Managing the Project Team
| Managing the project team involves "tracking team member performance, providing feedback, resolving issues, and coordinating changes to enhance project performance" (PMBOK). As a result of managing the project team, the staffing management plan is updated, issues are resolved, change requests are submitted, and lessons learned are added to the organization's database if one is available. This topic is as complex and "hard" as any that the project manager has to face. The inputs to managing the project team are organizational process assets, project staff assignments, roles and responsibilities, project organization charts, the staffing management plan, team performance assessment, work performance information, and performance reports, according to the PMBOK. All of these have been discussed earlier. The tools and techniques for managing the project team are observation and conversation, project performance appraisals, conflict management, and the issue log. As with all types of management, it is important to work directly with project members and to have personal interaction with them instead of just waiting for reports. Observation and conversation are two important parts of managing the project team. In fact, these are a major part of the management style known as MBWA, Management by Walking Around. As your project progresses, interpersonal management will keep you informed of how your team members are feeling and the ways in which you can help them be better at their jobs. No job is more important than this in project management. How complex or simple the performance appraisals are will depend on the complexity of the project, labor contract requirements, any organizational policies that apply, and the length of the project. Some may be formal. These will generally be structured by the organization itself to get information about your project team. Other appraisals may be informal, particularly if the appraisals are ad hoc as you are doing MBWA. If your performance appraisals are formal, you should begin with a set of objectives for the appraisal. Written documents are used for the most part in formal appraisals, and these documents should help you reach the objectives you set for the appraisal. During formal appraisals, you should give feedback to the team member. This feedback can be negative or positive, depending on performance. A management technique that works well is to give positive feedback before and after the negative. This is known as the "sandwich" technique, where you put negative feedback in between positive feedback. Do not be worried about negative feedback. Most people know when they have done something that is negative. Just make sure that you have it documented and can deliver the criticism without making it personal. Try to have positive ways to correct the actions when you do a performance report. In fact, this would be a good time to set personal objectives for the team member. Write these down and bring them up again when you have your next formal appraisal meeting. Conflict management, if successful, can result in a better team performance. The more formal the ground rules and role definition are, the less conflict there may be. At first, it is a good idea to have the team members try to work out their own differences. If this is not possible, you should address the problem early and use a collaborative approach. It is important that you do not compromise when working on a conflict. Compromise is likely to make all parties unhappy and will not solve the conflict; it will merely keep it going until a later date. If you have continuing conflicts, you may have to use disciplinary actions or actions suggested by the organization for conflict resolution. An issues log has been discussed before. The key to the log is to keep it as a written document and make it a permanent part of the overall project records. This means that you note the conflict, detail actions taken to deal with the conflict, and note the final outcome of the conflict. The more you record, the better off you will be in the future.
The answer is A. If possible, let the people involved in the conflict work it out in a collaborative manner.
The answer is D. Compromising while solving conflict results in the continuation of the conflict and seldom brings resolution.
The answer is C. By writing issues down, you create a permanent record of how issues were handled and resolved.
The answer is B. If you set clear objectives, you can use them as discussion points in the next performance appraisal.
The answer is A. If formal ground rules are set at the beginning of the project, it may be possible to avoid conflicts by referring to the established ground rules.
The answer is C. The acronym means Management by Walking Around, and it describes a practice that should be a standard for any type of manager. If you want to get your team to work closely with you, be sure to let them see you and in turn make sure that you communicate in person with them. The outputs for managing the project team are requested changes, recommended corrective actions, recommended preventive actions, organizational process assets updates, and updated project management plans. The requested changes listed as an output for managing the project team are changes in personnel. Sometimes you will be forced to make changes because of events out of your control. Other times you will choose to make changes because of something you believe will make the project work more effectively. When making a staffing change request, you should use the same standard change control process that is used for other areas of managing the project. The recommended corrective actions in this section deal with human resource issues such as staffing changes (reductions or additions), additional training, and disciplinary actions. The disciplinary actions should be done in accordance with organizational policy. Disciplinary actions should be kept in written form in an organizational guide. If they are not, you should question the HR department for guidelines. Do not do your own version of disciplinary actions. The organization decides how to discipline. Recommended preventive actions are those actions that are taken to avoid problems in the future. If possible, it is a good idea to take preventive action before a problem or conflict occurs. If you see a potential problem or some actions that you are certain will lead to problems in the future, you should try to forestall these problems. The updates of the organizational process assets center around lessons learned documentation. As far as possible, document knowledge that has been learned during the project so that the information is available for future reference. If you have a historical database in place, lessons learned will go into it. For projects that do not have a complete database, you can save lessons learned as a separate file for future information. Some of the lessons learned in the HR area are organization charts, positions, descriptions, ground rules, useful recognition events, skills or competencies of the team members that were uncovered during the execution of the project, and issues and solutions as found in the issues log. Finally, updating the project plan will finish the output for managing the project team. Change requests and approved change requests should both be kept. In addition, you should note corrective actions to see if they result in updates to the staffing management plan.
The answer is C. Requested staffing changes are an output of managing the project team.
The answer is D. The organization should set policies concerning disciplinary actions. You should contact the HR department to make sure you are in compliance with the organizational policy.
The answer is B. These, and others, are examples of information that may be contained in your lessons learned.
The answer is D. These types of actions should be taken when you have reason to believe that some type of problem may occur in the future. It is always better to anticipate problems and deal with them than it is to react to them after they have occurred. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
EAN: 2147483647
Pages: 167