Archives for 2004

Your future success, in large part, reflects how you dealt with your past failures.

by Neal Whitten, PMP, Contributing Editor

As leaders, we all have failed at something. We all will fail again. If you are not failing, then you are not growing. Failures can be small—not passing the PMP® exam—or large—your project came in 40 percent late and 50 percent over budget. Many leaders not only fear failure but allow failure to eat away at their confidence, their boldness, their passion and, ultimately, their overall effectiveness.

When we are bitten by the failure bug, we recoil—we want to go into hiding. We hesitate to take big steps with our dreams and endeavors; we become content with baby steps or no steps. We churn inside and nervously look over our shoulders. We cower at change. Many of our decisions are haunted by the possibility of failure. We become immobilized and substantially lose our effectiveness.

Maybe we’re afraid to look stupid, of losing our coworkers’ respect, to disappoint our mentors. We might fear reprisal, that we’ll be marked a failure by others or by ourselves.

Ironically, without failure, we cannot grow, learn and master those things that are important to us. Many of the things that we easily do today, i.e., swimming, riding a bike or playing a musical instrument, are things that we failed at repeatedly as we were learning to master them. Many more accomplishments are less overt—developing leadership skills, working well with others and making things happen—but not less subject to potential failure.

Many so-called failures are not failures at all but instead are steppingstones to progress—to success. Without these steppingstones, we could never arrive at the many destinations and goals we have attained. In the end, we call it experience.

We have all marveled at the athlete who wins an Olympic gold medal, the master painter who creates a priceless work of art, the biologist who discovers the defect-causing gene, the Oscar winner, the Nobel Prize winner. None of these great achievers seems to be a failure. Yet each of these champions of champions failed many, many times before achieving their victory.

None of these people saw their failures as indications that they themselves were failures. Instead, they grew stronger from each attempt. They realized that they were producing results that offered them opportunities for learning, for assessing, for growing, for achieving. The failures represented lessons, not defeats. They were not even viewed as setbacks as much as necessary steppingstones to reaching some personal summit.

Great achievers not only learn from their own mistakes, they learn from the experience and advice of others. They know that no one lives long enough to make all the mistakes themselves. They know that the only real failures are the experiences we don’t learn from, particularly when they are our own.

One of my favorite, famous-failure stories is of an American who:

• Failed in business
• Was defeated for the legislature
• Failed again in business
• Suffered a nervous breakdown
• Was defeated for state elector
• Was defeated for Congress
• Was defeated for Congress again
• Was defeated for a Senate bid
• Was defeated for a vice-president bid
• Was defeated again for Senate

…then became 16th president of the United States in 1860: Abraham Lincoln.

Being able to deal effectively with failure is one attribute of an effective leader. If you watch closely the leaders you admire the most, their careers may be littered with failures, invariably some large ones. Yet their ability to rise from the ashes and move on makes them all the stronger and more valuable.

This best-practice technique can continuously and dramatically improve your leadership effectiveness.

by Neal Whitten, PMP, Contributing Editor

When your day ends, the dust settles and you can see the results of your efforts and actions, what picture emerges? Is it clear and concise? Does it support a vision? Or is it fuzzy, in disarray and lacking conviction?

Here’s a technique that can help you grow your leadership skills and become more effective today than you were yesterday—and even more effective tomorrow than you are today.

At the start of each workday—when you are at your freshest—spend a few quiet moments reflecting both on your noteworthy achievements from the day before as well as on your “missed opportunities.” Make two lists: the top three things that you did that made a difference for the best and the top three things you did (or failed to do) that made a difference for the worse.

Assess your performance and contributions along three axes: leading, sustaining and impairing. Compare the state of things at the start of yesterday with the end of yesterday. Your day’s activities include a broad range of areas to reflect upon such as commitments, relationships, morale, costs, quality and the client. Based on your deliberate actions, ask yourself what things are:

• Noticeably Better
• At Their Current Momentum
• Noticeably Worse.

Of course, you hope that what you did yesterday caused events, activities or situations to noticeably improve, on balance, from where they began. In other words, as a leader, were you the catalyst for positive change for those around you?

If your actions resulted in the middle option—maintaining things at their current momentum—this can be either an OK thing or a bad thing depending on the direction of the momentum: positive or negative. If things are deteriorating, this is obviously not a momentum you want to sustain. In that case, you’re looking to lead rather than sustain.

Basing today’s actions on yesterday’s behavior enables you to adjust via lessons learned. Moreover, this immediate self-assessment can help you recover from missteps while the trail is still warm and deliberate recovery actions can have the most beneficial impact.

Performing the adjustments routinely—preferably each day—can have a strikingly positive impact on your effectiveness as a leader. We often avoid self-assessments, especially if they are routine, because we prefer to avoid any reminders of our so-called “failures.” But, as professionals, these self-assessments of our actions are essential for our continued growth, maturity and effectiveness.

Even more powerful, occasionally include a trusted friend or mentor in assessing your past behaviors and discuss how best to apply the resulting lessons to present and future actions. If you and a friend perform this exercise with one another once a week, the positive impact will occur over a relatively short period of time.

This best-practice technique may seem simple but it is disarmingly effective. Routinely applying this technique allows old habits to be questioned and immediately replaced by more effective “new” habits.

I am reminded of a saying by Thomas J. Watson, industrialist, entrepreneur and former chairman of IBM: “Nothing so conclusively proves a man’s ability to lead others as what he does from day to day to lead himself.”

Just because you have a leadership role doesn’t mean you are living up to the expectations of those who lead you.

by Neal Whitten, PMP, Contributing Editor

Your leaders want you to know–need you to know–the behavior they expect from you. You may be a project or program manager, manager, senior manager or executive, project sponsor–or strive to become one. But just because you have a leadership role doesn’t mean you are living up to the expectations of your leaders.

Listed below is a starter list of behaviors that your leaders expect from you but often are not fulfilled. Routinely adopting these behaviors can enhance your image, effectiveness and career–and they make your leaders’ jobs easier.

Don’t dump and run. When you have an idea for an improvement, don’t transfer that idea to your leader and then wash your hands of it. Be willing to be its champion and become part of the solution.

Make it brief. When you are dealing with your peers you can speak in sentences–sometimes in paragraphs. But as you communicate higher up the food chain, you should speak in sound bites. Your leader doesn’t have the time for the unabridged version.

Don’t complain. People who habitually complain are a bore and a waste of time and energy to those around them. If you are complaining, you are not solving. For example, complaining to person A about something that person B can fix wastes everyone’s time. But “complaining” directly to person B is the first step toward a solution.

Bring solutions with problems. When you need help, articulate both the solution and the specific help required. Tell your leaders exactly what you need from them, such as funding, letter of support, escalation, new hires, new tools, etc. You are far more likely to secure their support when you have a solution in hand.

Wear one face. Don’t be one person when your leader is around and someone different the rest of the time. Choose the same face regardless of the audience.

Close issues. Don’t allow issues to linger or drift. Close them with the urgency that they deserve.

Meet commitments. Show others that you can be counted on and that you are reliable.

Promote dialogue. Don’t be a “yes” employee–or more specifically, a silent employee. Don’t just take notes, nod and leave your boss’s office. Listen thoughtfully, ask good questions, raise concerns.

Make your leaders look good. Satisfying the needs of your leaders–fulfilling, even exceeding, their expectations–is your job. That makes them look good which makes you look good.

Keep your leaders informed. Don’t work in a vacuum. Keep your leaders informed. Avoid surprises. Don’t let them hear about your responsibilities from someone else.

Offer professional criticism. If your views run counter to your leader’s, then constructively and discretely share those views. Your value increases when your interest, honesty and passion are apparent.

Offer praise. When you observe noteworthy ideas, actions or deeds by your leaders, show that you appreciate their behavior. Do not focus only on criticism–as constructive as it may be.

Demonstrate integrity. Know the difference between right and wrong–and do the right thing. Do not support or condone illegal, unethical or immoral behavior.

Solicit feedback of your performance. Ask for constructive criticism as well as praise based on your actions and behavior. Make it easy–be a willing student–for your leaders to work with you and professionally “shape” you in becoming a more effective leader.

Support your peers. Be quick to support noteworthy ideas and actions by your coworkers. Choose the collaborative path rather than the competitive or contentious path.

Show you can be trusted. Don’t subscribe to loose lips. Earn the reputation of being a trusted confidant. Support the company mantra and work to continuously improve its effectiveness.

Be a role model. Without fanfare or recognition, behave in a manner that others can emulate. Promote an organizational culture that supports continual success.

If you are relatively new as a leader, this list may appear daunting. But to your leaders, it represents what they strive for when recruiting, coaching and mentoring.

It is my experience that far more leaders are made than born. Regardless, you have the ability to shape your behavior and, therefore, your effectiveness.

Take advantage of a best-practice tool that can develop effective leadership skills among project managers and resource managers.

by Neal Whitten, PMP, Contributing Editor

Project managers direct the planning and execution of a project and are held personally accountable for the success of the project. Simply stated, they nurture the project to meet its objectives.

Resource managers hire, fire, make job assignments, coach, counsel, evaluate, award, promote and secure future work opportunities for direct reports. In other words, they nurture people to both reach their individual potential and to meet their commitments on projects. Everyone in an organization works for a resource manager.

The project manager champions the project. The resource manager champions people. These are oversimplified definitions but the important thing is to understand the difference in the roles and responsibilities between these two critical leadership positions and how they can best work together for the mutual good of the enterprise.

The success of an organization is largely in the hands of the people who hold these two vital positions.

A best-practice tool for developing the leadership skills of people in these key positions is the One-Day Project Manager/Resource Manager Leadership Workshop. Here’s how it works.

The attendees are a mix of project managers and resource managers, up to 20 participants. A week or two before the workshop begins, attendees are required to identify the top three work-related scenarios that they would like addressed in the workshop. These are compiled into a single list with duplications removed.

At the start of the workshop, a brief refresher of the roles and responsibilities of both the project manager and resource manager is presented. The list of scenarios drives the remainder of the workshop. They include:

• Coaching and Counseling Employee Scenario–Should the resource manager stay abreast of his/her employees’ performance against their project plans or is that the exclusive territory of the project manager?
• History Repeats Scenario–Newer projects consistently suffer from the same old problems that were encountered on previous projects. Where’s the problem? Who’s primarily accountable?
• Test Plan Scenario–A project has no test plan. Who’s primarily accountable? Project manager? Test team lead? Test team lead’s resource manager? The project manager’s manager? Other?
• Missed Commitments Scenario–A project member consistently misses his/her commitments. Who’s not doing their job? Project member? Project manager? Resource manager? Other?
• Escalation Scenario–When two parties are unable to resolve a conflict related to a project, what role should the project manager provide in resolving the conflict? What role should a resource manager provide?
• Management Style Scenario–Which is worse: A project manager/resource manager overmanaging or undermanaging?

During the workshop, everyone is called upon to provide the “correct” answer to one or more scenarios. First-time participants likely will be surprised at the number of scenarios that they answer incorrectly. Coming into the workshop, many attendees assume they know what is expected of them in their job. One of the workshop goals, however, is to give people a renewed understanding of their roles and responsibilities as they relate to projects, people and the overall organization. These workshops both teach leadership behavior as well as reinforce effective leadership behavior already in play.

At the end of the workshop, the scenarios and their correct answers can be documented and distributed for reference and reinforcement. In relatively new, inexperienced or weakly run organizations, the workshop should be conducted monthly. As the experience of the project managers and resource managers improves across an organization, the workshops can be scheduled quarterly.

For senior managers struggling with the issue of whether leadership can be taught, this works! For project managers and resource managers, being the catalyst to adopt these workshops across an organization is a great demonstration of leadership. And the whole process proves that leadership happens at all levels–and if it isn’t developed, the enterprise will not succeed.

Are you leading within your domain of responsibility, or are you waiting for others to lead you?