27 Feb 2010

New Project Manager: How to screw up in the first 60 days

by Josh

This was a lot of fun to write, and I hope you get a laugh.  I also hope you’ll leave a comment about project management “worst practices” you’ve had experience with.

So you’re a new project manager.  Or maybe you’ve been doing this for awhile but now you’ve come to a new team.

They are waiting for you after the last project manager was promoted, left the company, or jumped off a bridge.  [be concerned if it's the latter]

So you ask yourself one important question.

How can I really screw this up?

new project manager fail

new project manager fail by hans.gerwitz via Flickr

Of course, all new project managers want to charge in and make a mess of things.  But what’s the best way to go about it without taking forever?  How can you create chaos and bad will in the first 60 days?

Come to the rescue, cape waving in the wind

Especially when there is no real emergency, a great way to alienate your project team right off the bat is to take the “new sheriff in town” attitude right from day 1.  Put on your Magneto costume and go to town!

Overhaul all the processes and make massive changes right away.  Do it really quick, before you come to your senses.  Resist the temptation to gain buy-in from the team and gradually transition in a collaborative way.

They will all feel like you think they are complete idiots who never did anything right until you graced the project with your presence, AND you will be taking bold action without any real clue about what’s going on.

It’s a like a preemptive strike on trust before it has the possibility of forming in the first place.  Nice!

Only worry about the tools

Why do you want to talk to them anyway?  No, just lock yourself in the office and stare at MS Project until your eyes bleed.  Require scheduled time to speak to anyone and preferably only communicate through email so you can collect status and plug it into the tool.

Pretend that the artifacts are the real project, not what those people are doing out there.  Tell yourself projects are about tools, not about people.

Ignore your stakeholders

What?  No stakeholder analysis was done by the last project manager?

Great!

Now you can get on without understanding who you are doing the project for, what their needs are, how much influence they have, etc.

If you do find a stakeholder analysis, shred that thing immediately.  It makes things so complicated when you try to poke around and empathize with people who have an interest in your project.  Who cares anyway?

I could go on and on, but I want to hear from you.  When taking over a project, what’s the best way you’ve seen in the first 60 days to help make it fail?

pmStudent e-Learning
  • Brian
    Quite Dilbertesque.
  • Emmanuel
    Here are some additions I would never do, or did I, I forget it, haha :)

    - Create a great project schedule in planning with perfectly defined activities, resources, start/end times, etc and never consulted in the next phases, it doesn't provide value at this point
    - Do whatever possible to win a contract, even though your reputation and professional conduct is at stake, remebmer the most important is the "CUSTOMER"
    - Do not inform the customer of the necessary recent major changes to the product, it's only an internal change the team only needs to know of
    - Prepare perfect status presentations with terms such as EVM, SPI, CPI but do not explain, so executive management gets impressed of your excellent PM knowlegde and the other stakeholders do not understand those advanced aspects
    - Send out long, very long documents to everyone so they know you are really working
    - Use email to communicate and never go out to see how things are going on. The important is the reports you are getting and sending
    - Use all the templates, policies and procedures you find on the Internet and your company AS IS, and force every team member use them and fill them FULLY
    - Never consult other people who have came across similar project because they probably did bad and you do not want to do the same mistakes
    - You should always look or feel very pressed and never stop to listen actively people as you are a very busy person
    - Do not believe in young people because they could not provide value to the project


    This never happens in real life but what a great imagination we have of it. :)
  • Thanks Emmanuel, great stuff! My favorite was "Send out long, very long documents to everyone so they know you are really working"

    I think we all have experience with the difference between apparent and real productivity.
  • Aski
    Context in India
    1. Hire 70% of girls in a team to discuss about personal things and give all the work to 30% of guys.
    2. Ask the community/region/language of the individual team members and give less work to people who belongs to your community.
    3. Give appraisal and appreciation to the people whom you like (Mostly girls)
    4. Give negative feedback about the person who works more and delivers more to delivery management
    5. Assign work to guys and take girls to team lunch
  • Wow, that's totally foreign to me. It sounds like a total different planet with reverse-sexism going on.
  • Aski
    Yes...it is true in india
  • Prarthana
    This is really really entertaining, Most of the things I wanted to say are already said by many. Here are the few to share with.

    1. Pick on grammer, punctuation, capitalization of Nouns in your Technical designs rather than looking at your design approach solving the actual business problem
    2. Tell business I did it my way because I thought this is what you need
    3. Stress your team to Document..document..document but when it comes to talking about outcome of those documents, tell them you didnot had time to READ them
  • I laughed out loud about the last one...it hit too close to home! We had separate plans for scope mgmt, communications mgmt, risk mgmt, etc. on one large project and when I got there I asked, "do people actually read these?"

    Since then I've re-examined the need to always question the value being added by documentation. There is value in many cases for a certain amount of it, but there's a lot of unnecessary documentation too.
  • Brent Jones
    These are hilarious. And note that we all laugh at the things we take most seriously.

    The reason these are so funny is because we have done these or have seen them done.

    Awesome!
    Brent
  • Absolutely Brent. Nothing is more funny than the truth!
  • One more - and only because it happened to me - word for word - FIVE MINUTES AGO!

    * When someone has worked on a deliverable really hard, be sure to nitpick about all the little things you would have done differently. Then, sigh, and say, "Oh well, I guess those things aren't really important in the scheme of things, but, maybe you could remember them for next time anyway."

    I kid you not.
  • Oh cripes. He/she admitted it wasn't important at the same time criticizing about it? They should add some comments to this post, I bet they'd have some other good ones too.
  • Let's not forget the following really helpful tips:

    * Be sure to manage your work breakdown structure at the lowest level possible - that way, the team can spend 90% of their time reporting on activities rather than doing them. THAT will prevent them from screwing things up.
    * Be sure that each task has at least 3 people responsible for it, and entirely different person accoutable for it - that way the blame game can be an "all team sport."
    * When senior management sends someone in to "help" you, be sure to focus everyone's attention on creating pretty powerpoints, so people will know how well you are doing. Also a good activity for keeping people from screwing up any actual project work.
    * Make sure you say, "that's great, BUT" or "That would be a good idea EXCEPT/IF" or "If you had read this document (throw in a "you idiot" for emphasis occasionally), you would know that..." at least 3-4 times a day to really get people's confidence up.
    * If the team actually delivers something, be sure to conduct a "Post Mortem" immediately after, so you can drive home the point that the project is dead on arrival anyway, and all the things everyone did wrong along the way....

    So sad that so many of these tips come from real life experience on projects I have assessed or been brought in to coach...
  • My 3-year old looked quizzically at me when I started laughing out loud about the "all team sport"!
  • Bruce B
    1a) Require all project members to keep IM windows open for immediate communication at all times for even trivial matters. After all, they don't need to concentrate on their own work.

    1b) If you send an IM or an email to someone and they haven't responded in five minutes, go by their desk and ask them to respond.

    1c) Send emails at midnight and ask staff as they walk in the door at 7am why they haven't answered.

    1d) Log in to IM at midnight to see who's on, then start a meeting the next morning by half-jokingly pestering those who weren't.

    (I saw all of those at one company... which later folded.)

    2) Miss meetings you've set up, because frankly, your time is valuable.

    3) Hold up individual failures for public notice so everyone can see how dumb that guy is.

    4) Encourage personal attacks in meetings to keep things interesting and to keep everyone on the defensive.

    5) Lose your temper publicly when people bring you bad news, so they'll know better in the future.
  • I love it Bruce! The IM stuff was great, and I laughed out loud at 2) - I've seen this WAYYY too often. That works best when there's no agenda too...then everyone can stare at each other and ask "why are we here?"

    "Oh, I don't know. But while we're here, let's talk about..."

    AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
  • Hi Josh,

    Inspired by this post and comments, maybe I will need to extend my list 100 Ways to know your project is FUBAR http://bit.ly/dx4x4i or even have a new one :)
  • Josh - Excellent post. The additional items added by the guys were great too. I've got a few of my own to add...

    1/ Spend a LOT of time in meetings. If for some reason you don't have one organised when someone comes to talk to you, quickly grab your diary, pen and paper while rushing out of the office saying 'Have to go to a meeting!'
    2/ Nag. Nag a lot. Nagging is not just the domain of female PM's.
    3/ When in a meeting whether on the phone or in person make a lot of very big sighs while shaking your head. Be certain not to add anything constructive to the discussion when asked what the issue is.
    4/ Probably most important for winning friends and influencing people - Don't lead by example. Follow the do as I say rule not the do as I do one.

    I defy anyone to refer to us as cynics!! (grin)

    Deanne
    http://twitter.com/UnlikeBefore
    http://www.unlikebefore.com
  • Josh,
    I loved this post. Geoff and Samad had me laughing out loud.

    My additions are all about communications:

    [1] Make sure you respond with "reply all" for every email communication. People want to know what is going on.
    [2] Make sure you interrupt everyone when they are responding to your questions. We all know you already know the answers and were just initially being polite.
    [3] When providing feedback, hold your thumb and index finger to your forehead and say "looooo zeeeeer"
    [4] When you've heard enough from the customer just put the tips of your index finger and thumb together and point to them. Say "Shhhh! Shhhhh!" a few times. (Make sure you're doing it with a Dr. Evil voice)

    Thanks for the great read!

    Derek
    http://twitter.com/derekhuether
    http://www.huecubed.com
  • Nice Derek! Do I get those conference room chairs where I push the button and people get thrown into a fire den?

    "hello? I'm very, very badly burned."
  • You don't have one of those conference room chairs yet? It's new from Herman Miller. They're only....wait for it.....1 Million dollars!

    Too much? Don't worry. It's for a cost plus government contract.
  • Awsome Derek!!!

    Loved "... say 'looooo zeeeeer'".
  • Dan
    It's good to see devices like satirical humour injected into project management in a way that gets people thinking not just about how to do it, but understanding HOW THEY SHOULD NEVER DO IT!
  • What is this humor you speak of? ?
  • Dan
    Maybe 'refreshing' makes for a better description than humor. That said, satire is just a great tool for humor, and this post had a feel of Dilbert to it that wasn't nearly as dry or forced. I found myself nodding, saying "Well put." I could picture it being a part of a rant on The Daily Show where the audience eventually claps in agreement and understanding of the construction and point being made. I could see you were, indeed, enjoying what you wrote.

    You don't see satire used effectively in the project management blogosphere that often; reading it was, as I mentioned, refreshing and enlightening. And your hope in your disclaimer came true: I got a laugh out of it!

    "They will all feel like you think they are complete idiots who never did anything right until you graced the project with your presence, AND you will be taking bold action without any real clue about what’s going on."

    Left me cracking up.
  • Thanks Dan. These comments are awesome! I'm getting a laugh out of them. Unfortunately, most of the time things are funny because they are pretty close to the truth!
  • Josh -- Fun reading filled with many truths.
  • Thanks John!
  • Chris
    Great little article. I start a new PM role tomorrow, perfect timing for me.
  • Awesome Chris, good luck to you!

    I absolutely encourage you to pose that 60 day rule on yourself so that you gain an awareness of what's going on and why, and build trust with the team before making lots of effort to change things.

    One thing I do recommend right away: weekly half-hour on-on-ones with your team, structured so they have time to tell you about their work and concerns they might have, and time for you to give direction and feedback, acknowledge their achievements over the last week, etc.
  • Chris
    Thanks for the comments Josh. I will let you know how I get on.
  • Great topic Josh!!

    Here are my top 3 recommendations:

    (1) Every opportunity you get, try to show your team members how smart you are. They will really respect you for that.

    (2) And start escalting to upper management anytime someone disagrees with you. That will really scare them. Especially if you take every opportunity to kiss up to upper management if front of your team.

    (3) And don't forget to throw a fit whenever someone brings you any kind of bad news. That will really make them think twice before they come to you for help. This way you will plenty of time to update your schedule, status reports, and Powerpoint presentations.

    There is more but I'll stop here.
  • I love it! Thanks Samad!
  • HAHA Josh that was fabulous! :-) I think I'd like to offer, if I may:

    * Ask for lots of advice, and then do the exact opposite of what people suggest.
    * Don't include any review or rework cycles in your project plans because "what could they possibly want to change, anyway?"
    * Scream "scope creep" really really loudly whenever a stakeholder opens his or her mouth.
    * Send out documents required for review 30 seconds before a review meeting starts and then say "did you get the documents? Well I sent them." when everybody's sitting down.
    * Hold brainstorming sessions meant to generate new ideas but control the pen and don't write down any ideas you disagree with.

    OMG I could keep going but I better stop now. LOL Thanks so much for a fun read! :-)
  • Thanks Geoff, those are awesome additional paths to failure!!
blog comments powered by Disqus
http://pmstudent.com/wp-content/themes/selecta