Top tips for project management success

Top Tips for Project Management Success
A selection of professional insights from the Blog archive

ProjectManager.com © 2013 All Rights Reserved 1

Since 2008 our project management professionals have been sharing knowledge,
experience and learning with online readers via the Project Manager Blog.

Their collective wisdom provides a wealth of how to, top tips and best practice advice,
for project managers, teams and businesses.

To make their writings more accessible we’ve created a series of “Best of” project
management topics available free to download and share.

We know that Project management is a challenging space to work so perhaps this
collection of top tips and insights, covering everything from working with the executives
to audits and information overload may help.

Enjoy!

Jason Westland CEO

ProjectManager.com

4 Ways to Attach Yourself to the C-Suite as a Project Manager ................................................................. 3

Project Management Training Tips for Executive Reviews ......................................................................... 6

4 Ways to Power Through Tough Projects .................................................................................................. 9

6 Steps to Prevent Project Information Management Overload .............................................................. 11

5 Ways to Survive the Auditors ................................................................................................................. 13

When Your Projects Are Late .................................................................................................................... 16

When You Are Not Meeting Targets ......................................................................................................... 16

5 Steps To Improving Project Quality Targets ........................................................................................... 16

30 Day Free Software Trial ........................................................................................................................ 17


4 Ways to Attach Yourself to the C-Suite as a Project Manager
The problem is that Project Managers sometimes have a hard time relating to the rough
and tumble environment of the executive offices. We have a pre-disposition for our
Gantt Charts, online collaboration software, Work Breakdown Structures, risk
mitigation, and the predictability and certainty on how our day unfolds. Executives, on
the other hand, are all about opportunities, risk taking, the unknown and uncertain, and
many times may deliberately throw chaos at something that appears to be working just
fine.

How can these two mindsets come together? First, it’s up to you as a Project Manager
to change YOUR mind-set to think like an executive. They will not change THEIR mind-
set to think like a Project Manager. This will entail leaving your comfort zone and
stretching a bit. However, you will soon find the benefit of thinking like someone in the
corner office puts you in an entirely different league than run of the mill project
managers.

Next, you will want to implement the following 4 suggestions on how to attach yourself
to the C-Suite:

1. Learn to Speak in the Language of an Executive
Executives are about return on investment and increasing value. They love innovation,
uncharted territories, and business opportunities that will propel the organization
forward. They like growth, efficiencies and process
improvement. They don’t like excuses, complaining,
stagnation, inactivity, or wasting time.

Your challenge, then, is to translate the current project
you are working on into language that will resonate with
the executive. Let’s say you have the proverbial 30-
second ride up together in the elevator and the CEO
asks you what you’ve been working on. You have a
choice to make. You could say

“I’m working on implementing a new project
management software package”, or you could say


“You know, we recently ran a study and found that there were missed opportunities
when it came to project collaboration which resulted in 30% loss of productivity. To fix
this problem, I’ve been working on an enterprise-wide initiative that will not only
recapture that 30% loss of productivity, but also introduce an additional 20% increase
on productivity once this new project management software is implemented…which, by
the way, will be done in the next two months.”

What a difference between the two responses!

The CEO undoubtedly knows about this initiative since it is company-wide, however, he
will appreciate and make note of your excitement about the opportunity, the cost-
savings it will introduce and the fact that you understand the impact to the business
that your project will have.

2. Don’t Talk to an Executive in Project Manager-ese
The opposite of the above is true as well. In Project
Managers roles we have our own jargon and expressions
we use to move projects forward every day.

For example …“Is the WBS complete so I can begin on
the project schedule to allocate resources to determine
if we need to crash or fast-track this project and develop
the necessary contingency plan based upon the
probability and impact of the associated risks…” may just
leave us giddy with excitement.

However, you can be assured that talking to the CEO, CIO, CFO or other Executives at
this level of detail will be sure to make their eyes glaze over. Worse yet, they may
mentally banish you in their minds as someone who can’t see beyond the tactical level
and grasp the big picture.

There’s a time and place for project manager-ese. You just need to be judicious on when
you break into this dialect and make sure you are not losing your C-Level audience.


3. Present the Idea of a PMO
Depending upon how your company is set up and where they are in the lifecycle of
Project Management maturity, floating the idea of a Project Management Office is a
great way to attach yourself to the C-Suite.

There may only be a handful of Project Managers that work for individual departments
with varying degrees of effectiveness and success. The appeal of a Project Management
Office is the ability to establish consistent process and provide visibility into what is
happening within the organization.

One component of a PMO is a regularly scheduled meeting where upper level
executives in the company come together for a quick debrief on where all project
activity stands. This is a great opportunity to talk about the business value that can be
realized from projects that are in the works, enlist the help of executives to clear
obstacles out of the way, and provide an overall pulse on how things are going within
the company.

Many times, a PMO will report directly to a top level executive to remove any conflicts
of interest or interdepartmental infighting, another great opportunity to attach yourself
to the C-Suite as a Project Manager.

4. Market Yourself and Your Team
One final aspect of being visible at the C-Level is to market yourself and your team. You
need to let them know the business value you continue to bring to the organization.
We’re not saying always going around patting yourself on the back, but tastefully letting
people know that you and your team’s contribution bring value to the organization.

Here’s an example of how that can be done. You’ve just received an email from
someone who benefited from the project you finished implementing. It may be the
project collaboration software. The email states that it’s easy to use, saves them a lot of
time, and has indeed increased their productivity.

All you need to do to market yourself and your team is to forward that to your manager.
Your manager will then forward that to their manager, their manager will forward it on
to their manager, and up the chain it goes. This type of feedback makes everyone look
good, and your name, along with the team are attached to another successful project.


Whether or not you feel comfortable with marketing yourself, we can no longer delude
ourselves with the feeling that “our work will speak for itself”. Business moves too fast
and there are so many distractions that your work will quickly be swept under the
carpet unless you take a moment and have others pause and reflect.

It’s up to you whether you want to be an executive or not. But, it’s also up to you to
maintain your viability as a project manager in any company you work. By implementing
some, or all, of the suggestions above you will find yourself attached at the hip with the
vision, strategy, and future of your company.

Project Management Training Tips for Executive Reviews
The presentation was set up. Everyone took their
places. The meeting was brought to order. The
presentation began. The money slide was the 4th
slide into the presentation. Everything was going
great as we gracefully moved through slides one
through three.

Then, someone accidentally hit a button that
caused the screen to disappear into the ceiling
and all the equipment to power down! What’s
worse, nobody was able to figure out how to get
things running again.

I was relegated to handing out a handful of printed presentation copies I had brought
with me. Gone were the sweeping transitions, gone were the creative slide animations,
and gone was the impact of this slide show I had worked so hard on!

It was replaced by scrappy sheets of black and white paper that had jumbled together
pieces of presentation artifacts that nobody could read. How disappointing!

The meeting went well despite the mishap, but it I learned a lesson that day. I could
have probably spent my time on things more important than putting together a
presentation that nobody even saw. After all, the meeting went well.


The next time I cut the time down by 75% in the time I spent putting the presentation
together and things went just fine! Nobody had told me this before. It’s not like there’s
project management training on how to make it through a quarterly executive review.

1. What Does This Audience Care About?
Presenting to this audience is very different from presenting to other audiences. You
may be used to presenting to your project team or your colleagues that work for your
client.

You can be dropped into these meetings at any moment in time and pick things up
without missing a beat. They are interested in where things stand, what’s next, and
what’s in the way. You know these facts like the back of your hand.

The first lesson in project management training to be prepared for an executive review
is that they are interested in something entirely different. This audience of executives is
not interested in the details. They want a high-level overview of where things stand (see
#2 below for the exception). More importantly, they want to understand how this
project ties into the company’s corporate strategy and ways that it supports this
strategy. They are more interested in where things are going in the future with the
project and less interested in where it has been.

2. Start at 30,000 Feet, but be Prepared to Land if Necessary
Another project management training lesson
about executive reviews is that most of the
time they are not interested in the details.

You can keep your presentation at a high
level in order to cover a lot of ground in a
short amount of time. But, there are times
when you must be prepared to land.

There may be a topic that comes up that has been bogged down for some time. This
group of people has the ability to clear things out and move forward, but they will need
the details to get this done.


Be prepared to get into the weeds with any topic you are presenting. This may be the
opportunity you need to unclog an area of that project that doesn’t seem to be going
anywhere.

3. Keep it Short
Executives are busy people. They are booked from early in the morning until late at
night. Their days are carefully orchestrated.

Another project management training tip for executive reviews is to keep the
presentation short. You are on their time schedule. They are not on your time schedule.
Think about what happens if you don’t cover everything in the time allotted with your
project team. You say it will take another 10 minutes or so and ask everyone to stay.
Everyone is usually able to stay and you are able to wrap things up.

It doesn’t work that way in an Executive Review. If you have 2 hours to cover the
material, you have 2 hours to cover the material. They will be on their way to their next
meeting (mentally and physically) as your allotted time comes to a close.

4. Cover the Most Important Points Up Front
Prioritize where you put your material in the presentation by its level of importance.
Start with those points that are the most impactful and meaningful up front or that you
know will take a lot of discussion. Executive review project management training
dictates that you may not be able to cover all the material no matter how hard you try.
It will be better to have covered the most important points up front. If you run out of
time, it will be the less important points that are missed
at the end.

5. Always Leave Time for Questions
Executives are inquisitive. They want to know, who,
what, why, where, and when about your project. Make
sure that you leave plenty of time for these types of
questions to come up in during your presentation.

What if questions don’t come up? Then end the meeting
early. If you’ve covered everything that needs to be
covered during your presentation, then there’s nothing


wrong with ending the meeting a few minutes early. Everyone will appreciate getting
those couple of minutes back to their day.

By the way, you may want to ascertain why there were not any questions asked. Was it
because the material was covered so well, or, was it perhaps an indication of peoples
waning interest in the project. Project management training for executive reviews will
keep you on the lookout for these signs. Don’t assume that it’s one or the other but look
at the situation in an honest way with yourself.

6. Provide them with a Brief Handout of What They Need to Do
Leave the executives with a one page “to-do” list with a couple of major tasks that need
to be accomplished. For example, it could be that a particular contract needs to be
approved, a decision needs to made on a direction to take, and some equipment needs
to be purchased. Leave them with that list of actionable items and the rest of your
project will go that much smoother.

Oh yeah, and don’t spend a week on one slide of your PowerPoint presentation that in
the end doesn’t make that big of a difference anyway! If you apply the list of executive
review project management training tips above you’ll find that you no longer dread
these reviews, but rather look forward to them as an opportunity to showcase your
project and the great job your team is doing!

4 Ways to Power Through Tough Projects

1. Realize that Everything is Temporary
Think about all the other tough times you’ve
been through in your life, whether professional
or personal. They seem insurmountable. You
can’t see a light at the end of the tunnel and
each step you take feels like one step further
into darkness. But, here you are and maybe
five, ten, or even twenty years have passed and
it’s only a distant memory.


The people that were around at that time are probably not here now. You may have
changed careers. The circumstances that were bringing you down may have changed.
No matter how tough times get, you can be guaranteed of one thing…given time, things
will change. It’s no different with tough projects or clients. When a mess has been
created, and you just don’t see a way out of it, keep your head down and power through
it. Things will change if given enough time.

2. Know the (Extreme) Details
Project managers are expected to know the details about their projects. However, they
can’t be expected to know every little detail. Guess what? During the tough times you
do need to know every little detail about your project. This is a powerful tool when you
are up against a bully that is looking to create a scene. You can’t blow smoke about the
fact that there are legitimate issues that need fixing on your side. Anybody that has
been around technology for any amount of time knows that this will happen. You’ll
instantly undermine your credibility if you try and paint the picture that your company
has zero issues and it’s all user error.

3. Never Lose Sight of the Ball
It’s a bit cliché, but also very true. Never lose
sight of your project’s end goal. Someone
like this VP is going to come along and try
and knock you off course every now and
then. They’ll push you sideways, pull you
from behind, and block you from moving
forward. If you don’t have a firm gaze set on
the end of the project, it will be easy to be
pushed off track. Have a deep understanding of what the project is to accomplish and
the benefits it will bring.

4. Understand You Are Learning Invaluable Lessons
Honestly, not a great deal of true learning occurs when things are going smoothly. Once
you’ve made it to a certain level of competence as a project manager, your days can go
by effortlessly. Sure, there may be a crisis or slight emergency, but you know exactly
how to handle it. You know what to do, who you need to work with, and that it’s not the
end of the world. That’s a great place to be as a project manager. But, it also introduces

the risk of becoming a bit stale in the profession. Without adversity you run the risk of
getting a bit soft on your skills. True learning comes when you are faced with extreme
situations. It forces you to think on your feet. You have to figure out the best way to
make it through these tough times. You have to go down some paths that are dead ends
or lead you to big, bold mistakes on your part. Once you’ve made a mistake while the
world is breathing down your project manager neck, you will never make that mistake
again, guaranteed!

Take a moment every now and then while you are going through a tough time to reflect
on what you’ve learned. You’ll at least feel you are gaining some experience along the
way.

6 Steps to Prevent Project Information Management
Overload
7 step process to provide avoid overloading other people with information

Define Your Users: The first thing that must
be done in order to prevent project
management overload is to have a very clear
understanding of who is using your reports:
Is the report being used by management to
make decisions on whether to continue or
cancel the project? Is the report being used
by project team members to get a feel for
when it will be their turn to start working on
the project?

Sit down with end users and get a feel for what they need to glean from the report. Find
out what they don’t need on the report.

Determine What Information You Already Have: Once you know what is important to
your users, start pulling together the metrics and data you already have at your
disposal. Is everyone interested in the percentage of high, medium and low risks that
are attached to a project? Find out where you have this information and pull it together.
Are people interested in the variance of actual over budgets? Find out where you have


this information and pull it together. Map the needs of the different users to the
information you already have.

Determine What Information you Don’t Have: Despite the fact that project information
overload is rampant, there may be some things you do not currently have available, that
showed up on the needs assessment from step #1. Identify those gaps and then come
up with a way to locate this information. One thing that’s way worse than providing too
much information is not providing enough information. If someone is asking for a
relevant piece of information to be included on your report then it’s incumbent upon
you to find a way to make that happen.

Determine What Everyone NEEDS: Just like the song says “You can’t always get what
you want”…you need to now take the data that was assembled in steps two and three
above and come up with a matrix clarifying which stakeholders requested which
information, and what it is that you will be able to provide.

You may find out that some requests are just not
achievable or require an inordinate amount of
manual time pulling information together that is
spread out over 2-3 disconnected systems. Even
the best pivot table expert and VLOOKUP expert
in the world would struggle with accommodating
some of the requests for information.

You now go back to the people that asked and let
them know what can and can’t be done. You may be surprised to find that what you are
able to provide, is fine. People are so used to being overwhelmed by project
management information overload that they ask for the moon. When they realize what
you give them will satisfy their needs, they are usually just fine.

Determine the Frequency of Reports: You now have the basis for a solid report or set of
reports that can be generated which people can use to understand what is going on
with the project. Find out how often they need this report. Remember, a daily report
may contribute to project information management overload and quickly find its way
into the Trash folder. People may initially say they want a report generated every day,
but the changes are so minute, or it doesn’t tell them anything new, that they quickly
stop looking at the report. Perhaps it’s better to spread the frequency out over a week
or two to allow for bigger changes to occur.

Make the Reports Easy to Access: Finally, now that you have given everyone just what
they are looking for and in the frequency they need it, make sure everyone knows how
they can get the report. Is it something you are going to email to them on a weekly
basis? Is it a folder on a shared drive where they can access the report? Are they able to
run the report themselves whenever they want? Make sure everyone is clear on how
they can locate the report so it is utilized.

That’s it. The above should help you address your stakeholder’s project management
information needs without overwhelming them with unnecessary bits of information.

5 Ways to Survive the Auditors
Find out why your project has been selected for audit. Are you just the unlucky recipient
of the audit lottery or is there a special reason why your project has been singled out?
Of course, you might have volunteered, especially if your project schedule shows that
the project isn’t going as well as you had hoped. Once you know whether the auditors
are looking for general reassurance or evidence that something is going wrong, you’ll
know how best to approach the next few weeks. Here are five tips to help project
managers survive the audit process.

1. Get Prepared
As soon as you know that your project is going
to be audited, start preparing the team. Let
them know that the auditor may want to talk
to them about their involvement in the project.
If you work with any contractors or third
parties, they may be interviewed too, so warn
them in advance.

You’ll also want to prepare all your project documentation. A project audit normally
begins with a documentation review, so you will be asked for copies of your project
schedule, project initiation document, requirements, status reports, latest Project Board
minutes, risks and issues log and so on. The list can be quite long and pulling it all
together in a handy format can take a while, so get as much as you can prepared in
advance.


An easier option may be to set up your auditor with access to your online project
management tool, so that they can browse information about the project and then
come to you and ask for additional information as required.

2. Don’t Hide Stuff
Don’t try to hide anything. If your risk log hasn’t been updated for weeks or your project
schedule never had a baseline, it’s too late to do anything about it now. Auditors have
seen it all before, anyway. Chances are, you were busy managing the project and not
updating paperwork – this is something you can explain so don’t try to cover it up. No
one is expecting you to be perfect. Anything too perfect in the real world is a bit
suspicious!

3. Agree the Reporting Schedule
You really don’t want there to be any surprises,
especially if the person doing your audit is going
to send a report to your manager, project
sponsor or the Project Management Office. Talk
to the auditor about the frequency of reporting
while they are carrying out their investigations.
A once-a-week summary of their findings and
recommendations, sent to you, is a good start. It
doesn’t have to be long – a quick email will do.

This gives you a chance to build up a picture of what their final report will say. It’s also
an opportunity to review as you go – weekly updates will give you a chance to identify
any weaker areas and work to put them right, perhaps even before the audit has
finished. You’ll get extra credit for reacting quickly.

4. Make Enough Time
It is hugely time-consuming to have to explain yourself
to someone else. Especially to someone who knows
nothing about your project and potentially very little
about your business.


They may have lots of skills in uncovering problems on projects or making
recommendations about how organizations can manage things more effectively, but
what do they really know about healthcare, or running a college, or candle-making – or
whatever it is that you do?

Don’t underestimate the time it is going to take to provide all the background data the
auditor needs. Talk to your project sponsor about the impact that the audit will have on
your project progress. If you pull key project team members into audit meetings for a
day or so, this could have a detrimental impact on the work they are doing, so you might
need to review your project schedule accordingly.

Try to schedule meetings in at times when you don’t have critical resources working flat
out on essential tasks. It’s another planning job for you, but minimizing the impact on
the project and the team should be a priority. A good auditor will understand especially
if you share the schedule with him or her and explain why someone can’t meet them
right now.

5. Remember, Audits are Good!
Try to stay positive! If your project is going well,
then the audit will show that you are doing a
great job at managing the work and the team.
Look at the areas where you are strongest and
see what you could do to build on those further,
maybe be mentoring a junior project manager or
giving a ‘lunch and learn’ session on what you do so that you can share your good
practices with the rest of the project managers in the company. Be proud of what you
have achieved.

It can be very frustrating to work on a failing project, but sometimes project sponsors
just won’t listen. If your project isn’t going well, and you already know that, then the
audit could give you the visibility you need to get your message across to senior
management. A report from an independent person is exactly what’s needed to get
your project sponsor to take notice of all the issues you keep flagging up. It might even
recommend that the project is closed down, which would mean your time and
resources could be redeployed on to projects that have a chance at delivering


something of real business value instead of working on something that everyone knows
is a waste of time. Everyone except the sponsor, that is!

Of course, there is always the option that the audit report will say that the project isn’t
going well and you had absolutely no idea about the failings. That’s not a great place to
be, but keep a positive outlook. The output of the audit process will help you get the
project back on track. It can be a really valuable learning opportunity as well, even for
experienced project managers. Use the report to identify areas that you need to work
on and talk to your manager about getting some training or mentoring on those topics.

In short, project audits can be a real pain – they are time-consuming, intrusive and a bit
scary. But a good auditor will help you identify areas where the project is not going as
well as it could be. Look on audits as a great learning experience and something to help
you make sure that your project has the best possible chance of success. And they
should give you advice on what to do to put it right. Of course, it’s up to you whether
you act on their recommendations or not!

When Your Projects Are Late
There isn’t a project manager on earth where 100% of their projects have come in 100%
on time. Devin Deen, Content Director here at ProjectManager.com offers five simple
steps that every project manager can do to get back on top of this situation.

http://www.projectmanager.com/when-your-projects-are-late.php

When You Are Not Meeting Targets
Devin Deen, Content Director at ProjectManager.com shares his advice on what to so
when your project team is not meeting their date or time targets. Watch the video here

http://www.projectmanager.com/when-you-are-not-meeting-targets.php

5 Steps to Improving Project Quality Targets
To learn more about meeting quality targets, follow these steps presented by Jennifer
Whitt, Director at ProjectManager.com http://www.projectmanager.com/meeting-
quality-targets-on-projects.php


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