Deliver a Little a Lot: And Other Not so Obvious Things I Wish I Knew When I Started as a Project Manager

By Mark Broadbent

Ever noticed that some project managers seem to just be successful or at least seem to have it all under control while others just seem to struggle? Are you new to the project management world and want a bit of the inside running of what it might take to make your life just a little bit easier? Deliver a Little a Lot will give you the extra insider knowledge you need to help you on your way to being one of these outstanding project managers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jan 27, 2016
• ISBN: 9780994517616

Book preview

RESOURCES

PREFACE

Why this book?

Ever noticed that some project managers seem to just be successful or at least seem to have it all under control while others just seem to struggle?

Are you new to the project management world and want a bit of the inside running of what it might take to make your life just a little bit easier?

There are so many books, courses, standards and certifications on how to run a project. There is so much information out there; it can be all a little overwhelming when you start. These other books, courses, standards, etc. largely stress the process of project management.

Just knowing a process though is only part of the job. What are those little extra not-so-obvious things that successful project managers seem to have tucked in their back pocket?

The problem is that no two projects are exactly alike, and no two project managers are exactly alike. Being another form of organized human endeavor, working on projects gives you all those wonderful things that innovation and creativity bring, but project management is not a simple black and white process – there is a lot of grey. People make it grey. Innovation can make it grey. Mistakes can make it grey. Ironically, getting to a clear process can be grey.

Standard project management processes are designed to reign in the grey but they too often create a semblance of competence while still delivering a failed project. Why? Because people mistake process for achievement. People mistake alignment to process for competence.

Competent project managers are competent despite the process. Perhaps more accurately, competent project managers are competent no matter what process they use because it’s in their nature, or they have enough experience, insight and wisdom to know some of the not-so-obvious things about working on projects that help make it a success.

What are some of these not-so-obvious and subtle things about planning, managing and delivering a successful project that are not mentioned in all of the standards, books and courses?

Yes, there are some checklist sources with lists of things that we are supposed to do as project managers, but still projects can fail or at best struggle on and get there but not quite fill expectations.

Sometimes, even though they complete their core objective, they managed to do it only after a whole lot of pain.

What might an old hand pass on to a newbie?

As a project manager, there is a lot to know. What I hope to do is provide some words of advice and a little wisdom to help the new project manager short cut the days of self-doubt, of time wasting processes and bewildering failure.

It isn’t an exact science dealing with people and project expectation.

Yes, a process can certainly help, but there are a lot of subtleties that come to you with experience and many sleepless nights. Hopefully this little book will help you.

Why Listen to Me?

So why would anyone listen to me?

Well, I make no claim to some type of insight over my colleagues or any special magic formula. In fact, I don’t believe there is any quick fool-proof formula to success at all. But there are certainly some not-so-obvious practices that can make your life as a project manager easier.

What I do have is years of experience (over 30 years) and many sleepless nights from which to draw the occasional words of wisdom.

My aim is to provide some insight for the relatively new project manager. I hope it helps at least in some small way and you have lots of happy projects and many nights of sleep!

Who should read this book?

While I designed this book for the new project manager, it should be just as useful for the more experienced person.

It is not a methodology book. I leave that up to the very many excellent texts and courses for those who want to know detailed processes. In fact, I will try and be methodology-agnostic (but please forgive some natural biases).

I envisage that as a new project manager you at least have some idea of the basics of projects. Perhaps as a project team member in the past you’ve worked on parts of project plans, produced progress reports, or dealt with project related issues. It is certainly not necessary to have this experience to read this book, but having some foundation may help you appreciate why I have approached this book the way I have.

I would hope that the not-so-new will find something to draw from here too. We can all learn something every day … I still draw from the good work my teams do. Some people you meet just have a knack for getting things done. We should all strive to be continuously on the lookout for how things might be done just that bit better. I hope I continue to learn every day. It makes the day interesting.

I am not a fan of rigidity or process for process sake. If you are after that then this is not the book for you. Take it as my first piece of advice – rigid adherence to a process does not guarantee anything but conformity to the process.

I judge a successful project as one that has happily delivered outcomes that people want in a way that leaves the team and everyone else feeling happy.

Mostly, the owners of the project don’t really mind how you achieved your great success, as long as the project did it appropriately for the organization, within reasonable timeframes and budget, and ended with a project team still smiling and proud of what they have achieved having delivered to the owners who are smiling and proud of what they have achieved!

Project Management Processes

Rigid adherence to a project management process does not guarantee anything but conformity to the process.

INTRODUCTION

So you’ve been given your first project

You’ve been given your first project. What do you do? Where do you start?

Sometimes even very experienced project managers forget some basics when starting projects.

Many people draw on one of the numerous project management standards or draw their process from internally established sets of standards. But what if you are doing this for the first time and your business has no standards?

You know you will need to produce some type of project schedule or plan. We’ve all seen them — those lists of tasks with some dates, allocated resources and lots of lines showing elapsed time. But how are they put together?

Honestly, mostly they are not done well. More often than not they are painstakingly developed by the designated project manager and then put aside barely to be referred to again. The team of people working just continue with best endeavors and with an element of personal heroism. This will often only lead to pain and stress.

Sometimes people forget that to do something easily you need to start with the end in mind (to quote Steven Covey in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People¹).

So, what’s the secret? You need to have a clear image of what it is you have to deliver at the end. In our project management world, this means a clear idea of the set of deliverables (or outputs if you prefer) that your project is going to produce in the end.

The big question at this point is how do you come up with this list? Moreover, how on earth does anyone know how long it’ll take to produce the things in your list? Well that’s planning. Look out for some not-so-obvious ideas around planning later on in the book.

What I wish I knew when I was starting

One thing I wish someone had told me when I started was this — it’s OK to not be quite right! The irony is, the more you try to get it right the more likely you are to be wrong with greater impact. Go figure.

I’m not advocating sloppy or poor quality work — far from it — but perfectionism is striving for the unattainable, when in most cases good enough is good enough.

Projects are human endeavors. They are fraught with imprecision, hopes, dreams and unrealistic expectations. But this is what makes projects great!

And while I am at it, another thing I wish someone told me: it’s ok for work to be fun!

So what do project managers do?

Project managers (PMs) are responsible for project delivery.

If the project owner or sponsor is the owner of the outcome, then the project manager works on their behalf to deliver the agreed outputs or deliverables to meet the expected outcomes.

To do this, they make sure they understand the objectives of the project owner and go about confirming what outputs will meet those objectives, and then organize to deliver those outputs.

A PM is the go-to person for the project owner. They are the person on the ground working with whomever is needed to realize the aspirations of the project owner. Simply, they make it happen.

So you can see that you need to