That great day has finally come. After working faithfully for months (or perhaps years), you are finally getting your chance to take over as a project manager. You are about to assume a leadership role for both the project and the people working on it. While there is a chance that you will be starting the project and staffing it from scratch, you may be inheriting a project that already exists in some form. This could range from a small team doing early planning to an existing project with a fully staffed project office and a long history.
The question is “What do you do now that you are in charge?” The classic answer you may have already heard or read while searching Google for the answer is, “It depends.”
Every project is unique, so what you should do depends on where the project is when you take it over and what it most needs to move forward. Your first task, before you make any decisions is to assess the current state of the project.
I cannot stress enough that your actions as the new project manager are highly dependent on your assessment of the project, there are a few things that every new project manager must carry out regardless of the circumstances. Assuming you have done your assessment and made some conclusions about the current state of your project, your first actions should address the following.
Provide Strategic Direction
Most projects are awash in documents providing direction. They could include a vision statement, that all-inclusive and cleverly worded statement found at the front of project briefings, reports, and even framed and hanging on the walls around the project office; a mission statement giving promises of great things you will do for your customers, stakeholder, and employees; business requirements; milestone and project review documentation. The problem soon becomes which of these sets of overlapping documents really drive the behavior of people who work on the project. You may be shocked to find that your people are working on many different and conflicting priorities.
Your task is to sort through the complexities and ambiguities of the present situation and provide clear direction for your project and any outside stakeholders. The objective here is clarity. Everyone should know and be able to restate in some form what the project priorities are as well as what specific part they must play in achieving those priorities.
Direction is not effective unless it is communicated, and this means frequently and through different media. Writing down direction and priorities and sending them out is only the start. Nothing can replace your personal touch in communicating this important information, since you are now the leader and visible spokesperson for the project. Your style in communicating helps you to share the clarity of your vision as well as your commitment and passion to achieve it. This is the essence of leadership! Setting a clear direction, getting people to follow you, and achieving the desired outcomes.
Gain Alignment
Now that you have reached some conclusions about the direction and priorities for your project, you need to figure out how to get everyone working toward the set of priorities. Examine the current degree of alignment across the team and stakeholders based on your proposed direction and priorities. Your conclusions about alignment will come primarily from interviews you’ll conduct during your transition. This assessment will help you formulate a plan for achieving alignment within your team and among your external stakeholders.
Alignment is a personal decision. It cannot be directed as a task or deliverable; it must be built from the ground up, and the building blocks of alignment are about building relationships and trust. Even though you’re the project manager, you still need to get team members to buy in to your direction and priorities. This may be difficult if it represents a change from previous priorities.
Aligning the team is your responsibility, and it will likely involve moving team members to different roles or, in some cases, off the team.
Alignment of the team is only the beginning. The real challenge for you as the new project manager is aligning the external stakeholders. Here you have no direct authority and must rely totally on your relationship development and influence skills. Since this involves considerable time and energy, you must first determine where to concentrate your efforts. External alignment eventually translates into a series of individual relationships, each requiring a different approach on your part. Relationships are based on mutual give and take. What do you need to give stakeholders to secure their support for your project? In some cases, it may just be information, while in others it may involve much more time and attention to detail. Your success as a new project manager will be highly correlated to your ability to cultivate and retain a critical mass of external stakeholders.
Build and Use Your Credibility
This may seem like a strange requirement for a new project manager, but it is the best word I can offer to highlight the character dimension of project management success. In fact, the two previous tips of providing direction and gaining alignment are absolutely dependent on your personal credibility. Credibility means being believable, reliable, and worthy of confidence.
Providing direction depends heavily on communication, and your success in communicating is directly linked to your credibility. Gaining alignment based on relationships and influence is determined by your credibility. You must work to build and maintain this credibility through your day-to-day actions.
Project managers seldom have enough people, resources, or time for the challenging jobs they are given. With skillful use of their credibility along with their development of relationships and ability to influence the right people, project managers can grow their initial resource base by continually adding outside resources and support.
There is great power and leverage for new project managers in establishing strategic direction, gaining alignment, and building credibility. The rest is execution.
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