I was watching George Osborne deliver his budget speech on Wednesday, trying to be a super cool executive with my iPad propped up on my desk, happily multitasking by sorting my emails, updating a report, painting my nails and eating a cheese sandwich (that list is a powerful argument against open plan offices!)

Anyway, I was half listening/watching George at work and it reminded me of the worst type of project management meetings that I attend as a Project Sponsor. They are bad because the project manager delivers a speech, doesn't draw breath for my questions and tries to sum up each point with a sound bite as if he/she is being interviewed by Sky News.

If the project is being managed by a less experienced Project Manager then I have a degree of sympathy. Talking at someone is a sign of insecurity, not stopping for questions is driven by fear of not knowing the answers to the questions. When it's an experienced Project Manager I think it's a warning sign that they will rush through their presentation, never staying long enough on one topic for penetrating questions to be asked.

If this applies to you either as a Project Sponsor or a Project Manager my recommendations for a meaningful two way exchange of information, opinion and decisions are:

If you are the Project Manager:
- Give the progress report using milestone reporting - don't give a blow by blow account of every activity but concentrate on the results of that activity I.e. Milestones
- Keep your information factual and in a way that enables each piece of information to be compared. For example, report each milestone as on or over schedule, the reasons for this and what you are doing about it
- Check that there is agreement with your actions (don't forget that this is a chance to ask for advice and guidance)
- Identify when a milestone has been reached and closed off, in contrast to those milestones that are reached but in doing so have identified interdependencies and knock on effects to the next period of activity
- Check that there is agreement with your assessment of the interdependencies (again, don't be afraid to ask for guidance - use the experience of others to check your assumptions and your analysis of the situation)

If you are the Project Sponsor:
- Remember that aggression or impatience generally leads project managers to reduce the information they provide for fear of criticism
- Ask questions that enable you to ensure four outcomes:
o Understanding and agreement of the progress made so far
o Clear instructions on any rework or amendments that are required and the resourcing of these activities - are you prepared to delay other work in order to fix something, or will you authorize overtime, temporary staff etc?
o Agreement to the work proposed for the next period
o Clear instructions on any reductions or increases in expectations for this next period and their impact on resource plans
- Use your experience of other projects to give advice and guidance to the Project Manager

Creating a compelling change story

At Maven we have a reputation for continually growing and changing and the number of new products and services that we create for our customers is high.

As we get ready to roll out a new accredited course in Management of Portfolios (MoP) I have been thinking how we ensure that all parts of the company hear the same message about this latest change.

Its my job as the sponsor for the MoP project to make sure everyone is excited and engaged with each launch that we do, and so this is the check list of points I use when creating a ‘change story’. I hope you find it useful, as ever, I welcome your comments:

Sense of urgency – why this change is needed now
 Describe the problems that the change will fix
 Explain the opportunities that can be exploited as a result of making the change
 Outline the risks if the change is not successfully implemented

Desirable outcomes – positive description of the result of the change
 How it feels to work for the organisation
 What type of work the organisation does
 How it is viewed by customers and suppliers
 The reputation it has with regulators and media

Impact – an acknowledgement of the scale of change
 List the biggest changes
 Identify those who will be impacted the most

Call to action – how employees can participate
 Brief description of key actions that senior management are taking
 Options for activities that employees can become involved in

Red Nose Day campaign

Just launched campaign http://www.maventraining.co.uk/courses-list/_/promotions-and-offers/12/and have given the team red noses and deeley boppers to wear throughout the week. Bought the 'Giggler' which is a soft nose that laughs whenever its picked up - definitely going to drive us crazy by the end of the day, with a good chance its dropped out the window before Friday

Using change management to scope my project

I continue to write the new book on how project management needs to take the lead in managing change if projects are ever to realise their benefits. This week I am putting together a series of Mini Workshop Guides to help project managers address the key issues of change management including:

1. Understanding the context for the change i.e. seeing the bigger picture by asking how the change will contribute to strategic objectives, who is driving the change that the project will support, who are the likely winners and losers from these changes, how time sensitive is the delivery of the benefits from the change

2. Understanding the detailed changes that the project is supposed to bring about including changes to information used for a process, the process itself, the outputs including information used for the next process, the decisions that need to be taken, the reports that are produced etc, changes in the size and make up of the teams involved in the process, changes in the level of authority and reporting line for each team member

3. Understanding the communication that is required to ensure everyone is informed about the proposed changes and has a chance to comment on them and engage with them prior to the changes taking place

I am interested in how these 3 areas fit with the scoping and the requirements gathering that project managers are responsible for at the start of the programme, but also how this information needs to be reviewed and updated as the project progresses and how this can lead to requests for change.

What are the most important questions you ask before getting started on a project – do you ask about the bigger picture, do you get to know the winners and the likely losers before you plan the project? As ever, all comments and emails welcome.

How do I implement change?

Maven is getting ready to change its booking system over to a new learning management system. We have piloted it with a few of our courses, but we are now planning the full launch. As a company that trains change management courses I feel the pressure to get this change right, which I think means that no-one outside of the company notices any differences and it feels just like business as usual.

One guide I use when planning any change is the warning I was given by one of my first managers “people don’t leave their jobs, they leave their managers”. Although it’s the managers at Maven who have identified the need for the new system, decided the high level functionality and selected the supplier, everyone in the company will be using it. Failure by the management team to involve, engage and inspire people will lead to failure in the adoption of the system.

That’s why this week we are busy putting up posters with quotes from staff about why they think the system is going to make things easier, and why we are putting up a chart showing our progress through each of the baby steps we are taking between now and Easter to get the system up and running. Every time we achieve one of these tasks we cross it off this ‘journey planner’ as a visual guide to how close we are to success.

We are using the information we gained from a survey (http://www.maventraining.co.uk/change-management-knowledge-centre/) we did last week that asked everyone in the office to rate from low to high their level of annoyance with the current system, their level of excitement for the new system and their level of confidence with our ability to move to the new system. This generated lots of points from people which were very relevant to their jobs but which had not been fully appreciated by the project team – we will do this survey again before we go live so we can check out any more comments, concerns and ideas.

What do you do to make change feel real and exciting and in your office – as ever let me know your thoughts.

MSP made easy?

Today I had to try and explain MSP to a group of senior managers who have no formal experience of Programme management - I say formal because anyone who has reached a senior position will have had experience of managing multiple initiatives and delivering strategic outcomes. Anyway, I was trying to explain how the structure of MSP can help make sure that any piece of work stays on track. By using the governance themes we have a ready made agenda for testing viability and progress. See below for my agenda for any decision point:

People:
• Organisation – ensure that the roles, responsibilities of the programme remain fit for purpose (too many people involved, overly bureaucratic application of responsibilities stifles action and progress)
• Leadership and stakeholder engagement – ensure identification of stakeholders and their level of influence and the amount the programme is impacting them is current
Outcome:
• Vision – ensure that vision remains aligned to strategic objectives of the organisation and that nuances in drivers for change are communicated to the programme manager
• Blueprint – ensure that further details are added as more is known and that there is challenge of the blueprint in line with changes to the vision/strategic direction of the organisation. Ensure that current and next tranche of the blueprint continue to ‘make sense’
Rationale:
• Business case – ensure that analysis is reworked on the basis of changes to resources, duration of activities, risks and activities elsewhere in the organisation
• Benefits realisation – ensure expected benefits are challenged against changes to strategic objectives, drivers for change and programme progress. Ensure that measurements of ‘As Is’ have been recorded as evidence base for success of programme
Mechanism:
• Planning – ensure alignment with other areas of the organisation including: Financial control, Resource planning and protocols for use of external resources
• Risk management and issue resolution – ensure that information from the programme is being escalated and communicated across the organisation and that impacts from other initiatives are being drawn into the programme (prevent programme becoming too internally focused)
• Quality management – ensure that quality processes are aligned with overall strategic direction

Change your location, change your motivation

As always I have too much work to do and not enough time to do it, and recently its got to a point where I go home after a really busy day, not having done anything on my To Do list – which is becoming such a size that its now a database rather than a list!
This week I hit a wall – too much doing X not enough thinking = no productive work!

So I took the advice of some of my learners on a recent Project Leadership course – remove yourself from your current environment, your location, the people you are with, the systems you are using. Change your physical perspective to change how you feel. By changing your perspective you break the negative cycle which in my case was being busy on all the wrong things because I could not see the wood for the trees.

Of course, being me I followed the advice to the max and booked myself into a hotel on Park Lane! But it definitely worked, a swim, some sleep, some room service and I got my motivation back and could take a more analytical approach to prioritising my work.

So what works for you – where do you go when you need to change your perspective? As ever, let me know, I love hearing from you.