I work in a job where I steer small to medium sized projects. I’m more of a project coordinator than a true project manager.
Anyway, on projects I’m steering, I always have regular status update meetings with all project team members (either daily, three times a week, or once a week, depending on the nature of the project). Anyone who has steered projects understands the importance of these meetings. They are designed to be short, sharp and to the point, but are important to make sure everyone on the project understands where the project is up to, what everyone else is doing, how the status of current project work might impact other tasks etc etc. It also helps me as project coordinator keep track of all outstanding tasks.
It’s important in these meetings that team members give snappy, straight to the point updates, otherwise, the meetings run too long.
Anyways, it seems on every project I am steering, there is always one team member who is either incapable, or unwilling, of giving snappy, straight-to-the point updates on tasks I have delegated to them.
For example.
Let’s say I’ve delegated a task on a project, that requires someone to take delivery of a set of chairs, then immediately move the chairs in to a venue where they will be set up straight away, in accordance with an agreed seating plan. So, there’s a task on the project:
Accept delivery of the chairs, ensure chairs are setup inside the venue in accordance with the seating plan.
Now, most team members, when giving an update on this sort of task, would get straight to the point. Here’s a typical, perfect update:
After a minute of that, just break in with “I don’t need all that detail. Were the chairs delivered?” (answers yes/no) “Ok, and were they set up according to the seating plan?” (answers yes/no)
Am I wrong in thinking that that much detail usually proceeds the announcement that the chairs have not been set up; that that level of detail is ass covering?
Somewhere I read the suggestion to have meetings in which everyone remains standing, rather than sitting in a comfortable conference room chair. The idea is that people will be less likely to linger and bullshit.
My idea was that anyone who schedules a meeting between 11am-1pm should be required to provide lunch. That may not be practical, but perhaps you can schedule the meeting for just before lunch, so people are motivated to get it over with.
If you can identify the people who ramble in your meetings, perhaps just ask them Yes/No questions and move onto the next person. And do you even need meetings to gather the status of these tasks? Can’t you just ask via email or text message?
In IT there is a project management process called Scrum. Daily 15 minute standups are a central part of the process.
The “Scrum-Master” asks each person “what are you working on?”, and “is there anything holding you up?”
I was skeptical when my employer adopted this process but I’m definitely a convert.
It cuts through any tendency to spend days banging your head against a problem, and harnesses the knowledge of the whole team towards solving that problem.
If the problem is organizational rather than technical, it’s the master’s job after the meeting to do what is necessary to obtain the needed resources or cut through the red tape.
Some people just really, really, really like to talk and/or can’t distinguish bullet points from details. And even when they have been asked direct questions, they want to say things and will not stop saying things until they’re done. I don’t get it, it’s really frustrating, and screaming “shutupShutUpSHUTUPSHUTUP!” at them is considered “not professional.”
There’s one guy, though, at my meetings who “Columbos” them, which drives me even more nuts.
He’ll give a reasonably ok update (e.g., “The chairs arrived, we have set them up inside the venue in accordance with the seating requirements. This task is complete.”) when it’s his turn. But then, after everyone has given their update and the meeting is closing, he’ll pipe up with
[QUOTE= Peter F]
Just one more thing… the venue has been condemned and the city has rescinded all permits until January. We’ll have to find a new place to hold the event
[/QUOTE]
Really? Couldn’t have mentioned that during your update? Impossible to inform anyone when you first found out? And on God’s green earth, why did you set up the chairs?
Also, “what did you do since the last stand-up?”, so basically, what have you done, what are you planning to do, and is anything likely to get in your way of success. After a bit the team just gets in the habit of giving their update like this and the Scrum-Master can take a step back. (Cite: am PSM1… which along with a few bucks will get me a cup of coffee.)
Ditto. Was huge skeptic, and pain in the ass of first Scrum-Master I worked with, but ended up enthusiastic convert and evangelist.
