Managing Up

I posted a blog around july 2008 specifically about how to manage your manager. I just recently came across the concept/buzzword of "Managing Up" which specifically talks about that in particular. In light of this, I encourage everyone to do some reading on this subject matter. I just grabbed a copy from the Harvard Business Press Pocket Mentoring series. It was a short read for me. Enough to cover a flight from Amsterdam to Copenhagen. I suggest you get bigger books on the subject matter as it is a very interesting topic that if practiced properly, indeed helps the project manager achieve his desired stakeholder reactions.

You need to GROWS

I just finished a short book on managing conflicts. It's called the "Top Performer's guide to managing conflicts". It's quite a nice book compiling several different researches and publications by other authors. In light of this, I'd like to share about the simple method of interpersonal conflict resolution which is thru the use of the GROWS technique. So here's what it says:

GATHER: which basically asks us to gather information about the conflict, asking questions such as "What do you think is the main cause of this conflict?" or "How did we get into this situation"? We need to fully understand the perspective of the other person?

REFLECT: reflect back on the situation and clarify that you want to resolve the conflict. It is important to paraphrase and summarize what the other person feels to ensure that you understand where the other person is coming from and that he/she knows that you understand him/her.

OWN: Admit it. Even if you feel that you were not at fault - you could have done something better - otherwise there wouldn't be a conflict. You need to be accountable for your actions that contributed to the conflict. No buts... it defeats the purpose.

WANT: Let the other person know what you need from him. Verbalizing a want is important. Note as well that not everything you want is an entitlement. Entitlement often produces resistance.

STRATEGIZE: Brainstorm win-win situations. Ask questions like "How can we both get what we want here?" or "What ideas haven't we tried yet?"

This is a very simple yet effective approach to conflict management. As the diagram shows, everytime a step does not work out, you can always go back to the previous step or go back to the gathering stage to get more information.

My current project needs this. Not internally to my team though.. but more to do with the internal customer dynamics. Unfortunately, we're at the receiving end of all the conflicts within them.

I am replaceable

It sometimes grips us with fear to hear that we as employees are actually replaceable. Oftentimes we try to do our job to the best of our abilities to a achieve a point in time that people will start thinking... "What will i do without him/her?" You know, people often think that being irreplaceable ensures job security.

Well... yes and no.

If someone is irreplaceable, he is also unpromoteable. This is why some good technical people remain well... good technical people. The tendency for management is to place people where they can be most effective. Irreplaceability is a sign of inflexibility. If management cannot move you around because you're the only person that can do the job... then chances are you're stuck there for life (or until the role/post becomes unnecessary).

The first thing someone should do once he gets assigned to a position is to find his replacement. This is otherwise known as "succession planning". If you've read one of john maxwell's books (21 laws of leadership methinks) you'll read about the "law of explosive growth / law of reproduction" which pretty much states that good leaders are capable of multiplying themselves - empowering their teams to do what they they can do. These are all in-line with ensuring proper succession planning. Managers who are capable of sharing knowledge and workload to his/her subordinates are more likely to be able to accomplish more and hence improve the overall performance of the team. On the other hand, managers who keep everything to themselves are bound to fail because he/she is overburdened with work since no one in his team can help/assist him.

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Currently, I've asked my boss to move me in another role in the office. Although its much much smaller in scope - it's something that I've been itching to do for some time. In doing so, I had to be replaced by people from my team. I guess I'm just glad to see that the team is still functioning well and in order. I do not expect my lieutenants to manage the same way as me, but because they know what I do and what needs to be done - they get the job done.

The Plan

The Project Plan is effectively the only tangible deliverable a project manager does within a project. Everything else is a supporting activity to the actual deliverables. The ability to make a good plan therefore shows the difference between a good PM and a so-so PM. It would be easy to think that as long as you have all the information you need, planning becomes better. To an extent that is true. Unfortunately, you will never have all the information that you would need in creating a plan.

So now what?

There is a concept in Project Planning known as " Rolling Wave Planning" which states that there is a constant need to plan and replan in waves based on the information gathered at every wave. A common misconception by noob PM's is that you plan once and then execute. However there is rarely the situation and unless the project is soooo simple this would rarely be the case. Planning is an ongoing and recurring activity. There is no shame on replanning since we need to accept that we cannot run with the previous plan. It should however be noted that constant replanning is also a sign of ineffectiveness of the PM. We replan because there is new information or events that need to be considered in the project not because we forgot or did not include these information from the start.

It's 2009. Time to start (re) planning.

Wait! the minutes.

Probably the most pathetic title to any blog post that I have ever written. I could probably change it to "The art of documentation" or something fancier.

Nonetheless, whatever title you fancy, the topic still stays - which is all about documentation.

Coming from the technology area into project management, probably the most irritating activity for me then was documenting all the programs, processes, and procedures that I did. I'd rather spend my time fixing things or programming stuff. However, looking back at all that I've done before, I noticed that a lot of the bloopers and a lot of the issues that I encountered with the customer or other project team members was that we can never really get to an agreement of what we previously agreed on. It tends to end up in a he says she says thing that lowers customer satisfaction and lowers productivty. Now who would want that? obviously no one. However, looking back again, a lot of these issues could have been easily avoided just by documenting things properly.

As I headed off into the wonderful world of project management - the importance of properly documenting things became all the more apparent. In its simplest form - always have a minutes to any meeting. Why? because meetings are held in order to achieve something - either information is provided, a decision is made, or an action is planned to be taken. (If you have meetings that don't amount to any of these - ask yourself why do you have a meeting?) And since something is achieved - it needs to be noted down in order for it to be referenced later on in the course of the project. Moreso, having meeting minutes ensures that your team is aware of what they need to do and that your customers see you as someone who does his work professionally. If you have a meeting with a customer - it would always be best if you created the minutes since it would be your version of the truth - always. This is not to say that you are lying but rather it puts you in a position to have an edge on things because it is how you interpreted the meeting that gets documented. Also when making meeting minutes, ensure that you send it to all the participants of the meeting so that they can confirm the contents of what you noted and that they will be aware of what actions are on their plate. Lastly, if you receive meeting minutes - ensure that you read them and respond to whatever statements go beyond what you believe you agreed upon during the meeting.

These are simple tips to use for better project management.