Project Team Archives

Take the risk of trusting your team

From the part of the person who gives it, trust is hard. It requires a leap of faith. It requires that we believe the person we trust is worth it.

From the part of the person who receives it, trust is energizing. It means that someone was willing to take that leap of faith for us. It means we are worth it. Trust also carries responsibility: if we want to keep that trust, we must prove the giver right. This means delivering on that trust.

Project management requires a high level of trust

The project manager must trust the team to do quality work on time and on budget.
The project team must trust the project manager to lead them efficiently and help them meet their deadlines.
The stakeholders must trust the project manager to understand their needs.
The project sponsors must trust the project manager to control the project and prevent cost and schedule overruns.

In a nutshell, the project team must trust each other. That includes the project manager, the team, the stakeholder and the sponsors. For most of us, […]

Project managers are not alone

A project should not be composed a leader on top and everybody else below. Actually, that's a very good way to fail. Your team is there for the project, and so are you. Why not work together?

You need to work together.

Be with your team. Spend time with them. Take the time to explain what's going on in the project. Listen.

When problems arise (they always arise), your team's unique perspective may be the key to solving it. Budget problems? Maybe one of your developers knows a less-expensive tool that does the job just as well. Schedule problem? Your QA specialist may have a few tricks up her sleeve to speed up the testing phase.

Project managers are not superheroes. We can't expect to fix everything on our own. That's why there are project teams.

The project can't succeed without the team, but it can succeed despite the project manager.