How to Help Your Project Management Team Succeed

We often hear from Project Managers that the odds were stacked against them from the start. If they inherit a messy project with a fractious client, the chances are higher that they’ll struggle to correct past mismanagement. Here’s how your organization can support the success of your PMs and ensure that they succeed in their role.

Create the Best Environment for Success

Running a project is never easy, but how your organization supports your management team is crucial to its success. To create this environment, make sure the metrics and goals for your team are clearly established. Helping your PM understand where they fit in the organization, your priorities, and business plan will help them guide the project toward meeting your ultimate goals. If your Project Managers understand that their role is serious and how it fits into your overall business strategy, they will stay more engaged and potentially be more successful.

Organizations seeking to support their Project Managers should also emphasize a culture of continuous improvement. Encourage your PMs to spot gaps in service delivery while seeking improvements to streamline management methodology.

Also, take a look at your estimating process. Are you providing each PM with enough information so that the estimate for service matches what you can deliver? Do you link estimation with risk? Is the Project Manager involved in this process or just the sales rep? Encourage your team to create estimates based on a range to improve the chances of avoiding a cost overrun. Try running estimates past the Project Managers before they’re complete to ensure they aren’t handed a project that is impossible in scope. It is in this way that you can set them up to succeed before the project is dumped in their laps.

It’s difficult to balance risk when the potential for a deal is on the table. We task our sales teams with closing deals and sometimes the odds are very high that they won’t pull it off. This creates enormous pressure to close the deal whether it fits into the organizational vision and values or not. However, if your goal is to improve the life of the Project Manager that has to take over once the contract is signed, having a crucial conversation with your sales team about:

  • How does this project fit our core service delivery portfolio?
  • How will this project impact the organization?
  • Do we have the capacity to handle this project?

These questions will help the organization support the success of the Project Manager – and the success of the client relationship.

Finding the Right Project Manager

Supporting your PM team starts with finding the right talent to join them in their efforts to help your organization succeed. But, like a lot of IT professionals, the seasoned Project Manager is like a needle in a haystack today. It takes real effort to find the right PM to augment your team; that’s exactly why organizations like yours turn to Blackstone. We are IT industry professionals ready to help you succeed. Call us to find out more.

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