PART II RUNNING A PROJECT This page intentionally left blank Chapter 8 COMMUNICATIONS One of the key PM responsibilities is communications. In fact, the PMBOK ® GUIDE defines communications management as one of the Process Areas of Project Management. Four processes are defined as communications processes: communications planning information distribution performance reporting administrative closure 160 Communications While there are many formal communications associated with projects, including items such as meeting minutes, contracts, project charter, status reports, etc, most project communications are informal. All communication affects the project, so the PM and every team member needs to be aware that communication should be as accurate and as professional as possible, aimed at ensuring that the project moves smoothly. Project communications can be oral or written. They may even be non- verbal, such as facial expressions, movement and positioning of hands/arms/body, impressions created by clothes, accessories or make-up and even furniture arrangement. In some Asian cultures, seating arrangement conveys considerable information, such as who is the host, and who is important. Many people are unaware of cultural differences, and in fact, many are not at all concerned with the messages that are conveyed via these channels. Not being aware, these people run the risk of sending unintended messages, which might be quite contrary to the messages that they wish to convey. So the PM should ensure that someone on the team is aware of such messages, and that people help each other to ensure that the messages conveyed are the desired ones. Although it is recommended that all plans and results be written, most project communications will be oral. When there is information that has legal impact, such as specifications, contracts or RFP’s these should also be carefully written and archived to avoid any potential misunderstanding. The team needs to plan all the important project communications, at a detailed level. Obviously the specific content can not be planned, as this will de determined as the project evolves. However, many details of the communications can and should be planned. The team needs to determine and list all of the important project communications, and build a plan for each. For each communication the team needs to define who is responsible for the communication, what they are to communicate, to whom, the purpose of the communication, when, and via what media. Some information should also be included to specify the level of detail required. Some communications involve the collection of information and some involve the distribution of information. The information specified above will specify which category in which each communications belongs. The overall communication plan should contain information about each of the process areas – the charter, scope statement, scope management plan and work breakdown structure to define the scope, the risk management plan, the quality management plan, the schedule information, the budget and 161 Communications cost management plan, information about the team and team management, the communications plan and the procurement plan. This can be short for smaller projects, but all relevant information should still be documented. Larger projects generally do have more structured communications, but even here, the project team still has to define all the specifics for the particular project, even if an overall framework is provided. Many engineers are aware of Shannon’s model for communications. This model was developed for the building of electronic communication mechanisms. However, the model actually applies quite well to all communications, even oral face to face communications. See Figure 2 for the model. In every communication there is some information which is to be communicated. This information is encoded in some way – the English (or 162 Communications other) language, a diagram, etc. The encoded information is then transmitted through a medium – maybe that’s air, if two people are standing talking, or mail when a signed contract is mailed back, or email, when meeting minutes are distributed. The transmitted information travels along a path to the receiver, who will decode it, and hopefully interpret the information as that which the sender intended to send. However, associated with every transmission there is noise. The noise might be in the environment, as in a meeting is a room with open windows, with construction underway outside. The noise might be introduced by some participant or other factor, such as a secretary transcribing a voice message for a manager, where the secretary is unfamiliar with the issues and the participants, and therefore misinterprets some of the message, or misspells someone’s name. Noise can even be generated in the mind of the receiver, who might be thinking about something else while listening to a presentation, or interpreting a word or phrase differently than the sender intended because the receiver’s background in that area is quite different. In order to ensure that there were no encoding or interference problems with the communication, it is always wise to include a feedback loop, which can help to identify the fact that a miscommunication has occurred, and allow for early correction. In cases in which correct communication is critical, it is wise include some redundancy, just in case the primary communication is lost or corrupted. Oral communications should always be kept to a professional level, even when high stress is involved, or disputes arise. For all communication, the following principles should be adhered to: Be objective No surprises Communicate what the listener needs/wants Establish procedures and guidelines for communication Keep it focused Be objective Most project communications are objective. However, in some environments, objectivity can get lost. In an environment which is fraught with politics, maintaining objectivity can be quite difficult. When any environment becomes stressful, especially over a long period of time, people can lose objectivity. Both politics and stress tend to be part of every project to some degree; so maintaining objectivity becomes a challenge in a project environment. Therefore the PM and the team need to plan for this, and to 163 Communications give some focus to ensuring that the communications remain objective. When objectivity begins to fail, it is important that this is recognized, and that everyone then works to remedy the problem. It is also important that people realize that this is a natural problem with project communications, and when it does happen, they need to refrain from blaming or pointing fingers. The important thing is to correct the problem, and get back to the work at hand. No surprises This means that when there is news that will have an impact on any stakeholder, this news should be communicated to the stakeholder. Even if the news is bad news. No one likes to receive bad news, and therefore people hesitate to communicate bad news. But if the project is going to be late, or over budget, or if the specs for some deliverable will not be met, people need to know this as early as possible. In fact, this knowledge will allow the affected party to plan for the altered situation, rather than being hit with the problem at the last minute when there might be much more difficult to deal with some of the problems. Communicate what the listener needs/wants Consider a management meeting at which corporate senior management are reviewing the status of multiple projects. Perhaps they have earlier reviewed the corporate financial picture, and found that in fact they cannot continue to fund all the projects that are currently underway because some critical project has seriously overspent, and their backers will not extend any further credit. Suppose that the PM for one project arrives to give project progress information and that this PM is a very technical person, working on a project that is the creation of a new service using some new technologies. To the PM, the biggest and most significant challenges with the project are probably technical. He is quite likely to focus heavily in his presentation on technical aspects of the project, to ensure that the management understands the issues and the excellent solutions his team is working on. In most cases, the management team will not consist of only technical people, so at least some of this team will not have a strong interest in the technical aspects of the project. For at least these people, the PM needs to ensure that other aspects are covered in the presentation. In addition, even if the management team were all technical people, their job is management, so their interests will be in the management information, such as the schedule and the financial aspects. In fact, by making the effort to get their agenda for their meeting ahead of time, and considering it carefully, the PM can determine 164 Communications that they are addressing finances, and can then conclude that he should be prepared to address this area clearly as they will undoubtedly be interested – probably more interested that they might normally be. The point of this discussion is that the purpose of communications is to give information to the receiver. Therefore, the content and the style of any communication must be something that is meaningful and interesting to the receiver. Content that is of interest to the transmitter might be information that the receiver should have, but the responsibility lies with the transmitter to convey to the receiver why he needs to know. If the transmitter just conveys information that is interesting to him, there is no guarantee that it will be received. This should be clear to the reader if you think about sitting through a boring presentation. Probably the presenter was very interested in the information being presented. But if it was boring to you, you did not relate to the material as being either interesting or useful to you. In that case, how much of the presented material did you retain? If you needed to have all of the information, the sender should have prepared it differently to ensure that you would actually receive it all Establish procedures and guidelines for communication Since effective communication requires significant planning, the team needs to do significant planning. All of this is documented in the communications plan. As mentioned above, the team needs to document what needs to be communicated, by whom, to whom, when, why and how. And in determining the answers to these questions, the team needs to take into account the mindset and style of the receiver(s) of each communication. One of the best tools for communications planning is a communications matrix. It is not necessary to use a matrix for this plan, but when communications are not overly complex, the creation of such a matrix can be relatively straightforward, and the tool provides concise but clear documentation. One model for such a communications matrix is shown in Figure 3. 165 Communications Here we can see that the matrix shows the people involved in transmitting the communications on one axis and the categories for the purposes of the communications along the other. This would be further refined to show the actual communication events themselves along the top. In the boxes the team puts the answers to the questions of when, why and how. This is often done by using letter codes if the picture is not too complex. At a minimum, the matrix should include the creation of, and communications of the wbs, charter, risk plan, etc. Another key communication for every project is status reporting. Reports from the project team members to the PM should be included, as well as reports from the team to management, the customer, and perhaps other key stakeholders should also be planned. Once the matrix has been created, someone must then be assigned to manage the activities identified in it to ensure that they occur. The PM can allow the team to determine the format, if that fits his management style, or, even allow the person assigned to matrix maintenance to come up with one - which consumes less time, and is fine, as long as it works for everyone. 166 Communications This tool can be built fairly quickly, and it gives a structured way to consider all of the required communications. If something is forgotten it can be added to the matrix later. In addition to the matrix, it is also wise to document some processes, formats or samples of any types of communications that might not clearly be understood by all senders. This avoids rework later. One common method of communication is the holding of meetings. As important as meetings are in enabling communication and decisions, there is still a lack of understanding of how to use them most effectively. Particularly in a project environment, where time is generally in very short supply, it is very important for the team to use every minute productively. This can be done in meetings, as long as the meeting is properly planned. However, the planning must be done carefully, with thought given to the items to be covered, the people who should attend, the optimal sequence of events, and the time required. There are a number of established techniques for this, which differ from each other somewhat, but all have the goal of making the meeting productive, enjoyable and worthwhile for everyone involved. The first step is the meeting planning. The chair of the meeting must carefully think through the details mentioned above. He can do this alone, or with some team members, or with someone whose specific role is meeting facilitation. We’ll come back to the facilitator later. Start with the purpose of the meeting. Decide on the overall purpose of the meeting, and the objectives to be met – just as we do for projects. This will give a framework for the rest of the planning. Then think carefully through the steps that are required to attain the desired results. This takes some time, and some serious thought. It is a far cry from listing a set of topics and sending them in an email to a group of people. The idea is that with proper planning, the meeting can flow well, with the attendees having all of the information they need at any given point in the meeting, either because they brought it with them, or because it has already been covered during the earlier part of the meeting. The agenda can be drawn up from these thoughts, with each step being entered into the agenda in the order in which they need to occur. So, step one in drafting the agenda is to determine the meeting purpose and objective. Step 2 is to list the items which need to be covered, in the order in which they should be addressed so that everyone will be properly informed. But, the agenda preparation does not finish here. Next the planning team must identify the purpose of each item on the list, and decide who would be the best person to handle that item [...]... filed with the project documentation for reference during and after the project In fact, looking through the preceding discussion, it is apparent that a meeting is essentially a project in itself All of the same discipline need for project planning and implementation is required for meetings, for the same reasons In this Chapter we have discussed some of the forms of communication used by project teams,... these, or learn the information, there are some other key roles that should be filled These are related to the running of the meeting itself, and most will generally be filled by people who are already attending the meeting anyway for other reasons These roles include: meeting chair timekeeper note taker scribe facilitator The meeting chair is generally the project manager, for project meetings, but... time allowed for addressing each item They should also consider the fact that there is some overhead required as well People may not all be sitting in the room at the appointed start time, so there should be an item listed first that allows for this They should also ensure that they get feedback from the attendees on how each thought that the meeting went for him, in order to better plan for the next... reconvene to continue the discussion They could allow the item to run on for a set additional time But this means that they will then have to decide what to do about the impact on the agenda They can extend the meeting end time, and just move the times for the remaining items back by the amount of overflow time Or, they can reduce the time for an upcoming item, or postpone one of those items to another time... better planning for future meetings The role of the note-taker is to document the meeting flow clearly and later, prepare the minutes Meeting minutes should not be written as a novel They should be concise, and clear They should mention all of the agenda items, showing the key results, and identifying all action items, with the names of the people responsible for them, and the due dates Before minutes... things in real time, on a whiteboard, computer screen, or padboard, for the attendees to view as the meeting progresses This can be very useful when the group is discussing an item, or drawing up plans, to keep all of the information available A meeting may or may not have a facilitator, and the facilitator may or may not be a member of the project team This is a non-essential, but often very valuable role... all of the information that is suggested in the planning The attendees can see all of the details regarding the administration of the meeting along with the content information 170 Communications After every meeting there should be documentation distributed to all who attended Unless there is confidential material in the minutes preventing it from being made more widely available, this information should... meetings, but this does not have to always be the case If the meeting is focused on a specific project area, perhaps the prime from that area will chair the meeting Sometimes a stakeholder, such as the customer, calls a meeting and then this stakeholder acts as chair In formal meetings, which follow structured rules, 1 68 Communications such as Robert’s Rules, the chair plays the specific role of directing... discussions, it is more appropriate for him to step down from the role of chair during these discussions, in order to take sides This leaves the chair position temporarily vacant, and the facilitator is an appropriate person to fill in As mentioned above, when there is a facilitator, it is most appropriate to have this person work with the meeting chair to plan the meeting as well For some of these roles, it... key results, and identifying all action items, with the names of the people responsible for them, and the due dates Before minutes are finalized, they should be circulated to the attendees in draft form for their approval In some cases all attendees should be polled to identify errors or omissions; in others just some key people participate in this process Once the minutes have been approved, they . Communications cost management plan, information about the team and team management, the communications plan and the procurement plan. This can be short for smaller projects, but all relevant information. implementation is required for meetings, for the same reasons. In this Chapter we have discussed some of the forms of communication used by project teams, and some methods for managing the communications. are many formal communications associated with projects, including items such as meeting minutes, contracts, project charter, status reports, etc, most project communications are informal. All