Communication and Commitment

Chapter 18 - Using the Web for Enhancing Decision-Making: UN Project Failures in Sub-Sahara Africa (SSA)
Managing IT in Government, Business & Communities
by Gerry Gingrich (ed)
Idea Group Publishing 2003

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From the perspective of project failures, it is obvious to say that most project managers do not communicate as effectively as they should in SSA. Project managers do not keep team members and upper management, or themselves, properly informed. Communication problems are experienced more often than project managers would like to admit. Previous studies in this field have highlighted some key problems. The author's personal experiences indicate that the following are major problems commonly found in SSA (Ghana being used as an example).

Barriers To Effective Communication

Often organisational barriers are much more important in communicating problems on projects. This is because of the very nature of a project. Projects in Ghana involve people from different ethnic (tribal) groups, who use different languages, have different objectives, have had different types of training, and yet must work together closely on a unique task. An example is given in Randolf and Posner (1998) who say "typical organisational barriers to communications include an organisational structure that separates the departments, information overload or sometimes underload (too little information), ambiguity leading to incomplete information or faulty transmission of information, and time pressures." In Ghana and some other SSA countries, the problem is generated primarily from tribalism, selfishness, greediness, bribery, and last but not least, control and power (UNDP, 1997).

Progress Report And Commitment

The author suggests that project leaders should adopt the "need to know" principle so that copies of written and unwritten communications are freely available to those who need the information. Electronic communication is nowadays in general use, and can very powerfully inform action. It is essential that efficient project management teams, including lower-level employees, make use of electronic communication to report to the "need to know" authorities on progress of a project and when things are going wrong. The best way to do this is make use of the Internet e-mailing system. It is cheap, easy to use, and free from monopoly.

In countries where project failures are common, progress reports are the main formal means by which project progress is communicated and recorded. As records, they are vital parts of the project's audit trail, so they must be prepared with all possible care. To eliminate unnecessary recording and information overflow, project progress reports should:

• State clearly the current status of the project

• Compare actual achievements with the planned target achievements

• Draw attention to critical issues

• Identify problems and propose solutions

• Promote effective management and control

In SSA project teams need extensive commitment in order to perform well in project managing. Below are some vital examples that the researcher believes SSA project managers need to follow.

• Generating a realistic plan, with realistic costs and reports

• Implementing straight-forward and easily-maintained report/approval procedures

• Producing and using "need-to-know" information strategy

• Straight-forward and effective change control, fault reporting, and cost control

A commitment plan and procedure must be put into effect decisively. The plan must make clear what is to be achieved, when it is to be achieved, and how it is to be achieved. A project manager needs to balance what needs to be done to maintain control over the long term. Having control of the project is a matter of maintaining control over a long term, which is also more a matter of managing risks and establishing effective monitoring procedures.

A project manager will have to balance challenging demands from different places, e.g., to satisfy the sponsor's management (who need to know what has happened) and to create space for the project's success. In SSA, where project failure is common, Chicken (1994) advises that there is a need to create effective risk management strategy to allow for project success.

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