Build an effective project team in a challenging organisational culture

Abstract

An enterprise-wide project can often expose the true health of an organisation. During normal operations, endemic issues are often ignored or accepted as the routine. In the environment of a major project these issues can become prominent and have significant impact on the effectiveness of a project team. As the project manager without direct authority over resources, you may be challenged with minimising the effect of these issues while ensuring the success of the project. This presentation will use a recent software implementation at a city government to illustrate common organisational issues that often have significant impacts on projects and identify the techniques used to minimising these issues while maximising the effectiveness of the project team.

Introduction

“Coming together is a beginning, staying together is progress, and working together is success.”
Henry Ford

This statement by Henry Ford captures the greatest challenge of project management - working together. For all of the sophisticated models, methodologies, processes, tools and technical disciplines the profession has developed, program and project success remains dependent upon team or group dynamics. This challenge has increased as organisations, and thus programs and projects, have grown in complexity. Projects often require that two diametrically opposed cultures merge and work in tandem. In the case of a merger or acquisition, the cultural clash between organisations can be dramatic. However cross-functional efforts can be just as challenging, requiring that two disciplines with very different ways of approaching work align their efforts. Even projects within a single department can become a challenge, as interpersonal conflicts and working style differences are often highlighted by the demands of project work. As leaders and project management professionals, what can we do to effectively address the teamwork challenges?

The following case study captures the experience of a mid-sized municipality in developing and implementing a new business software system across all of the functions of the city. The project experienced a wide array of common challenges of a cross-functional, enterprise-wide effort. In addition, as with many such projects, it encountered significant organisational, project, and interpersonal teaming challenges. The problems encountered are not unique, the methodology applied to understanding and addressing them is. From a project management perspective, this effort went beyond the traditional scope of project management to engage the entire system and organisation team in understanding and embracing the challenges highlighted by the project. It led an effort to leverage them as catalysts for system wide improvement. The focus of the project never wavered from its original scope and definition, yet a very skilled project manager was able to use project team dynamics to highlight systemic challenges that once addressed, enhanced both the project's benefits and city operations. By expanding the focus of project management beyond delivery of a software system to delivery of a holistic solution addressing team and group dynamics, this project achieved a level of success far beyond that achieved by most successful projects.

Project Teams are not Developed, They are Assigned

To begin, the city established project sponsorship by identifying key managers holding a vested interest in the new system. Recognising a lack of management time and project management expertise, the city hired an external consulting firm to manage the project and represent the city's best interests. The city's project team was made up of city staff supported by software vendor implementation staff. As in most organisations, assignment of staff was decided based upon availability and subject matter expertise, not by evaluation of teamwork and or interpersonal skills. This is the reality of most project teams, members are not recruited based upon a wide range of skills as in general employment efforts, but rather based upon availability and specific expertise. Although organisations have greater experience of both the general and specific skills of internal staff being considered for project work than that of recruits considered in general hiring situations, we continue to be forced by expediency to defer to primary work expertise in staffing projects. (Current efforts to develop sophisticated skill profiles in establishing matrix organisations may well shift this deficiency in coming years.) So, the project team was organized.

The project manager moved immediately to engage with the software vendor and establish a project launch, development and implementation plan. In addition, the project manager sought to identify and coordinate with the key project sponsor or city business manager who could operate as the city's business project leader. This is when the project began to develop typical symptoms of troubled projects. Recent management staff turnover had resulted in the key project sponsor leaving the organisation. The city's project sponsor was no longer a manager with the responsibility and authority to lead, but rather, a staff person with long-term knowledge of city operations and systems who had assumed the lead role by default. Thus, team dynamic challenge number one: A key leadership role is established at staff level by default.

With the high level development and implementation plan developed, the project manager called a meeting of the project team and sponsors to launch the project. The goal, to insure a shared understanding of the road ahead, develop a detailed project schedule, and verify availability of staff for specifically timed project development needs. Sponsor attendance was limited and project staff was overwhelmed by the demands of project tasks in addition to their standing responsibilities. Team dynamic challenge number two: Sponsor inattention leaving staff without the support to establish work priorities and integrate project and process work.

As team members attempted to problem solve the work demand conflicts, many established interpersonal issues became apparent. Team members began to posture either offensively or defensively, dictating other's roles and level of responsibility, or declining participation in the dialogue or commitment to tasks. The default project sponsor or lead attempted to exercise authority over others without having any real authority or power. Team dynamic challenge number three: Established team dynamics do not support a staff level leadership role, shared responsibility-taking or group problem solving.

The project manager was faced with a specific delivery timeline based upon calendar year-end system cut-over requirements. The project schedule was reasonable. The problem was team and group dynamics.

The Project Team and Understanding the Group Dynamic

The project manager went to work in a way few project managers do. All efforts were turned to the project team members, identifying their individual challenges, and understanding current group dynamics. The first step was to interview each team member to obtain their unique perspective on the project, their role, their task assignments, and their challenges in completing their task assignments. This process resulted in a thorough understanding of individual and collective challenges facing the project team. These one on one interviews, with a neutral project manager, allowed team members to air issues and concerns candidly. The interviews also clearly established the role of the project manager to each team member as one of supporter and champion. Through this process, a long list of individual, interpersonal, departmental, and organisational problems were revealed.

The next step in the project manager's process was to organize and then prioritize the issues in the following table:

In every case the project manager determined the path by which the issue would be addressed and/or brought to the attention of the next level of authority for resolution. As the project manager worked through the list, a pattern of unresolved issues developed that when summarized revealed the primary challenges negatively impacting the team, group dynamics and the success of the project. These can be summarized as follows:

• The Finance & Administration Director was unable or unwilling to provide the leadership, decision-making and conflict resolution support required by the Finance & Administration department to this finance-dependent project.
• The staff level project sponsor had a history of unilateral decision-making, dictating to and directing staff far outside of his/her authority, based upon an assumption that length of service and system familiarity equaled automatic authority.
• The project team and sponsors lacked the experience and expertise to develop the new software system beyond the current level of process maturity.

With the key unresolved project team issues identified, the project manager was able to develop several alternative approaches to addressing each challenge. At this point, the project manager was better prepared to approach city leadership, the Mayor and City Administrator, explain the challenges, detail the effect upon project schedule and benefits, and begin to explore solutions.

Mapping Project Team Dynamics to Organisational Dynamics

Each of the organisational issues revealed in the team member interviews is a long-standing systemic issue. Each is familiar to most project managers: a leader unwilling to make decisions and resolve conflicts; a staff member who has been allowed over time to develop into an over-reaching and controlling police authority; and, a team lacking the knowledge and experience to take itself to the next level of development or maturity.

The simple process of identifying individual team member issues and working through them in a process that distills them to key organisational issues can do more to jettison a project team forward than any other teambuilding and group dynamics process. Unlike organisation dynamics, which are regularly addressed with a multitude of formal and informal programs, project team dynamics and teambuilding efforts focus on the team, as though its dynamics initiate on day one of the project and stand alone from the organisation.

For many organisations the thought of a project manager collecting and surfacing organisational challenges can be somewhat threatening. However, if done well by a seasoned business and project manager, this process can actually become the catalyst to addressing long-standing unresolved issues. Enterprise or organisation-wide projects, in particular, can open up new avenues for addressing seemingly un-resolvable institutionalized problems.

Addressing the Project Team Support System

Back to our project and project manager. With issues documented and revealed as fundamental to the success of this key city project, the Mayor and City Administrator were able to look at long-standing issues in a new light. They set off to incorporate and address them as part of an overall change initiative built upon the foundation established by a process improvement and automation project.

The Finance & Administration Director was replaced, but given the option to remain in a position more appropriate to his/her experience. Addressing the issue as part of a change initiative that focused on achieving the next level of maturity rather than an audit, assessment, or punitive action, the former director chose to remain and moved into a support position on the project team. The staff level sponsor was replaced by the new Finance & Administration Director with the skill and experience to make decisions and resolve conflicts. The former staff level sponsor was constrained to an appropriate team role in which he/she was coached in developing collaboration skills. The city hired a consulting firm to assist the project and city management in developing a strategy and plan for developing processes and the new system to support more mature operations.

Not possible in your organization, just a fairy tale you say? This took place in a highly visible, politically charged atmosphere that captured the attention of the media, the city council, and local citizens. Why did it work, you ask? Because, it worked from the project team outward - starting at the individual, and moving to the collective issues. All too often, we approach a project team's challenges by accepting the organizational challenges as a given and that under these conditions project teams cannot, in fact, affect substantial change Taking this approach with an enterprise or organisation-wide project only serves to incorporate the status quo and severely limits the projects impact and benefits. With issues identified at the individual project team member level, then extrapolated to the collective level, you can begin to identify quantifiable impacts and develop a compelling case for addressing them. Project managers of organization-wide projects need to take the time to work team and group dynamics at the individual level in order to establish the collective solution that can support the team's and project's success.

Leveraging Project Team Dynamics

With a new support system in place, the project expanded its efforts to enhance the system far beyond initial expectations. The city project that set out to replace outdated technology, no longer supportable by the vendor, instead initiated a process improvement and automation project that now fully supports the city, improves operations and increases customer benefits. Not an expansion of scope or definition, but rather an enhancement of benefits.

Using standard project management issue and risk management techniques, a project team can be supported in working through the fundamental issues that slow progress and ultimately negatively impact project quality. Project managers can position themselves as value added organisational problem solvers by developing solutions that leverage the dynamics of the project team and increase the benefits statement for a project.

Summation

Enterprise or organization-wide projects are an opportunity to address systemic human dynamics issues. Such project teams are a direct reflection of the larger organisation and, as such, a perfect proving ground for issue identification, clarification and resolution. Unfortunately today, too many large projects are falling short of anticipated benefits. In almost every case, the human factor is at the heart of the shortfall, challenged to digest and adopt new processes, systems and, or organizations and suffering long delays in project delivery.

There is a growing body of knowledge addressing the value of individuals reflecting upon and addressing organisational issues. This project study brings to light the value of enterprise projects in revealing systemic issues. In a solution focused business culture, projects must position themselves as solution as well as delivery focused.

If as Henry Ford stated, “…working together is success” then team dynamics and the support of teams through individual issue recognition, correlation to organizational issues, and systemic resolution may be the best road to working together--successfully.