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Author: George Pitagorsky

George Pitagorsky, integrates core disciplines and applies people centric systems and process thinking to achieve sustainable optimal performance. He is a coach, teacher and consultant. George authored The Zen Approach to Project Management, Managing Conflict and Managing Expectations and IIL’s PM Fundamentals™. He taught meditation at NY Insight Meditation Center for twenty-plus years and created the Conscious Living/Conscious Working and Wisdom in Relationships courses. Until recently, he worked as a CIO at the NYC Department of Education.

Balancing Face-to-Face and Virtual Meetings

Written by George Pitagorsky on . Posted in Articles. 5 Comments on Balancing Face-to-Face and Virtual Meetings

Projects imply meetings. Meetings are forums for sharing information, discussing and resolving issues and making joint decisions.

They are forums for cultivating and maintaining personal relationships. In this age of virtual communications, we must address the issue of how many of our meetings should be face-to-face and how many should use alternative media – email, messaging, electronic discussions, phone, video. Perhaps, soon to come, holographic images.

There is a trend “towards virtual contacts and less and less to real ones. And that endangers the “human moment” – that in-person connection where we feel the closeness that allows bull’s eye contact, the kind of interaction that resonates, moves people, and makes a lasting impression. Such moments allow a powerful psychological encounter that simply cannot happen on-line. “1

But, let’s not get carried away in an either-or comparison or an absolute statement about what can and can’t happen on-line. The convenience and efficiency of virtual communication must be considered in order to reach the right balance; a balance that leans towards more virtual contacts. How do we make sure virtual contacts are effective and that they increasingly stimulate the kind of connection we get from face-to-face contacts? How can we maximize the impact of the human moments with or without face-to-face contact?

The Power of The Human Moment

In 1999, face-to-face meetings were defined as meetings at which the participants are together in the same location at the same time – they are synchronous and collocated. They enable “the human moment: an authentic psychological encounter that can happen only when two people share the same physical space. … The human moment has two prerequisites: people’s physical presence and their emotional and intellectual attention. ” 2

The physical proximity allows for the sense of presence that comes from being attentive, seeing, hearing and “feeling the presence” of the other(s). Attention – uninterrupted by phone calls or distractions like emails and texts – communicates that the exchange is important and encourages the other party(ies) to also pay attention.

The human moment happens one-on-one and at team meetings. The face-to-face contact provides us with the emotional and social connections that support healthy interpersonal relationships and the effective performance they enable.

Being face-to-face (whether in the same room or via video conferencing) helps to reduce ambiguity and the worry it brings. The cues that come from body language, facial expression and tone of voice gives us the non-verbal communication that is so critical to a complete exchange between people.

What are Virtual Contacts?

Virtual contacts are exchanges that are supported by technology. We can consider an email or message exchange on a particular subject to be a virtual meeting.

The participants are not collocated. The meetings may be synchronous or not. There may be visual contact as in video calling and conferencing, audio only, or entirely in text via email, texting, electronic discussion facilities, shared documents, etc.

Each has its pros and cons. For example, synchronous meetings enable the shortest duration for addressing a subject, while they are the most constrained (the individuals who must be present at the same time), more costly, and more difficult to facilitate in real-time. Asynchronous, text based contacts (email, etc.) offer an audit trail, time to think and write, while they are most prone to misunderstanding because of the absence of non-verbal cues and they also make for a longer duration to address the subject.

Project Meetings

Project meetings are about reporting status, syncing up to make sure everyone is on the same page, defining and solving problems/issues, vetting requirements and designs, and planning. They involve both dialog and presentation. Projects can be more efficient and effective by skillfully using virtual methods. This is particularly the case when the participants are geographically apart or difficult to schedule.

The Right Mix of Face to Face and Virtual Meetings

What is the right balance between face-to-face and virtual contacts given the power of the human moment and the desirability of virtual meetings to save travel time and expense, enable scheduling flexibility and promote a documented audit trail?

Of course, there is no one right answer. Balance is a dynamic quality that changes as the situation changes. Human moments are complex and do not necessarily require physical collocation. The right mix depends primarily on geography, the team members’ emotional, social and organizational intelligence levels, the degree to which the participants know one another, the complexity of the issues and whether there is a time constraint.

Ideally, the participants would have had physically collocated face-to-face contact and their human moments so they come to the table with some sense of the others as real people. In my experience, this is not always possible and also not necessary. I have experienced months and even years of virtual contact with colleagues who I have never met in the flesh. We have accomplished quality work, cultivated an effective relationship, and gotten to know one another in a series of emails, document sharing, phone calls and, in some cases, video conferencing.

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In one project I worked with a team to create a project management methodology. Team members were in NY, Toronto, the Mid-west and Germany. Our synchronous meetings were by phone and used conferencing tools for document sharing. We shared complex ideas via email. We argued, joked around, designed, defined, wrote and edited and accomplished.

When I finally met some of the team members we were already friends. We had had human moments virtually.

Would face-to-face contact have been better? Maybe. Would it have been more costly? Definitely.

In another instance, we engaged in a contract negotiation that was accomplished in a series of face-to-face meetings separated by email contacts to clarify complex issues and provide inputs to the meetings. Again, this team did all the same things the other team did in the virtual meetings. Did the addition of human contact – sharing food, socializing and seeing one another’s body language, facial expressions and general attentiveness – add value? Absolutely. We negotiate a contract and we set a stage for being able to work together to execute the contract. Our face-to-face contacts enabled doing most of the detailed work virtually over a geographical span.

Over the course of the contact’s execution, monthly face-to-face meetings were planned to sustain and reinforce personal relationships. Complex technical solutions were transacted via teleconferencing and the sharing of documents to memorialize the meeting results. In some cases, the team members involved had never met face-to-face yet were able to come to amicable and effective technical decisions.

Paying Attention

As defined earlier, human moments have two prerequisites – collocation and attention. Collocation is not enough to engender the social contact “that resonates, moves people, and makes a lasting impression”3 . In my experience, much of that effect can be obtained without the physical collocation. The psychological and intellectual attention and the quality of communication seem to make the difference.

If a person at a meeting – whether face-to-face or virtual – is constantly checking and responding to texts and emails there is a negative human moment – a lasting impression that the person is dismissive of the others, uninterested in the content. In email and e-discussion exchanges the amount of time between posts, the seriousness and relevance of responses and the general tone of the language create a subtle meaningful impression. Not all human moments lead to positive impressions.

Find the Right Balance

Face-to-face and virtual contacts are facts of life in projects. The bottom line is to remember that whether you have met them in person or not, the people you are communicating with are people with opinions, biases, capabilities, priorities, jobs to do, time constraints and all the challenges that confront you. With this in mind, there will be more human moments even in virtual contacts.

Your common purpose is to get the project done well. Every meeting is a step towards that end; a mini-project. Design each meeting to be as efficient and effective as possible, given geography, criticality, communication skills and the emotional, social and organizational intelligence needed to operate skillfully in any media.

References
[1] Goleman, Daniel, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/chemistry-connection-daniel-goleman
[2 ]Hallowell, Edward, “The Human Moment at Work, HBR, Jan-Feb 1999, https://hbr.org/1999/01/the-human-moment-at-work
[3] Goleman, op. cit.

Qualities of a Good Leader

Written by George Pitagorsky on . Posted in Articles. 7 Comments on Qualities of a Good Leader

Leadership is a complex competency that you can develop and improve.  

As a project manager you can benefit from an understanding of what leadership is and how you can develop it further.Leadership is a complex competency that you can develop and improve.  As a project manager you can benefit from an understanding of what leadership is and how you can develop it further.

A leader directs, enables, commands, conducts, influences, inspires, guides.  She can lead a small team, large project, program, department or enterprise.

But, what is a “good” leader?

There is no simple answer.  Many see Ghandi, Mandela, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Dr. King as good, if not great, leaders.  Others see the likes of Hitler and Kim Jong-un as great leaders.  It is all relative to one’s values and self-interest.

We can make deciding on the goodness of a leader more objective by defining leadership qualities, though it will always remain somewhat subjective.  For example, some boards of directors might consider a CEO who makes great profits a good leader even though he/she promotes business practices that cheat subcontractors or pollute the environment.  A project manager may be considered a good leader because she gets projects to come in on time and within budget, even though half the team vows never to work with her ever again.  

Qualities of a Leader

“Leading effectively is less about mastering situations or even mastering social skill sets, than about developing a genuine interest in and talent for fostering positive feelings in the people whose cooperation and support you need.”  1

A good leader possess sufficient self-awareness and intelligence to display the following qualities:

  • Empathy – a sense of how others feel; feeling with them 
  • Courage – the capacity to behave in a way that may buck the system and speak truth to power
  • Organizational awareness – experientially understand the big picture of how people relate to one another and the nature of the environment
  • The ability to work collaboratively with others
o Responsiveness as opposed to reactivity
o Trust in oneself and others and the ability to delegateo The ability to communicate clearly to a diverse audience – executives, technologists, administrators – across organizational hierarchies and knowledge areas
o Open mindedness and the ability to be influenced by others
o Caring
  • Honesty – Being trustworthy
  • Charisma – The ability to influence others
  • Resilience and cognitive readiness – the capacity to effectively manage in an predictable changing environment
  • Confidence in oneself and the correctness of the mission.

Core Capabilities

The key underlying capabilities that a leader must possess to exhibit these characteristics are

  • Mindfulness – the capacity to observe whatever is occurring objectively while remaining integrally involved in action
  • Emotional intelligence – the ability to recognize, fully experience and manage one’s emotions and be aware of the emotions of others
  • Social intelligence – the ability to apply interpersonal competencies to inspire others to be effective; the capacity to communicate and work well with others.
  • Intellectual or cognitive intelligence – the capacity to use information to reason, plan, solve problems, learn, synthesize abstract ideas, and understand.  It is beyond book learning and involves the ability to deeply “get” what is going on
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As a leader or follower, it is important to recognize that the more subtle qualities of ethical behavior and positive values are critical differentiators.  For example, a very mindful person, with a high IQ, who can manage his emotions, is sensitive to the feelings of others can rationalize the marginalization or dehumanization of some people “for the greater good” and lead the team, organization or country in a self-serving direction.  Let’s look at some of the key differentiators

Trust and Delegation

Lao Tzu says “a leader is best when people barely know he exists.” When the work is over and the objectives met, people feel that they did it themselves.

The effective PM sets the stage by providing the right resources, articulating the vision, goals and objectives and collaborating with the team to define the approach.  She steps back to allow the team to get the work done.   From behind the scenes the PM protects the team from the demands and distractions that can mike project work more difficult than necessary and adjusts the process to accommodate change.  The good leader trusts and delegates.

Ethics and Values

The leader’s values are a foundation for his behavior and direction.  The PM who values hitting the deadline over product quality and quality of life is not likely to be a gooid leader.

There is an ethical quality.  Without ethics the qualities of honesty and trust are in jeopardy, self-confidence is weakened and the ability to lead is diminished.  In project management, according to PMI  “Ethics is about making the best possible decisions concerning people, resources and the environment. … Leadership is absolutely dependent on ethical choices. PMI members have determined that honesty, responsibility, respect and fairness are the values that drive ethical conduct for the project management profession.” 

The good leader/PM takes responsibility for his decisions and actions, respects the norms, customs and points of view of others, directly confronts differences of opinion with a respect for truth, facts and fairness – even if these attitudes and actions are not reciprocated.  The PMI code accepts that even in the face of organizational and peer pressure “We make decisions and take actions based on the best interests of society, public safety, and the environment.” 

Spiritual Intelligence

Values and ethical behavior are supported by spiritual intelligence.“Spiritual intelligence is the central and most fundamental of all the intelligences, because it becomes the source of guidance for the others.” 2

Spiritual intelligence enables values based ethics  by recognizing the importance of awareness beyond intellectual understanding.  The spiritually intelligent person has a positive outlook, sees the big picture as well as the details and seeks to benefit others as well as herself.  She wants to know why things happen as they do.2 3  

Servant Leadership

Spiritual intelligence  folds into servant leadership.  Servant leadership is founded on the idea that the leader is there to serve the needs of his followers.  This is vastly different than the idea that the leader is to be served and revered.  

The servant leader paves the way for his people to get their work done in a healthy well balanced way.  This leader is willing to fight battles over irrational expectations.  The good leader cares about the people and works towards their well being.

A Good Leader

As a project manager, to be a good leader recognize that the people are the key to success.  With this in mind focus on the communication and relationship skills as well as the technical PM skills and capabilities.  This in turn will promote the loyalty and motivation that is needed for optimal performance.  People will go the extra mile to succeed.  If you lead effectively you will get out of the way and make it seem as if you barely exist.

References
1 Goleman and Boyatzis, Social Intelligence and the Biology of Leadership, https://hbr.org/2008/09/social-intelligence-and-the-biology-of-leadership  Goleman and Boyatzis, Social Intelligence and the Biology of Leadership, https://hbr.org/2008/09/social-intelligence-and-the-biology-of-leadership 
2 Covey, Stephen, The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness (Simon and Schuster, 2004, p.53) 
3 Zohar, Danah, Q’s for Great Leadership: 12 Principles of SQ, http://danahzohar.com/www2/?page_id=146

Agility, Uncertainty, and Expectations

Written by George Pitagorsky on . Posted in Articles. 4 Comments on Agility, Uncertainty, and Expectations

There are few things we can be certain of, for example, change and impermanence. When it comes to plans, there is no certainty that the plan will reflect the actual outcome.

Plans Do Not Determine Outcomes, They Predict Them

Managing and performing under uncertain conditions is a challenge. In Agile and more traditional projects alike, some people act as if they think that there is 100% assurance that the planned end date will be met within budget while producing a quality outcome. Others are “variance averse” – they deny the implications of current conditions and stick to the plan, no matter what.

Acknowledge that even with a well-defined backlog of sprints, nicely estimated user stories, stable technical requirements, assigned resources all backed up by forceful direction and support of sponsors and clients, you cannot guarantee an outcome with 100% accuracy. Also acknowledge that while the plan does not determine the outcome, it and the constraints it sets do influence performance.

Uncertainty Is a Fact of Life

As I point out in my book, Managing Expectations: A Mindful Approach to Achieving Success, it is irrational to think that a plan will truly reflect the outcome with 100% accuracy. This is particularly true for complex projects and for plans that are made well in advance of the actual performance.

Plans are predictions. Given the number of performance factors, no-one can predict the outcome with 100% accuracy. Uncertainty is certain. The performance factors or variables in play are:

  • the availability of required resources
  • clarity and accuracy of requirements
  • changes in requirements
  • priorities
  • design quality
  • errors and responses
  • reliance on external performance
  • getting approval
  • and more.

The more time between plan and performance, the more opportunity for events that make the plan a fiction. The more individuals and organizations involved, the more complex and volatile the environment, the more uncertainty.

Recognition, Acceptance, and Action

Both Agile and traditional waterfall project management approaches when managed well, recognize and accept uncertainty and act by analyzing risk, identifying areas of uncertainty, qualifying estimates to manage expectations and continuously managing the plan.

The Agile approach brings the issue of uncertainty to the surface. Founded on the idea that Agile is cross-functional and interdisciplinary teams that evolve a product through exploration of requirements and their implementation in an iterative process of small concrete deliverables, review, refinement, acceptance and integration.

The process itself makes behaving as if plans were deterministic less likely. Who knows how long refinement will take? How many errors? How many discoveries of new requirements and improvements? How many disagreements and how much time to resolve them?

The acceptance of refinement – controlled change throughout the process – as normal and beneficial, is a major difference between Agile and the more traditional waterfall approach, Waterfall tends to see change as a negative and tries to inhibit it and postpone it until after the product is delivered. Agile views change as beneficial and enables it.

Levels of Detail: Step Back to See the Full Process

To help face the challenge of managing and performing in uncertainty, we conceive of the project in levels of detail, a hierarchy as in a work breakdown structure, identifying phases, major functions and interim and final deliverables and the tasks and sub-tasks that must be performed to deliver them.

Each level is a point of reference for an estimate and a view of the project. The higher levels represent the roll up of the detailed estimates at lower levels or are estimated in a top-down approach.

By breaking the project into small manageable and meaningful deliverables, performed in sprints, it is possible to tightly estimate the effort and duration of the work required in each sprint to deliver a technical result – code to satisfy a defined requirement.

When we step back from the coding and look at the rest of the development process – requirements, design, review, refinement, acceptance, and integration – we recognize uncertainty and the need for continuous plan refinement.

Stepping back further, we can see the product in the context of the overall program that it is part of – integration, process management, training, organizational change, deployment, user acceptance testing, hyper-care, infrastructure, support, etc.

At this level, fulfilling business objectives is the focus, as are the product and its surrounding processes making a valuable contribution to the organization.

Greater Uncertainty

These aspects of the project are difficult to estimate with the same degree of precision as the typical software sprint. For example, in software projects, it is common to identify changes to the product directly after the product is released. There is a need for hyper-care to carry users through their change process and address issues. This part of the process is complex, and therefore there is uncertainty, though we can have a good sense of a range of possible outcomes based on several factors such as:

  • past experience
  • knowledge of the players and how they relate to one another
  • confidence in the quality of the product and how well engineered it is, as measured by its performance the frequency and impact of changes

How to Manage Uncertainty

The bottom line is that uncertainty is a fact of life and must be considered in every project. To manage it:

  1. Make sure that everyone understands the nature of planning and the need for continuous refinement – the actual outcome will be known when the project is completed, though, as the project progresses the estimates should be increasingly accurate
  2. Define business objectives, program and subproject objectives clearly and make sure everyone agrees
  3. Assess the degree of VUCA – the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity – of your project, sprints, tasks, etc.
    Volatility is measured by the frequency of change and variance from your baseline assumptions.
    Uncertainty is unpredictability, the probability of surprise and the degree to which issues, objectives, principles and events are understood.
    Complexity is a function of the number of interacting factors in a process and the degree to which outcomes are predictable.
    Ambiguity is the fuzziness of understandings such as objectives, constraints, roles and responsibilities, requirements, values, and principles.
  4. Bring risk and uncertainty into each estimate – how certain are you; what can cause variance; what impact can it have; what can you do about it?
  5. Break your project or program into clearly defined chunks – phases, activities, sprints, etc. in levels of detail
  6. Remember that product development (e.g., coding) is always embedded in a business project or program and that the development is the easiest and most certain part
  7. Estimate top down at the high level when you are far from performance – include buffers and ranges of estimates along with assumptions.
  8. Iteratively estimate bottom up as you progress through the project and have more specific knowledge.
  9. efine the plan as you identify variance.
  10. Communicate to manage expectations.

A Common Thread Among the Agile Methodologies

Written by George Pitagorsky on . Posted in Articles. 5 Comments on A Common Thread Among the Agile Methodologies

Agile is an interesting phenomenon. It is a practical “philosophy” that has become a movement with multiple denominations –

Scrum, XP, Kanban, Lean, as well as eclectic practitioners who do not ascribe to any denomination or brand of methodology.

Having multiple interpretations and implementations of the Agile approach to product development is fine, as long as we are aware that no one “brand” is the ultimate one; the one that will eliminate all the others.

A development methodology is the interpretation of a way to develop the product. There can be many valid interpretations. It is like choosing any important product, why reinvent when you can pick one and adapt it to your needs.

Methodology

We need methodologies. They provide a road map, principles, guidelines, forms and templates and promote discipline and precision. They help to make terminology and practices consistent across projects. Effective methodologies carry the essence of the philosophy and enable practitioners to achieve optimal performance.

While some practitioners can operate on their own without the structure provided by a methodology with its guidelines, forms, and steps, others are not comfortable creating a process on the fly.

Creating the process without considering past performance makes continuous improvement more difficult; we do not carry best practices forward. Methodologies work best when:

  1. they can easily devolve into bureaucracies and
  2. they are a starting point for an adaptive process – a process that can be adapted to meet the needs of changing circumstances – as opposed to laws that must be followed to the letter every time.

The Essence of Agile

Agile methodologies are influenced by a combination of agile and quality management principles. The underlying principles are expressed in the Agile Manifesto in which its authors value:

“Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan
That is, while there is value in the items on
the right, we value the items on the left more.”

The basic principles of Agile:

  1. Above all, satisfy the customer, delivering value quickly and continuously.
    a) Deliver working software frequently, within no more than a month of two
    b) Maintain a constant and sustainable development pace.
    c) Measure progress regarding delivered software.
  2. Enable and accept changing requirements, even late in development.
  3. Engage product owners and developers in a unified team.
    a) Create and empower effective teams.
    b) Recognize and promote the power of face to face collaboration.
    c) Self-organizing teams produce the best architectures, requirements, and designs.
  4. Recognize that technical excellence and good design enhances agility.
  5. Simplicity — only do what is necessary.
  6. Continuously improve through regular and frequent process evaluation.
  7. Take a both sides approach.

This last principle is implied in the Agile Manifesto’s statement “That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more.” This principle is often overlooked by Agile zealots who devalue documentation and contracts for a seat-of-the-pants approach.

The Quality Management’s Influence

The quality management movement strongly influenced Agile. Lean and Kanban software development approaches are based on the methodologies used in manufacturing to minimize waste and promote highly effective results with control at the team level. The principles here are:

  1. Visualize the workflow to make it clear and explicit to make control easier
  2. Limit work in process to remove pressures to multitask and to promote timely delivery of product
  3. Manage the flow of work to achieve 2.
  4. Explicitly state process policies – have a defined process that everyone knows and follows
  5. Improve continuously by collaboratively analyzing performance and changing the process.

These overlapping principles are the foundation for Agile methodologies. They boil down to:

  • Collaborate
  • Accept and enable change
  • Deliver useful and quality product in a timely manner
  • Manage the flow of work to performers
  • Don’t waste time on unnecessary tasks.

Evaluate and Improve

Essential to any methodology is an attitude that the methodology is never finished. There must be an ongoing evaluation of the methodology, tools, and techniques in the context of your organization and its projects that lead to continuous improvement.

Evaluate your methodology regularly, as an integral part of project performance reviews, to make sure that the essence has not been lost to overzealous adherence to the letter of the law or to an unskillful interpretation of principles that leads to neglected documentation, formal agreements and project management.

Adaptability

In addition to including continuous improvement, the effective methodology must enable performers to adapt to situational needs. Every project is unique. Variations in scope, cost, significance to the organization and the availability and quality of resources require taking a creative approach to the way the methodology is applied.

In a project, the availability of knowledgeable users/product owners and developers will influence the degree to which a purely agile approach can be used. Agile requires a mindset change for development management. The involvement of the developers in work sessions that address user stories and requirements must be valued and planned for.

The mindset of product sponsors and business management, in general, must acknowledge the role of the “users” in the development process – it is not about defining a set of requirements, throwing them over the wall to the development and then getting the desired result. Instead, experience has shown that requirements and the product itself evolve. The choice is to enable that evolution during the product by engaging the product users and owners or to have the evolution take place in the operational environment after the product has been delivered.

In Agile, the evolution of the product is facilitated during the project itself. The product will continue to evolve once in production and operational use. However, Agile seeks a greater likelihood that the true requirements will be met in the initial delivery and that will minimize post-delivery changes.

Remember the Big Picture

Whatever Agile approach you use, keep in mind that Agile addresses the development stage of projects in which detailed requirements are defined and transformed into a product within a solution architecture to satisfy organizational needs.

A principle difference among Scrum, Extreme Programming (XP), Lean and Kanban is in the emphasis on particular goals; though the common goals are always the same – collaborate to deliver value frequently, expect and enable change and do no more work than is needed to produce a high-quality product. All of them offer useful and effective templates, guidelines and practices that make the work of the team more efficient and effective.

Scrum and XP are focused on software, often without ample consideration of the training, procurement, documentation and organizational change aspects of the product. Lean and Kanban more clearly address software development as one part of a larger project.

It is important for the developers to understand that an Agile approach does not eliminate the early stages of a waterfall methodology. Agile development is about development. There is still a need for the definition of high-level requirements to drive project approval and prioritization, set the stage for solution architecture and design and provide the source for the lists of user stories that the developers will deliver.

With Agile’s essential principles in mind choose your Agile approach carefully, as if you were selecting any important product, and be prepared to tweak it to suit your needs.

Resilience – Thriving in Change

Written by George Pitagorsky on . Posted in Articles. 2 Comments on Resilience – Thriving in Change

Everything is subject to change. Nothing stays the same. To expect that it will is a delusion that leads to much suffering.

The ability to thrive in the face of change, particularly organizational change, and the uncertainty that comes with it, is critical to success in project management.

Managing Change

There are many types of projects across many organizations. The example here is one slice. The more you bring to mind your own situation, the more you will be able to see how you can improve the way you manage change.

Marv is the manager of a large process improvement program. Its goal is to improve the performance of an organization. He works with Jane, the senior executive responsible for the “target” organization. As the program began, Marv and Jane understood that they were going off into unchartered territory. No organization-wide major process change had been attempted for decades. They also understood that the current operation must continue uninterrupted and that substantial changes in policy, regulations, economic conditions, budgets can arise at any time to cause changes to their project’s goals and constraints.

They recognized the need to manage the change in business units and the need to manage changes at the program and project level.

Marv and Jane assessed the capacity of the people who would be implementing the process change and those who will be living with the results – several thousand people in line operations, middle management, project management and at executive levels. They concluded that a few key people were open to change and rational in their expectations. Many were “uncertainty averse.” They liked or needed things to be stable, definitive and predictable. Some had expectations of Nirvana by the target date of the program.

Change Management Strategy

A change management strategy was formulated:

  • Stakeholders would be eased into an acceptance of uncertainty and an understanding of their responsibility to adapt
  • Incremental planning and control would minimize the probability and impact of the disruptive change in operations using risk management, project control, pilot projects, focus groups, and incremental implementation. It would also set rational expectations about the outcome
  • Training, procedures development, and regular communication would give stakeholders a sense of what they can expect and what is expected of them
  • There would be transparency regarding changes and their impact
  • There would be recognition that the change, to be truly effective, would have to become institutionalized after several years of effort

The leadership team budgeted and planned for putting their change strategy into action. They made it an integral part of the program. Jasmine was assigned as Organizational Change Management Lead. Her role was to work with project managers, training, QA, communications, IT and others to create communication channels and content, discussion forums, training programs, procedures management, and the other components of a change management process.

Degree and Frequency of Change

Marv and Jane were wise to give change management the attention it deserves.

There are varying degrees and frequency of change in a project. Some changes are small or have been anticipated and have little impact. For example, a simple change in requirements. A few of these every so often are easy to manage. When allot of them come quickly, one after another, then things become more challenging. Other changes are more profound. They may cause you to radically change your plan or cancel the project. For example, major loss of budget, policy changes, changed key stakeholders, etc. When these are frequent, you are pretty much rudderless in the rapids of a fast-moving river.

In addition to changes that impact the project or program, there is organizational change, the change that impacts people when their roles, processes, values and environment change. Individuals have varying degrees of ability to accept and work with change.

As project managers, you are responsible for both keeping your boat, the project, afloat and minimizing undesirable change and disruption. To do this, you need resilience coupled with the leadership abilities required to keep all the stakeholders (including yourself) calm and able to respond rather than react.

How Do You Do That?

There is no simple answer, no off-the-shelf methodology or magical 10 step program you can follow. Though, there are capabilities, understandings, and guidelines that you can apply.

These begin with cognitive readiness and resilience.

“Cognitive readiness is the mental preparation (including skills, knowledge, abilities, motivations, and personal dispositions) an individual needs to establish and sustain competent performance in the complex and unpredictable environment of modern military [project/business] operations.” John E. Morrison J. D. Fletcher, INSTITUTE FOR DEFENSE ANALYSES (IDA), Paper P-3735 Cognitive Readiness, p ES-1]

Competent performance in the midst of change is resilience – able to adapt gracefully to change. It is a quality needed by any person or group “who must adapt quickly to rapidly emerging, unforeseen challenges.” 

Researchers have identified the capabilities that enable cognitive readiness and resilience. They boil down to:

  • a systems and process perspective to promote objectivity and awareness of the big picture and the details
  • the ability to manage emotions and work well with others
  • an open mind
  • the intention and capability to facilitate collaborative problem solving and decision making to drive appropriate situation action.

These capabilities are founded on mindful awareness.

As I point out in my new book, Managing Expectations, there is the possibility to set rational expectations in a planning process that includes the acceptance of uncertainty and change.

Putting these elements together we have guidelines for resiliently managing change:

  • Set rational expectations (especially the expectation that everything is subject to change) and manage them as the project unfolds.
  • Acknowledge that an effective plan with its tasks, schedules, resource assignments and budget, is subject to change
  • Manage the plan as the project unfolds – refine estimates based on a review of assumptions and actual results.
  • Continuously manage risk to identify, assess, plan for and control the change events that can be predicted and to remember that there are risks that will not be identified until they appear, usually at the most inconvenient time.
  • Communicate frequently to inform stakeholders about the organizational changes they can expect and how those changes will be facilitated.
  • Take a step back regularly to assess and report on how the project “looks and feels” – where you are, where you are likely to be going, the health of relationships, budget, etc.
  • Cultivate cognitive readiness and resilience in the entire organization through training and regular dialog that addresses process and systems thinking, attitudes, mindfulness, emotional issues, change management, problem-solving and decision-making process.
  • Have the courage to ‘let go’ of fear when you are faced with disruptive change so you can apply your skills, experience, and intelligence most effectively.