Building the team - Buffer resources

You are a project manager. You work with a team of skillful professionals. The project is stable. The team works perfectly and in unison with the aim/goal of the project. There are no escalations from the client. It seems like a dream, but so far you've been gifted with it.

Scene 1:The client is happy and expresses his/her wish to offload some more work to you. You are all excited.

Scene 2:Murphy's law is always lurking around to spring into action. And at one fine moment it gets active. One of your key members chooses to call it quit.

Now your topmost priority is to go hunting for some new members to add to your team.

Yours is an organization assessed at one of the top CMMi levels. Hiring processes are well in place. You inform the resource manager of the upcoming requirement. Chances are that, your organization already has a few buffers whose experience/skill sets match the broad specifications provided by you. If you are new to project management, then this might sound as if your job is already half done. But wait! Think. Is it really so?

Most of these buffers would be young 'fresh out of college' lot. They may not have the exposure to the technologies your project uses, but they'd be brimming with enthusiasm and raring to take the challenges head-on. You 'talk' to a few of them, and your confusion level increases. You can't decide whether to absorb Mr./Ms. X or Mr./Ms. Y; One is very promising in terms of the ad-hoc extra work that your project demands, while the other is technically inclined, but looks averse to (even) rare incidences when it comes to stretching their time. These situations are just the tip of the iceberg. The more you talk to the 'resources' the more confused you tend to get. You are in a fix.

Now you don't have much time, as the new resource MUST join in a defined time frame. (The notice period issued by the outgoing team mate is exhausting very fast OR the client is on your head to get the team ready on war front as they are tight with their deadlines to launch their new software/system in order to combat their competition.)

Your own boss is also interested in what's happening at this front. According to him/her, these resources are already a part of the organization. They have already gone through a 'rigorous' hiring process. So he/she insists on having a really short discussion and let the resource manager know of the person on whom you are going to zero-in.

Frankly speaking, you are sure that, none of the droplets in the resource pool suit your needs. You either don't have the option to look outside the organization or you don't have enough time that would take and outsider into your team. But you are a manager and now it's YOUR test. Because, after all, managing the resources (and not just Human resources) is what should be your forte. It's you who has to put your foot down and make the decision.

Have you gone though such a situation? What did you do then? How are the new team-members working out? Are you at the same earlier level of the project where everything looks like a dream? Is it better than earlier or the other way round? Did the concept of buffers prove to be helpful/disastrous?

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Motivating the team

Once Bas De Baar posted a question on his 'Project Shrink' blog "What Is The Best Way To Motivate Team Members?" I feel exuberated to say that my answer won the prize, which was his book: "Surprise! Now You're A Software Project Manager".

I thought I should elaborate it a bit further here.

I believed "Everyone wants to get noticed, and everyone wants to grow. If their leader assists them in achieving their goals, it makes a great positive impact on their motivation". Well, to be frank, this applies to a majority of people, not all. I wanted to toy with my ideas to see how many of them really fall in this category. I took the following approach:

When I started my weekly meetings, I asked my team-members to take up some responsibilities voluntarily. The identified 'projects' were to manage some leisurely things like Birthday celebrations, weekly outings, picnics, trainings etc. The basic intention was that, people would pick up the tasks that look interesting to them. I wanted to 'make everyone capable' of 'managing'. The experience they would gain while takling these would help them 'grow' in a way. While managing these tasks, they would interact with people that they have never interacted with, before. They would learn to manage their resources, they would learn the knack of negotiations, they would be able identify (from the feedback) the areas where they need to put-in some more efforts. The list is virtually endless. The confidence that they would get at the end would urge them to take up the responsibilities that are 'accountable'. I had made it loud and clear that 'with responsibilities, you also get the releavant authorities'.

After observing for a couple of weeks, I threw a surprise pizza party in recognition of the efforts spared by those who picked up the responsibilities. Everyone enjoyed the surprise party. (I feel the more enjoyable thing was the 'surprise' factor)

Well! I got a considerbale success with this idea. But as I said, there were STILL a few of them who were hesitant/shy in coming forward. I had to turn my attention to this lot now.

In the next weekly meeting, I declared that now onwards, the ones who haven't assumed any responsibilities during the given month would be the ones to (jointly) sponsor the next party in the appreciation of those who have assumed responsibilities. And if, in a given month, every single person has some kind of a responsibility, then I'd be the one to foot the entire bill. It was now, that some of these 'seemingly passive' members started to ask questions to me like: "I don't think I am good at doing the things that are already identified, can I identify some tasks that I can do better and take the ownership?". Voila! Isn't this what I wanted? The team is showing improved signs of motivation! I'm happy!

The story doesn't end here. Now, I needed to walk the last mile, and motivate the last bunch of people who are STILL lagging behind. What needs to be done? These are the ones, who are absolutely passive. I'm working on this lot and getting success to some extent. But, I'd like to hear from you.

What do you think, how would YOU motivate this lot of people?

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Identifying hidden skills of your team members

We all work in a team. Yes! even when you think you are the only person working on a given task, there would be someone who depends on you for this task, or you may depend (directly or indirectly) on someone else for this task to be complete. For a task or a project to be successful, we need to identify the right people who would optimally work on it and deliver the best. And hence it's crucial to identify who's best suited to carry out the set of tasks that comprise the project.

Every individual has different interests and skills. These interests and skills would normally be hidden, unless the individual is complacent or pompous. Thus, it naturally comes on the shoulders of the project manager or the team leader to identify these hidden skills. The question that comes up is: How to go about this finding, so that I'll have a database of the mapping between the skills and the person who possesses it?

I always mingle with my teammates and make sure that there's negligible gap between me and them. We hang around together, play pranks, indulge in some lightweight teasing. More often than not, this gesture puts the teammates at ease. I get to know the nature and interests of the ones I interact with.

But when it comes to the skills that are required for, say, estimation, or lateral thinking, I need to broaden my audience from which I can build my repertoire. The idea that readily struck me was to ask one classical question everyday. The questions were posted to our internal distribution lists. As expected, there were not many responses, but astonishingly, there was at least one person who responded with a correct answer.

I tried this idea as a pilot, with questions related to just two categories, viz.; Guesstimation and lateral thinking. And now I feel great that I have at least a few people in my reach who possess these abilities. Someday, when the need arises, I will ty this idea for other types of requirements

The questions were:
1. How many liters of water do all the seas and oceans hold in them?
(Note:Accuracy is not important; how you arrive at the answer is.)
2. How much deep can you go in a thick jungle?

Do you have answers to the above questions? I'm curious to know.

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