by Caryl Teh

Let’s say you’ve been assigned the honour of planning a summer food festival and will need to manage a team on this project. Even with a perfect plan, that doesn’t guarantee that it’ll be a walk in the park. Unavoidable road bumps will force you & your team to be flexible and adapt. 

But don’t worry, we’re here to help you prepare by highlighting some common problems that might arise when working with a group of people & what you can do about them. And even if you’re not a team manager, you can use these as a self-check to make sure you aren’t being a wrench in a well-oiled machine. Ready? Grab a snack & let’s troubleshoot some problems!

1. Not Having A Clearly Defined Project

The very first task a manager should tackle is to define the project as clearly as possible so everyone is on the same page. Identify core elements like: 

• Shared goals
• Ideal outcome
• Deliverables
• PIC (persons-in-charge)
• Timeline & major milestones
• Potential challenges
• Metrics for success

Let’s apply some of these to our hypothetical food festival example:

• Shared goals: (1) provide an easy, social, and fun way for residents to become familiar with their local restaurants and eateries; and (2) build a sense of community around the localities’ food culture.
• Ideal outcome: a sunny day with a good spread of vendors and lots of attendees eating their hearts out on the street.
• Potential challenges: COVID-19 SOPs, location, permits, vendors, and unpredictable weather.
• Metrics for success: (1) number of tickets sold; and (2) number of vendors participating.

2. Failing To Get Stakeholder (and Steak Holder) Buy-In

Your project is highly unlikely to succeed if it doesn’t have the support of your team as well as external stakeholders, i.e. the handful of people from whom you need the OK to get this party started. As a team manager, you are the central communication point between these parties. So one of the best ways to get buy-in is to involve them in the planning process. Give them a voice at the table.

• Ask your team what is realistically feasible for the given timeline & goals.
• Maybe you need to speak to local officials about using the public park or a permit to close several blocks in a busy neighbourhood.

Whatever it is, your main focus should be on communicating clearly and effectively. Everyone should have all the information they need to understand the cruciality of their role in ensuring the project’s success.

3. Too Many Voices Ringing In My Head

Have you ever had this happen:

• At the start of the project, your team planned the steps required to complete the project. Everyone was clear.
• But thereafter, more voices got involved or new ideas were raised that slowly changed the plan. 
• Yet your team was still expected to complete the added work within the original timeframe and, worst case scenario, without any additional budget.

Yikes! So what’s a good way to approach this?

• Don’t jump to assume the worst
  New considerations aren’t always bad. It’s an opportunity to consider how you might be able to improve the project.
• But, one must be wise and rooted in reality!
  It’s the job of the project lead to ensure that enthusiastic ideas don’t run ahead of realistic restrictions. Have a bi-weekly sync with your team. Raise the new ideas and revisit your project scope, goals, budget and timeline. Update when necessary.

4. Lack of Effective Communication

Frequent communication can empower a dynamic and agile team. But constant interruptions with incessant emails or excessive messages might eat up time that can be better spent getting and staying in the flow. What’s more important is to communicate EFFECTIVELY. Here are some suggestions on how you can do that:

• Keep the project’s scope, vision & timeline in mind with a project tracker
• Clarify each person’s role, responsibilities and expectations
• Designate time for progress checks, question time & encourage FEEDBACK
• Utilise online COLLABORATION TOOLS – they work wonders to help distributed teams stay on (virtually) the same page
• LISTEN to concerns faced by your team members or issues raised by stakeholders.
• Lastly but importantly, CELEBRATE each member’s contributions & team successes

5. Not Being Flexible

This is kind of the bedrock for all the previous points we talked about. Remember this rule: Be definite in your vision and flexible in your approach. 

Back to our spicy example: Your initial food festival location is no longer an option because the permit will take too long to get approved. But fret not! Your open and effective communication paved the way to a contact who helped secure a new location that met all your requirements. But, you need to make some adjustments: it’s a bigger space. That means reorganising the vendor layout and potentially adding some extra entertainment. Or it could just be another reason for more cheese fries, wedges and boba tea. Who wouldn’t love that?

Source:
Trello