The Human Factor in Project Management

Denise Thompson

• Publisher: Auerbach Publications
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781138064195
• eBook ISBN: 9781351658980
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Negocios y empresa
• Subtopic: Gestión de proyectos

In the fluid world of changing business environments and variables affecting projects, a style of project management that primarily relies on maintaining the Iron Triangle, that tenuous mix of schedule, scope, and budgets, is no longer the sole path to success. Today's project management demands a focus on leadership of the kind that anticipates and embraces change, challenges the status quo, and inspires teams. Developing these skills requires a mastery of emotional intelligence, courage, critical thinking, and a desire to become a true leader dedicated to developing success. Whether you are participating in a project for the first time or you've been doing projects for decades, you know the very essence of a project is to return value that gains a competitive edge and propels the organization forward into new frontiers. Whether you believe the best results are earned through agile, waterfall, or a mix of methodologies, project leadership is the secret weapon that will maintain and grow professional relevance, knowledge, and value in today's workforce.

Through a series of notable lessons in human history and behavior, The Human Factor in Project Management takes you on a journey of self-discovery to define your capabilities and gaps, while building your leadership skills.

In your role as a project manager, project sponsor, product owner, or champion, the book challenges you to question the choices you make in a series of stories where you are the main character. This guide to career and personal growth forces you to look beyond the limitations of a Gantt chart, spreadsheet, or a Kanban board to evaluate the value from every tool you use and every action you take.

Chapter 1
Are You a Stick in the Mud, a Cog in the Wheel, or Skids on Rails?

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

— Chinese proverb

© Jim Kangas

There are many factors to consider in the world of project management. One of the most important is the one that is often most overlooked. Why? Because to examine this factor and create a formula for your success as a leader and a project manager requires the hard work of embarking on a learning journey that demands self-reflection, specific leadership behaviors, and skills in the ability to embrace change and adapt quickly. Like anything in life, if you want to earn genuine success and the respect of those around you, you are going to have to work hard. This book is not the answer to your success. It is simply the key to learning how you can earn it. As you read, you will note that project manager and leader are treated as synonymous terms. It is as if a project manager is a specific type of leader, like chocolate is a specific type of ice cream.

As we embark together on this journey, think of yourself as a leader of people and not someone whose success is predicated on a pretty Microsoft PowerPoint^® or impressive Gantt chart. Those are the tools of the trade. Tools, no matter how effective, eventually change, become obsolete, or useless. It is the human factor in project management that drives success and earns results, not the tools. It is, in fact, you! Considering that companies routinely dedicate 40 percent or more of resources to project and information technology (IT)–based initiatives and are wasting an average of $97 million USD for every $1 billion USD invested in projects (Project Management Institute [PMI], 2017b), you may be the most powerful asset within the organization to produce three key deliverables: earning value, building teams, and project performance. Do you think you can accomplish all three of these deliverables? Let us find out.

1.1 What Really Controls a Project

Since the time of the pyramids, project management has based its value on the ability to complete project deliverables on time, on budget, and within scope. The relationship among these three factors is called the Triple Constraint or the Iron Triangle. The skill of the project manager in wrangling the infamous Iron Triangle, which represents project resources, schedule, and scope, has focused primarily on the prescribed use of an array of tools, processes, and procedures. In the past, the concept was the belief that a seasoned project management professional had the mastery of tools which inevitability control unyielding schedules, manage escalating budgets and uncertain resources, while holding a firm grip on project scope. In fact, as new project managers become seasoned, they learn that the tools and processes which provide aid to understand, mitigate, and reduce risk to the factors representing the Iron Triangle do not control anything. Why? People and behaviors control events and outcomes, not tools and process. Let’s look at an example.

Think of people in your life who are notorious for taking their time to get somewhere. They are not terribly concerned about arriving at any event on time or even early. You, on the other hand, are hell-bent on always arriving early. Imagine you and a friend are driving together to an event today. You arrive early to pick up your friend Sue. Sue is well known for being late. You wait in the car, texting Sue of your arrival. You are anxious, trying to figure out a way to prod Sue to hurry. After five minutes, you become increasingly concerned that you both will arrive late to the event. You decide to walk up to the door to urge Sue out of the house and hurry to the car so you both can leave for the event on time. Instead, Sue invites you into her house. After another five minutes, you state your concerns and suggest you may want to drive separately. Sue responds, “I’ll only be a couple of minutes, hang on.” In the end, you both arrive together late to the event. You are frustrated and Sue senses this, which sets a negative tone between you for the rest of the evening. Reflect for a moment on how successful you were in preventing the very outcome that you did not want. How did you change Sue’s behavior? What can you do to improve the outcome next time, so you both have a better experience and arrive on time?

The bottom line is that you can do nothing on your own to improve or change a future outcome that is reliant on the behavior and actions of other people. It is your ability to model the way and inspire a change in the other party’s behavior that will inspire change in the future. It is Sue’s willingness to change and be receptive to adopt new behaviors that will allow you both to arrive on time in the future. By now you are probably asking, “What does this have to do with project management?” Let me tell you. Everything.

Today, project managers and stakeholders alike are wising up to the fact that the Iron Triangle is an ocean of ever-changing variables that yield very few predicable outcomes. In business environments, which endure buyouts, take-overs, mergers, acquisitions, and more change than we can track, all occurring at the speed of light, the adage that we can only control our own actions and reactions has new meaning and importance.

1.2 What Affects the Outcomes

It is more important than ever to understand that the success of project managers depends on their ability to wield influence and guide outcomes toward a result that stakeholders value. What does that really mean? It means that when you get down to how stakeholders define your success as a project manager, your behavior, the perception of that behavior, and your intent is how you are measured as a professional.

1.3 It’s About Relationships

To understand more about how the ability to exhibit successfully the behaviors that develop solid trust and relationships with stakeholders drives positive outcomes, think about Sam. Sam is a project manager who is responsible for a project that is now experiencing a slipped schedule, a blown budget, a dysfunctional team, and deteriorating confidence. Through it all, Sam remains in good standing with the project sponsor and steering committee. In this turbulent environment Sam is known as the calm through the storm by everyone around him. He refrains from placing blame, he is quick to own his mistakes, he openly seeks input, and he respects his team and colleagues. Sam is eager to support the team and is proactive in removing barriers to make the team’s work efficient. He is reluctant to take center stage or give credit to himself. For Sam, it is all about the team. Sam is careful to exhibit his character through consistent, reliable actions and is known for keeping his word. Many might define Sam’s behavior as playing politics or applying political savvy. Yet, if you ask people who work with Sam, they simply say he can be trusted to get the job done in a way that promotes solid relationships that remain long after the project is closed. Sam has earned his good standing by working to create meaningful, genuine relationships built on trust. Because of these solid relationships, the trust between Sam, the sponsor, the team, and the steering committee remains stable through turbulent times. The foundation of trust allows the group to be supportive and provide what Sam and the team needs to turn things around and get the project back on track to deliver measurable value. In the end, Sam and the team remain cohesive, and they continue to be supported by the steering committee and sponsor even though they deliver two years late and are $1 million USD over budget. Despite missing the original budget and schedule targets, the project is defined as a tremendous success by the organization. How could this be? Certainly, the delay and increase in budget reduced whatever return on investment (ROI) was estimated for the project. There may also be opportunity costs, realized risk, issues, and other consequences that impact the organization financially because of the project budget and schedule overruns. To make the scenario even more confusing, the outcome is not always this pleasant for project managers who find themselves struggling with a dysfunctional team, budget overages, and slipped schedules. So why, given the same project failure, would the outcome be different for one project manager over another?

1.4 Human Behavior—The Real Driver of Projects

To answer this question, let us examine the definition of a project as defined by the Project Management Institute (PMI) in A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK ^® Guide), Sixth Edition, as “a temporary endeavor to create a unique product, service, or result” (PMI, 2017a). By that very definition, project manage ment is a journey into the unknown. As project management professionals, we are leading the organization to complete an effort that has not been achieved before exactly as the project scope outlines it for that particular effort. Just like walking alone down a dark alley in an unfamiliar city, going on a project journey can ignite in us some of the same primal fears that the cave men experienced when exploring a dark unfamiliar cave. Science does not have a clear definition of what spawns these fears, because what triggers the sensation of fear is different for everyone based on the individual’s past experiences and perceptions of the past, present, and future. To understand this fact is important, because fear is the undercurrent that drives your choices and behaviors as well as the choices and behaviors of everyone around you.

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, developed in 1943, established five psychological needs that spark a series of reactions in humans when they are threatened. The base of these needs, described as a pyramid, is categorized as our basic needs. These are the need to feed, clothe, and shelter ourselves and our families, and the need to feel safe and secure (McLeod, 2017). Described in this way, for many of us, these basic needs can quite literally be connected to the need to keep our job. Reactions to these basic needs are described by Maslow as some of the strongest in the human species, born from our primal instinct to survive. Does thinking about this put a new light on boardroom antics for you? If it doesn’t, maybe it should.

What is really playing out in the boardroom when things get tough? Chances are, we are witnessing a reaction to fear. We might be reacting to the fear that one of our needs will not be met and the fear that our self-preservation in the form of our job is in jeopardy. When you reflect on behavior in the boardroom, or in any meeting at work where the stakes are high, how often do you see what could be categorized as a fight-or-flight behavioral response by those involved in the meeting? Establishing blame, preparing political defenses, framing messages and facts to create a desired perception of the information, or shutting down, denial, and the elusive “I do not recall”, “I don’t understand”, or “Let me get back to you on that” response can signal a flight from a tough situation at hand. Behind the scenes, establishing an offense, gathering allies, making quid-pro-quo deals, are all actions we might take to prepare for the fight to come and assure our self-preservation, self-actualization, and self-promotion. These are strategic moves, even politically savvy moves, that we carefully orchestrate to increase the opportunity to build our success and that of our organization and to reduce the risk of failure as we perceive it in the situa tion. Also, our own perception is not the only factor at play. The perceptions, actions, and reactions of others can have an effect on the outcome of any situation. If you ignore this reality, you are ignoring the real story that is unfolding. This is the story that will be judged. This is the story that will define how you are perceived in your organization.

1.5 The Power of Group Dynamics

Group dynamics is defined as several individuals who come together to accomplish a task or goal and refers to the attitudinal and behavioral characteristics of a group. Group dynamics focuses on how groups form, their structure and process, and how they function. In addition, group dynamics can increase stress and anxiety in individuals, spreading negative emotions throughout the group, whose members often translate these negative emotions into negative and harmful behavior. This bad behavior essentially amplifies the effect of actions and reactions in stressful situations, creating a concoction of human emotions and reactions that can be volatile and impossible to navigate and predict. To understand better the impact of group dynamics when people are affected by negative stress, anger, and fear, let’s examine a few events in recent history. These events left indelible marks on our entire nation in the 1990s.

On April 29, 1992, a court in California handed down a “not guilty” verdict in the case of four white police officers who were accused of severely beating an African American man named Rodney King in Los Angeles the previous year (History.com Staff, 2009). Almost immediately, Los Angeles fell under siege from its own citizens. What started as a small protest soon became an angry mob. Five days later, property damages inflicted by the mob were estimated at $1 billion USD. Fifty people had been killed, more than 2000 injured, and 12,000 people had been arrested, resulting in what some say was the worst incident of mob violence in U.S. history (CNN Library, 2013). Afterwards, some of those involved in the violence stated they felt they were victims of “mob mentality.” Mob mentality is described by Flow Psychology as a state when human actions and reactions are influenced by the peers around them. It leads to others adopting behaviors from the group that they might not normally exhibit. The influence can be profound (Flow Psychology, 2014).

Throughout history, there have been many examples of human behavior under stress. The result is not always negative. Think of the attacks on U.S. soil on September 11, 2001. Americans are very familiar with the outpouring of accounts of people who reacted with courage and valor to the events that occurred on 9/11 to defend and protect the lives of others. The account of Flight 93 is one example.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, United Airlines Flight 93 departed from Newark, New Jersey, heading to San Diego, California. The plane carried 7 crew members, 33 passengers, and 4 hijackers. Forty minutes into the flight, the hijackers made their move to take control of the plane. The passengers gathered in the back of the plane, where they voted to plan and execute a counterattack against the terrorists. At approximately 10:03 a.m., the plane was crashed by the terrorists just east of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in an effort, it is believed, to prevent the passengers from regaining control of the plane. The courageous actions of the passengers foiled the terrorists’ plan to crash the plane into the White House or the Capitol Building in Washington, DC, which was believed to be the ultimate target. If the plan had succeeded, countless more lives would have been lost, significantly increasing the devastation of the 9/11 attacks (National Park Service, 2017).

The historical account of Flight 93 demonstrates how a group of strangers experiencing a direct threat to their lives and the safety of others joined together to overcome their own irrational, emotionally reactive responses to act cohesively, collaborating to overthrow the hijackers, at the ultimate cost of their own lives. The story of Flight 93 is an account of an act of heroism that literally saved hundreds of lives.

1.6 Fear Is the Greatest Cost of Project Failure

Are you wondering how these examples relate to human behavior on projects or in the boardroom? Maybe you are thinking these historical lessons are too extreme to apply to project management? In this chapter, I will present some historical facts that might just change your mind. The point we need to remember is that group dynamics can negatively affect outcomes whether we are on a plane that has been hijacked or we are dealing with a million-dollar project budget that is in jeopardy of serious cost overruns. To demonstrate these dynamics on projects, let us look at a few more examples from history.

The Panama Canal, known from its inception as an engineering feat of the time, started its project journey with an initial investment of $120 million USD. In 1880, this was a substantial sum of money. To compound investor fears, the building of the canal was expected to be one of the most risky, expensive, and high-tech projects of its day (Global Security, 2011). From the project kickoff, anxiety over costs, labor unreliability, injury and death, difficult terrain, and other known and unknown risks was exacerbated by the behavior of the humans involved. At first glance at this story in history, the causes of project failure seem clear and out of the project manager’s control, so maybe we should look a little closer.

Ferdinand de Lesseps was still reaping the benefits he had earned from his success as developer of the Suez Canal, and glowed with a confidence that some would say later was arrogance. In 1879, Ferdinand proposed building a canal across the Isthmus of Panama. Based on the financial success of th...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Chapter 1: Are You a Stick in the Mud, a Cog in the Wheel, or Skids on Rails?
• Chapter 2: The Firing Squad, Suicide, and Other Hazards of the Profession
• Chapter 3: Creating the Freedom to Fly High
• Chapter 4: Waterfall, Agile, or Timbuktu—Who Cares?
• Chapter 5: The Magician and the Disappearing Magic Wand
• Chapter 6: Teleporting into the Future
• Chapter 7: The Chameleon
• Chapter 8: The Thrill of the Ride
• Chapter 9: Teachers or Leaders—What’s the Difference?
• Chapter 10: What Will You Choose?
• References
• Index