Closing a project is like stretching after a workout. People know they should do it, but they’re so glad to be done, they skip it. But stretching helps you avoid injury and increase flexibility, and in a sense, this is exactly what project closure does. It helps you avoid mistakes in the future and take lessons learned to new projects. You are more agile and prepared.
It is critical for managers and executives to clearly understand business goals and strategies before embarking on projects.Alignment ensures that the right projects – the ones that will optimize costs and achieve business value within reasonable risk parameters – are initiated. No one is an island in an organization; if one project is funded, it is likely that another project is not being funded. Is your project going to pull its weight and provide a healthy return? Will it contribute to the organization’s objectives and help drive strategy forward? The wrong time to answer these questions is when you’re six months in.
In any team, there will be cultural differences. That is true whether you have team members in Southeast Asia, the UK, and North America or across the hall from each other. The nature of our workplace is such that cultural diversity is increasingly ubiquitous. The same tools that we use to manage co-located project teams work as effectively with geographically dispersed teams. It is imperative that leaders implement sound governance structures and foster constant, clear communication in their teams. This not only helps us acknowledge cultural differences, but focus on team similarities and common goals and objectives.
According to Albert Mehrabian’s research, a message is conveyed 55 percent by body language and 38 percent by tone of voice. That leaves just 7 percent for the actual words. On the phone, the message is conveyed 87 percent by tone of voice, and just 13 percent by the words. Communication is obviously more than what is coming out of your mouth – and that presents a great difficulty for geographically-dispersed teams.
Can you manage a geographically-dispersed team as well as you can a centrally-located team? You have to! Global teams are an operational reality for many enterprises today, which involves management of systems, processes, and practices in multiple locations. To make them work – to ensure the organization appears as a single, cohesive unit with consistent levels of service, quality, and productivity – you need strong teams and sound leadership. You can’t fly hundreds of people from all over the world in to a central location; so, how do you get them to work together as a functional project team?
