Alexandra Levit's Water Cooler Wisdom

How to Work Effectively on Project-Based Teams

Not long ago, employees would have ample time to build relationships with their colleagues while working together in the same office. But as organizations transition to more project-based work, workers need to understand the steps they need to take to foster trust and cooperation immediately.

That's where business owners and managers come in. Whether you have a full-time employee or gig worker working on a series of projects, you'll need to carefully consider the unique communication, inclusion, management and culture issues that arise with remote project work.

Communication

Even before the pandemic, the majority of project-based teams worked virtually. Organizations assembled teams from across locations and skill sets to solve specific business problems. Your team members most likely will be required to work closely with people they’ve never met before, and may in fact never encounter in person at all.

So much meaning is translated via body language, so working with someone entirely online adds a layer of communication complexity. When you don’t know someone, it's difficult to infer their tone, their motives or even whether or not they’re joking. Someone might perceive positive messages in email or instant message as neutral, and neutral ones as negative.

In the history of work, some of the most meaningful and rewarding one-to-one interactions have happened over chance meetings in the hallway or elevator. Many project-based teams don’t have such opportunities, so encourage team members to be direct and deliberate in communicating respect, collaboration and concern.

Inclusion

When most people worked in person for long time periods, the workplace could resemble high school. Some bosses would give the best assignments to their favorites, and it wasn’t unusual for some employees to feel left out when a clique of coworkers headed out to lunch together.

In other words, there were many ways to feel excluded and marginalized.

Virtual project-based teaming is a great equalizer. It provides flexibility for people, regardless of their situations. While webcams do offer a personal view into team members’ lives, people can purposely create the desired impression with dress, virtual backgrounds and decor—or simply choose to turn their camera off.

Project-based team members can still, however, be victims of microaggressions—statements, actions or incidents regarded as indirect, subtle or unintentional discrimination against members of a marginalized community.

New teams don't often have a reservoir of trust or comfort established at the beginning. Managers and leaders should be sensitive and mindful that microaggressions can occur and ensure that during online dialogue, all member's contributions are appropriately valued.

Make inclusion a value that's established through your hiring and onboarding process, and have systems in place that properly address any issue that does arise in a way that respects and affirms the harmed party.

Management

Many project-based teams are self-managed, meaning they have no formally assigned leader. About a decade ago, economist Elinor Ostrom received the Nobel Prize for her studies of self-governed communities in Africa and Asia.

Ostrom found that many human societies establish agreements among themselves for sharing and maximizing resources without the “help” of higher-order authorities. In other words, self-managed teams work. The best ones have several parameters:

• well-defined operational boundaries,
• access to resources to achieve their goals,
• a system for monitoring member behavior and performance,
• an internal process for dispute resolution and
• sanctions for rule-breakers.

According to SAP Success Factors (which refers to project-based, self-managed teams as "dynamic teams"), these groups are defined by the following:

• workflow that changes rapidly as new ideas are introduced and implemented,
• membership that is cross-functional and frequently in flux and
• the encouragement of failure in pursuit of innovation.

For the rest of the article, head over to the AMEX Business site.

 

Agility Strategies to Keep You Sane

In today’s rapidly changing business world, an agile business is a successful business. But how do you know when the best thing for the project  is to change the plan, and how can you execute and communicate changes without destroying team motivation and momentum? The following strategies may prove helpful.

Any major strategic initiative should involve the upfront establishment of goals, milestones, and success metrics. But, as Tim Berry pointed out in his article for the Small Business Administration website, assumptions should also be considered in your initial planning. “Tracking your results, you want to be able to compare them to what you had planned or expected to see,” he said.

“Get your team members together once a month to review your plan and its results. “Take a hard look at your underlying assumptions and assess whether or not they’ve changed. If they have, there’s no virtue whatsoever in sticking to the plan you built on top of them.”

Berry suggested you look at the difference between what you planned and what actually happened. Some results will be better than planned, and some will be worse. “For each key difference you discover, and all of them combined, use your best judgment to determine whether the differences were caused by false expectations or unexpected good or bad execution.”

“Also, consider external and internal factors that may have influenced the results. Maybe your expectations were too conservative, or too optimistic. In that case, you revise your plan,” he said.

Common sense, remarked Berry, is critical.  Although the project may be close to your heart, you want to remain pragmatic: for example, asking yourself if you were you wrong about the whole thing, or just about the timing? You also want to consider if something else has occurred in the market to change your assumptions.

For more where this came from, check out the full piece on HR.com.

 

 

 

The Future of Agile Business

Considering the pace of change in today's world, agile business—the process of making quick decisions based on the information you have and the willingness to adopt new strategies as you go along—has gone from being a competitive advantage to a necessity for many organizations. 

I was curious about how modern business owners view the future of agile business, so I talked with Adelaida Diaz-Roa, co-founder of social travel network Nomo FOMO and Aaron Michel, partner at venture capital firm 1984 Ventures.

Both Diaz-Roa and Michel support agile business in their own enterprises. Diaz-Roa defines it as “having a work culture built around trust, speed, flexibility and transparency. It's about empowering everyone on the team to take risks to achieve the company's mission, knowing that their manager will support them if they fail." 

“Agile business enables a company to be more nimble, eliminate waste and reduce lead times," Michel adds.

Where Is Agile Business Headed?

Agile business got its start in the tech playgrounds of Silicon Valley, but it's becoming increasingly common in large corporations around the world. 

 

“Agile organizations are becoming flatter, trusting employees to act as business owners," says Diaz-Roa. “People operations are more important, leading to an increased focus on individual accomplishments."

For more thoughts of the future of agile business, visit the AMEX OpenForum.

How to Create an Agile Process

Many organizations pride themselves on having predictable policies and procedures that drive performance and growth. However, given the rate of change in today's business world, sometimes being inflexible can be a problem rather than a solution. Having an agile process can help.

Agile processes are plans that involve advance planning and organization but also allow you to quickly change course if needed. To learn how business owners create agile processes in the real world, I consulted Mary Ellen Slayter, CEO of Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based B2B content marketing agency Rep Cap and Matt Weinberg, president of interactive digital agency Vector Media Group in New York City.

Why Use An Agile Process?

An agile process can be advantageous because it mandates a close consideration of your business goals, but can also be adjusted as you gain more information or as circumstances evolve.

 

“The agile framework forces owners to make decisions quickly and communicate frequently," says Slayter. “The emphasis on testing frees you from best practices so you can pursue the surprising insights that are unique to your business. In the end, the risk is actually lower because you're making fewer big bets."

It's also important to realize what agile is—and what it isn't.

“Just because you're agile doesn't mean you don't have process," Slayter points out. “Agile is not about flying by the seat of your pants—it's dynamically deciding how to deploy your resources to achieve your goals."

For the rest, check out the AMEX OpenForum.

Do You Rely Too Much on Processes?

I know that the topic of generational differences irritates some people. My personal experience, though, is that when it comes to certain things, baby boomer points of view do often differ from millennial points of view. One of these areas of debate is process.

Why (Some) Boomers Like Process and (Some) Millennials Don’t

Many boomers scaled their organizations successfully because they put the right processes in place to do so. For a long time, these processes worked, and so understandably they may be reluctant to let go of them. And when new business challenges present themselves, many leaders answer them with new processes, because after all processes are tried and true. These are the rules, and if we don’t stray from them, we’ll be okay.

When millennials came into the work world starting in the aughts, many weren’t as enamored by process. They wanted to use new technologies, in real time, to solve new kind of dilemmas popping up every day. They wanted to change business for the better by streamlining work and getting it done as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Tension started to build, particularly in this decade when the health and survival of a company depends upon its ability to be agile. Some leaders wanted to stick steadfastly by procedures that had served them well in the past, while others felt that existing processes and the bureaucracy often associated with them were impeding growth and true progress.

For more where this came from, head over to the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

Why Finance Pros Are Turning to Automation

Are financial experts afraid of automation? Not exactly. If you talk to many of them, you’ll hear that technology has actually changed their jobs for the better and has positively impacted how they work in their organization by eliminating manual processes, increasing accuracy and efficiency, and facilitating valuable customer interactions.

I rounded up some of the best thoughts on automation from big timers in the industry. Here’s what they had to say.

“Automation will change how we insure property, loan money, invest money, deliver technology, write research reports, and what professionals in financial services do every day. Every week in the news we read about a new application for artificial intelligence, machine learning, neural networks, or robots — whether it is self-driving cars, AI assistants, predictive models, robots building (or printing) hardware, or how to invest our money. Put these all in the category of automation — and that is what will impact finance the most in the next decade.” David Reilly, CTO of Bank of America, as told to Tina Wadhwa, Business Insider.

“Open digital technologies will continue to support finance transformation. Transformation is accelerating in terms of companies and people needing investment decisions, as well as the development and implementation of new business models. This will require increased automation and simplification to drive process efficiencies, increased analytics to provide high-speed business insight to drive better business decision-making, and, finally, better collaboration so business connects in a much more seamless way.”  Richard McLean, regional CFO, Asia-Pacific and Japan, SAP, as shared on the SAP blog.

“We developed a chatbot named Eno, an automated program that can communicate with the bank’s customers via text message to give them information on their accounts and help them make credit card payments from their smartphone. The gender-neutral virtual assistant uses artificial intelligence to respond to natural language text messages from users about their money. For example, customers might ask Eno to show them their recent account balances or pay off a credit card bill.” Ken Dodelin, vice president of digital product development, Capital One, as told to Anne Irrera, Reuters.

For more insights from finance professionals, check out the full post on the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

Why AI's Not for Everyone

A recent MIT/Sloan survey of senior corporate executives showed they see artificial intelligence (AI) as the single most disruptive new technology, and nearly 70 percent said they already have AI investments underway.

Looking at these results, you might feel insecure. You might worry that you’re falling behind, and that your business will lose its competitive edge if you don’t get with the program (literally). And it’s tempting to march into your CEO’s office and demand approval for an AI strategy now. You might want to sleep on that, though, because in the project management domain, the timing might not be quite right.

We Don’t Have it All Figured Out Just Yet

As we talked about here last year, AI has made interesting strides in the last few years, particularly with respect to deep learning. To refresh your memory, deep learning involves training computers to recognize patterns in data and then classify and categorize them as a human brain could do instantaneously. This is cool to be sure, but in the enterprise, a lot of deep learning applications are still in their infancy. They have yet to solve specific business problems or notably increase bottom-line profitability.

One common problem is that most organizations still haven’t mastered big data and basic data analytics. While they’ve started collecting data, in many cases that data is just sitting around. And this data can’t necessarily be used for AI if it’s not in the right format and cleaned appropriately. So, before being able to realize the true potential of AI, you’ll need to first plan exactly how you intend to analyze the data you have and put it to use in the service of insightful business decisions.

AI is Tougher Than It Sounds

According to Brandon Allgood at Forbes, the complexity of AI is another reason to put off an implementation. “As the CTO of a company with a foundation in AI, trust me when I tell you that it’s harder to implement than you might think,” he wrote. “AI and machine learning are not commonplace today because we still lack a few essential building blocks, like a robust software infrastructure around core algorithms, or the interfaces to easily make use of those algorithms.”

In an article for Fortune.com based on the recent Brainstorm Tech event, panelists discussed the use of AI in small-to-medium sized businesses. “It probably makes no sense to dedicate limited resources to hire an AI expert, even if there were one available,” they concluded. “Maybe every industry needs an AI strategy, but not every business,” said George Kurtz, CEO of CrowdStrike, a cybersecurity specialist.

“AI is just beginning, so having a strategy around it is a problem because you have to define what you’re talking about,” added Norman Winarski, founder of Winarski Ventures. “You have to be incredibly careful in how you deploy an AI solution, you need to think about how people will react, and it takes a lot of resources.”

For more, check out the full post on the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

How to Manage Disruptive Organizational Events

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez, a world-renowned thought leader on Project Management and Strategy Implementation, recently penned an article for CIO around PM fundamentals for mergers and acquisitions.

As he wrote: “Last year, some 40,000 companies changed ownership, for a total deal value of some $5 trillion, according to Thomson Reuters. That means people are managing 40,000 massive transformation projects – but how well are they executing them? And have they been planned using the best practices of the professional field known as project management?”

In the article, Nieto-Rodriguez cited 10 steps for leveraging PM to assist with mergers and acquisitions. These included identifying a unique problem or opportunity, examining alternatives and being selective about projects to take on, understanding the puzzle of how all of your projects fit together, defining a specific timeline, securing high levels of sponsorship, obtaining necessary resources, anticipating drag and overconfidence, imagining plausible kill scenarios, selling to internal stakeholders, and tracking metrics.

In a follow-up interview, I asked Nieto-Rodriguez how to best leverage PM in the event of other disruptive events that might occur in an organization. Here are some of his ideas:

Layoffs

Manage a round of layoffs as a project and appoint an expert project leader to execute it. In most cases, the rationale for the layoffs is clear and the PM should communicate it to the impacted stakeholders. The inception and planning of the project might take some time, as all of the details must be carefully defined. As opposed to traditional projects, the implementation part (or the layoff announcement) should be as short as possible. Your project plan should include support for both the employees leaving as well as the ones staying.

Reorganizations

Reorganizations are transversal by nature and impact several or even all of the departments within an organization. The project approach and its emphasis on clear objectives, tasks, and deadlines will bring focus to the proposed changes. Here again, the rationale has to be clearly articulated, including the benefits for employees. Avoid being in “constant reorganization mode,” which creates change fatigue when the organization is not able to recoup sustainable benefits from the new model introduced. Reorganization projects need time, sometimes a few years, to make changes stick and deliver the promised benefits.

For the rest of Antonio's advice, head over to the QuickBase Fast Track blog.

Deloitte's Old and New Rules for People Analytics

Deloitte University Press’ Global Human Capital Trends 2017 report revealed that people analytics is undergoing a transition. The field of people analytics has moved from answering basic questions about recruitment, engagement, and retention to giving organizations much more complex insight into management issues. Now that CEOs want to use data to understand every part of a business operation, and embed analytics into real-time apps and the way we work, people analytics has moved from the purview of HR to the purview of the c-suite.

In the report, Deloitte suggested that we can no longer view people analytics through the same lens and that an understanding of the “old rules versus the new rules” will help maximize the use of data to enhance organizational performance.

• Old Rule: People analytics is viewed as an HR team focused on advanced analytics within HR
• New Rule: People analytics is viewed as a business analytics team that works across the business to drive business results

• Old Rule: Analytics focuses on HR topics such as retention, engagement, learning, and recruitment metrics
• New Rule: Analytics focuses on business problems such as sales retention, fraud, accident patterns, and other operational needs

• Old Rule: The organization makes a business case for better data integration, quality, and tools
• New Rule: The organization has already committed to accurate and integrated data, and has tools and processes to ensure quality and ease of analysis

• Old Rule: The people analytics team has a strong understanding of HR data
• New Rule: The people analytics team understands HR data, relationships with all the other analytics groups in the company

For the rest of the rules, check out the full piece on the SilkRoad blog.

Being Overlean Could Be Your Downfall

Shazir Mucklai is a startlingly young angel investor and adviser in disruptive startups. He currently runs a six-figure PR firm helping startups commercialize their products and launch their ideas. I say that he is startlingly young because according to his LinkedIn profile, he is still in college.

One of things I love about working with millennials and Gen Z-ers is that they often excel at taking a successful idea and figuring out how to apply it elsewhere. When it comes to project management, Shazir did just that. In a recent article he penned for Forbes, he questions why PM should just be for big companies that can afford whole departments and experts.

Shazir argues that even the smallest start-up or team should implement PM strategies in order to bring clarity, focus and much-needed structure to the growth process and operations.  Project management is essential, he claims, because it facilitates the following:

Agreement on “Reason for Being”

 According to Shazir, many teams can only provide long-winded explanations of the features of the product or service instead of the benefit it imparts to customers. The question of “what does it do and why?” is usually answered fairly quickly after a project manager is engaged.

Agreement on Goals

 Many smaller companies have flat organizational models. But, says Shazir, if every member of a four-person team is the leader, there are four different to-do lists, each in a different order. Mismatched priorities can be resolved by setting strategic, overarching goals with help from a project management orientation.

For more where this came from, read the whole article at the QuickBase Fast Track blog.