Author: Drew Davison

Drew Davison is the owner and principal consultant at Davison Consulting and a former system development executive. He is the developer of Project Pre-Check, an innovative framework for launching projects and guiding successful project delivery, the author of Project Pre-Check - The Stakeholder Practice for Successful Business and Technology Change and Project Pre-Check FastPath - The Project Manager’s Guide to Stakeholder Management. He works with organizations that are undergoing major business and technology change to implement the empowered stakeholder groups critical to project success. Drew can be reached at [email protected].

From the Sponsor’s Desk – Conquering Culture Clash

Written by Drew Davison on September 5, 2017. Posted in Articles. 2 Comments on From the Sponsor’s Desk – Conquering Culture Clash

“We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us”

Jo Cox
British Labour MP
22 June 1974 – 16 June 2016

Culture clashes are occurring the world over. In Britain, Europe, North America, the Middle East, Asia and Africa, confrontations between cultures are often the new normal. So too in the business world. Organizations in search of the best and brightest bring people together from all over the globe to work together. Sometimes the result is not what was hoped for. Often the culprit is culture clash – the inability of people from different cultures and backgrounds to work together effectively. So how do we conquer culture clash?

In this story, we’ll look at one person’s journey from project and change management consultant to trainer and ambassador for cultural collaboration. What started out as a request from one business leader to help solve a cultural conflict on one technology team ended up with over fifty training sessions for over one thousand people in North and South America. The accolades from all quarters suggest the program was a success. Attendees acquired new frames of reference to help conquer culture clashes in their worlds going forward.

The Situation

Rekha Kulshreshtha was an experienced project and change management consultant. She was working on a change management assignment when her client approached her with a request to address a potential cultural conflict on one of the teams on a major business change he was sponsoring.

The client had encountered a problem on a previous project that cost him the services of a talented East Indian technician. He was recruited because of his unique skill set after a long search. He was flown to the North American firm’s headquarters, provided with a motel room close to the office, introduced to his leader and teammates and given a standard company orientation. Two days later, the technician informed the company he wished to return home. It seems two problems were at the core of his request: he was a vegetarian in a meat loving city and couldn’t determine what was suitable for him to eat and, he didn’t know how to use the phone to call home. His culture made asking for help inappropriate. He didn’t want to offend.

The client wanted to pre-empt a repeat occurrence on this project. The project was much bigger. The number of offshore staff was much larger. The risks were far greater. So he asked Rekha to take on the challenge. Rekha was born in India and moved to North America when she was six. Often she was the only non-white student in her school. She knew how North Americans tended to react to people who looked and spoke differently. She could also empathize with those who were from away. So Rekha said yes to the challenge.

The Goal

With her client’s collaboration, Rekha established the following goal: to ensure that team members have the environment, knowledge and tools to prevent and/or overcome barriers to effective communication. Emphasis was to be placed on but not limited to cultural perspectives.

The Project

Rekha was an experienced change management consultant. She looked at her change management plan but found the new assignment didn’t fit. She came to the conclusion that providing a framework to achieve her goal was a separate and distinct deliverable. She believed a short targeted course was the answer. She proposed her solution to her client. He agreed.

Rekha wasn’t an educator. However, she had prepared and run innumerable workshops and project reviews in her career so she decided to tackle the course development herself. After all, she had personally experienced the cultural divide. So, she researched. She developed and borrowed material. She trialed and revised accordingly. Finally she had a course she thought was ready for prime time.

The Course was based on a number of principles:

It had to be interactive
It had to have a Goldilocks duration – no more than three hours
It had to be accessible locally and remotely
It had to be suitable for any culture or mix of cultures
It had to feature stories – Rekha’s as well as the attendees
It had to leave participants feeling confident about their abilities to adapt to most communication challenges, one on one and in group settings

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The core of the course was the Cultural Dimensions chart below:

The dimensions and spectrums Rekha chose were sufficiently broad to generate discussion, tales of personal experiences and provide insights into the approaches one could use to avoid or remedy a communication problem. And so Rekha proceeded to deliver the first course.

The Results

The first course was delivered to eighty team members. There was no offshore staff involved. Rekha used examples from her own experience to get the discussions going. And then the flood gates opened. One after another, the attendees would recount an experience, a culture clash. They were often about misunderstandings with someone from the same community, with the same cultural background.

Rekha explained to me, “Although the intention of our course was to help people from different countries communicate with each other more effectively, what we really focused on was the basic elements of ‘teaming’. And actually we used stories like the difference between a visit with a hair-dresser (long term relationship) versus a used car dealer (short term transaction) to emphasize that even within our country and culture, there are behaviours across the spectrum and we experience and accept these differences. Once we get people to see the spectrum of behaviours within our own culture, it’s easier to understand that these behaviours exist in other cultures as well.” As Rekha observed, “culture is about generalizations. Never assume everyone is going to be the same”.

After more than fifty courses on two continents involving over one thousand participants, both locally and remotely, the course has received over 80% positive response. Participants are usually bubbling with insight and enthusiasm at the end. Clients have been universally positive. Their feedback suggests that all teams that have been through the course seem to perform at a higher level, offshore members or not. I’d say Rekha and her clients have indeed managed to conquer culture clash.

How a Great Leader Succeeded

I met Rekha virtually, through Linkedin. I asked if she had any stories to share. And here we are. Her success is due to a number of factors including the following:

Outside the Box Thinking – Rekha’s success was due, in part, to her realization that the client’s request was a separate and unique challenge. You know the old saying, “if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail”. Rekha didn’t fall into that trap. She recognized that the problem identified by her client needed a different approach even though it was outside her comfort zone.
Credentials – Rekha was an experienced project and change management consultant. She was also Indian born and Canadian raised. She brought that insight and experience to the development of the course and the delivery of the material.
Supportive Clients – like all changes of this magnitude, Rekha wouldn’t have been successful without the leadership and passion of her client, the corporation’s CIO. He was open, honest and collaborative and he owned the program. When one of the project managers suggested the first offering of the course should be cancelled because the risks were too high, the CIO just said keep going.
Collaboration – Rekha consulted widely, with managers, project teams, change management and organizational development experts, educators and culture change pros. She begged, borrowed and adapted as the needs dictated.
Iterative development – Rekha recorded lessons learned from each course offering using the formal assessments submitted as well as her own recollections and reactions. The course evolved over time and Rekha’s ability to adapt the content and delivery progressed as well.
Time – the two hours Rekha required for the course was ideal. It was short enough that it was tough to say no to. The content she was able to cover was sufficiently compelling and consumable to be retained by the attendees well after the course finished.

So, be a Great Leader. Put these points on your checklist of things to consider so you too can improve team communication and performance. If you’d like more information about the course, contact Rekha directly at [email protected] And if you’d like to understand your own cultural tendencies and how they compare with different country profiles, take a look at Country Navigator. And remember, use Project Pre-Check’s three building blocks covering the key stakeholder group (including the key stakeholder roles), the decision management process and Decision Framework best practices right up front so you don’t overlook these key success factors.

Finally, thanks to everyone who has willingly shared their experiences for presentation in this blog. Everyone benefits. First time contributors get a copy of one of my books. Readers get insights they can apply to their own unique circumstances. So, if you have a project experience, good, bad and everything in between, send me the details and we’ll chat. I’ll write it up and, when you’re happy with the results, Project Times will post it so others can learn from your insights. Thanks

From the Sponsor’s Desk – 10 Project Manager Resume Best Practices

Written by Drew Davison on August 2, 2017. Posted in Articles. 3 Comments on From the Sponsor’s Desk – 10 Project Manager Resume Best Practices

Project managers live a life of change, from project to project, from stakeholder to stakeholder, from team to team, from technology to technology.

That means periodic searches for new opportunities to stay employed, leverage your talents and build your skills and capabilities. It doesn’t matter whether you’re going from company to company as a contractor or getting your assignments within a company or organization. Personal contacts and a solid professional reputation are essential in the search process. But the bedrock is the resume. Having a comprehensive, robust portfolio and a targeted resume to secure that next ideal assignment can be the game changer.

I have a colleague who has been a highly successful contract project manager for over two decades. His projects are always successful. Always. They’re not always on budget and schedule. They don’t always deliver the originally planned functionality. But his key stakeholders love him. His biggest challenge is leaving. They just don’t want him to go even though he charges a sizeable premium for his services. He is also amazingly successful at securing the kinds of assignments that will build his skills and capabilities going forward. In addition to the usual employment history and education, here are the ten project manager resume best practices he uses to differentiate himself from the competition.

1. Match the opportunity

The resume should always be targeted at the opportunity. Do your research. If you know someone in the organization you’re seeking to join, have a chat. Find out about the mission, vision, culture and core competencies. Learn about recent successes and failures, market performance, competitors, internal practices, processes and technologies. Get any information you can about the key stakeholders, their careers and aspirations. Always keep the hiring manager’s needs in mind. Shape your resume to that information base to show off a hiring manager’s dream candidate – you. Customizing shows you care enough to learn about the organization and helps the decision makers arrive at the right hiring decision.

2. Focus on your successes

The whole purpose of your resume is to get an interview and the job offer so you can decide if you want to take on the challenge they’re offering. Don’t include problem or failed projects, even if you think they were someone else’s fault. Include your best work and demonstrate how that can help your prospective future employer.

3. Cultivate Brevity

My colleague uses a two page rule of thumb but has gone to five pages on occasion because the situations dictated a fuller response. The key is to keep the material absolutely relevant, legible and succinct. Use charts, graphs, pictograms and other graphics as appropriate to make your point and attract the reader’s attention. Remember that old saying, “a picture is worth a thousand words”? It can be especially true in your resume.

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4. Demonstrate Currency

Even though the prospective assignment may only require knowledge of and experience with conventional practices and technologies, include your exposure to new and emerging developments. The hiring manager might see these capabilities as an opportunity for the organization which can strengthen your case.

5. Lessons learned

For each assignment you cover in your resume, include lessons learned and applied along the way. Show how they contributed to a successful outcome. Lessons learned demonstrate your commitment to finding better ways and your ability to collaborate and deliver change. Don’t cover post project reviews or audit unless they were emphatically positive.

6. Be a professional

It’s one thing to do the work. It’s another matter to demonstrate that you take professionalism seriously. Include your certifications, like PMP, CAPM, CSM, Prince2, GOAM/APM, etc. Also include any related certifications, including change management, Lean/Six Sigma, ITIL, quality management, etc. Certifications alone won’t get you the job but, more and more, they are a necessary pre-requisite.

Also include memberships in project management and related organizations like PMI, IPMA, ACMP and CMI and your level of involvement – member, contributor, board member, etc. Finally, cover any related publishing activity, including books published, blog posts, podcasts, articles, speaking engagements, any commentaries you have contributed and any industry accolades you have received in the recent past.

7. Recognize your networks – stakeholders, teams, clients

Project management is all about leadership, with your clients, stakeholders and team members. Resumes that feature the “I” word will be quickly discarded. Taking credit for the work and success of others will usually earn your resume a speedy reject. Use your successes with the diverse set of players involved in projects to demonstrate your leadership agility and capability.

8. Be a storyteller

Bullet points are nice and succinct but not very compelling. Sometimes a short story can gain a reader’s attention where a bulleted list will fail. An article, How to Tell a Great Story by Carolyn O’Hara in the Harvard Business Review quotes Nick Morgan, author of Power Cues and president and founder of Public Words, a communications consulting firm: “Facts and figures and all the rational things that we think are important in the business world actually don’t stick in our minds at all”. The article goes on to suggest that stories create “sticky” memories by attaching emotions to things that happen. So create some sticky memories in the minds of hiring managers by telling a few compelling stories.

9. Seek feedback

No project manager is an island. PM’s work with all sorts of people within and outside an organization. Take advantage of that. Get feedback from stakeholders, team mates, clients, peers, even your current boss, depending on the circumstances and relationship of course. You’ll be amazed at the feedback you get. It’s almost like a 360 degree performance appraisal, intimidating at first but immensely illuminating in the longer term. Reflect that feedback in your resume. It will be a much better product as a result.

10. Show your personal brand

This is your resume. Structure the content, format and media to reinforce who you are and what you offer. It doesn’t have to be on letter size or A4 paper. It doesn’t have to be on paper at all or only minimally. A web site, podcast, blog posts, Youtube video? How about a resume in Twitter tweets? Experiment. Get feedback. Revise and try again. Check out Elon Musk’s resume to get an idea of the possible.

There you have it – my colleague’s 10 project manager resume best practices. Try them out and let us know how they worked for you. If you have your own resume best practices, please leave a comment below so others can benefit. And remember, review Project Pre-Check’s three building blocks covering the key stakeholder group, the decision management process and Decision Framework best practices to ensure you cover everything of significance in your new, compelling resume.

Finally, thanks to everyone who has willingly shared their experiences for presentation in this blog. Everyone benefits. First time contributors get a copy of one of my books. Readers get insights they can apply to their own unique circumstances. So, if you have a project experience, a favorite best practice, or an interesting insight that can make a PM’s life easier, send me the details and we’ll chat. I’ll write it up and, when you’re happy with the results, Project Times will post it so others can learn from your insights. Thanks

From the Sponsor’s Desk – Lessons from Small Projects Are Scalable

Written by Drew Davison on July 19, 2017. Posted in Articles. 3 Comments on From the Sponsor’s Desk – Lessons from Small Projects Are Scalable

According to a 2012 Gartner study, “Small is beautiful — or at least small projects are easier to manage and execute.

The failure rate of large IT projects with budgets exceeding $1 million was found to be almost 50% higher than for projects with budgets below $350,000.” The survey was conducted to provide insights into IT project performance in organizations across North America, France, Germany and the United Kingdom.

A 2012 McKinsey & Company study in conjunction with the University of Oxford looking at 5,400 large scale IT projects (projects with initial budgets greater than $15M) found that 17 percent went so badly that they threatened the very existence of the company. On average, the study found large IT projects ran 45 percent over budget and 7 percent over time, while delivering 56 percent less value than predicted.

And the problem isn’t just related to so-called “IT projects.” In a previous post, The Wonders of Wishful Thinking, we tackled the challenges of managing mergers and acquisitions. I included a quote from Roger L. Martin from a Harvard Business Review article: “M&A is a mug’s game, in which typically 70%–90% of acquisitions are abysmal failures.”

What’s puzzling to me is how organizations can continue to deliver successful, small projects yet stumble badly on large projects especially when the lessons from small projects are scalable! As we’ll see in the following case, the approaches that work on small undertakings are equally applicable to large scale projects, IT oriented or otherwise.

Thanks to R.A. for the details on this story.

The Situation

This large American-based worldwide technology organization was struggling with its sales performance. While sales were increasing in absolute terms, the rate of growth on a year by year basis was declining, and that decline had been accelerating over the last four years.

Senior management had looked at the issue and had brought in some consulting organizations to assess the problem. The findings included well-regarded and competitive product lines, good cost control, productive design, manufacturing and distribution practices and effective customer service. The primary problem most studies identified focused on sales staff productivity. That problem was compounded by the organization’s strategic reliance on the sales organization as the conduit for client satisfaction, retention, and growth.

The organization had hired a new VP of Sales six months prior. He was fully aware of the studies’ findings and conclusions. He understood the strategic significance of the sales force’s performance and capability. He recognized that improving sales staff productivity was his number one priority. So he launched a program to remedy the situation. He called it Ever Better, or EB for short.

The Goal

The VP of Sales established the following goals for his Ever-Better transformation program:

To increase sales numbers by 5% annually over the next five years

The scope of the initiative would include all management, sales and support staff within the Sales organization with assistance from the Information Services organization and external consultants as required.
The content would cover all policies, processes, practices, locations, and technologies
The direction and timing of the remedies would be determined through discussions with clients and then active engagement of all Sales Department personnel
Solutions would be delivered in small incremental releases on an office by office basis.
Success would be measured by annual sales growth, client satisfaction, retention and growth and sales force satisfaction, retention and growth.

The Sales VP established a budget of $2 million and a fourteen-month target to complete the changes. He believed that would give him a one-year payback, a necessity if he hoped to achieve his 5% annual sales growth goal.

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The Project

The Sales VP had worked with a project manager on a similar challenge in a previous job. They worked well together and delivered terrific results. The Project Manager was a straight shooter and outstanding leader, exactly what the Sales VP needed right now. So the Project Manager was offered the position. He accepted.

As soon as the Project Manager was on board, the Sales VP and Project Manager closeted themselves for two days to plan their approach, shown below:

Framework for Ever Better Transformation Program

The PM charged ahead and booked meetings with their client executives around the globe over the first few weeks. He followed that up, booking meetings with all their sales and support staff. He also developed a structured facilitation agenda for the meetings to get the most out of the time available. And then the meetings happened. It was a whirlwind of flights, hotels and meeting rooms, facilitations, note taking and feedback. After five weeks, they had covered 90% of their clients and 94% of their sales and support staff. The findings were illuminating:

From the clients:

Inconsistent follow-up to replenish inventory and address issues
Lack of information on new or enhanced products and services
Unreliable fulfillment of orders
Sales contacts were by product line. Sales staff lacked an overall view of clients’ dealings with the company.

From the sales and support staff:

Lack of an overall view of a client’s dealings with the company was often a source of embarrassment and ill will
Time-consuming process to access a client’s order history across products
Sales staff kept information on a client’s communications and so was not accessible by others
Announcements about new products and services varied by product line, some going directly to the clients, others to sales staff only and some to both

From the sales managers:

Very little information was available on individual sales staff plans and performance to manage and guide development
Organizing sales staff by product line made it very difficult to get comprehensive client views.

The Sales VP and PM saw four areas of opportunity to improve sales performance:

Align sales staff by customer, not product line, with appropriate adjustments to sales and service compensation and recognition programs
Provide sales staff with client views showing order history and client communications from all sources
Provide sales managers with comprehensive dashboards to plan and monitor performance by client, staff and product line
Improve new product introduction processes, so clients and sale staff received the information they needed in a coordinated and timely manner.

While the last item about product introductions was outside of the Ever-Better program scope, it was low hanging fruit that couldn’t be ignored. The Sales VP and PM met with executives in the product development organizations to apprise them of their findings and get their commitment to improving the process. They were met with enthusiastic responses and promised to revise and standardize their processes.

The Sales VP and PM continued to work the plan, organizing a talented group of business, IS and contract resource to develop the target architecture including:

organization changes to bring a client orientation to all sales activities
resulting process changes
new technology solutions to provide sales staff and managers with anywhere, anytime access to their information and functionality
new web functions for clients to review product specs and order online
interface changes and conversions from existing sales applications

The architecture group recommended two SaaS solutions to address the technology needs of the sales staff and managers. They were market proven and would allow the project to deliver quickly. They also accelerated and shaped the follow-on discussions about priorities and phasing and staging options.

Throughout these stages, the Project Manager organized and ran the day to day efforts. The Sales VP communicated and dialogued broadly with his staff, keeping them up-to-date on progress, soliciting feedback on plans and proposals. He engaged with his clients on plans and progress, in person and remotely. He kept his executive colleagues in the loop on a regular basis. Almost half of every day was committed to the Ever-Better program.

Initial implementations involved an office at a time and a subset of the planned functionality. In fact, the first implementation occurred in month five with a limited slice of functionality and barely satisfactory results. Pizza and beer with the Sales VP along with lots of laughs and rapid fixes left everyone feeling positive about the future.

That story was repeated across the sales organization and created a culture of openness and problem solving that paved the way for future iterations. Extra attention was given to the sales managers and staff and their clients. Facilitated feedback sessions highlighted successes and brought out opportunities to improve the introduction and implementation processes and the delivered solutions. Learnings and findings were applied to subsequent rollouts. And so, the Ever-Better program progressed through to completion.

The Results

The Ever-Better program was completed in sixteen months versus the planned fourteen months at the cost of $2.3 million, $300,000 over the original budget. The extra time and cost were due to expanding the scope to integrate product launches and enhancements into the program. Total sales increased by 4% in the first year, 9% in the second year and were trending well above the target 5% in the third year when I was given this case.

There were some challenges. Sales on a couple of product lines fell as the sales force was transitioning to a client centered organization. There were some resignations among the sales staff, also because of the client orientation. The problems were addressed expeditiously and the fixes included in future rollout practices.

Most impressively, client, sales management, and sales staff satisfaction levels all experienced double-digit gains each year to midway through the third year.

The Title of this post is “Lessons from Small Projects Are Scalable.” At $2.3 million, the Ever-Better program isn’t a small project. Costs through the first few implementations were only $450,000. The costs incurred after that were simply replicating and expanding a proven, tried and true solution. The foundation had been laid. What came after was simply building on and benefiting from a solid, comprehensive base. The lessons did scale remarkably well.

How a Great Leader Succeeded

There is no question the Sales VP owned this problem and this project. His influence was felt throughout, from the project’s goals and scope to the selection of the PM, the discussions with client executives, sales managers and staff and ongoing updates to all concerned. There are ten factors that help explain the project’s success:

Executive sponsorship – ownership, passion, promotion, enlightened leadership
Clarity of vision – end results, roadmap, priorities and context – relations to corporate mission, vision, goals, strategies, priorities, culture and core values
Small is beautiful – time, cost, scope, impact, phased and staged
Focus on results – benefits, practices, behaviors, attitudes
Understanding worth – realistic benefits, relevant budgets and timelines
Engagement – commit, socialize and celebrate with everyone affected
Talent – the right skills, the right attitudes, when needed, in the quantity required
Collaboration – active participation in problem-solving and solution development
Communication – up, down, sideways, in writing, in person, over social media
Measurement – overall sales, sales by product line, by client and satisfaction levels all around

So, be a Great Leader. Put these points on your checklist of things to consider on your next project so you too can successfully scale from small to large. And remember, use Project Pre-Check’s three building blocks covering the key stakeholder group (including the key stakeholder roles), the decision management process and Decision Framework best practices right up front, so you don’t overlook these key success factors.

Finally, thanks to everyone who has willingly shared their experiences for presentation in this blog. Everyone benefits. First-time contributors get a copy of one of my books. Readers get insights they can apply to their unique circumstances. So, if you have a project experience, good, bad and everything in between, send me the details, and we’ll chat. I’ll write it up and, when you’re happy with the results, Project Times will post it so others can learn from your insights.

From the Sponsor’s Desk – 5 Ways to Sustain a Change

Written by Drew Davison on June 7, 2017. Posted in Articles. 7 Comments on From the Sponsor’s Desk – 5 Ways to Sustain a Change

We work our butts off to implement a successful project. We ensure key stakeholders are actively involved. We keep the needs of our customers front and center.

We apply best practices, as appropriate, to deliver better, faster and more cost-effectively. We collaborate with our teammates and others within and outside our organization on whose skills we rely. We communicate widely. Finally, we celebrate those successful implementations to glowing accolades. In the end, we move on to our next assignment with another experience notch on our belts and pride for a job well done. Then six months or a year later, we hear that pride and joy we helped deliver has come unraveled. Something or, more likely someone, has decided, for whatever reason, that our project was not what the organization needed after all. Things have reverted to the old status quo. Here are five ways to sustain a change so that the new way becomes the best way, well loved by all those affected.

This story is a great example of an unraveling, how a well-conceived and well-executed project delivered great short term results that were undone within eighteen months. It turns out the staff affected by the change complied with the new order of things, but they did not internalize the new behaviors. As soon as an opportunity presented itself to go back to the old way, they took it. The organization that had reaped the benefits of the change gave them all back.

Thanks to Y.T. for the details on this story.

The Situation

This medium sized financial services organization with its head office and forty-seven local offices covering clients in the southeast region was experiencing increased competition on all fronts – mortgages, insurance, banking services and investment offerings. Senior management had seen the challenges escalating over the years and had attempted some programs to improve their competitive position, but nothing changed the results significantly. They decided on a different strategy this time – to leverage the free time of the local office staff to sell the company’s products and services.

The Goal

The local office sales program had three key objectives:

Develop and introduce a local office sales program that would help the company combat the efforts of the competition by engaging with their clients and selling the company’s products.
Increase the number of client meetings in the local offices by 40%.
Develop product campaigns to offer through the local office channel.
Achieve a 20% increase in campaign revenues from the new channel within 12 months.

The Project

The key sponsor for the change, the Vice President of Sales, was highly visible, accessible and consistent in his support for the change. He pulled together the key stakeholders needed to introduce the change and see the program through to completion. That included the corporate sales office which supported both strategic concept development and program delivery, the six region executives, areas that supported sales reporting and analytics and product partners from banking, insurance, mortgages, and investments.

The sponsor also brought in a highly experienced and much-praised contract project manager, Isabel, to lead the development and delivery of the program. Isabel had a background in change management and ten years of experience delivering sales and marketing programs. Over the years she had developed an approach that worked. It included:

Up front target assessments to understand the real culture and core values she had to deal with. She included the key stakeholders as well as the change recipients in her appraisal.
A rapid Conceive->Deliver->Assess->Refine cycle to hit the ground running, gain experience and improve the program as it was rollout out.
Staged delivery an office or group of offices at a time to boost the focus and allow local tailoring. Office cultures and capabilities could differ materially. It was important to the success of each stage of the rollout that those local differences were acknowledged and reflected in the program.
Checking assumptions. The program would affect over 300 people plus their clients. It was vital that every assumption on which the program was based was identified and its veracity confirmed.

Isabel put together a plan for the local office sales program she believed would deliver maximum impact for the company:

Phase 1 – Preparation

Implementation minus 8 weeks: materials and tools development for local staff sales training and communication plan development
Implementation minus 6 weeks: region selection and confirmation at executive level
Implementation minus 4 weeks: region engagement at the local level and the start of corporate, regional and local communications
Implementation minus 2 weeks: region briefing at local leader level

Phase 2 – Iterative Delivery

Event week: 1-day local development and collaborative preparation, 1-day training, 1-day monitored application, 1 day debrief and next steps planning
Weekly region results measurement
Implementation plus 2 weeks: in region follow-up
Implementation plus 4 weeks: region post-launch assessment
Implementation plus 8 weeks: region final launch assessment and transition to local ownership

Phase 3 – Monitoring and Close

Weekly program results measurement and communication
Post Program Implementation: program follow-up
Post Program Implementation: program post-launch assessment
Post Program Implementation: program final launch assessment and close

Isabel reviewed the plan with the VP Sales and other key stakeholders. She received unanimous approval with a couple of minor adjustments, and then the work began.

The target assessments revealed some interesting findings. The VP Sales, the Sales Executive, and the product partners were very entrepreneurial in their outlook. They had an “act now and asked for forgiveness later” mindset. In contrast, the region executives and the local office staff were more inclined to an order-taker mentality – tell me what to do and I will make it happen. Isabel and her team used that information to tailor their program development efforts. They demanded more rigor from the sales and product partners to provide greater specificity for the region executives and local staff. The material seemed to work.

The process of identifying and confirming assumptions uncovered some interesting findings as well. The program they developed assumed the local staff would book meetings with their clients using Outlook, which had been in the offices for some years. They discovered that few local staff knew how to use it to schedule appointments. They also assumed that the staff’s primary client contact times would be late morning through early afternoon and mid to late afternoon. They discovered that those times were also the most active for client drop-ins to carry out their banking activities. These and other findings were used to adjust the program design and materials to accommodate the revised assumptions.

Also, another offshoot of the program was used to support a new local office manager. The original structure was designed primarily to support an existing manager creating a “call to action” or increase in client contact and sales activity. With a new office manager, the tone was adjusted to frame the activity as a “fresh start.” While the basic framework was maintained, the new manager program was given a new title, and the messaging and tone were adjusted to reflect the change in emphasis.

The project largely progressed as planned. Isabel and her team were in frequent contact with the key stakeholders to gauge their levels of comfort and adjust content and plans accordingly. Reception at the local offices was reserved, as expected. The VP Sales, the local region executive and one or more of the product partners were involved in each local office rollout. That certainly helped impress on everyone involved the importance of the program. It was a huge commitment of management time. Moreover, it worked.

The Results

All forty-seven offices were introduced to the new local office sales program over a period of twelve weeks. As planned, local tailoring was done to reflect the market served by each office and the skills and capabilities of the local staff. There was some turnover, mostly in line with what was anticipated. In spite of the recognition programs and the financial incentives offered to all participating staff, some found the increased focus on “sales” and securing “customer meetings” not to their liking. Results also reflected the passion and leadership of the local office managers. Offices with gung-ho managers who worked to create a collaborative team atmosphere, celebrating successes and helping each staff member according to their need were significantly more successful. Remedial help and guidance was provided to the offices that were not performing to plan.

The program was deemed complete after six months, and Isabel departed with accolades for a job well done. At the end of twelve months on the new program, program revenues were up over 30%, well beyond the targeted 20%. The increase in client meetings could not be tracked because there were no baselines to compare.

After eighteen months, the VP of Sales, the program’s original sponsor, departed the company for greener pastures. The new VP of Sales conducted a tour of the local offices shortly after arrival. On one of the visits, he was asked why local staff had to, as the questioner phrased it, “spend all our time selling over the phone and neglecting the clients who come into the branch for assistance?” The new VP of Sales, somewhat startled by the question, asked for more details. On his return to head office, he questioned his staff. A week after that question was asked, he canceled the program, instructing local office managers to discontinue the sales calls. Within six months of that fateful decision, program revenue fell back to pre-program levels. It is unfortunate there was no orientation program for that new VP, to help him understand the culture and practices that were being built by the local sales program.

How a Great Leader Succeeded and the Company Lost

The initiating sponsor, his stakeholder group along with Isabel and her team did some very smart things to achieve the results they did and one thing they missed that was the program’s undoing:

The active involvement of the VP of Sales and the other key stakeholders in all local office rollouts sent a very clear message about the importance of the program.
Isabel’s four-point personal practice was an insightful, professional touch – up front assessments, the rapid development cycle, staged delivery and the continuous assumptions check set the stage for success. The endorsement of the practices by the key stakeholders showed thoughtful leadership.
Including local leaders and staff in the review and customization of the program delivered greater local buy-in and better results.
The program used a few simple metrics to gauge progress and communicated widely about the rollout and the performance of the program.
Unfortunately, the staff did not internalize the new customer service culture. I did a post a while ago called Cultivating Culture, about an organization that was facing rapid growth and wanted to preserve their “whatever it takes” culture. They succeeded wonderfully by helping staff view everything from the client’s perspective. The attitude was internalized by every employee. It was who they were. That message was reinforced at every turn. It is unfortunate that this program’s sponsors did not see the need for and Isabel and her team were not given the opportunity to take that extra step. They delivered compliance, but they did not achieve internalization.

So, be a Great Leader. Put these points on your checklist of things to consider on your next project so you too can achieve great, sustainable results. Remember, use Project Pre-Check’s three building blocks covering the key stakeholder group (including the key stakeholder roles), the decision management process and Decision Framework best practices right up front, so you do not overlook these key success factors.

Finally, thanks to everyone who has willingly shared their experiences for presentation in this blog. Everyone benefits. First-time contributors get a copy of one of my books. Readers get insights they can apply to their unique circumstances. So, if you have a project experience, good, bad and everything in between, send me the details, and we will chat. I will write it up and, when you are happy with the results, Project Times will post it so others can learn from your insights.

From the Sponsor’s Desk – Slicing and Dicing for Success

Written by Drew Davison on May 25, 2017. Posted in Articles. 4 Comments on From the Sponsor’s Desk – Slicing and Dicing for Success

Change is all around us these days. Disruptive competition is the norm.

Organizations are frequently challenged to launch changes that are outside of their comfort zones, at odds with their cultures and beyond their skills and capabilities. So what should one do? Try slicing and dicing for success.

This case provides an interesting example of one company’s response to competitive pressures that were threatening its livelihood and longevity. It managed to implement an essential service in the face of long odds by applying some well-known, well-proven practices you are probably already familiar with.
Thanks to J.B. for the details on this story.

The Situation

This manufacturer and wholesaler made and sourced a variety of housewares and related products primarily for the domestic market. They had some regional warehouses to provide products to their retailing customers, either through pickup or local delivery.

Over the past five years, the company’s performance had been lagging. It was still making a decent profit, but it was not growing much, and the shareowners were getting restless. Senior management agreed to bring in a consultant to review their strategic plan and operating performance and get some recommendation to improve profitability.

The consultant examined the company’s operations and performance and their prospects going forward. He gave good marks to customer service, product quality, and operational effectiveness. Even marketing and distribution functions received good grades, with one glaring exception: Internet services. The consultant found seven web sites, one for each of their product lines. His assessment:

They were mostly brochure ware
They offered no or minimal e-commerce functionality
There was no cross lines linking
Each site had a different look and feel
It was difficult to update existing information and add and revise new products
The sites were based on outdated, unsupported technology
There was no tie-in to local or regional inventories
There was no tie in to customer buying habits and purchasing records

Essentially, the consultant discovered the company’s web services and infrastructure were afterthoughts, something which came in last when developing strategy and plans and delivering products and services. The company’s web offerings were not competitive. The company’s sales were not growing because the competition was beating them on the web services front.

The consultant recommended a complete replacement of the seven current web sites with a new, integrated offering based on current, up-to-date technologies. He suggested that such an offering could boost earnings by 30% annually. He indicated that failure to take action would put the company at an even greater competitive disadvantage and accelerate the company’s flagging fortunes.

The consultant also identified what he felt was a significant risk standing in the way of a successful web services upgrade – corporate culture. The business and IT groups were used to smaller, siloed, tactical projects, usually less than six months in duration. They used a typical waterfall approach and had limited project management capability beyond that. For the web services upgrade to make an immediate and lasting impact on corporate results, the consultant identified five essential requirements:

The ability to assemble and manage cross-organizational teams
The need to accelerate decision-making within the product lines and across the enterprise
The use of rapid development and delivery practices, preferably including agile methods
The development of a web services architecture to ensure a cohesive framework offering a superior user experience
The need for a secure, high performance web services infrastructure to host the new offerings.

The company’s executives reviewed the consultant’s finding and recommendation and decided to act. The CEO charged the CIO with making it happen. The CIO accepted the mandate.

The Goal

The CEO’s goal was to increase the company’s earnings by 30% annually through the implementation of the consultant’s recommendations. On the advice of the consultant the CEO also set a target of eighteen months for full implementation with a budget maximum of $2.5 million, excluding capital expenditures for infrastructure.

The Project

The CIO knew his organization had never handled anything this big and this visible. He reviewed his in-house project management talent and concluded none of them had the skills and experience to do the job. He tapped into his industry contacts to find a PM who would be able to handle the challenge and received a number of resumes. After screenings, interviews and reference checks, the CIO made his selection, Diane, a contract PM. Diane had fifteen years of project management experience including a number of multi-million dollar, enterprise-wide undertakings. She also had four recent web-related projects to her credit. Previous employers raved about her direct, no-nonsense approach, superb collaboration talents and exemplary leadership skills. The CIO offered her the job. She accepted.

Even before she officially started the job, Diane knew enough about the obstacles facing her to make some demands of the CIO:

Set up one hour meetings with each of the key executives to discuss their expectations, priorities, issues and concerns. The meetings had to happen during her first week on the job.
Start freeing up contiguous space for the forty or so business and technology staff needed for the project, along with meeting and break-out rooms and the necessary technology.
Pull together an IT web services assessment team to start building the selection criteria and a list of potential candidates
Start a candidate search for a user experience lead, an agile development lead and a web services lead. These three positions would be vital to the realization of the projects goals.

When Diane arrived on the Monday of her first week, she found progress on her requests well underway, including the scheduled meetings with the key executives. In these sessions, she asked each executive a series of questions. She also asked them if they were ready to serve on her key stakeholder committee, which customers should participate in the project and what they thought of the current web services. She received some interesting feedback.

Expectations and priorities were all over the map. The CEO and two of the other executives she interviewed saw no reason to participate in her committee. Five of the seven saw no reason for customers to participate. Four of the seven had never checked or used the company’s current web offerings, even after the damning report from the consultant. At the end of the week, she met with the CIO and CEO. She reviewed her findings and presented her demands; all seven of the executives, including the CEO needed to participate actively and representatives from at least two clients needed to be included. Failing that, Diane stated she saw no hope for the project’s success and would not continue. The CEO and CIO agreed to her demands.

With the CEO’s backing, Diane penned a one-page key stakeholder committee charter for the CEO to send out covering mandate, roles and responsibilities and assignments. She also booked committee meetings every second week for the first three months. She then met with each of the executives again, reviewed the CEO’s message and their vital role in the project, listened to their concerns and committed to touch base on a regular basis. In fact, this approach was Diane’s secret sauce – frequent contact and dialogue to keep each executive in sync and smiling throughout the course of the project.

Diane then pulled together an initial Web Service delivery plan. It was more of an approach framework than a plan but it served to move the dialogue with the executives forward. It emphasized a couple of points that she needed the executives to embrace:

the primacy of the web services infrastructure to enable the rest of the business function delivery,
the necessity of a high-level architecture to describe the target enterprise environment and guide the development plan,
the dependence on short-term iterations to move them forward,
frequent planning and prioritization exercises to ensure the project accelerated business value delivery.

The approach called for an initial web services infrastructure delivery by the end of month three and the first function delivery by the end of month four. With a few tweaks, the executives bought in.

With the CIO’s help, Diane then pulled together the Web Services Architecture group with senior leaders from IT Architecture, Application Development, Operations, Security, the business and functional groups and Internal Audit. The mandate of the group was to identify and agree on the key web services infrastructure elements and their relationships to each other as well as the potential impact on business processes, corporate functions and delivery practices. She also wanted them to identify potential opportunities for agile practices. Diane selected an Application Development manager to lead the group. The CIO and three other executives had identified him as a trusted and capable facilitator.

The group met in an intensive four-day session to hash out the initial model with comings and goings of additional expertise to cement the consensus.

Again, Diane shared the model with each executive, explained each element and passed on any issues or concerns to the Architecture group to refine as needed. The executives bought in.

While the planning and architecture work was progressing, Diane oversaw the other priority tasks including facilities, specialty recruiting and the initial prioritization exercise. One of the key decisions during this stage came from a review of the target architecture by the newly contracted web services lead. He suggested they restrict their search for new technology platforms to outsourced providers only. That would take months off the delivery plan and ensure fully supported current state solutions going forward. After an accelerated review and vetting with the Architecture group, prospective vendors, and the executive team, the company selected an outsourcing provider to build and manage a turnkey in-house environment. The in-house solution had a major advantage at the time, providing superior performance and security interacting with the company’s back-end systems.

The user experience and agile leads worked their magic as well, starting as soon as they were in place. The user experience lead formed her UI team with subject matter experts from the business and selected customer organizations, software, infrastructure and testing staff. The team used the planned three iterations to deliver the full web interface the product line teams required. The agile lead also worked with the UI team to help it become familiar with and apply agile practices. By the end of the third iteration, the members of the UI team had the new agile way down pat.

As the PM formed the new product line teams, she gave each the choice of learning and applying agile practices or operating in a more traditional way, but still within the established time boxes. The UX and agile leads transitioned their efforts to help the new teams get up to speed quickly. In addition, as the UI team wound down its work, the team members were moved to the product line teams to provide and reinforce the UX and agile practice knowledge.

The Results

The project was declared complete after almost two years and a cost of $2.8 million. While the project took longer and cost more than originally allocated, the executive team approved every dime and day along the way. And they did it with big, broad smiles on their faces. Earnings were up 20% after year one and in excess of 40% at the end of the second year.

Diane used her secret sauce of executive and stakeholder engagement to keep everyone informed, involved and satisfied. The project executed over seventy iterations, supporting the core infrastructure, core interfaces and bridges and all the line of business functionality. At the beginning of the project, less than half of the teams chose to learn and use agile practices. By the end of the first year, all the teams were agile.

Perhaps the project’s most significant impact was on the corporate culture. By pushing the executives into the prioritization and decision-making exercise at the project’s start, the collective mindset was transformed from parochial to enterprise. In fact, the first product line iteration selected was a “Company Specials” service on the new web site that would be used by all product lines.

How a Great Leader Succeeded

This project could have easily been just another one on that long list of failed ventures. Yet the organization made a successful and dramatic shift from a product line focus with small, tactical projects to a broad-ranging enterprise solution. How did they do it? There were seven factors that contributed to their success:

It’s a business project – The company’s executives got the ball rolling by hiring the consultant to address their concerns about business growth. The consultant kept the emphasis on the business with his findings and recommendations. It could have easily morphed into a typical “IT project” when the CEO tossed accountability to the CIO. Fortunately, he hired Diane as PM. She made sure the project stayed in the business’s court.
Culture watch – The consultant’s observation about the company’s culture and limited capability to run an enterprise wide program was very timely. Fortunately, the CIO and his PM took the necessary steps to shift and shape a new cultural viewpoint. Remember Peter Drucker’s sage saying – “Culture eats strategy for breakfast”. Fortunately, this company’s strategy managed to avoid being eaten.
Skills are paramount – The right skills at the right time turned out to be the game changer. Diane had the right skills for the time. So did the UX and agile leads. They knew what they had to do and how to do it. They were the force multipliers. They helped the organization move with them.
Priorities need to be clear to everyone – The iterative priority setting cycle was a wonderfully effective trap. Once the executives had a taste, they couldn’t get enough. Once they got involved, they had no choice but to embrace an enterprise view.
Think big, do small – The initial draft plan and target architecture established the big picture for all involved. That allowed the slicing and dicing that followed, to incrementally deliver to the priorities and to change the priorities as needed.
Agile practices work – Diane’s decision to allow the product teams to self-select agile was a stroke of genius. She built organizational knowledge and expertise with the UI iterations that was visible to all. Staff gained confidence in the agile practices and that rubbed off, creating a groundswell of support.
Communication is the tie that binds – Diane’s “special sauce”, touching base with executives and stakeholders, having a conversation rather than sending a report, or in addition to a report, created a rapport and level of trust that yielded honest, straight-forward understanding. Diane’s approach made everyone feel special.

It is always nice to tell a happy story. This is one such. The seven success factors described above are well known but often forgotten. Please don’t forget them anymore. Be a Great Leader. Put these points on your checklist of things to consider on your next project so you too can achieve great results. Moreover, remember, use Project Pre-Check’s three building blocks covering the key stakeholder group (including the key stakeholder roles), the decision management process and Decision Framework best practices right up front, so you do not overlook these key success factors.

Finally, thanks to everyone who has willingly shared their experiences for presentation in this blog. Everyone benefits. First-time contributors get a copy of one of my books. Readers get insights they can apply to their unique circumstances. So, if you have a project experience, good, bad and everything in between, send me the details, and we will chat. I will write it up and, when you are happy with the results, Project Times will post it so others can learn from your insights.