Managers Only do 4 Things

Sometimes my head spins with the many and varied duties of a manager. How can anyone be a competent manager in the face of so many skills needed? Must we be good at everything, or just the important things? How can we be confident that we know what the important things are? Do the important things change with time? It is like a nightmare.

Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman write, in the book First, Break All the Rules, that a manager only performs the following four tasks:

· Select the right people
· Set expectations
· Motivate the people
· Develop people

What are Buckingham and Coffman missing? Can everything a manager does fit into one of the four categories above? Where does conflict resolution fall? How does encourage/build teamwork fit?

Sacred PM Practices – Possible Explanation

It may seem reasonable that with strong leadership, ownership, and trust in place, there is less of a need for the standardization of project management procedures/activities (e.g., resource estimation, risk assessment, change management).

In contrast, there is a need for standard project management procedures in the absence of leadership, ownership, and trust.

This possible explanation implies that standard project management procedures serve as a substitute for project leadership, ownership, and trust.

Am I reaching here? Have I oversimplified the observations?

Hell hath no fury like the wrath of a band scorned?

One customer service statistic that I came across during school really sticks out in my mind -- only one in six dissatisfied customers will complain. What is the ratio of customers who devote their energy to publishing a music video to right a customer service wrong? One in ten thousand?

The Sons of Maxwell band members witnessed careless, or negligent, handling of their equipment by United Airlines baggage handlers. Unfortunately, after a year of requests, United could not compensate its customer for his destroyed guitar.

Enjoy the video. For those who have picked up damaged luggage after a flight, have empathy for the band. Reconsider your choice of airlines the next time you fly. This video on Youtube is about to hit 2 million views. I wonder if United executives are reconsidering how they handled this complaint.

The band promises to publish three videos about its experience on United Airlines. Two more videos are to follow.

Sacred PM Practices – Unexpected Findings

Project Managers of successful large IT projects spend relatively little effort on activities declared important in project management literature, methodologies, and training seminars. Only two of the nine initial assumptions, dedicated project team and frequent interaction with stakeholders, passed the 80% bar (see posting on June 15, 2009).

These same project managers do focus on project leadership, build a sense of ownership, and cultivate trust among project stakeholders.

Why do you think that leadership, ownership, and trust are not prominent in literature, methodologies, and training seminars? I have been looking for these topics to be addressed for four years now. Only recently have I seen a couple of books and a seminar on Trust.

Sacred PM Practices – Trust

Trust is the confidence one has that another will fulfill his obligation.

Many of the respondents shared their conviction that trust among individuals was crucial to the success of their projects. These respondents reported that there was trust among senior management, the project manager, the project team members, the business community, and users. Others, like Dr. Keith Mathis, have found the importance of creating an environment of trust. His posting can be found here on Project Smart.

One particularly interesting observation was that when there was trust in a project relationship, the relationship could sustain multiple mistakes (e.g., missed deadlines, budget overruns). These mistakes, of course, could batter the level of trust.

Has trust ever played into the success of any of your projects? Have you found the there is less documentation when there is a lot of trust?

Sacred PM Practices – Ownership

Ownership is a psychological bond between a project team member and the outcome of a project.

The majority of respondents in the study volunteered their belief that a sense of ownership was critical to the success of their projects. Many discussed several perspectives on ownership. Respondents shared examples of project managers, project team members, the clients (both internal and external), and users exhibiting ownership of project outcomes. There was the consultant who volunteered to cancel his contract if a software release was not successfully executed at a critical time. I also remember the CEO who found a project team in the office hours after a blizzard ended. No one from the rest of his company could make it into the office because of the snow-drifted streets.

The respondents did not know how to measure the level of ownership, but believed that they could state whether project team members exhibited ownership.

When have you seen a project team show ownership of its success? Have you witnessed an especially engaged project team? If so, what made the team engaged?

Sacred PM Practices – Project Leadership

Project Leadership is the ability to use interpersonal relationships to stimulate and guide people toward the accomplishment of a project.

Many of the respondents made a strong distinction between project management and project leadership. While there are various definitions offered, a leader seems to be the one who achieves goals by influencing others, has a respect for expectations and perceptions, and directs others with a shared vision. A project manager, on the other hand, simply manages a project schedule, checks on progress, and tries to contain scope. Other comments from respondents included the following sentiments:

• While a leader may not like office politics, he knows politics is part of the work environment. He does his best to use politics to his project’s advantage.
• A leader makes an effort to understand all the personal agendas and expectations of the key stakeholders. He tries to understand why each does, or does not, want the project to succeed.
• A leader is successful in establishing and managing relationships

Have you also had difficulty describing how leadership contrasts with management? Pawel Brodzinski tackled this question here. Do you simply know leadership when you see it?

Sacred PM Practices – Qualitative Factors Uncovered

My prepared questions were asked. Hundreds of pieces of information were organized. Trends were identified.

When I asked the successful project managers what I was missing, most project managers shared a few ideas that had helped their projects to succeed. The following characteristics were discovered to be present, to a large extent, on most of the sample projects:

• Project leadership, as opposed to project management
• Ownership of the project outcome
• Trust among project members, stakeholders, and senior management

I was dumbstruck. In all of my project management courses and seminars, studying of PM textbooks, and discussions with senior management, I had never come across the importance of leadership, instilling a sense of ownership, and cultivating an environment of trust. After all, most of our status reports address schedule, budget, and risks.

When was the last time your boss asked you about your project team members’ sense of ownership? When has your status report commented on your client/customer’s trust in the project team?

Sacred PM Practices -- Findings Revealed

I thought the best way to share the findings and trends of the research project would be in podcast form. Please click the podcast listed on the right panel of this page to listen. The podcast, along with the graph below, provide a concise summary of what was found.

Thank you for visiting Management House. I look forward to reading your comments.

Management’s Biggest Problem Today

What is the most common way to bring ruin to a project, a business (Enron, Bernie Madoff’s Ascot Partners), a nation? What, since the beginning of human history, has brought on self-destruction?

Lack of personal integrity.

Every major religion and many historical figures comment on maintaining personal integrity.

• Christianity - The Lord abhors dishonest scales
• Judaism – Thou shalt not bear false witness
• Islam - Thou shalt not raise a false report
• Buddhism -I will honor honesty and truth, I will not deceive
• William Shakespeare -- No legacy is so rich as honesty
• Ben Franklin – Honesty is the best policy
• Thomas Jefferson -- Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom
• Your mother – _______ (fill in the blank)
  

No matter where I go in the business world, I am a witness to lying, deceit or both. How often have you seen some one lie to buy time? How often has a lie only deferred the pain? How many unnecessary lies have you witnessed?


I have never found a lying leadership to be inspiring. Personally, it is difficult for me to work with those who lie so easily. Timothy Barry, in Project Smart, lists integrity as one of the top qualities of being a project manager.

And what is the rationale given for a lie in the business world? It is the way businesses work. Everybody does it. How about the comment, “If we don’t lie, another company is just going to lie and win the work?”

Are we to just accept it? How are we to protect ourselves, our projects, and our business?

Management’s biggest problem today is that of all times -- To deceive others, or oneself.

Sacred PM Practices -- Lessons Learned

The final assumption that I tested in my project management research project (introduced in a Jan 25, 2009 posting), was a project’s collection and use of lessons learned. I wondered whether a difference between project success and project failure might be that a successful organization might learn from its own successes and failures.

Observations

• The majority of the projects were successful without conducting such meetings.
• Of the 56% of the projects that did not conduct such a meeting, nearly all of the respondents reported that such an activity should have been performed.
  

My experience with lessons learned is limited to a one-time meeting at the end of the project, where what is discussed (i.e., lessons) is largely or entirely ignored the next time around. When have you send lessons learned used? Has it made a difference?