakeholder analysis results in a list of stakeholders and relevant information such as their position and roles on the project, expectations, and attitudes (level of support). Or stakeholder mapping and representation. Inputs are project charter, business document, project management plan, project documents, EEFs, and OPAs. so that their needs and expectations can be met early.
Stakeholder engagement plan
The component of the project management plan defines the strategies and actions required to promote the productive involvement of stakeholders in project decision-making and execution. The project manager should be aware of the sensitive nature of the stakeholder engagement plan and take appropriate precautions when distributing the plan to another team member.
Build shared understanding about a project
Vision
Desired end-state. When a new project is commenced, it is critical to have a clear vision of the desired end objectives. Depending on how well-defined the deliverables of the project are Predictive or agile. The vision statement describes the product or solution, intended users or consumers of the solutions, key desired objectives, competitive approaches, key features, and benefits.
Project charter
Document issued by the project initiators or sponsor that formally authorizes the existence of a project and provides the project manager with the authority to apply organizational resources to project activities. The project initiator or sponsor is a person who provides resources and support for the project and is accountable for enabling the project’s success. An effective project charter conveys why the project is being initiated and what the project’s outcomes will be, ensuring that you have support for the project. The project charter establishes the relationship between the requesting organization and the project-performing organization. Ideally, the project manager is selected while the charter is being developed by the sponsor or the project manager, but always before project planning. Early engagement between the sponsor and project manager ensures an understanding of the project purpose and objectives and desired stakeholder benefit. The charter ensures that the stakeholders have a common understanding of the project’s key milestones, deliverables, and roles and responsibilities. If there is no project charter in the organization the PM should discuss the need to have one with the sponsor Both Project Charter and Assumption Log since are the key deliverables coming out to Develop the Project Charter process. An assumption log is a High-level strategic and operational assumption and constraints that are normally identified in the business case before the project is initiated and will flow into the project charter.
The project charter may include
Project purpose Measurable project objectives
High-level requirements High-level project description deliverables
Overall project risk Summary milestone schedule
Project approval requirements Key stakeholder list
Project exit criteria Assigned project manager, responsibility, and authority level
Name and authority of the sponsor or other persons(s) authorizing the project charter.
Engage and Support Virtual Teams
Collaboration technology will enable team planning, collaboration, and communication will be important. The team will want to establish its team charter to lay out the following: Shared work hours, how the team makes decisions, how the team manages conflicts, core team values
Different collaboration tools common in projects with virtual teams, including
Shared task boards and burndown/burnup charts to promote visibility.
Shared messaging and chat boards to enable quick ad hoc communication.
Knowledge repositories to store shared documents.
Video-conferencing tools create more opportunities for face-to-face collaboration.
Virtual team member needs a shared goal, clear purpose, clarity on their role, and what is expected of them. Managing engagement with virtual team members requires persistence and a focus on good team dynamics, transparency, accountability, active attention to effective communication
Alternatives for virtual team member engagement use of video conferencing to enable team meetings to more fully integrate all aspects of the team and to ensure that the team members are committed to their solution approaches.
Many tools enable the use of Kanban-style boards to visualize the work to do, to track (and limit) work in progress, and to note when work activities are completed and objectives have been met.
Communication: Successful teams get to be successful by working together to execute work, solve problems, and produce solutions. Part of an effective team charter is to make decisions as a team about how, when, and why you communicate with one another. Good retrospectives often focus on specific ways the team can improve communication, collaboration, and the use of their tools to improve visibility.
Engagement Assessments
When a team is first engaged, care should be taken to identify team members who will be able to successfully form a coherent working team and work together to achieve the team’s objectives. While certain subject matter expertise is needed other capabilities, effective teamwork, collaboration, and communications are important. As new members may join the team over time, the team itself will need to go through the process of re-forming, storming as necessary to produce a new set of team norms, and then begin the process of continual improvement.
Communication plan
In the same way, the project manager establishes a communication plan for engaging with other project stakeholders, and a communication plan for the team itself should be created and executed. This may include
When the team meets. Do they hold daily standup meetings? Grooming meetings to clean their backlogs? Sprint planning meetings? Sprint reviews? Retrospectives? How do team members update the status on task boards and/or burndown charts?
How often do team members update their work status?
What are their preferred communication approaches? (Chat channel, E-mail, Shared task boards)
Guidelines to implement options for virtual team member engagement.
Focus on collaboration and team norms before focusing too much on tools.
Recognize that team formation in a virtual environment is difficult, so it’s critical to reinforce the team’s mutual commitment, achievement, and opportunities.
Virtual teams will require a significant amount of feedback and reinforcement of the team's goals.
When possible, provide opportunities for the virtual team members to meet in person, build relationships, have fun together, and nurture their shared commitment to the project’s goals.
Calendar tools
Help team members plan meetings, coordinate feedback, and improve visibility into project goals and activity status. TTimeboxingmeetings improve focus, encourage the team to set clear agendas and objectives, and help with keeping the work on track.
Variance analysis
It is defined as a quantifiable deviation away from a known baseline or expected value. The project manager may produce variance analysis of different kinds as the team completes its work. This may include (Accuracy of team estimate, delivery in a sprint or by an established milestone, and team performance against targets). Results of a variance analysis may be shared with the team as part of a retrospective and may serve as (The basis for problem-solving, identification of lessons learned, and proposed experiments to improve team performance in subsequent iterations).
Guidelines to continually evaluate the effectiveness of virtual Team member engagement
Track the progress of your teams as they carry out the work and produce deliverables.
Use videoconferencing tools/ Timebox your meetings/ Ensure meetings like daily standup are not just status updates, but value commitments from the team to itself/ Listen for blockers or other potential issues that team members may be uncomfortable discussing.
Define Team Ground Rules
Ground rules
Setting clear expectations regarding the code of conduct for team members includes all
actions that are considered acceptable and unacceptable in the project management. To decrease the risk of confusion and improves performance. Communicate organizational
principles with the team and external stakeholders. Establish an environment that fosters
adherence to the ground rules. Manage and rectify ground rule violations.
Team Charter
A document that enables the team to establish its value, agreements, and practices as it performs its work together. A good should include
The team’s shared value/ Guidelines for team communication and the use of tools/ How the team makes a decision/ How the team resolves conflicts when disagreements arise /How and when the team meets.
Negotiation skills
A discussion that a team might have aimed at reaching an agreement. In any performing team, there will be negotiation required, on roles and responsibilities, priorities, assignments, and deliverables. All team members should develop good negotiation skills among themselves and other stakeholders as required. Communication between internal and external team members: the team will need to have regular communication with stakeholders outside the team. In many cases, the project team may have dependencies with other external teams, and collaboration will be required to ensure effective expectations management among the various stakeholders. Part of an effective team charter may include communication protocols, inside the team (team meetings, shared calendars, etc.) or with external stakeholders periodic communication with to generate feedback, manage dependencies, and ensure alignment.
Team norms
The goal of the team charter is to establish team norms, or expected behaviors of the team by taking the time to establish these norms at the beginning of the project. These norms should include (meetings, communication approaches, managing conflicts, shared values, and decision-making). The code of ethics describes the ethical and professional behavior expectations of any individual working as a project management professional. PMI code of ethics (responsibility, respect, fairness, honesty).
Guidelines to manage and rectify ground rule violation: if there are violations of the team’s ground rules, the team and the project manager should assess opportunities for remediation, or if the violation is so serious as to contemplate the removal and replacement of an offending team member. The team should continue to focus on its core values in these circumstances, including accountability, shared expectations, and transparency where appropriate.
Mentor relevant stakeholders
Project management is an art and a science. The discipline gets better with practice, learning, and experience. You learn from others every day. Allocate the time to mentoring.
Coaching and Mentoring
Coaching and mentoring others help them become more proficient team members.
Raising the abilities of the team increases their output and their value.
Increasing the knowledge base and the skill sets of all project stakeholders sets up more successful and effectively managed projects.
To contribute to the benefit of better project management knowledge and practice, you must guide, coach, share, and mentor others.
Time and resources are limited, therefore you must make sacrifices on how much and how to mentor others.
At a core, you mentor relevant stakeholders associated with your projects.
Even the little things you do every day can make positive improvements to an individual’s actions and the practice as a whole.
Promote team performance through the application of emotional intelligence
Emotional intelligence
The ability to identify, assess, and manage the personal emotions of oneself and other people. The team can use emotional intelligence to reduce tension and increase cooperation by identifying, assessing, and controlling the sentiments of project team members.
Influencing
Project managers often have little or no direct authority over team members in a matrix environment, their ability to influence stakeholders on a timely basis is critical to project success. Key influencing skills include the ability to be persuasive, clearly articulating points and positions, high levels of active and effective listening skills, awareness of, and consideration for the various perspective in any situation, and gathering relevant information to address issues and reach agreements.
Active listening
Communication technique that involves acknowledging what you hear, clarifying the message, and removing barriers to confirm that what you heard matches the message that the sender intended. It helps reduce misunderstanding and improves communication and knowledge sharing. If only one team member has a problem, the PM should listen to him and support him.
Reflective Listening
Communication technique where you repeat back a summary of what the other person just said to you to confirm understanding. Another benefit in this situation is that having the person hear their ideas in another person’s voice/words may make it easier for them to be objective
Stay tuned for Part 4, All The Luck with your PMI-PMP Journey!