Managing Virtual Team Members

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Managing a remote (virtual) team has some nuances over managing an onsite team. A few adjustments can make a big difference in your success with virtual team members. Here are a few techniques that can help your remote resources work as part of a productive team.

  • Hold frequent short meetings. Schedule meetings 3 times a week for 15 minutes. These meetings provide quick opportunities to understand what’s happening —  like conversations you have when you’re co-located with your team members. These discussions can identify problems early so remote team members don’t get stuck solving problems on their own. These meetings can be with small groups or 1-on-1 depending on the number of team members and their role on your project.
  • Foster a team the same way you do when you’re co-located. Reserve time for checking in on how your team members are doing and give them a chance to share with each other. Consider virtual coffee breaks where you don’t spend much time on business. Instead, encourage each team member to talk about what they’re doing outside of work or what their favorite work activities are. Or they can describe a book/podcast/video that they enjoyed.
  • Insist on good video conference capabilities. Phone calls are good, but video conference meetings are better…when the technology works. Seeing someone’s non-verbal cues helps you understand how meetings are going and connect with remote team members. If you don’t have video conferencing, make sure speaker phones work well. Nothing is worse than being remote and not hearing discussions, or not being able to contribute because you can’t be heard.
  • Arrange participation in meetings for all attendees. Give each attendee a purpose in meetings. Consider a role for every attendee in your virtual team meetings. Rotate coordination responsibilities for the meeting, such as delivering project status items or stakeholder perceptions. This approach relieves some project management workload while increasing meeting engagement.
  • Increase the frequency of feedback sessions. All team members benefit from feedback delivered by the PM. Virtual team members need this feedback even more, because they might not participate in other deliverable discussions. The sessions don’t have to be extensive. They can focus on one or two specific deliverables or presentations, and the impressions they generated. Feedback keeps virtual team members engaged and comfortable about their contributions.

Have you encountered problems dealing with remote team members? Or have you found ways to engage remote team members and improve their productivity? Share your questions or tips in the comments section.

For more about working with remote teams, check out  Cyndi Snyder Dionisio’s Leading Remote Project and Virtual Teams course.

Coming Up

Project success is driven to a large extent by healthy relationships within your project teams, which is why a lot of people skills go into project management. In this Office Hours on June 1, 2023, at 11:00am MT, Todd Dewitt will join me to talk about how to build better relationships – by learning to overcome our own fears and by building rapport with others through empathy and mutual respect.

Todd will be sharing some of the insights and strategies from his new book, Dancing with Monsters. I’m a big believer in relationship-building, so I’m looking forward to this conversation. I hope you’ll join us and bring your questions and challenges! Here’s the link to join: https://www.linkedin.com/events/betterrelationships-betterresul7060330084796170240

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 38,000 subscribers. This newsletter is 100% written by a human (no aliens or AIs involved). If you like this article, you can subscribe to receive notifications when a new article posts.

Want to learn more about the topics I talk about in these newsletters? Watch my courses in the LinkedIn Learning Library and tune into my LinkedIn Office Hours live broadcasts.

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Which is Better: A big picture or detail-oriented PM?

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Which is Better: A big picture or detail-oriented PM?

Photo by pine watt on Unsplash

If you want to be a better project manager, do you enhance your big-picture thinking, or focus on being more detail-oriented? Ideally, both! For some types of projects, one style or the other can be advantageous. Here are some situations when big picture thinking and detail-oriented thinking are more helpful. 

Big picture thinking is best when:

  • The organization considers a series of inter-related projects to address strategic needs, and inter-project relationships have to be identified and managed.
  • Many stakeholder groups are involved, and you have to define and establish the relationship between the stakeholders’ needs.
  • There are many potential approaches for delivering the project. To be successful, you have to evaluate different methods and determine the sequence of high-level activities and high-level business risks.
  • Resourcing issues will arise due to demands from projects and operations. You’ll need big-picture thinking to figure out ways to satisfy the resource demands from both.
  • Continuous improvement is the motivation for the project(s). With continuous improvement projects, the outcome of each project is a new environment which future projects are designed in. 

A detail-oriented project manager is better suited when:

  • The PM needs to be in charge of building the WBS, task groupings and task sequences. This is often the case when the PM also serves as a technical expert, or when particularly careful project planning is required.
  • The PM needs to be a focal point for resolving technical issues and working with management to justify the project team’s proposed actions.
  • A strong focus on risk, budget, or quality practices is required. As the saying goes, “the devil is in the details.” When a project is heavily constrained by the budget or timeline, attention to detail is crucial. Also, strict quality standards require a detail oriented PM.
  • Improving processes requires detailed analysis to be successful. The insights identified by a detail-oriented PM are helpful with this type of project.
  • Intricate or numerous specific requirements need to be satisfied. Attention to detail ensures that all requirements are captured and met.

I hope this information gives you a different perspective on project management skills and your personal tendencies.  Use it to identify your  areas for improvement and to recognize the need for different thinking styles so you can communicate to sponsors/potential hiring managers accordingly.

Remember, neither style is better than the other. And a big-picture person can be detail-oriented  and vice versa. Some people are naturally big-picture thinkers, while others tend to be detail-oriented. Being adept at both isn’t common. If you lean one way or the other, consider having someone of the other style on your project. That way, you get the best of both!

Have you tried to expand your thinking to include the style that isn’t your strong suit? What issues did you run into? What was most helpful to your improvement? Share with us in the comment section.

 

Coming Up

Project success is driven to a large extent by healthy relationships within your project teams, which is why a lot of people skills go into project management. In this Office Hours on June 1, 2023, at 11:00am MT, Todd Dewitt will join me to talk about how to build better relationships – by learning to overcome our own fears and by building rapport with others through empathy and mutual respect.

Todd will be sharing some of the insights and strategies from his new book, Dancing with Monsters. I’m a big believer in relationship-building, so I’m looking forward to this conversation. I hope you’ll join us and bring your questions and challenges! Here’s the link to join: https://www.linkedin.com/events/betterrelationships-betterresul7060330084796170240

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 37,000 subscribers. This newsletter is 100% written by a human (no aliens or AIs involved). If you like this article, you can subscribe to receive notifications when a new article posts.

Want to learn more about the topics I talk about in these newsletters? Watch my courses in the LinkedIn Learning Library and tune into my LinkedIn Office Hours live broadcasts.

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How to Leverage Your Out-of-Scope Statement

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How to Leverage Your Out-of-Scope Statement

Photo by Mohammed-Alqarni on Unsplash

The Scope Statement may be the most important document a project manager publishes. It helps define the project, captures what the project will produce, and defines success criteria for those results. A crucial section of the scope statement doesn’t cover what is in scope at all: the part that specifies what’s out of scope. Here are some tips for getting the most out of your scope statement’s out-of-scope section.

  • Make sure it reflects project delivery realities. In the scope statement, be specific about what is in and out of scope. In the out-of-scope section, be sure to document why out-of-scope elements are excluded. Typically, out of scope items are dictated by time to delivery, complexity or the availability of expertise. Sometimes, business priorities might exclude items.
  • Explain the advantages of smaller scope. A smaller scope allows for focused effort, a smaller team to manage, reduced cost, and less need for integration. These reduce complexity and increase the probability of successful project completion. If the reduced scope causes concern with key stakeholders, create risk profiles for the proposed smaller scope and one for the larger project stakeholders may be looking for. The differences in risk might help you justify going forward with a smaller scope.
  • Trigger debate, if necessary. When it comes to project scope, the worst debates are ones that need to occur, but don’t. Succinctly documenting what is in and out of scope is likely to generate a debate between key stakeholders. That’s good because it’s probably needed to move your project forward. Remember, your job as the project manager is to evaluate risk and deliverability. So, your part in the debate is to inform the stakeholders, not choose sides! 
  • Share what a “Phase 2” might look like. When an individual project ends, it doesn’t have to mean that creating business value ends. Many practical project initiatives involve a string of projects, each delivering incremental value. In fact, that’s the premise of agile project methodologies. Note in your out-of-scope section what a future project, like a phase 2, might look like. This can make it easier for stakeholders to approve your scope statement. 

Have you used the out of scope section in other ways? Or has that section gotten you into trouble or saved your project from problems? Share with us in the comments section.

For more about scope, check out my Project Management Foundations course.

Coming Up

On May 18 at 4PM MT, I will be joining Christina Charenkova to talk about how Project Managers and Change Managers collaborate on things like scope, communication, and stakeholder management. We’ll discuss how to use and clarify roles and plans, avoid pitfalls, and collaborate better for awesome outcomes! Sign up here:

https://www.linkedin.com/events/7056412593510363136

On June 1st at 11AM  MT, Todd Dewitt will join me to talk about how to build better relationships – by learning to overcome our own fears and also by building rapport with others through empathy and mutual respect. Todd will be sharing some of the insights and strategies from his new book, Dancing with Monsters. I’m a big believer in relationship-building, so I’m looking forward to this conversation. I hope you’ll join us and bring your questions and challenges!

https://www.linkedin.com/events/betterrelationships-betterresul7060330084796170240

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 36,000 subscribers. If you like this article, you can subscribe to receive notifications when a new article posts.

Want to learn more about the topics I talk about in these newsletters? Watch my courses in the LinkedIn Learning Library and tune into my LinkedIn Office Hours live broadcasts.

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Determine Your Minimum Viable Product

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Determine Your Minimum Viable Product

Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash

A key to success in an agile project environment is to determine your Minimum Viable Product (MVP) — that is, the smallest, quickest-to-develop product that provides business value. With passionate stakeholders, keeping the MVP to a minimum can be a challenge. Here are steps to help you define your MVP.  

  • Understand the pain or opportunity. Take the time to understand the source of a problem (the pain) or the envisioned improvement (an opportunity). Analyze processes analysis to further understand the source of pain or opportunity. How can you generate value by adding/removing/creating new steps in a process? Your goal in producing a valid, minimal MVP is to minimize the number of process changes to achieve an improvement.
  • Sit at your customer’s desk (literally, if possible) and watch how they perform their job.  Watch for anything that represents manual activity: duplicate data entry, data verification or handoffs to another person or department. Many of these inefficiencies are taken for granted when collecting requirements. Observing someone at work can flag these as candidates to include in your MVP. If your customer shares other requirements during your “customer desk time,” ask them to show you what they envision. Be sure they use their current processes and tools to do so. Sketch things out on a whiteboard. Make sure you understand the advantages of their proposal.
  • Prioritize the features that surface. And be persistent! You may collect a lot of potential features while you sit at your customer’s desk. Use your observations to identify the most impactful features. If you are having trouble prioritizing, use the pairwise comparison approach. Take each feature and pair it with another. Then ask which one would you prefer to have. Do that for every possible pair of features, and you’ll have a prioritized list. 
  • Iterate building a prototype until you generate business value.  Generating ANY business value means you have created an MVP. That is, if your prototype shows evidence of delivering a positive business outcome, you have an MVP. Share it with your customers and assure them that you can continue to add more features and enhance business value. Doing this avoids the trap of an MVP not being a true minimum, but rather a set of features that address more than one point of pain or opportunity. Stick to the literal definition – a minimum solution – and you’ll be sure to generate the MVP agile was designed to produce.  

What else do you do to identify the minimum viable product in your agile projects? What questions do you have about identifying a true minimum product? Share with us in the comments section.

For more about minimum viable product, check out Daniel Stanton’s Project Management Tips course.

Coming Up

On May 18 at 4PM MT, I will be joining Christina Charenkova to talk about how Project Managers and Change Managers collaborate on things like scope, communication, and stakeholder management. We’ll discuss how to use and clarify roles and plans, avoid pitfalls, and collaborate better for awesome outcomes! Sign up here: https://www.linkedin.com/events/7056412593510363136

On June 1st at 11AM  MT, Todd Dewitt will join me to talk about how to build better relationships – by learning to overcome our own fears and also by building rapport with others through empathy and mutual respect. Todd will be sharing some of the insights and strategies from his new book, Dancing with Monsters. I’m a big believer in relationship-building, so I’m looking forward to this conversation. I hope you’ll join us and bring your questions and challenges!

https://www.linkedin.com/events/betterrelationships-betterresul7060330084796170240

_______________________________________

This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 36,000 subscribers. This newsletter is 100% written by a human (no aliens or AIs involved). If you like this article, you can subscribe to receive notifications when a new article posts.

Want to learn more about the topics I talk about in these newsletters? Watch my courses in the LinkedIn Learning Library and tune into my LinkedIn Office Hours live broadcasts.

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Communication Tips for Handling People’s Concerns

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Communication Tips for Handling People's Concerns

Photo by Christina @ wocintechchat.com on Unsplash

Even with the best communication plan in place, your stakeholders might have concerns about your project. Here are a few common-sense communication tips to use when you’re addressing concerns. (These work equally well in professional and personal situations.)

  • Listen actively.  Your stakeholders should no doubt that you’ve heard what they said. You can do this by explaining how you think their concerns might affect the project. Make sure that your views reflect your stakeholders’ fears. Also, spell out the steps you are or will take to address their concerns.

Important Note: Explain your views and the actions you will take even when you don’t agree with the stakeholders’ concerns. Don’t try to convince a stakeholder that their concerns are unfounded. For example, say that the stakeholder is worried about a risk that you think is unlikely to occur. Normally, you wouldn’t add it to your list of actively monitored risks. But in this case, you would monitor what you need to track their concern – or take an action to track the risk. You will build trust and a stronger relationship by appreciating their emotions and acting on their concerns.

  • Provide regular updates through your stakeholders’ preferred medium. To reinforce that you’ve heard your stakeholders’ concerns, make sure that the stakeholders have up-to-date status of their concerns. Set up a schedule for updates that the stakeholders are comfortable with. Always use the communication method your stakeholder prefers. For example, you might use formal methods, like status reports, as well as informal methods like a specific message to your stakeholder. Keep your updates concise and make sure they address their concerns. Use the same vocabulary the stakeholder uses to reinforce that you listened and understand their situation.
  • Be transparent and share bad news early. To maintain trust, you must share both good and bad news in a timely manner. Also, don’t let stakeholders hear bad news come from anyone before you communicate it. If that happens, your relationship could be permanently damaged. Contact your concerned stakeholder whenever theirs concerns come to fruition. At that time, explain the issue and what you’re doing to address it. If you aren’t sure what action you’ll take, explain the investigation you’re doing and the alternatives you’re considering. Ask your stakeholders for opinions.  Let them know you’ve chosen a course of action. Schedule follow-ups to report on your progress.
  • Be realistic. While stakeholders may prefer to be reassured, don’t fall into the trap of trying to “fix their concern.” If things aren’t good, clearly state that. Don’t sugar-coat it or they might not get your message. Reaffirm the actions you’re taking. Tell them (and mean it) that you are dedicated to solving the issues that arise. 
  • Watch your mood.  Be mindful of your mood. Your stakeholder will catch your mood more easily than the words you use, no matter how wise your words may be. If you are feeling negative emotions, take time to improve your mood before you meet your stakeholder.

Do you have other tips for communicating when people are concerned about something in your project? What about when they’re angry or demoralized or overwhelmed? Share with us in the comments section.

For more about communication, check out Doug Rose’s Project Management Foundations: Communication course.

Coming Up

On May 18th 4PM MT, I will be joining Christina Charenkova to talk about how Project Managers and Change Managers collaborate on things like scope, communication, and stakeholder management. We’ll discuss how to leverage and clarify roles and plans, avoid pitfalls, and collaborate better for awesome outcomes! Sign up here: https://www.linkedin.com/events/7056412593510363136

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 35,000 subscribers. If you like this article, you can subscribe to receive notifications whenever a new article posts. This newsletter is 100% written by a human (no aliens or AIs involved).

Want to learn more about the topics I talk about in these newsletters? Watch my courses in the LinkedIn Learning Library and tune into my LinkedIn Office Hours live broadcasts.

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