Which methodology is best for R&D projects?

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Someone recently asked about the best methodology for managing a research and development (R&D) project. The answer depends on many factors. Here are a few things to consider and the methodologies you might use depending on the nature of your R&D project.

  • Project goals and objectives. R&D projects usually have lots of unknowns. You might be testing new materials, new processes, new tools, or all of these! Working through unknowns requires flexibility and taking small steps. You’ll want to promote learning during the project, too. Agile methodologies, using short iterations, are ideal for this type of situation. Each iteration might not produce a tangible product but can generate learning and knowledge, which help define the next step for the project. Projects where the driver of iterations is learning as you go are sometimes referred to as Spiral Projects. Each “spiral” will help identify and refine the goals and objectives for the next spiral or iteration.

  • Team size and location. Larger teams, or teams with critical skills working remotely, need more formal structure. It’s important to take time to ensure communication is flowing and information is understood. In this case, a more predictive methodology like waterfall is helpful. But, you rarely need to manage an entire project this way. A hybrid approach can be effective. A sub-team that is not co-located with the core team might use agile methods. Then, they can work with the core team to integrate their deliverables into the waterfall project that the core team manages.

  • How much you know about requirements. Agile projects are ideal when requirements aren’t well-defined. Requirements emerge through exploring and producing sample deliverables. However, R&D projects often have well-defined goals and well-understood requirements. Research and development come in with the processes for satisfying those requirements. For example, a car manufacturer has requirements for an electric car battery that is half the weight of current batteries with 20% more range. In this example, an agile project might be the way to go to try out new chemical and manufacturing processes.

(On the other hand, agile isn’t as good a fit when the requirement is to produce a chili pepper that is tasty but not hot. You need to plan to determine who your target market is. More planning, in the form of market research, might be needed to determine consumers perceptions of tasty peppers and hot peppers. Because of this planning, a waterfall project might be the answer.)

  • Your organizational culture and expertise. Because of unknowns, R&D projects are typically complex and costly. Introducing a methodology that your organization isn’t familiar with will escalate that complexity. If you decide to use an unfamiliar methodology, start slow. If possible, try the methodology in a small area of your project. Consider bringing in experienced people to help. You can then expand the use of this methodology as you learn. Iin other words, start with the methodology you know and migrate to new ones as you gain experience.

If you work on R&D projects, I’d love to hear about the methodologies you use and any best practices you’ve learned. Share with us in the comments section.

For more about agile and waterfall methodologies, check out my Project Management Foundations course and Doug Rose’s Agile Foundations course.

Coming Up

My updated Advanced Microsoft Project has been published to the LinkedIn Learning library. This update is completely rerecorded with a new, comprehensive sample project. It is half as long as the previous edition because I took out all the topics I cover in my other Project courses. My humble opinion is that it is also more engaging, because of everything I’ve learned about recording videos in the past 8 years! Here is a link that lets you watch the course for free for the first 24 hours after you begin watching.

https://www.linkedin.com/learning/advanced-microsoft-project-22898395

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 52,000 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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Tips for Supporting Stakeholder Needs

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Tips for Supporting Stakeholder Needs

Producing a useful product is one aspect of successful project delivery. Considering the thoughts and feelings of stakeholders is just as important because it helps prepare stakeholders for accepting and using your deliverables. Here are four recommendations to help you support your stakeholders’ needs.

  • Find which business areas your project affects. Include specific tasks to research the tools, processes, strengths, and weaknesses of each stakeholder area. If you have access to business analysts, this is a great first assignment for them to tackle. If you don’t, the project manager should conduct stakeholder interviews to collect this information. What you learn helps your project plan accommodate your stakeholders’ realities and prevent surprises during project implementation. You certainly don’t want your solution to make your stakeholders’ weaknesses worse.
  • Plan early exposure to the solution. You can generate ownership of the solution by letting stakeholders see early versions of your products. Encourage them to share feedback. They will be more confident when they take part in creating project outcomes. What does seeing a solution mean? Showing stakeholders anything that is an early view of an upcoming product or service: prototypes, business processes shown with sticky notes, early versions of IT user interface screens, or IT testing or design diagrams. Many project managers delay these activities because the solution may change. But that’s the whole idea of early exposure! Your stakeholder perspectives can be incorporated into your products to deploy positive changes. So, show the product early, even earlier than you’re comfortable with. You’ll increase stakeholder buy-in.
  • Identify business processes before committing to new tool deliverables. A risky way to run a project is to come up with what looks like a useful tool to build to help your business and move forward with a project to implement it. HOW and WHERE that tool could be used in your business should be analyzed first. Develop to-be business processes to figure out how your business could incorporate a new tool. Use those new processes to show stakeholders how the tool could create better outcomes. In short, if you want buy-in from stakeholders, create to-be processes first. Then you can start a new project to deploy the tool.
  • Let stakeholders drive project definition and organizational change. There are stories about the placement of new campus sidewalks. As the story goes, buildings were constructed and opened, and sidewalks were laid on the worn paths created by the campus’ occupants. This was better than laying sidewalks where designers THOUGHT people would walk. This is an excellent example of letting stakeholders drive change. Project teams are often guilty of thinking they know what stakeholders want. And they design projects according to that vision – often to catastrophic results. Letting stakeholders drive projects can build enthusiasm and help focus on what that stakeholders want changed or improved.

What other steps can you take to account for what stakeholders really want? Share your thoughts, questions, and anecdotes in the comments section.

For more about working with stakeholders, check out Natasha Kasimtseva’s Managing Project Stakeholders course.

Coming Up

  • Join Tiffany Uman and me on Wednesday, Oct 25, 2023 1:00pm MDT for our live broadcast “How to Provide Project Updates to Executives “. Your leadership team is not out to get you. That said, communicating with them effectively is essential, especially when providing pertinent project updates to drive the business forward. In this live Office Hours, Tiffany Uman and I will dive into the key DOs and DON’Ts for presenting updates to your leadership team with confidence and getting the buy-in you need. I’m excited to hear her advice about communicating project information to executives. Post your questions in the event comments or bring them to the live event!

Tiffany is a career coach, workplace expert, and fellow LinkedIn Learning instructor. Check out her course,  Nano Tips for Answering Common Interview Questions with Tiffany Uman.

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 51,000 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 write an effective project objective

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How to write an effective project objective You may have defined a project with a set of scope statements. A better approach to defining a project is with a single project objective or goal statement. This statement focuses on the overall goal of the project, which helps obtain stakeholder buy-in. It also helps the organization focus on what the project’s supposed to do. Here are tips for creating an effective project objective statement. 

  • Keep scope definitions out of the project objective. You want the objective statement to be business oriented. What business change should the project achieve? Defining the project goal without scope does just that. It also creates organizational focus on what the project is supposed to achieve. Discussion of scope can follow later. At that time, you can confirm that the scope statements are appropriate to meet the project objective. 
  • Evaluate whether the objective statement clearly states the problem to be solved or the opportunity to be pursued. Make sure you have a clear statement about why the organization will pursue the project. Have someone – anyone – read the statement. The project purpose should be clearly understood, regardless of the reader’s role in the organization.
  • Confirm the statement’s ability to inspire. A project objective statement should inspire stakeholders to support the project. It should also excite project team members about participating to make the project objective a reality.
  • Verify that the statement presents an appropriately challenging goal. Stakeholders should see the objective as a challenge that will motivate and stretch their capabilities without being out of reach.
  • Ensure the statement allows flexibility for achieving the goal. In an agile world, the best approach is to let stakeholders determine the best ways to accomplish a goal. This generates the best solutions with the strongest stakeholder buy-in.
  • Include an objective measure of success. No goal is valid without a clear (quantitative or qualitative) way to identify that it has been achieved. An effective objective statement includes a clear way to confirm that the objective has been met.
  • Examples
    • Reduce aircraft costs by 15%, increase overall aircraft availability by 10%, and increase aircraft mechanic productivity by 25% measured by time spent on mechanical work versus overhead.
    • Design and implement hospital diagnostic capabilities to accommodate a 15% increase in patients, while limiting the increase in investment in diagnostic equipment to no more than 10%. (Notice this statement does not say “redesign” as this would limit the options available to the project team. This gives them the option to add a new diagnostic area if that is the best option.)
    • Increase consumer product division profits by 15% and increase market share over 2023 levels through new packaging, new products, or other approaches. (This does limit options to a specific area of the company, but that’s reasonable as that is where the concern for profitability and market share lies. Flexibility as to the approach or scope of activities is supported in this project objective statement.)

If you have other tips for writing an effective objective statement or examples of statements you’ve used in the past, share with us in the comments section.

For more about writing powerful objectives, check out Jessie Withers Goal Setting: Objectives and Key Results course.

Coming Up

My updated Advanced Microsoft Project has been published to the LinkedIn Learning library. This update is completely rerecorded with a new, comprehensive sample project. It is half as long as the previous edition because I took out all the topics I cover in my other Project courses. My humble opinion is that it is also more engaging, because of everything I’ve learned about recording videos in the past 8 years! Here is a link that lets you watch the course for free for the first 24 hours after you begin watching.

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/bonniebiafore_my-updated-advanced-microsoft-project-has-activity-7120114915880701953-wD1I?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 51,000 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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Balancing Optimism and Realism

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Balancing Optimism and Realism The pessimism of Eeyore, the gloomy donkey from Winnie-the-Pooh, would be an uninspiring project manager. But unchecked optimism comes off as unrealistic. The key is to be realistically optimistic! Here are ways to find that balance:  

  • Use risk management as your basis for optimism. It’s being realistic to acknowledge  that projects involve risk. So, foster a risk management culture within your project. You can build a sense of optimism by identifying project risks and developing effective response strategies for them. Promote optimism within your team by emphasizing that they can respond to risks. Encourage discussions about risk. Good risk management plans also give stakeholders reason for optimism. Best of all, this optimism increases confidence in the project.  
  • Back up your optimism with history. Use past successes to validate your optimism. Successes from your current organization are the most powerful. If the history of success comes from outside your organization, explain what your project has in common with your example.
  • Treat pessimism as a chance to improve your project plan. Pessimism typically comes from actual experiences. Pessimism can be draining, but you can learn a lot from it to help you deliver a successful project. Don’t dismiss the pessimists as problem stakeholders to manage. Instead, collect pessimistic comments and study them. That way, you can address the underlying issues to enhance or reinforce your project plan. 
  • Be authentic. Reflect on yourself. Do you tend to be pessimistic, optimistic, realistic, or, most likely, a combination of all three. Be mindful of how your outlook affects others. The tips in this article not only help identify and advocate realistic reasons for optimism, but also leverage pessimism to increase project success.

Most important: Never fake optimism! People see through this, and it will do more harm than good.

What do you do to achieve the nirvana of realistic optimism? Share with us in the comments section.

Coming Up

Join Tiffany Uman and me on Wednesday, Oct 25, 2023 1:00pm MDT for our live broadcast   “How to Provide Project Updates to Executives “.

Your leadership team is not out to get you. That said, communicating with them effectively is essential, especially when providing pertinent project updates to drive the business forward. In this live Office Hours, Tiffany Uman and I will dive into the key DOs and DON’Ts for presenting updates to your leadership team with confidence and getting the buy-in you need. I’m excited to hear her advice about communicating project information to executives. Post your questions in the event comments or bring them to the live event!

Tiffany is a career coach, workplace expert, and fellow LinkedIn Learning instructor. Check out her course, Nano Tips for Answering Common Interview Questions with Tiffany Uman.

_______________________________________

This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 50,000 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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Assigning Responsibilities in the Ideal Project Charter

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Assigning Responsibilities in the Ideal Project CharterA project charter defines project scope and describes the responsibilities of the sponsor and project manager. So, you might think the responsibilities section would be as easy as “cut and paste.” Think again! The responsibilities in an ideal charter depend on the experience and expertise of the sponsor and project manager. Here are areas and considerations that can affect the responsibilities in  the project charter.

  • Scope definition and refinement. Sponsors and project managers can bring different technical backgrounds to a project. Based on the nature of the project, the project manager or the sponsor might manage scope definition and refinement. When the sponsor takes on this role, the project manager needs to stay up to date, because understanding scope is vital for managing the project schedule and risk. The sponsor must ensure that they have time to perform scope management properly.
  • Stakeholder communication. Senior leader focus on the project could affect stakeholder management responsibilities. The sponsor may have more direct contact and stronger relationships with senior leaders. In that case, the sponsor may spearhead communication with senior leaders, while the project manager focuses on working with the project team and other stakeholders.
  • Resource management. The sponsor might handle resource management when there’s a shortage of skilled resources. Also, when the organization has many projects running simultaneously. Prioritization decisions will be crucial and need senior leader buy-in. So, this requires active senior-level management of personnel availability. The project manager still needs to be involved so they can manage the project schedule.
  • Risk management. The sponsor might manage high-risk items or risks that senior leaders will have to address. In this arrangement, the project manager typically manages other risk items and monitors the status of high-level risks for the sponsor.
  • Alignment with organizational strategy. Aligning a project with business strategy might sit with the sponsor. The PM focuses on tactical delivery of the project and aligns the project with other relevant projects and operational processes.
  • Personal strengths and preferences. The best sponsor-project manager relationships work like a partnership. The project manager and sponsor have different strengths and preferences. They can consider these when dividing project management responsibilities. The partners each take responsibility for things they are best at and enjoy. This leads to highly successful project delivery. Keep in mind, the sponsor needs to have enough time to manage their assigned project activities.

Can you think of other factors where project responsibilities might vary? Have you ever worked in partnership with your sponsor? If so, how did it go? Any tips for the rest of us?

For more about the project charter, check out my Project Management Foundations course.

Coming Up

Do you have questions about careers in project management? Will I like being a project manager? What skills do I need? What about education? How do I get experience? Are certifications worth it and what do I need to do to earn them? What are the possible career paths? Chris Croft and I co-authored the course How to Launch a Career in Project Management to answer all these questions – and many more. For this Office Hours event, we want you to watch the course FIRST. Then, if you still have questions, join us in this event , on Wednesday, October 11, 2023, 9:00am MDT.

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This article belongs to the Bonnie’s Project Pointers newsletter series, which has more than 49,000 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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