Most executives aren’t quite ready to trust the first glimmers of an economic recovery on the horizon and are keeping a tight lid on resources.
Lean teams, it seems, are here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future. “We as project managers should be prepared to work like this for the next six months,” says Cynthia West, PhD., vice president, sales and marketing, Metafuse Inc., Irvine, California, USA.
Even in stabilizing industries, executives may still be hesitant to add new hires. The last thing organizations want to do is hire people only to let them go a few months down the line, she says. And many companies have adopted the “do more with less” mantra simply because they now know they can. “Companies have been taking advantage of the economic downturn,” Dr. West says. They save money by having the excuse of “bad times” to explain layoffs or the postponement of new hires.
Here are some tips on how project managers can work with today’s lean reality—and come out stronger for it.
Be Graphical, and Be Honest
As resources are cut, remaining employees often have to step up and work harder. Dr. West says that project managers should speak up if they think the project will suffer as a consequence.
She recommends that you run a visual report to show how heavily each team member is booked, to help you establish priorities. A graphic representation of all the projects in the portfolio that shows the impact of extra work also goes a long way in helping management understand how to prioritize initiatives. “If you take on the jobs of three people, you’ll most likely fail,” she says. “Create an agreement with management and be honest that you can’t complete all these tasks.”
Plan Your Projects into the Future
Although many organizations are thinking short-term right now and are waiting for the economy to completely recover, Dr. West stresses that long-term planning is always essential in project management, no matter the economy’s status.
The “long-term” thought process usually depends on the culture, but she recommends having at least a three- to five-year plan. Map out all the projects in your portfolio in terms of crystal-clear strategies, objectives and goals, Dr. West explains.
Part of the planning process should address the economic realities—organizations want ways to cut back. Project managers should map out a complete budget. These days, a rough estimate of won’t suffice, says Pablo Lledó, PMP, director, MasConsulting, Mendoza, Argentina. “Now, it is not enough to be effective at only doing the project right,” he says. “You need to be efficient at doing the right project at the minimum cost.”
Prioritize Responsibilities
If there was ever a time to know your priorities, it’s now. “You have to decide which clients are most important and most profitable,” says Dr. West. Prioritization takes considerable analysis because it might reveal that the client who spends the most money with you might not necessarily be the most profitable.
Dr. West says tracking time and billing hours will reveal which clients should be your top priority. Project Insight, for example, assigns a weighted score to each project in the portfolio so that both the team and the leaders know which projects are the most important.
But no matter how the order of projects fall, project managers and their teams should take this time to master the art of “working thin,” says Mr. Lledó. “The downward economy was a great signal to watch out for efficient projects,” he says. “Project teams should become stronger after all these lessons learned regarding how to keep managing projects under the crisis.”
