1 00:00:03,990 --> 00:00:10,120 Now the next mistake to avoid is quite different to all of the others because it's not to do with the 2 00:00:10,120 --> 00:00:14,970 technical side of planning and numbers and calculating is to do with people. 3 00:00:15,220 --> 00:00:20,380 And I think there's a risk that project managers don't involve their team enough. 4 00:00:20,380 --> 00:00:24,730 They think well I'm the project manager I need to sit down and do this plan and I need to do it all 5 00:00:24,730 --> 00:00:26,150 myself. 6 00:00:26,380 --> 00:00:29,560 And that's a real shame because why not involve your team. 7 00:00:29,740 --> 00:00:34,820 Your team will be more motivated if they're involved but also the project will be run better. 8 00:00:34,840 --> 00:00:41,090 The plan will be better the carrying out of the project will be better if you involve the team. 9 00:00:41,110 --> 00:00:46,360 So I would involve the team in pretty much every one of my 12 steps and that's just have a quick look 10 00:00:46,360 --> 00:00:51,490 through the 12 steps and just see which ones you'd involve the team with. 11 00:00:51,490 --> 00:00:57,490 So step one was to define the project and I think even then you know you want to involve the team and 12 00:00:57,490 --> 00:01:02,200 say what do we think is going to be in scope and out of scope on this project what do we need to make 13 00:01:02,200 --> 00:01:04,870 sure is is part of it. 14 00:01:04,900 --> 00:01:08,320 So I would involve them even in step one probably. 15 00:01:08,350 --> 00:01:10,710 Now that might just be a meeting you have with the customer. 16 00:01:10,780 --> 00:01:15,970 You might evolve your team but definitely you need to talk to a few other people about what the project 17 00:01:16,090 --> 00:01:17,100 is. 18 00:01:17,140 --> 00:01:21,640 Then when you get to the planning clearly the listing of the tasks you want to involve the team and 19 00:01:21,640 --> 00:01:27,790 have a big brainstorm of everything they can think of and you probably know more about it than the team. 20 00:01:27,820 --> 00:01:32,350 But remember they will all have their own individual areas of obsession. 21 00:01:32,350 --> 00:01:35,830 So they're all going to come up with little extra things you haven't thought of. 22 00:01:35,920 --> 00:01:41,410 And even if between all of them they only come up with one more task than it was worth it because you've 23 00:01:41,410 --> 00:01:42,650 got a better plan. 24 00:01:42,700 --> 00:01:45,910 Plus you get buy in at an early stage. 25 00:01:45,970 --> 00:01:50,080 So if the team are right in there at the beginning of the planning they're going to feel some ownership 26 00:01:50,080 --> 00:01:51,940 of the project and that's great. 27 00:01:51,940 --> 00:01:55,070 So you've definitely got to have all of the team at step 2. 28 00:01:55,330 --> 00:01:59,560 Similarly estimating I would evolve the team and say how long do you think it's going to take. 29 00:01:59,560 --> 00:02:01,140 What do you think is in a cost. 30 00:02:01,570 --> 00:02:06,730 And one of the points about project management is that if you know this process you can plan and you 31 00:02:06,730 --> 00:02:10,810 can deliver any project if you've got a good team. 32 00:02:10,810 --> 00:02:17,290 So if I had to put a space rocket on Mars I could do it even though I know nothing because what I would 33 00:02:17,290 --> 00:02:23,080 do is I would have a team and I would say to the team what are the tasks involved and then I would say 34 00:02:23,260 --> 00:02:26,700 how long do you think these are going to take and how long are these going to cost. 35 00:02:26,770 --> 00:02:29,530 And then I would say so which order should we do them in. 36 00:02:29,560 --> 00:02:30,790 And I'm just a manager. 37 00:02:30,790 --> 00:02:33,230 I'm just facilitating the process on time. 38 00:02:33,250 --> 00:02:33,990 But that's great. 39 00:02:34,000 --> 00:02:38,470 I mean that's adding value if somebody does have to bring it all together and facilitate it. 40 00:02:38,680 --> 00:02:43,960 But if you involve the team on the estimating you're going to get much better estimates. 41 00:02:43,990 --> 00:02:48,100 There's also a thing called the wisdom of the crowds which says that if you want to estimate something 42 00:02:48,740 --> 00:02:53,740 the more people you are ask providing they obviously know what they're talking about. 43 00:02:53,740 --> 00:02:59,710 The more people you ask the more accurate your estimate will be because statistically half of them will 44 00:02:59,710 --> 00:03:02,290 overestimate and half will underestimate. 45 00:03:02,290 --> 00:03:07,890 So if you're doing that pub game where you have to guess how many pennies are in the jar. 46 00:03:08,020 --> 00:03:13,500 By all means have a guess yourself for what you should do is get 10 friends or even 50 friends to all 47 00:03:13,500 --> 00:03:14,050 guess. 48 00:03:14,200 --> 00:03:20,450 Just take the average of all of their estimates and you will win that prize. 49 00:03:20,470 --> 00:03:22,380 That's what the wisdom of the crowd says. 50 00:03:22,390 --> 00:03:24,280 Try it sometime you'll find it's true. 51 00:03:24,460 --> 00:03:28,230 So the more people involved in the estimating the better. 52 00:03:28,360 --> 00:03:32,190 Step Four was the network diagram with the post-its that I showed you just now. 53 00:03:32,410 --> 00:03:33,960 Again involve the team. 54 00:03:33,960 --> 00:03:39,640 They love it it's fun and you're going to end up with a better plan even if they've had no plan no training 55 00:03:39,640 --> 00:03:40,390 at all. 56 00:03:40,420 --> 00:03:46,090 They will understand what you're doing and then step five how do we speed up the plan if we're not happy 57 00:03:46,090 --> 00:03:46,880 with what we've got. 58 00:03:46,990 --> 00:03:52,450 Again the team will have suggestions of how we can speed it up and you really do need them to be involved 59 00:03:52,450 --> 00:03:58,390 and have some buy in with that stage because they're not going to like it if you single handedly unilaterally 60 00:03:58,600 --> 00:04:00,520 speed up their plan. 61 00:04:00,520 --> 00:04:02,710 So involve them with that. 62 00:04:02,710 --> 00:04:04,390 Then there's the drawing of the Gantt Chart. 63 00:04:04,390 --> 00:04:10,360 Step Six now I think this is probably the only stage which you might have to do on your own. 64 00:04:10,360 --> 00:04:13,790 You probably need to sit down and Excel and just type it into the Gantt Chart. 65 00:04:14,080 --> 00:04:20,140 You might delegate it but I don't think you could really involve the team in that once you've got the 66 00:04:20,140 --> 00:04:20,940 Gantt Chart. 67 00:04:21,010 --> 00:04:26,230 You then look at resources you might discuss that a bit with the team of who's going to do what and 68 00:04:26,440 --> 00:04:29,080 how flexible Would you be able to do this one for me. 69 00:04:29,110 --> 00:04:32,150 So I perhaps would evolve the team with the resources. 70 00:04:32,350 --> 00:04:34,030 The last bit of planning is risk. 71 00:04:34,030 --> 00:04:36,420 I definitely would involve the team on risk. 72 00:04:36,490 --> 00:04:41,800 So we would brainstorm everything that might go wrong and then we would discuss amongst ourselves how 73 00:04:41,800 --> 00:04:45,300 likely how serious how could we make those things less likely. 74 00:04:45,340 --> 00:04:46,910 How can we make them less serious. 75 00:04:46,910 --> 00:04:49,960 So definitely you want the team for Step eight. 76 00:04:50,050 --> 00:04:53,890 You also must have the team from Step Nine which is where you report the progress. 77 00:04:53,890 --> 00:04:59,290 So this would be probably a monthly meeting but it might be a weekly meeting and the team would all 78 00:04:59,290 --> 00:05:05,130 mate and we would all talk about how we're getting on of course what this does is a little bit of pressure 79 00:05:05,430 --> 00:05:09,690 on the people who are behind schedule because they have to come to the meeting and go on letting the 80 00:05:09,690 --> 00:05:11,980 side down because I haven't done my bit. 81 00:05:12,180 --> 00:05:16,710 So you must have the team for Step nine for the finance. 82 00:05:16,710 --> 00:05:18,420 You could just review the finance. 83 00:05:18,420 --> 00:05:24,360 But again if you do that same meeting it's good for the team to understand the finance and to see what's 84 00:05:24,360 --> 00:05:24,860 happening. 85 00:05:24,870 --> 00:05:29,150 And if if they are overspending they need to come and say well this is what I've done. 86 00:05:29,220 --> 00:05:33,450 And you might want to ask them about how they can save money on on the remainder of their tasks. 87 00:05:33,480 --> 00:05:36,930 Step 11 is rescheduling what are we going to do. 88 00:05:36,930 --> 00:05:37,770 We're running late. 89 00:05:37,770 --> 00:05:39,300 What can we do in the second half. 90 00:05:39,300 --> 00:05:41,430 I definitely will involve the team for that. 91 00:05:41,430 --> 00:05:44,460 The great news is you don't have to do it all yourself. 92 00:05:44,490 --> 00:05:49,830 And finally the review again I would absolutely involve the team for the review. 93 00:05:49,830 --> 00:05:51,030 We all go out for a meal. 94 00:05:51,030 --> 00:05:53,840 Personally I like a curry in an Indian restaurant. 95 00:05:53,940 --> 00:05:56,560 But you can always go Italian pizzas if you want. 96 00:05:56,730 --> 00:05:58,650 All made up have a meal. 97 00:05:58,650 --> 00:06:01,900 Celebrate the fact that you finished the project. 98 00:06:02,220 --> 00:06:07,680 I actually think that the project manager probably should pay for that mail as well if if they can but 99 00:06:07,800 --> 00:06:08,280 whatever. 100 00:06:08,340 --> 00:06:10,320 Go out celebrate the fact you're finished. 101 00:06:10,320 --> 00:06:12,290 Talk about what was good about the project. 102 00:06:12,310 --> 00:06:14,010 We're going to repeat next time. 103 00:06:14,010 --> 00:06:18,860 What was bad that we were going to avoid next time and what could we have done even better. 104 00:06:18,870 --> 00:06:24,990 And that review of course has to involve the team so you can see we need to involve the team all the 105 00:06:24,990 --> 00:06:25,610 way through. 106 00:06:25,710 --> 00:06:31,620 Just because you're the expert doesn't mean you have to sit on your own all lonely in an office trying 107 00:06:31,620 --> 00:06:34,220 to produce a plan that will not be as good. 108 00:06:34,230 --> 00:06:36,150 So involve your team.