The Basic Functions of Project Management

Chapter 4
The Vision Statement and Motivating for Project
Success
Perry Fitzberg, newly appointed manager for GWI’s Smythe Project, knows all too well that leadership
involves more than just building schedules and calculating budgets. As project manager it will be his job
to:
1. Provide a vision of what the project is to achieve.
2. Communicate that vision to all involved.
3. Ensure that everyone stays focused on that vision.
4. Motivate people to participate in the project.
5. Facilitate and expedite performance.
6. Build an effective team.
But let’s examine each of these points, one at a time.
Providing the Project Vision
From a project management perspective, the vision describes what the project is to achieve. It is often a
high-level statement supported by a list of goals and objectives. The vision is essentially an idea of some
desired end state, expressed in a form that everyone understands, can relate to, and can feel a sense of
commitment to.
Perry knows that the vision should be clear, concise, and direct. He used several sources to draft the
statement, including the minutes of meetings and the formal contract with the customer. Perry also knows
that
the vision statement will require commitment by people working directly and indirectly on the project. To
engender this commitment, he solicits feedback to make revisions where appropriate. This helps generate
commitment, encourages raising important questions, and possibly addresses communciation problems
before
they can negatively impact the project. Exhibit 4-1 is his vision statement for the Smythe Project.
Having a vision statement at the outset offers several advantages:
1. It clearly formulates in people’s minds what the project is to achieve. In other words, it
communicates the scope of the project, helping to avoid “scope creep,” that is, unintentional expansion
of the project’s boundaries.
2. It provides a basis for managing the project. All subsequent activities are planned, organized, and
controlled from the perspective of that vision. “Mapping” becomes easier because everyone knows
what perspective to take.
3. It bridges the communications gap. Since a vision statement describes what the project is to achieve,
there’s less chance for ambiguity as people understand the importance of their activities.
4. The vision statement provides a basis for evaluating performance. Throughout the project cycle,
questions will arise about performance. The vision statement is the yardstick against which
performance can be judged.
5. It determines the importance of questions that arise during the project. What is important and what is
not must always be clear. A vision statement is the tool to help answer those questions.
6. The vision statement empowers, it gives people a means for independent judgment. Essentially it is
the criterion for decision making.
Communicating the Vision
A vision statement is worthless, of course, unless other people know about it. Therefore, Perry widely
distributes the statement. He ensures that the right people receive the statement at the right time.
Making the vision statement public has obvious benefits, which are important to state here. For example, it
gives people a sense of the scope of the project. It establishes the groundwork for effective communication
via
a common language and mental framework. Finally, it helps build a sense of community.
Exhibit 4-1. Vision statement.
Smythe Project Vision Statement
Provide a wedding with the grandest of flair, which all attendees will talk about for years to come and
which
will bring joy and happiness to the families of the newlyweds.
But the challenges of communication are many. Mental paradigms, values, beliefs, and attitudes, for
example,
may restrict how the vision statement is received. People tend to filter or slant the message. Also, “pockets
of
resistance” exist, reflecting nonacceptance of the vision. That resistance might be covert (subtle, negative
comments) or overt (vocalizing opposition). Another challenge is to cut through the layers of bureaucracy.
Organizational layers may filter or alter the message, either intentionally or inadvertently.
So Perry will publish the vision statement in a house newsletter. He will post it on the project’s Web site.
He
will conduct information-sharing sessions or give presentations. He’ll provide a copy for each project
manual
and reiterate it at training sessions and other meetings. (Chapters 13, 14, and 19 have additional
information
on communciation.) The key is to ensure the vision statement is brought to everyone’s attention.
Keeping People Pocused on the Vision
Perry realizes that it is easy to get sidetracked—that is, to lose sight of the vision while “fighting fires.” He
is
concerned about not letting those fires distract him or the team. If they become distracted the likelihood
increases for the schedule to slide, the project to overrun the budget, and the output to be inferior.
As project manager, Perry takes the lead in asking whether each process, activity, or action will achieve
the
vision. He continually raises the issue of direction, although he wants everyone to do the same. And there
are
several ways he can ensure that people stay focused, such as collecting and evaluating data regarding
schedule
and budget; tracking past performance and projecting the future; identifying likely risks and ways to
respond;
instituting change management disciplines; and collecting and evaluating measurements and metrics on
quality. Chapters 15 and 16 will describe methods for data collection. Of course, Perry does not do this
alone.
He obtains help from team players to validate his assessments.
Facilitating and Expediting Performance
Most project teams do not operate in a vacuum. They face obstacles and frustrations, such as not having
the
right equipment or having to deal with bureaucratic politics. In addition, project managers can frustrate or
facilitate the performance of team members.
Perry, of course, wants to facilitate rather than impede performance. He faces constraints on his power, yet
he
refuses to take a “dying cockroach” position. He strives to eliminate physical distractions (e.g., noisy
equipment), to ensure the availability of the right tools (e.g., telecommunication equipment and software),
to
shield the team from administrative red tape (e.g., computing paperwork), and to handle the political
aspects
of the project (e.g., interference in daily activities by senior management).
Perry does not address every problem or obstacle that confronts the team. But he determines what is
important, in light of whether it affects the achievement of the vision.
Motivation to Participate
Perry understands that, without people, the project does not exist. He also knows that without motivated
people, performance will suffer. To motivate his team, Perry must have insight into human behavior and
direct it toward achieving the vision.
Motivation deals with the internal conditions that encourage people to act or not to act. It is a complex
process
that remains intriguing to psychologists and layman alike. From Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung to
contemporary practitioners, the mystery of human behavior remains, despite growth in our knowledge.
From
a managerial perspective, there are many theories that work most of the time, but not always, and have
proved
useful for project managers like Perry.
Credit for the birth of motivational theory largely falls to Frederick Taylor, a major contributor to the
development of the concept of scientific management. He relied on identifying the most efficient tasks to
perform a job, training people to do them, developing standards to measure performance, and separating
tasks
between management and workers. The best workers—the ones meeting or exceeding the standard—
received
the best pay.
Over the years, it has become quite clear that scientific management, albeit revolutionary, had negative
motivational consequences. Work often became meaningless and highly routine, and management relied
solely on financial motivations. But since Taylor, other motivational therories have been developed.