Good morning, I'm Lao Yuan.
If an important guest comes to your house in an hour, what's the first thing you want to do?
After research, the data shows that 87% of people will choose to tidy up their rooms.
It's also understandable, after all, who doesn't want to show their best side.
Just like if a project wants to be successfully delivered, it must first ensure that the time schedule can keep up.
But the reality is that even if the deadline is set, the project often cannot be completed on time.
During the operation of the project, due to the influence of various factors, the details of the goals and plans deviated. Due to the lack of project visualization, these deviations were not discovered and dealt with in time by relevant personnel, which eventually led to the delay of the project.
This is commonplace for many project managers, but in the long run, it will eventually overturn.
1. Make rules that everyone can see at the project start-up stage
Projects don't fail at the end, they fail at the beginning.
Any project has foreshadowed the outcome of the project at the beginning stage.
In the initial stage, if the rules for dealing with foreseeable problems are formulated in advance, the degree of cooperation of the parties when facing practical problems will also be greatly improved.
01 Rules to be clarified in the start-up phase
I have shared with you how the project kick-off meeting will be held before, if you forget it, you can review it
Today I will mainly share with you what necessary rules need to be clarified when the project starts.
What rules should be established in the start-up phase? According to various situations such as project type, cycle duration, team size, etc., I have probably listed several important categories.
① Communication: communication method, frequency, content and format;
② Responsibilities and rights: decision-making rights, project reward and punishment rights, change process rights, personnel scheduling rights, team management, assessment indicators, etc.;
③ Relevant parties: Party A's responsibilities, demand provision, research cooperation and business guidance, obligations and responsibilities of various departments of the project developer, etc.
These rules are not necessarily announced in the form of a project system, because becoming a project system itself may bring pressure to some stakeholders and be more sensitive.
To the extent practicable, the project manager may advise on these rules as appropriate.
If it is necessary to correspond to certain systems, it may be the project regular meeting system, performance appraisal system, reporting system, document process, change management system, etc.
What is more friendly to us is that stakeholders are not sensitive to these rules during the project initiation phase, which is generally easier to establish than other phases.
Discuss and establish rules when encountering problems, and everyone will make targeted substitutions. At this time, disputes and conflicts are very easy to arise.
One problem that needs attention is that establishing rules at the start-up stage will make people feel that project managers are more dogmatic and rigid. People often prevaricate with sayings such as "the project time is tight and the tasks are heavy, so let's do it first."
In this regard, project managers should resist the pressure and do not need to explain too much, because the reasons you explain will often become the target of others opposing you.
Remember, there are no rules in front, and there are pitfalls behind, and it is you who suffer.
02 immune response
In addition, I will give you an Amway method called immune effect.
To put it simply, first talk about the situations that the other party will encounter in reality, especially those unpleasant situations, and at the same time talk about the psychological reactions they may have to make in these unpleasant situations, so as to change the other party's inherent "program" .
When this thing really happens, the original effect on the other party will be reduced, or even not. This is called "immune effect" in psychology.
for example:
When talking to family members: "I know you're going to be mad at what I think, but I really want that SUV!"
When communicating with customers: "The next news may make you crazy or angry, but I don't want to lie to you, because the project will not be delivered on time."
You can even walk into your boss's office and say, "I know this request is going to upset you and cause all sorts of dissonance, but I really want a raise."
Do not believe you can try.
2. Visualization makes project management and control more effective
A friend of mine is the chief engineer of a certain research institute, and he has quite a few projects in his hand, but most of them are seriously delayed. He laughed at himself and said to me: "There is no project that we can't finish, but we don't finish it on time either." project".
In the Internet industry, when estimating the progress and cost of software projects, developers are more optimistic about their own work estimates than reality. The actual completion time of most projects exceeds the estimated progress by 25%~100%, and the accuracy of a few progress estimates reaches 10%. %, projects that can be controlled within 5% are very rare.
How to complete the expected project results within the limited time and how to manage this embarrassing progress are the challenges that every project manager faces.
If you want to control the project in your own hands and save the progress of the project, it is very important to be visualized.
01Use WBS to make a task wall
WBS is a useful tool that allows all people involved in the project to create a WBS, and use different color blocks in the WBS to indicate the status of each work.
It is also possible to indicate the person in charge of each job and give the time plan for each job at the same time. After the WBS is completed, paste it in a public place to visualize it, this is the task wall (Task Wall).
When using the task wall, the specific method is as follows:
Use a black label to indicate that work has been completed;
Use a green label to indicate that the work is in progress and is progressing smoothly;
Use a yellow label to indicate that the work on the non-critical path has a schedule deviation, but it has no impact on the total project duration and needs attention;
Use a white label to indicate that the work has not yet started;
A red flag indicates a critical schedule issue that team members cannot find a solution for, and the project manager should immediately coordinate or seek external support.
This method can clearly tell everyone the progress of the project, which is very popular with the project team.
02 5 minute standup meeting
The 5 Minutes Stand-up Meeting is another good way to practice project control.
During the 5-minute stand-up meeting, project team members stand around at a fixed time (such as 8:30-8:35 every morning) and at a fixed location every day, take turns to host and inform each other, and each person answers the following 3 questions.
what did i do yesterday
What difficulties am I having now?
What am I planning to do today?
A 5-minute stand-up meeting can not only promote project progress and track project problems, but also often enhance the team's sense of responsibility for the project and play a role in team building.
In fact, the reason why visual tools such as task walls and 5-minute stand-up meetings work well is that they get to the heart of the problem.
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I am Lao Yuan, welcome to follow my official account [ Project Manager Lao Yuan], every day there will be dry goods sharing of project management cases .