Project Management Skills for Better Library Service
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Workshop Slides from Nebraska Library Association Conference Preconference session October, 2017
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Project Management Skills for Better Library Service
- 7. Legitimacy Authority Sets Expectations Documentation Communication Process for Change Mitigates Risk Recovery Options Lessons for Future Written Documents with Formal Approval
- 12. • Access • Confidentiality/Privacy • Democracy • Diversity • Education & Lifelong Learning • Intellectual Freedom •Preservation •The Public Good •Professionalism •Service •Social Responsibility Adopted June 29, 2004, by the ALA Council http://www.ala.org/advocacy/intfreedom/corevalues
- 13. Core Values of Librarianship Community Values, Vision Library Mission, Vision, Values
- 15. Front: A New Service at Your Library Back: Up to 3 Core Values this service supports
- 16. • Access • Confidentiality/Privacy • Democracy • Diversity • Education & Lifelong Learning • Intellectual Freedom •Preservation •The Public Good •Professionalism •Service •Social Responsibility Adopted June 29, 2004, by the ALA Council http://www.ala.org/advocacy/intfreedom/corevalues
- 20. GOALS OBJECTIVES WHAT should this project accomplish in order to get us to that WHY? HOW are we going to go about making those thing happen?
- 21. Look at your group’s Purpose Statement for this Project. What are some Goals we can define for the Project?
- 24. Remember: Objectives are the specific things that are going to be done in order to meet our project goals and fulfill the purpose of the project.
- 29. Do no more, no less.
- 31. Purpose Statement Scope Definition Project Requirements Resource Roles &Responsibilities Project Timeline Budget Communication Plan
- 32. Extremely simple, clear statements summarizing the WHY, WHAT and HOW of your Project.
- 33. Address specifically WHO will be impacted and involved in the Project and set up some clear expectations.
- 34. A tool for beginning to organizing the people involved in a project. List EVERYONE impacted by the project in ANY WAY, and begin to define the ways they are involved.
- 35. A tool for defining Roles & Responsibilities in a Project. Helps set Expectations within a project team. •Responsible • Who will actually DO this task? • Who is assigned to work on this task? R •Accountable • Who’s head will Roll if this goes wrong? • Who has the authority to make a decision on this? A •Consulted • Who can provide more information about this part of the project? • Who has expertise or insight to share about this? C •Informed • Who should be kept in the loop about this? • Who should get updates about this? I
- 39. Include a clear Project Timeline indicating the major Project Milestones. This should be based on a detailed Project Schedule.
- 41. PURPOSE GOALS OBJECTIVES TASKS SCHEDULE, RESOURCES BUDGET PURPOSE GOALS OBJECTIVES TASKS SCHEDULE, RESOURCES BUDGET VERSION A VERSION B
- 42. A strong Communication Plan is ESSENTIAL Account for EVERYONE
- 43. (n(n-1))/2
- 44. Who - To, From How - Medium What - Content, Detail When - Frequency Why - Purpose Evaluation
Editor's Notes
- Intro and my background People/Libraries represented here Kinds of libraries Library sizes PM Experience Giving your experience a vocabulary PM and scale of concepts Applying PM concepts and related skills consistently to projects helps things go more efficiently Get things done faster More staff ownership More community ownership Cuts costs Saves time Saves resources Coordinates projects Helps aim towards larger goals Builds trust with stakeholders Makes everyone less crazy Don’t need to do everything – just a few things here and there that fit for your library – then think about building Today – focus on initial steps in project planning Trickle down effect – impacts all parts of the project With more time, we could extrapolate, but that’s hard to keep general As we go, keep your own situation and projects in mind and we’ll talk about how these techniques fit and can be scaled or modified My goal: Each of you takes a few ideas back that you can actually try right away, and a few ideas you can think more about for the future--- KEEP A NOW AND FUTTURE LIST GOING
- Project – temporary, unique, goal driven, cooperative Constraints- budget, time, resources, scope Ever been in charge of a project at your library? Ever been deeply involved in one? They’ve all gone perfectly, right???
- Discussion: What are some typical library projects you’ve been involved in? Have any of you been in charge? Volunteered? Been assigned? Been involved but not in charge? Who is usually in charge? Any good disaster stories? Great triumphs to share? Any guesses as to how LP’s compare to projects in the business world? What are some common pitfalls?
- The beginning is often a good place to start
- Great idea! Now let’s just dive right in!!! NO Planning time is not a waste of time Without having a good, cohesive plan in place, you’re going to waste a lot of time in rework, inefficiencies, and bungled communication. Your messaging will suffer, outcomes won’t be as sharp, and the whole thing has a much higher risk of failure. I have seen it over and over again. Projects that don’t have a strong plan in place turn into dumpster fires FAST.
- And when I say that you should have a plan, I mean a formal, written plan. Depending on the size and scope of the project, it may not have to be really huge, but there are some key components that must be in place, and others you may want to consider. If I can not SEE your plan, if you can not produce it and sow it to me, YOU DO NOT HAVE A PLAN
- With the short amount of time we have here today, we’re not going to get into all of the intricacies of creating new library services that will wow everyone every time. But what I would like to do is use our time to focus on one technique that blends the kind of thinking I’ve learned as a project manager (results oriented) and the kind of thinking I’ve learned as someone in a very service oriented profession and offer you some food for thought about how to approach designing library services in a way that will get the buy in, ensure we don’t lose sight of our larger goals, and that strike a cord with the people whose lives we want to make a difference in. I being every project I’m involved with by asking one single question. WHY??? Why are we doing this project to begin with? Remember how we talked about how library folks have a tendency to dive right in and start doing things without planning first? They also tend to skip directly over this question and move forward with project based on a lot of assumptions that can wreck a project before it even starts. Asking WHY is essential if you want your projects and their outcomes to be effective and to serve the overall mission of our organizations, and not just create shiny objects that are ;lovely to look at, but don’t really serve the needs of our communities.
- let’s look at idea through a slightly different lens. Simon Sinek: Start with Why --- “Golden Circle” Successful endeavors stem from purpose based efforts – EXPLAIN IN 2 sentences Libraries can take the same approach when it comes to designing service to offer patrons. Instead of asking WHAT should we do for our community? We should ask WHY do we serve a purpose in the community? And work from there
- PM takes a similar approach to SS, but in a little more practical way. Start with Why Define What Plan out How (bridge) In my experience, This is a model that works really well for getting things done in libraries, and for providing a framework for service design at the same time.
- So let’s unpack this a little in a library context. Why do we design and offer new services? Why do we have events and classes at our libraries? Why do we build or renovate spaces? Why do we undertake any of these projects? Where do we look to determine if a particular service has enough “Why” to it to be worth the effort? WHERE DO WE GET OUR WHY? Organizational Mission, vision, Community feedback, departmental goals, etc etc
- As a librarian, I find a good place to start looking for purpose is often the core values of our profession. Everything we do in libraries should be in service of one or more of these values.
- If we take these core values and compare them with the values of the communities we serve, the overlap between the two (which is usually much greater in proportion than this diagram!) is where we get our library’s mission, vision, and values. I hope that these are clearly articulated for your organization – it really is helpful to have formal, written versions of these to look to for guidance no and then. If they are well thought out and articulated, they can provide invaluable guidance for developing library service that actually matter and serve the values we say we want to uphold.
- From there, everything else we do in our library flows. Once there is a strong mission, vision, statement of values in place, a library can use that as a basis for a strategic plan and specific strategic directions, goals for the library, for various departments, and all the way down to specific objectives…. Like the ones that will apply to your individual services.
- Game: Find the Why Take a few minutes to write on the front of your card a new service at your library (New, new-ish, in progress) On the back, write up to 3 core values this service supports (Put Core Values back on screen) Pass them up I’ll ask the room a few, share answers Can anyone elaborate on more specifics if you were to do this at your library? Any local goals, values, etc. that would also apply? Write one of the new services on the pad at front Write Core Values associated OK, so here’s a new service were going to implement at our library. We know why it’s something we think is worth doing, why we have a commitment to it. Think of the communities you serve: Give me three reasons why it will be important to the people you serve. (Write) Talk about who these people are, their needs, values etc. and how they align with the ones we’ve talked about.
- Pass them up I’ll ask the room a few, share answers Can anyone elaborate on more specifics if you were to do this at your library? Any local goals, values, etc. that would also apply? NEXT---- Write one of the new services on the pad at front Write Core Values associated OK, so here’s a new service were going to implement at our library. We know why it’s something we think is worth doing, why we have a commitment to it. IF TIME PERMITS:: Think of the communities you serve: Give me three reasons why it will be important to the people you serve. (Write) Talk about who these people are, their needs, values etc. and how they align with the ones we’ve talked about.
- So we have a lot of data here about why this service is important, worthwhile, why we believe in it. Now we have to convince others. This is where the purpose statement comes in. We need 1-2 sentences to tell others what this service is all about. Not a paragraph listing all the details. Not a list of features. A statement that will do one thing: We want our stakeholders to BELIEVE in this service. That’s the administration, the library board, the project team, the library staff, community members, target demographics, anyone exposed to this project should get the same message, and it should draw from this data to make them BELIEVE TIPS The purpose of this service is… IS OK OUTCOMES are good to mention Avoid specifics – specific actions, features, etc Let’s see what you’ve got. I will give your groups FIVE MINUTES to write a purpose statement Get into groups and take a few minutes to write one sentence (two is cheating but I’ll allow it) that uses some of the words here to make an inspiring case for this new service. Share a few examples
- Now that we have our WHY, we need to get on to the WHAT of our Project -
- We know our WHY So let’s figure out WHAT we’re going to be aiming for as ways to meet that purpose by the end of the project. Establish Service Goals – higher level “What is to be accomplished” statements All based on the Purpose
- Goals – WHAT The higher level statement of what the project will accomplish Objectives – HOW Exactly what steps we’re going to take to meet those goals We engage in this thinking all the time - Goal: Patrons will not need wait for more than six weeks for any item they have on hold Objective: Staff will monitor holds queues regularly to ensure the library has enough copies available Objective: The Library will maintain a 3:1 hold:copy ratio for popular items Objective: Circulation staff will follow up regularly on long overdue and billed items to ensure enough copies are available For our projects, these must be clearly defined, agreed upon, approved, and disseminated to team members and stakeholders
- Activity For the project we’ve been working on together, let’s define a few goals. I’ll give the groups 10 minutes or so to work together to come up with some specific goals for this project based on the purpose statement Remember, these are Higher level statements defining some of the things we’re going to aim for as results from this project. NOT HOW YOU”RE GOING TO DO IT Goal: Patrons will have to wait no longer than 6 weeks for any item they place a hold on Goal: Students will have additional access to library services during finals week Goal: Staff will focus more of their work time on customer service interactions Share these goals and list them up front – Group leader shares Statement and Goals
- Now that we have our WHY, we need to get on to the WHAT of our Project -
- Why: Check What: Check Now let’s look at the bridge. HOW are we going to get from here to there? We’re going to take the Purpose and goals of our project and derive from them the specific objectives of our Project
- For each project Goal we’ve defines, we want a set of specific Objectives that meet each of these criteria. Goal: Patrons will have to wait no longer than 6 weeks for any item they place a hold on Goal: Students will have additional access to library services during finals week Goal: Staff will focus more of their work time on customer service interactions An objective for each or one? Are they SMART?
- Activity – Each group is assigned a Goal for the project Define a set of objectives for this goal. This does not have to be a comprehensive list of objectives, just something to get us started. Each objective should be SMART (I’ll put these back up)
- For each project Goal we’ve defines, we want a set of specific Objectives that meet each of these criteria.
- NOW choose ONE of these objectives and start making a list of specific tasks that will have to be done to meet this objective List the tasks on individual post it notes. RULE: DO NOT USE THE WORD AND. That means a new post it. Each group will share the objectives they have defined, and tell the larger group about the stuff on the post its
- What you have in front of you in the form of your project objectives and tasks is the SCOPE of your project. This is what your team will be doing as you move forward with the project. Every single task in this pile should be necessary for completing an objective Every objective should be necessary for reaching a goal Every goal serves the overall purpose The purpose is based on core values, mission, vision One sacred tenet of Project Management that Librarians have a VERY hard time with: NO MORE, NO LESS. We are a service based profession and LOVE to go above and beyond. But this is extremely dangerous to projects. Once you have established a solid scope , document it, get it approves, and do not Add or subtract ANYTHING without a very good reason and have a process for vetting the change. SCOPE CREEP will kill a project faster than almost anything else. BONUS ACTIVITY – DEPENCENCIES AND SEQUENCING – Work with one group’s post its Add durations Add resources
- Now that we have our WHY, we need to get on to the WHAT of our Project -
- Number one pitfall I’ve seen library projects fall victim to: WHERE IS YOUR PLAN?
- Think Executive summary. Convince in a few pages, use quick figures, bullet points, simplified but persuasive language, make it as brief as possible. This is the document sponsors will see, but also other levels of stakeholders who you want to be invested in the project. They need lots of WHY, some WHAT, and only a little HOW in this Document. They do not need to see all of your processes to get there.
- Number one pitfall I’ve seen library projects fall victim to: WHERE IS YOUR PLAN?
- Tool EXPECTATIONS
- Simple
- Complex Sometimes good to share as part of Project plan – good visual for communicating how everyone will work together through project phases Forms a good basis for Project scheduling and Communication plans
- COMPLCATED - I took months of courses on different methods for this, so I’m just going to pass on one major tip that I find very valuable for working on Library Project schedules. From all of the scheduling methods out there , there are two very common basic approaches. Reverse Scheduling Establish a Project End date and schedule tasks backward from that date Forward Scheduling Establish a Project start date and schedule tasks forward from that date The one I see most in libraries is Reverse scheduling, and this is one used a lot by inexperienced project managers in lots of different disciplines. It does have its uses, and can be a good method to use for certain kinds of projects. The problem with using this method with libraries is that if you begin scheduling based on when something must be done, and back up from there, the schedule can be really inflexible and subject to collapse once you get started on the work. The risk of a Reverse scheduled process running into trouble is heightened in any organization where there is a serious constraint placed on RESOURCES, as is usually the case in libraries. If a key person is for any reason unable to perform their assigned tasks, there is little leeway within this kind of schedule to make up for the time, and usually not a lot of money to throw at the problem. The result is delays, missed deadlines, inefficiencies, rework, cost overruns, stress on already overburdened staff, decrease in quality, and impact on other library services and projects. Forward scheduling, however, offers the opportunity to base deadlines on the tasks established during our WHY WHAT HOW process, allowing us to know precisely how much time the project will take if started ASAP, with the given resources. Going a bit further, adding in milestones and buffer time during the process helps introduce flexibility for organizations at risk of problems due to changes in Resource availability. If there is a time constraint that must be adhered to, Planning on a Forward based model and tracing a Critical Path through that project schedule shows exactly where the schedule can be tightened up to save time by allocating resources, spending more money, or changing the scope.
- I like to take a similar approach to the budget I present in my Project plan, as well. IN AN IDEAL WORLD, the budget should be h=based on what you want to get done. But in the real world, we don’t have unlimited funds. SO here is how I deal with setting a Project budget. Sometimes I’m given a Project with no budget bottom line specified. Sometimes I’m given a number I should come in under. Either way, I start the same thing, and base the thing on the WHY WHAY HOW process. In both versions, I give them a version of the budget that reflects what I’ve determined to be the realistic cost of delivering the result determined by the project In the second version, where there was a limit given I give a second version of the budget with areas of the proposed outcome where I’d recommend cutting back on the Project scope. Opens the conversation about what is realistic for this project
- LAST BUT NOT LEAST – the piece that ties it all together! NEVER DO A PROJECT WITHUT A COMMUNICATION PLAN! After the WHY, WHAT, HOW of the Project Plan, the most important thing to have clearly articulated is a communication plan. In my experience, the lack of a strong communication plan is one of the most deadly things for a project. Period. And, like with the overall Project plan, I WANT TO SEE IT Rule #1 Account for Everyone – All Stakeholders Anyone involved in the project in any way should be included in your communication plan in some way, even if it is just to let them know that a project is happening. Remember that the definition of a stakeholder includes anyone impacted by a project, even if that impact is all just in their mind.
- Communication is HARD
- Make sure your communication plan covers these basics for every major phase/element/ step in the project lifecyle This can often take the form of a matrix showing who can expect to hear what when from whom, in what way, how often, and what the point of it is. And don’t forget to incorporate some kind of evaluation into this process so that it can be tweaked as you progress. Moving forward with broken communication is often worse than having no communication at all!
- With a strong Project Plan in place, you’re off to an excellent start. You’ve got a roadmap to success in your hand and a strong foundation for your efforts in the things that mean the most in this profession: core values, related to local interpretations and areas where local values, etc. intersect Clear Goals and Objectives directly based on the same foundation As a project – good start getting stakeholders invested, sponsors behind the project The building blocks for a strong project are in place Think about the things you might also consider Risks Contingency plans Processes Vendors Agreements There's a lot you could add, but the basics are there. NOW AND FUTURE LISTS Get your plan approved. Get your Team together. Share your inspiration. Communicate the underlying goals. Have a Party. #MIH