Principles are foundational guidelines for strategy, decision-making, and problem solving, intended to guide the behavior of people involved in projects (without addressing the ethics of such behaviors).
Values establish expectations for moral conduct.
In other words, the principles describe the “what” and the values and code of ethics describe the “how” to conduct yourself as a project manager. Let’s dive a bit further into each of these values to understand how they pertain to you. You’ll probably find that none of these values are exclusive to project management and each of them should be incorporated into all aspects of your life, not only your work.
The price of greatness is responsibility
This quote, attributed to Sir Winston Churchill, captures the importance and potential reward of responsibility and even begins to reveal one of the reasons people tend to gravitate toward and respond positively to the leadership of those who are generally perceived as responsible.
Let’s be real — as a project manager, you’re responsible for all aspects of your project: the product or service to be delivered, the budget, the schedule, your project team, managing risks, ensuring that your stakeholders receive timely and meaningful status updates and are ultimately satisfied, and more. If the idea of taking on increased responsibility doesn’t appeal to you, then project management may not be a great fit. However, you’ve already taken responsibility for advancing your PM knowledge by reading this book and also, presumably, preparing to sit for the PMP certification exam. Both are very responsible choices that will almost certainly help you achieve greatness!
R-e-s-p-e-c-t, find out what it means to…your project
Few things can derail your project faster than a lack of respect and professionalism between project team members, and a team culture of respect begins with you as the project manager. Project team members need to feel they are working in an environment that encourages collaboration, out-of-the-box thinking, and open and effective communication.
The next best idea, suggestion, or solution for your project could reside in the mind of a team member who may not feel comfortable injecting their point of view into a conversation where disrespect is deemed acceptable. Would you blame them? What a shame it would be if you and all your stakeholders missed out on that idea or solution because the environment isn’t one of mutual respect, openness, and understanding!
Maintaining fairness
Impartial, objective decisions based on facts and data, not on opinions, are the cornerstone of a fair project, project team, and work environment. We share with you that most decisions will be met with acceptance by some and resistance by others. It’s rare that you’ll have the opportunity to make impactful decisions that provide only positive outcomes for everyone involved. With that said, decisions are significantly easier to accept, whether they benefit you or not, if they are made and communicated in a fair and equitable manner.
Imagine you are working on a project (as an individual contributor, not the project manager) with a team of engineers, quality assurance specialists, and a project manager to design and build a new high-tech widget. Now, let’s assume that the project manager, Tanya, has been employed by your organization for over ten years and her son, Zack, is an intern serving as one of the engineers assigned to the project. Tanya routinely overrules you and the other engineers in favor of Zack’s ideas for the widget’s design, even though not one of his ideas has yet to work, and she rarely provides any explanation for overruling the more senior engineers for Zack’s ideas.
Tanya’s nepotism towards Zack is unfair and demotivating to others involved with the project and can be detrimental to the project’s overall success. This particular scenario can be tricky, though, because we don’t want to openly call out Zack each time his ideas are considered over everyone else’s (that would only serve to shame Zack with no beneficial outcome, especially since it isn’t Zack’s fault that Tanya continually favors only his ideas). Nor do we want to blatantly accuse Tanya of favoring her son despite the availability of objectively better ideas on multiple occasions from numerous team members (doing so could cause Tanya to become defensive or, worse yet, to dig in and continue to show favoritism toward Zack).
After the first couple demonstrations of such egregious unfairness, most rational team members would begin to become disillusioned and disinterested in providing meaningful contributions. They would understandably learn to expect that Tanya will continue to disregard their inputs in favor of Zack’s, without justification. Unfairness can become toxic to a project team, eventually resulting in a lack of trust of the project manager, which is very difficult to rebuild, and resentment.
Be objective: People can become understandably irrational when considering family and other personal matters. Rather than pointing fingers and blaming Tanya for favoring Zack, stick to the facts of specific situations where certain ideas were overlooked in favor of Zack’s idea. Describe the results of such decisions (why Zack’s idea didn’t work out and why you believe one or more of the overlooked ideas would have been worth pursuing instead).
Don’t be selfish: Your concern for the project team, the client, your organization’s leadership, and for all the other project stakeholders, as well as the project’s ultimate success or failure, are all excellent reasons to be concerned that favoritism or other unfair practices may have a negative impact. Be sure to separate, from your discussion with Tanya, any feelings of personal resentment or frustration. This won’t help present your most effective argument for ending the unfair practice (facts and data are almost always more difficult to write off than a feeling or opinion).
Honesty is the best policy
Most people don’t enjoy delivering bad news, but all news (especially bad news) is best delivered as soon as possible, after you’ve performed your due diligence to confirm that the news is accurate and real. It’s also best delivered in a truthful, factually accurate, and direct manner. Your audience will ultimately appreciate your unemotional delivery of news, leaving as little as possible open to misinterpretation. Whether your audience is pleased with the content of your message or not, they cannot reasonably fault you for delivering the message professionally and honestly. Always remember that withholding information is akin to being dishonest!
You’ll likely find yourself at some point addressing one or more of the following example scenarios in your capacity as project manager that will require honest and frank conversations to remedy:
Underperforming project team member: This can have a negative, demotivating impact on other team members and hinder the entire team’s ability to effectively deliver the project.
Budget overrun: As soon as you are confident there exists a realistic risk of overrunning your project’s budget, loop in your organizational leadership, either for assistance in course-correcting the current path, depending on the cause of the projected overrun, or for a determination as to whether the project should continue as is or be adjusted in some manner. Perhaps it should be adjusted through a change order or similar contractual adjustment if there has been a documented deviation from the original project scope.
Schedule slippage: Your stakeholders, particularly the client, need to know as soon as possible if the project schedule starts to slip so they have sufficient time to make any necessary adjustments to accommodate the updated schedule.