Pressure often comes from the disparity between expectations and reality. We can limit this disparity by limiting the perceived ups and downs that come with most projects. Here are some tactics for managing pressure by smoothing out the ups and downs. See "Managing Pressure: Communications and Expectations," Point Lookout for December 13, 2006, and "Managing Pressure: The Unexpected," Point Lookout for December 20, 2006, for more.
- Space milestones evenly
- It's common practice to divide project timelines into uneven segments distinguished by milestones, with some milestones identified as "major." This practice can undermine perceptions of progress, because people prefer steady forward progress to an uneven stream of equal-sized steps forward. This is true even if the achievements vary greatly in significance.
- Spacing milestones unevenly creates progress perception problems. To manage perceptions, let go of the distinction between kinds of milestones. Have more milestones, and space them fairly evenly.
- Milestones near deliveries are critical
- Gaps between milestones just prior to a delivery are especially costly, because they engender anxiety about a lack of real evidence that the project is healthy. Anxiety increases if preparations are underway for receiving the delivery.
- Idle time creates fear. Choose milestones that provide news during parts of the schedule when people might be susceptible to fear.
- Deliver usable capability at regular intervals
- Even when a schedule has evenly spaced milestones, customers, sponsors, and management can become anxious when the project delivers usable capability at irregular intervals. Milestones that don't "matter" to the customer have little positive impact on perceptions of progress.
- The psychological reason for this may be related to airline passengers' aversion to itineraries that have legs in them that go the "wrong way" even when those itineraries are faster. Milestones that don't "matter" represent cost and schedule without real progress. Schedule regular milestones that have customer impact.
- Help the customer with the post-delivery environment
- Difficulties in incorporating Spacing milestones unevenly
creates progress perception
problems. Have more
milestones, and space
them fairly evenly.the deliverables into ongoing operations can affect the customer's perception of the quality of the deliverables. And anxiety about the coming chaos is often reflected in perceptions of progress. Even deliverables that are 100% compliant with requirements will take the blame for internal difficulties in incorporating them organizationally. - Do whatever you can to make incorporation easy. Automate any required conversions and prepare for transition training and help. These efforts are most effective if they're in the plan from the beginning, but add them later if necessary.
A little pressure does help, but most of us are under way more pressure than is helpful. And we can do something about that. Top Next Issue
Are your projects always (or almost always) late and over budget? Are your project teams plagued by turnover, burnout, and high defect rates? Turn your culture around. Read 52 Tips for Leaders of Project-Oriented Organizations, filled with tips and techniques for organizational leaders. Order Now!
Micromanagement is a common source of pressure. For insights on micromanagers and micromanaging, see "When Your Boss Is a Micromanager," Point Lookout for December 5, 2001; "There Are No Micromanagers," Point Lookout for January 7, 2004; "Are You Micromanaging Yourself?," Point Lookout for November 24, 2004; and "How to Tell If You Work for a Nanomanager," Point Lookout for March 7, 2007.
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Related articles
More articles on Workplace Politics:
- Organizational Loss: Searching Behavior
- When organizations suffer painful losses, their responses can sometimes be destructive, further harming
the organization and its people. Here are some typical patterns of destructive responses to organizational
loss.
- The Attributes of Political Opportunity: The Basics
- Opportunities come along even in tough times. But in tough times, it's especially important to distinguish
between true opportunities and high-risk adventures. Here are some of the attributes of desirable political
opportunities.
- Ground Level Sources of Scope Creep
- We usually think of scope creep as having been induced by managerial decisions. And most often, it probably
is. But most project team members — and others as well — can contribute to the problem.
- Staying in Abilene
- A "Trip to Abilene," identified by Jerry Harvey, is a group decision to undertake an effort
that no group members believe in. Extending the concept slightly, "Staying in Abilene" happens
when groups fail even to consider changing something that everyone would agree needs changing.
- The Illusion of Explanatory Depth
- The illusion of explanatory depth is the tendency of humans to believe they understand something better
than they actually do. Discovering the illusion when you're explaining something is worse than embarrassing.
It can be career ending.
See also Workplace Politics, Conflict Management and Managing Your Boss for more related articles.
Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout
- Coming April 3: Recapping Factioned Meetings
- A factioned meeting is one in which participants identify more closely with their factions, rather than with the meeting as a whole. Agreements reached in such meetings are at risk of instability as participants maneuver for advantage after the meeting. Available here and by RSS on April 3.
- And on April 10: Managing Dunning-Kruger Risk
- A cognitive bias called the Dunning-Kruger Effect can create risk for organizational missions that require expertise beyond the range of knowledge and experience of decision-makers. They might misjudge the organization's capacity to execute the mission successfully. They might even be unaware of the risk of so misjudging. Available here and by RSS on April 10.
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Beware any resource that speaks of "winning" at workplace politics or "defeating" it. You can benefit or not, but there is no score-keeping, and it isn't a game.
- Wikipedia has a nice article with a list of additional resources
- Some public libraries offer collections. Here's an example from Saskatoon.
- Check my own links collection
- LinkedIn's Office Politics discussion group