Project Manager’s Wishlist for 2013

After completing year-end activities like project status reports, project budgeting, approvals, etc. we said good bye to year 2012. Let me wish you a very happy new year, and as we are entering in year 2013, let me take this opportunity to peek into the future and make a wish list for me as a project manager.

1.   Building the right team

All things said and done, you will need helping hands to deliver project. Every project manager wishes to have the best team. But question I would ask is – What is the best team? I wish for project team members who can understand functional as well as business aspects, work with commitment, have sense of urgency when appropriate and deliver desired quality output, on time and within budget.

2.   Earning respect of your team

Building the right team as mentioned above is ideal situation, isn’t it? In real life, you will have team members of different capabilities, interests, aspirations, etc. Research mentions diverse background of project team members helps in many cases. However, as a project manager you are responsible to build a cohesive team, the team that delivers above expectations. If I wish for such a team, I must garner their respect.

To garner team members’ respect, first – I need to respect them, empower them, entrust them. When they will see, I am standing with a strong support for them, I will earn their respect. In most probabilities, team that highly respects project manager goes extra miles to meet project manager’s expectations, or save him/her from the situation.

3.   Setting clear project objectives for everyone

Right from the beginning, I would like to set clear objectives of the project. If it is a project sponsor, we will have mutual clear understanding what to expect from project. If it is internal management, I will set clear output and bottom-line of the project. As far as team members are concerned, I wish to clearly communicate what you are expecting from individual/group.

4.    Communicating clearly and judiciously

I wish for clear communication in my project. There is a dire need of clarity of communication – medium, channel, frequency of communication in projects I wish to manage. To communicate with customers, senior management, team members and partners I will use judicious communication strategy, to keep them informed, set expectations, avoid any ambiguity. This communication does not mean more number of status reports or status meetings, but it is about useful dialogue. I will have clear escalation matrix, distinct channel to address concerns, issues.

5.   Gaining a solid higher-management support

In my experience, I have seen if a given project has strong leadership support, it becomes easier to manage various stakeholders. In such cases, your project will easily surpass initial hurdles. Moreover even during crisis like situations, senior management can extend guidance, judicious interference and support which can really save you, your team and the project. I would really wish that my senior management is convinced about projects I am managing.

6.  Using project management and collaboration software

Gone are the days, when I used to create project schedule separately and used to share it offline with team members. Today it is different. It is about working together; keeping everyone informed i.e. collaboration and keeping project data organized. With excellent online project collaboration software available, I will insist and advocate in my team about using project management and collaboration software. There is undeniable improvement in productivity using collaboration software which can also give better clarity of project health to relevant stakeholders. So finally, I wish to organize my projects & team work with a project management and collaboration software in year 2013.

What’s your wish list for 2013?

Additional readings about project management, leadership

• Case Study: What Happens When Project Team Has Dual Reporting
• Avoid These 10 Most Common Mistakes That Leads to Project Failure
• Back2Basics: Ultimate Project Management Guide: Project Planning
• 8 Reasons to Decide Whether Your Organization Needs Project Management Office
• How To Select The Right Project Management Software

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