From programmer to project manager (20): Let employees work for their goals

From programmer to project manager (20): Let employees work for their goals

The ship sails on the sea and needs the guidance of the lighthouse. The target is the beacon in the project. In a project, goals can not only guide the direction, but also bring people together.

1. Unite employees under goals

Managers who are not good at setting goals for their work are not good managers, and teams without goals cannot be called teams. A suitable goal can bring employees together tightly and generate great power. Therefore, the project manager must learn to take advantage of this, make employees work for the goal, and unite the employees under the goal.

( 1 ) Goals are the source of leadership and the basic characteristics of the team

The importance of goals, both for individuals and organizations, cannot be overemphasized. For the great goal of "realizing communism", countless revolutionary martyrs threw their heads, shed their blood, and sacrificed their precious lives, which shows the great effect of the goal.

For a manager, in everything you do, you must first set goals, otherwise, no matter how strong your leadership is, your work will not be effective. In fact, setting appropriate work goals is an important manifestation of managerial leadership. Mr. Kai-Fu Lee once pointed out that the leadership of managers comes from nine factors, the first of which is to clarify the vision and formulate work goals.

Goals are also an essential characteristic of a team. The general definition of a team in management is: "A team is a community composed of employees and management. It rationally uses the knowledge and skills of each member to work together to solve problems and achieve common goals. The elements of the team are summarized as The 5Ps are goals, people, positioning, authority, and plans.” It can be seen that, to become a team, we must first have a common goal, otherwise it cannot be regarded as a team, but can only be called a “group of people”.

The same is true for projects. Without a clear goal, the leadership of the project manager will become water without a source, and the project team will become a group of "rabble people".

( 2 ) Leading employees should pull rather than push

There is a rope on the table, how can I make the rope move forward? If you push forward, the rope will twist into a ball, it is not the original rope, the best way is to pull the rope forward.

The driving force of a person's work can also be divided into push force and pull force. The project manager criticizes and urges employees, which is a kind of push, and it is an external force; it is a kind of pulling force to motivate employees and set goals for them, and the pulling force is a kind of self-driven inner force. In fact, people are like ropes, they are soft, and this softness comes from people's inner thoughts and feelings. For something this soft, "pulling" is clearly a more sensible thing to do.

If the main driving force of employees in the project is thrust, their work will not be motivated, and the project manager will feel that he is very hard, but not effective. Therefore, if the project manager wants to relax, the last resort is to change his thinking, not to push the employees in the back, but to exert a pull on the employees in the front.

There are two main types of pulling force, one is the self-motivation of employees, and the other is the motivation of managers. Setting appropriate work goals for employees is actually a way to trigger employees' self-motivation. If employees don't even know what goals to achieve, what can they use to motivate themselves?

( 3 ) Let employees work for their goals

In a team of project managers with super personal charisma, the motivation of employees to work is likely to come from the attraction of the project manager, that is, to work for the project manager. If you change a project manager, employee motivation may plummet. Such a project manager is like a magnet, and employees are like screws attracted by the magnet. Now that the magnet is taken away, the screws will naturally be like loose sand.

Jack Ma, the founder of Alibaba, once said: "Don't let your colleagues work for you, but let our colleagues work for our goals, work together, and unite under a common goal, rather than unite under you. It’s much easier to be an entrepreneur. So convince people to share common ideals first, not let people do the work for you.”

Jack Ma did the same. Although he himself has extraordinary charisma, he places more emphasis on the role of goals. From the very beginning of Alibaba's business, Jack Ma has set the goal of becoming the largest e-commerce company in China, and he never gives up when faced with difficulties and dangers. Alibaba's achievements today can be said to be inseparable from its original goals.

A business needs goals, and a project also needs goals. In fact, a project is more objective than an enterprise, and a project team is established precisely to accomplish a certain objective, and these objectives are often clearly written in the bidding documents or contracts. What the project manager has to do is to carefully evaluate these goals, make necessary adjustments and refinements according to the actual situation, and let the goals replace the project manager, become a magnet that attracts employees together, and unites the project team closely.

2. Development of project goals

For company leaders, project goals are the indicators for project managers to assess; for project managers, project goals are vision, motivation, means, and the credit of the project team, so project managers must carefully formulate project goals.

It is not an easy and pleasant thing to formulate a suitable project goal. It  needs to go through multi-party communication, games, and obtain the approval of relevant parties. The project manager must be justified, neither humble nor arrogant, and strive to play a leading role, rather than blindly being a good person and compromising, otherwise the entire team may be hurt.

( 1 ) Three ways to formulate project goals

Compared with a company or department, the goal of a project is easier to determine, which is determined by the natural characteristics of the project. Why have a project? It is to do one thing, and doing it well is the goal of the project. Specifically, the project has three major goals, namely cost, time and quality. Among them, the quality and time goals come from the customer's requirements, which are generally clearly stipulated in the bidding documents or contracts, while the cost goals come from the company, which is the maximum amount of money required by the leader to do it well. Generally speaking, cost objectives are the most difficult of the three objectives to determine, and are often the most likely to be disputed between project managers and the company.

Project objectives are generally determined in the project charter or project assignment book or project proposal book. There are three ways to formulate project goals: top-down, bottom-up, and jointly formulated by both parties, which also reflect the differences in cultural atmosphere between companies.

lTop -down

即项目目标由上司制定，直接下发给项目组。领导在制定目标时，总是希望越高越好，他们相信有压力才会有动力，员工才会拼命的往前赶。他们常见的做法是质量和进度要求直接与合同保持一致，而成本限制往往是合同金额按一定比例计算出来的。这一类型的工作公司往往管理层过于强势和精明，氛围比较紧张，员工的压力比较交大。

l自下而上

由项目组制定后，交给公司领导层进行审批。这种公司的管理层一般比较温和，公司气氛也比较缓和。

l双方共同制定

一般由公司或项目组先制定一份初始的目标，然后根据项目的实际情况，公司和项目组一起进行分析讨论确定。这种公司的氛围一般比较民主化，能够具体问题具体分析，尊重员工的意见。

当然还有的一些运作比较粗放的公司，根本就不会去制定明确的项目目标，也没有项目章程或项目任务书之类的文件。一般直接按照合同要求开展工作，有问题时双方进行口头沟通。

（2）制定项目目标应注意的两大问题

根据管理学中的目标管理理论，一项目标应该符合SMART原则。其中S（Specific）是指要具体明确，尽可能量化为具体数据；M（Measurable）是指可测量的，要把目标转化为指标，指标可以按照一定标准进行评价；A（Attainable）是指可达成的，要根据组织的资源、人员技能和管理流程配备程度来设计目标，保证目标是可以达成的；R（Relevant）是指相关的，即各项目标之间有关联，相互支持，符合实际；T（Time-based）是指目标要有完成时间期限，便于监控评价。

这五项要求看似简单，但要做到其实并不容易。结合软件公司中经常存在的弊病，我觉得有两点必须加以特别的重视，第一是要重申SMART中的A，即目标必须是现实可行的；第二要补充一点，目标必须获取所有人相关人员的认同。

l目标必须是现实可行的

所谓现实可行，也就是说目标是综合了范围、成本、时间、质量、人力资源各方因素权衡的结果，是可以实现的，而不是拍脑瓜的结果。自上而下的方式中最容易出现的误区，就是领导直接规定目标，还美其名曰“不看过程，只看结果”。可以说这种方式非常简单粗暴，只管公司利润，不管员工死活。要知道一个不现实的目标，不但不能像磁铁一样吸引员工为之努力工作，反而可能会大大打击员工的积极性。

因此在制定目标的过程中，项目经理必须争取自己的话语权，认真分析目标的可行性，充分考虑项目中可能存在的问题和风险，并就双方差异主动与领导进行沟通，力求达成一致。试想，假如等到项目开展到后半段，项目经理才发现原来的目标有很多不切实际的地方，比如工作量与想象的有太大出入，质量要求过于苛刻，费用预算完全是拍脑袋，如果这个时候项目经理才提出目标不科学，将责任推给公司领导，只会让领导更加觉得项目经理无能、没有担当。

有些人担心，这样“讨价还价”领导会不会嫌我烦？确实有个别领导不喜欢员工提出异议，觉得他在讲条件、不听指挥，但大部分领导还是乐于与项目经理讨论这些问题的，因为这说明项目经理对项目有全面系统的思考，重要细节都已经考虑过了，这样做事领导会更加放心。公司最怕的不是挑剔的项目经理，而是没有想法的项目经理。

对于质量和进度目标，由于涉及到客户方的直接利益，如果经过评估确实需要变更，还必须与客户和监理等方面进行沟通，确保各方的认识一致。

l目标必须获得所有人认同

一个目标可以要想将员工团结起来，把大家凝聚在一起，还必须获得项目团队的认同。

项目中经常出现这样的情况，项目经理和上级领导确定目标后，项目经理将目标通知给大家，也不理会员工的意见。等到目标眼看无法完成的时候，项目经理对员工 “兴师问罪”，员工会理直气壮的说，我当就说过这个目标不可能实现的。这是一个项目目标没有获得员工认同的典型例子，项目经理等于复制了公司对项目“拍脑袋”的决策模式，是一种不负责任的做法。要想得大家的认同，最好的办法就是让员工直接参与评估和制定项目目标。

（3）团队目标与个人目标

在一个组织中目标可以分为团队目标和个人目标两个层次。团队目标确定以后，项目经理需要根据具体的工作任务、团队成员的构成情况，对目标进行分解，最后形成每个员工的个人目标，从而实现个人目标与团队目标的统一。

图 项目目标的层次性

项目经理要关注团队目标，同样也需要关注个人目标。团队目标会影响整个团队的士气，个人目标同样会影响个人的动力。因此项目经理必须也要认真考虑如何与员工一起，对员工进行准确定位，制定恰当的目标，安排合适的工作，以保证员工发挥最佳状态，保持最强的战斗力。

3.弗洛姆“期望理论”的启发

斯大林所曾说过：“伟大的目标产生伟大的动力。”那么一个具体目标对员工究生能产生多大的动力呢？

著名心理学家弗洛姆曾提出一种激励员工的理论，认为“某一活动对于调动某一人的积极性，激发出人的内部潜力的激励的强度，取决于达成目标后对于满足个人的需要的价值的大小与他根据以往的经验进行判断能导致该结果的概率”，用公式来表示就是：

目标的激励力=目标的价值×能实现目标的概率

根据这一理论，我们可以得到以下几点启发：

（1）目标要适当

从公式中我们可以看到，目标的激励力与目标的价值是成正比的，因此在给员工安排工作任务时，可以尽量将目标设定得适当的高一点，让其更具有挑战性。

美国行为学家吉格勒认为：“设定一个高目标就等于达到了目标的一部分。”由此可见，给员工设置一个具有挑战性的目标是非常有必要的。适当的提高目标，可以激发员工的工作热情，增强其抗压能力，而且当工作目标完成时，会更加具有成就感。

然而必须注意的是，上述公式中的两大自变量，即目标的价值、能实现目标的概率两者这间本身也存在一定的函数关系。当目标较低时，实现概率为1，也就是说，员工信心十足，认为完全可以实现；当目标逐渐升高，超过某个点时，实现的概率又逐降低。两者的变化关系如下图所示：

图 预期实现概率与目标价值之间的关系

相应的，目标的激励力与目标价值之间的关系也可以用下图来表示：

图 目标的激励力与目标价值之间的关系

因此目标不能定得过高，否则“预期的实现概率”将会迅速减小，到达某一临界点后，目标对员工的激励力也会随之降低。

图中有A、B两个点，其中A点是能够完全实的最大目标值，但项目经理给员工安排工作时的最佳点还不在这里，因为此时“目标的激励力”这一变量，要到B点才能达到最大值，这也就是为什么管理专家们建议安排工作时要让员工“跳一跳能够得着”的原因。

（2）改变个人对概率的预期

上面的图只是简单的数学模拟，实际上预期实现概率是一个主观的因素，它与目标的难度固然存在较强的关联，但其本身又受其它诸多因素的影响。项目经理利用这一点，可以通过对员工的引导，提升他对实现概率的预期，从而提高其工作的动力。

要提升员工对实现概率预期，实际上就是提升员工对工作的信心。要实现这一点，项目经理可以做很多工作，例如：

l把客户的肯定、领导的表扬及时传递给员工；

l使员工对目标保持谨慎乐观。如果过于乐观，就会觉得太容易，放松工作要求；

l让工作井井有条，员工看到一切都有条不紊的进行，会觉得一切都在计划之中，其信心自然大大增强；

l加强项目控制，让员工感受到目标正在一步步靠近；

l让员工及时看到整个团队的工作成果；

l项目经理要展示自己的能力、活力和信心，员工首先要对项目经理充满信心，才能对工作充满信心；

l帮助员工克服困难，实现目标。

4.目标是一种承诺

为什么要让目标获得团队的认同？一个重要原因就是获得员工的承诺。当员工接受并认可工作安排的时候，其实就是做出了一种承诺：我承诺按照目标的要求，及时保质保量的完成任务。一个人一旦做出承诺，就会想办法去实现自己的承诺，这是一种内在的力量，可以促使其自主自发的完成任务，达到目标。

 

 

 

from  http://developer.51cto.com/art/201211/364725.htm