Manage This - The Project Management Podcast

It’s a “Stump the PM” session! Velociteach Senior Instructor, Margo Love has over 30 years experience managing projects and we are going to discover which of the 49 Project Management Processes she has not performed and why. Margo discusses executing both internal and external projects. Of the 33 Project Documents in the PMBOK guide, Margo weighs in on which she has found to be indispensable.

Hear how to support your team’s success when transitioning to Agile. The adaptation of the Aikido principle of Shu Ha Ri, as well as more info on Disciplined Agile. Table of Contents 00:58 … Meet Alan 02:07 … Defining Agile 04:20 … Shu Ha Ri 08:26 … Non Traditional and Non Profit uses of Agile. 14:43 … Challenges with Transitioning to Agile 17:41 … Disciplined Agile Train the Trainer Seminar 21:48 … Choosing your WoW 23:14 … D.A. and Lean 26:01 … Value Stream Mapping 27:33 … Fundamentals of Agile InSite Course 29:51 … Closing Alan Zucker: ...as long as you are stepping in and making those decisions, the team won’t.  So you really need to focus on stepping back and giving the team that space to make those decisions and allowing them to stub their toes and skin their elbows. So that they will become successful over time. NICK WALKER:  Welcome to Manage This, the podcast by project managers for project managers.  We’re back with another episode, bringing the kind of information you’ve been asking for.  We hope you’ll keep the requests and comments coming in.  You can always comment right there on your listening app, or on Velociteach.com, or on social media.  We love hearing from you. I’m your host, Nick Walker, and with me are the two guys who guide our discussion, Andy Crowe and Bill Yates.  And this time around we’re featuring a member of the Velociteach family.  And like most of the folks around here, Andy, he has credentials a mile long. Meet Alan ANDY CROWE:  He does indeed, Nick.  And we have Alan Zucker on the show today.  And Alan and I go back a good ways.  He and I interacted back before he worked for Velociteach.  We had a relationship.  Somebody I have deep respect for, and I’m really looking forward to today’s podcast. NICK WALKER:  Before we hear from Alan, I want to tell you a little bit more about him.  He’s a certified project management professional, an ITIL Foundation certificate holder, a Scrum master, a scale Agilist, and an Agile certified practitioner.  Alan Zucker is a keynote speaker, and he has more than 25 years of experience as a leader in Fortune 100 companies.  In 2016 he founded Project Management Essentials to provide training and advisory services.  He recently completed a new course for Velociteach titled “Fundamentals of Agile.” Alan, welcome to Manage This.  We want to talk Agile today. And before we really get into it, can you tell me a little bit about what Agile is, particularly for my benefit and for the benefit of those who maybe are coming from a predictive or waterfall background. Defining Agile ALAN ZUCKER:  Sure, Nick.  Well, first of all, Andy, thanks so much, it’s great to be on the podcast again. So Agile is a way of managing projects and it goes back formally about 20 years. And it started out as a way of developing software using incremental and iterative development techniques. So what we try to do with Agile is try to develop our projects and deliver our projects in smaller pieces. And then learn from what we’ve delivered in order to make things better with each of the successive increments. BILL YATES:  Those are some of the keys; right?  Small batches, quick iterations, quick turnaround, get it in the hands of the customer, deliver value quickly.  Those are some of the keys. ANDY CROWE:  Value, value, value. BILL YATES:  Yeah, value, value. ALAN ZUCKER:  And so I think one of the other really big pieces of Agile is that it changes the way we work, and it really focuses on having empowered teams and people really engaged, both from a customer’s perspective, as well as from the technology team perspective. In our traditional projects, particularly our waterfall projects, there’s a big separation between the customers, the business, the development team, the testing team, and on an Agile project we try to get everybody to collaborate together more effectively. So, it’s really interesting, Jeff Sutherland wrote one of the really great books on Agile, and he actually wrote it with his son J.J, and J.J Sutherland, as you may know, was a producer for NPR.  And in the book he talked about how, when J.J. was covering the Arab Spring in Egypt, they really were having a hard time getting the material back to the states for broadcast.  And they thought about how do we deliver the broadcast, and how do we cover the topics more quickly so we can get smaller pieces back to the states in order to meet their broadcast delivery schedule.  So even though Agile was built for software development, it has a lot of applications outside the software development realm. Shu Ha Ri NICK WALKER:  Alan, there’s a Japanese martial art called Aikido, and so within that there’s the principle of steps to mastery of Aikido that’s the Shu Ha Ri, and a lot of Agile leaders have borrowed this principle.  Tell me about how Shu Ha Ri fits into the Agile concept. ALAN ZUCKER:  So a number of the Agile thought leaders use the Aikido principles of Shu Ha Ri as a way of talking about progressing and maturing our Agile. The idea behind Shu is where we’re following the rules, and if you’re doing a martial art, this is where you follow the master, and you really are copying the master step by step. So the idea behind Ha is where we’ve learned the principles, and Ha stands for bend the rules.  So we’ve learned the principles, we’re beginning to adapt the style a little bit for ourselves.  And then the idea of Ri is break the rules, and that’s where you’ve gained your own mastery, and you can see patterns, and you can pool different practices and almost create your own style with this. So one of the things that’s been really interesting for me is I’ve been doing Agile now for actually well over, I hate to say it, 30 years.  And now that I’m teaching, and I’m consulting and coaching organizations, I’ve really gotten to the point where I’ve got that rate, where I can pick different things off the shelf, and I can work with non-software development organizations and other organizations to help them apply the Agile principles to improve whatever they are doing. ANDY CROWE:  You know, Alan, when you were talking about this, something came to mind, I’ve been reading Cormac McCarthy lately and Cormac McCarthy is a famous fiction author.  He will do some things that are so unconventional as a writer. For instance, he doesn’t do a lot of punctuation marks, he doesn’t do quotes, he just goes back and forth with narrative and dialogue, and it’s very fluid. Now, my middle child tried to do this back in high school, and decided he was going to just eliminate certain pesky rules of grammar, but he had not mastered the Shu first, so he didn’t know the rules and you’re not allowed to exactly bend the rules or break the rules yet. So as a writer, this actually resonates very loudly with me, I understand, you know, there are certain rules as a writer that I will intentionally break. The rule in my house is you can use incorrect grammar if you know the rule, and you know what you’re doing, so there’s a little bit of a parallel there, as well. ALAN ZUCKER:  So it’s really interesting, about two years ago I started working with this team. I was part of a small eLearning company, and when I started working with them, they were like, we want to learn Scrum.  So I went, and I did a workshop for them, got them running on Scrum. But I also taught them how to do Kanban, or flow-based Agile, and I’ve maintained contact with the director of the group over the years. And in the last six months they’ve actually moved onto the next version, where they’re doing what they’re calling “hyper sprinting.” So instead of following the two-week Scrum process, or the flow process, they are doing demos two times a week. They’re delivering work as soon as it’s available, they are not doing story point estimates. They’re still doing daily stand-ups and some of those things, but they’ve bent the rules in order to make it work for their organization. And so it’s really interesting, and they’ve been very, very successful with it, that’s in software development. Non Traditional and Non Profit Uses of Agile I’ve also started to do some work with nonprofits. I’m working with the board of a nonprofit near me, and so I’m using Agile principles with them to help them run their board meetings much more successfully. BILL YATES:  What are some of the challenges that you see a group like that – so you know, you’re mixing things up for them and introducing these new concepts. Do you start out with, “Hey, guys, I’m going to teach you Agile,”  or do you just go into specifics and say, “Hey, here’s another practice that I think may benefit our group?” ALAN ZUCKER:  So I don’t start trying to teach Agile theory to a nonprofit board.  What I do is I start in with the practices.  So the new board started its term in July.  So at the first board meeting, I did what I normally do when I’m starting up an Agile team, which is setting the rules of normative behavior. And so I go through a structured brainstorming process, everybody puts their ideas, how should we behave as a board, what are our expectations of each other and of ourselves.  We put the ideas on the wall.  We go through our brainstorming process, and we sort of codify that into the rules of normative behavior, and then we set that as how we’re going to work. So it was really interesting, I was standing there, and we came up with the rules. It was like, we want to be respectful, we want to be efficient in terms of the use of our time. We want to have respectful debate, all these things.  And then I turn around – I’m going through this, and I’m facilitating this process, I see a couple people on their cell phones scrolling through, a couple people sort of having side conversations. And so like a good Scrum master, like a good Agile coach, I said, “Look,

The podcast for project managers by project managers. Hiring the best is a significant undertaking. Our guests Don Lang and Laura Butcher offer excellent advice on how to approach filling a critical position, and choosing a candidate who is a right fit for your organization. Table of Contents 00:48 … Meet Don and Laura 02:03 … Understanding the Whole Person 03:21 … Job Description vs Job Specification 07:00 … Measurable Job Specs 08:12 … Candidate Specification 11:03 … Deal Breakers 11:55 … Talent Brand 13:35 … Being Transparent and the Cost of a Bad Hire 19:23 … Planning for the Interview 21:08 … Building Rapport 23:12 … Laying out the Interview Plan 24:40 … Non-Verbal Cues 25:48 … Note Taking 28:46 … Roles of Multiple Interviewers 32:12 … When No Candidates are a 100% Match 35:10 … Assessing Capability 37:04 … “Hire The Best” Insite Course 38:23 … Closing DON LANG: Oftentimes companies will spend more time investing in a new piece of software or a photocopy machine in terms of doing research and scouring prices and so forth.  And they’ll do a couple of quick interviews and think you’ve made the right decision.  NICK WALKER:  Welcome to Manage This, the podcast by project managers for project managers.  Every couple of weeks we meet to discuss what’s important to you and to all professional project managers.  We try to talk with the best of the best, drawing on their experience and seeing what has worked for them. I’m your host, Nick Walker, and with me is the true voice of experience, Bill Yates.  And today, Bill, we have another full house here in the studio. Meet Don and Laura BILL YATES:  Yes, we do.  It’s great to have Laura and Don in the room with us.  And I cannot wait to dig into this topic because they are experts when it comes to hiring the best. NICK WALKER:  So let’s talk about hiring.  As we all know in today’s economy, hiring the best people is more critical than ever.  It costs a lot to find and interview candidates and to train new employees.  No one can afford to lose time and money from a bad hiring choice.  Employees are an investment, and we want a good return on that investment.  That’s why Don Lang and Laura Butcher are here with us.  They are the founders of Blue Key Partners, a consulting firm focused on helping organizations develop their leadership talent through learning and executive coaching. Don and Laura wrote a course titled “Hire the Best” for Velociteach’s InSite Mobile Learning Platform.  Laura has a background as an HR leader, supporting hiring and talent decisions across multiple industries; and Don has experience as an assessor of talent and in helping leaders apply skills and techniques to get the right person in the right job at the right time.  Don, welcome to Manage This.  Laura, great to see you again.  Welcome back. LAURA BUTCHER:  Thank you. DON LANG:  Thank you. Understanding the Whole Person NICK WALKER:  Let’s just start with the basics; all right?  First, getting to know a job candidate.  To what extent is it important to learn more than just the person’s job skills? DON LANG:  Well, it’s certainly important to understand the whole person because that’s who shows up at work.  Oftentimes in an effort to try and get the best person we focus on some technical competency, some experience, some skills, at the exclusion of really understanding how is this person going to fit in the organization? And I was reminded of that the other day when I was talking to a hiring manager who hired a construction estimator.  Lots of great experience in estimating significant construction projects.  But when they got to work, immediately they started looking at different ways of changing the work environment in their office.  They wanted to move to a different floor because it was too noisy where the other estimators were.  They wanted a microwave brought in.  They wanted someone to help do some of the tasks that typically the other estimators would routinely do.  So very quickly they’re finding out, even though he’s very skilled, he’s not a good fit for that organization.  And they’re thinking at 90 days now that they may have to let him go. Job Description vs Job Specification NICK WALKER:  Oh, my.  How do you sort of judge that, assess that before? LAURA BUTCHER:  Having a thorough plan for how you’re going to approach filling this critical position is an important aspect of hiring the best and hiring the right fit.  So understanding very specifically what’s required in the role and what are the specifications of the candidate that will be best suited for the position.  We often discuss the difference between a job description, typically, and what we refer to as a “job specification.”  So when you think about a job description, job descriptions were created largely in organizations to grade jobs, to benchmark them with the marketplace for compensation purposes.  Job descriptions weren’t created to fill the job or to staff the job appropriately. BILL YATES:  But we use that all the time, don’t we. LAURA BUTCHER:  We do. BILL YATES:  I mean, that’s kind of our first – that’s like our introduction to somebody.  Hey, are you interested in this position?  Let me show you a job description. LAURA BUTCHER:  And what we distinguish when we talk about a job specification is really focusing in on what are the results that this role needs to produce for the organization?  What outcomes  will this person be responsible for creating for the organization?  So that drives a deeper level of understanding of what you’re really looking for in this candidate, what outcomes they need to produce. BILL YATES:  When I was looking through the content for this course, excellent content, I was hanging out on that because I’ve been guilty of that, just showing candidates a job description and not really talking about what my expectations are, what kind of results I want them to hit.  So give some examples.  For instance, I was thinking, you know, maybe somebody’s responsible for first response to a customer, if there’s a change request.  And then I was thinking, okay, that could be in a job description. But maybe going deeper in the spec it’s, you know, what should that thing look like?  What should that response look like?  What’s an acceptable email or phone call or whatever, the kind of communication that we expect, and then the timeliness of it.  You know, I don’t want to be having a performance review with somebody later and go, yeah, you are responding.  You’re doing what’s on the job description.  But it’s not of the quality I expect, or it’s not timely.  What are some other examples that you guys have helped people with? DON LANG:  Well, certainly, back to the example you’re mentioning, Bill, in terms of activities, really, around the job, right, oftentimes we have in mind certain outcomes that we’re looking for.  Like we want to raise the bar on customer excellence.  We want to raise the bar on our responsiveness.  We want to raise the bar on innovation in the changing work processes to be better at it, as opposed to we’re just satisfied with what has gone on over the past several years. So it’s helpful to give the extra thought before going to the marketplace to figure out, so who do I want, to figure out what do I really want to accomplish over the next 18-24 months that is going to have an impact on our business.  And once I can put some clarity to that, then I’m in a better position to actually start to break down, so what are the behaviors and competencies that are necessary in order to be able to achieve that?  That’s where we would generate a candidate specification. Measurable Job Specs BILL YATES:  Got it.  So in the job spec are you driving some metrics there?  Are you trying to make that measurable? DON LANG:  Absolutely, that’s what you would share with the candidate along the way, so there’s no surprises. BILL YATES:  No surprise. DON LANG:  They know what you’re expecting, and so they can perhaps even self-select out, if those are not something that they want to achieve or don’t believe they could achieve, that kind of thing.  So it isn’t a surprise when they come onboard that now we’re asking them to achieve certain levels of results. And so that’s, wow, that’s news to me, I didn’t hear that in the interview process. BILL YATES:  Yeah, right. DON LANG:  We were just talking about activities. BILL YATES:   So thinking about this specification, are we talking about like a 10-page document here?  Is this something short?  A briefer one-pager?  What does it look like? DON LANG:  If it’s more than a page, it’s probably too long. BILL YATES:  Okay. DON LANG:  We’re really looking at I would say somewhere in the three to six priorities, the outcomes, more than that, you’re not actually going to be able to assess the candidate around.  And more than that they’re probably not going to be able to accomplish. BILL YATES:  Yeah.  They won’t have clarity on what really is job one for them. DON LANG:  What matters. BILL YATES:  Yeah. Candidate Specification NICK WALKER:  So we’re talking about two separate specifications here:  the job specification, the candidate specification, what exactly is that difference? LAURA BUTCHER:   So the candidate specification actually flows directly from the position specification.  So when we talk about a candidate specification, we’re trying to identify very specifically what are the technical competencies, experiences that are required to be successful in the role, but also those qualitative attributes, those things that really are the X factor, the things that will make the person fit with the culture, with the leadership, with the values of the organization. And so those qualitative attributes become part of the candidate specification.  And driving those to some degree of specificity,

In the early 1900’s, the fungal pathogen which causes chestnut blight was accidentally introduced into the United States. It was first detected in New York in 1904 and quickly spread throughout the eastern US forests. By the 1950s, this pathogen destroyed 90 percent of nearly four billion American chestnut trees. Current projects bring hope for the majestic American chestnut tree. We spoke with Dr. Powell about his role as project leader in one such project.

The podcast for project managers by project managers. The NTSB: hear about managing projects for the National Transportation Safety Board. Our guest Michele Beckjord is the Supervisory Investigator in Charge and Project Manager for the NTSB Office of Highway Safety. Michele explains the investigative process and describes some positive changes from NTSB projects. Table of Contents 00:52…The NTSB02:48…Meet Michele05:16…The Supervisory Investigator in Charge05:16…NTSB Project Manager Role08:02…Disaster Response Teams09:50…Incident Response Criteria12:14…NTSB Most Wanted List13:46…Sharing Lessons Learned16:00…Following Up NTSB Recommendations 17:34…Some NTSB Projects19:09…Avoiding Emotional Burnout22:58…Stages of the NTSB Investigation Process28:17…Growing into the Job32:01…Getting Accurate Information33:18…Positive Changes from NTSB Investigations36:40…Find Out More about NTSB Projects37:47…Closing MICHELE BECKJORD: You’re never an expert in a project you’re handed.  You’re the project manager.  It’s not your job to be the expert in that particular area.  It’s your job to get that project managed to its completion point.  NICK WALKER:  Welcome to Manage This, the podcast by project managers for project managers.  Every couple of weeks we meet to try to get to the heart of what you face every day as a professional project manager.  And we do that by talking with people who are right there with you, facing their own challenges and finding their own solutions. I’m your host, Nick Walker, and with me is Bill Yates, who thankfully is the one who keeps us on track around here.  And Bill, we often hear in the news stories of accidents involving aircraft, railways, ships at sea, vehicles on highways.  Our guest is someone right there in the thick of all those stories. The National Transportation Safety Board. BILL YATES:  She is.  And we’re going to talk about the National Transportation Safety Board and have a conversation with Michele.  And just I’m fascinated in seeing how does a project manager manage the situations that she deals with, with the high impact that it has, the high visibility, and just the high stakes of these types of projects. NICK WALKER:  Yeah.  Let’s get into this just by talking a little bit about the National Transportation Safety Board.  The NTSB is an independent federal agency charged with investigating every civil aviation accident in the U.S., and other significant accidents on land and sea.  It also issues safety recommendations aimed at preventing future accidents.  Listen to this number:  14,900.  That’s how many safety recommendations the NTSB has made in its 52 years of existence.  And more than 80 percent of them are implemented. Meet Michele We’re looking at kind of a different approach to project management today with our guest, Michele Beckjord.  Michele is the Supervisory Investigator in Charge for the NTSB Office of Highway Safety.  She has a B.A. in Criminal Justice from American University and a Master of Forensic Science from George Washington University.  She has worked for the National Transportation Safety Board since 1995 and has served as a senior survival factors investigator and senior project manager.  Ms. Beckjord has led investigations of major highway crashes involving school buses, motor coach fires, and bridge collapses.  As a project manager, she’s also taken the lead role in managing major investigative hearings, safety forums, and workshops. Michele, thank you so much for joining us on Manage This.  And we want to start by just hearing more about your position as the Supervisory Investigator in Charge and Project Manager for the NTSB Office of Highway Safety.  What does that entail? The Supervisory Investigator in Charge.  MICHELE BECKJORD:  Well, I’ll start with the Supervisory Investigator in Charge.  We call it an IIC for short.  What the ICC does is lead a team of investigators.  And each of our investigators have a different background or specialty area they focus on for every investigation that we send a team out.  We have three teams in the Office of Highway Safety that covers the entire nation.  And so I am one of three IICs.  My team, and all the teams, are composed of a human performance investigator, survival factors investigator, a vehicle factors investigator, highway investigator, and then a motor carrier.  And so each of those guys has their niche in the investigation.  And of course there’s a lot of crossover. So, for example, our motor carrier investigator is going to go to – let’s just pick Greyhound.  If we have an investigation involving Greyhound, he will actually go to the motor carrier’s location and look through their files and look at their driver qualifications.  And so but you’re also going to have a human performance investigator that wants to know exactly what the driver was doing.  They’ll work in tandem.  Also our vehicle investigator is going to be putting that vehicle up on a lift, getting in there and looking at all the mechanical systems, make sure everything was functioning as it should have.  Our survival factors investigator will do the interior of the vehicle.  So if it’s a motor coach, looking at how did somebody get injured or killed inside the motor coach, and then working with the vehicle investigator to see what type of seats were in there, what type of belts.  When was this built?  What was any retrofit that might have been done?  So everybody works very closely together, but they each have their own area. BILL YATES:  And Michele, do these three – is it often that these three teams are working at the same time, working investigations at the same time? MICHELE BECKJORD:  We have multiple investigations ongoing all the time.  So we spend two weeks on call, two weeks in backup, and two weeks off call.  So each team does that rotation to cover a six-week period.  However, if one of our teams gets sent out on a major crash investigation, the next team in backup may need to go out if there’s another large one that happens so that we don’t miss out on an opportunity to make a difference.  And so you need to be right near your phone, and you have a “go bag” with you, and you launch out to wherever that accident will be.  We say “launch.”  But, you know, if you were talking about deployment, we would go to wherever that accident happens anywhere in the U.S. NTSB Project Manager Role Right now, as a project manager – which I’m sort of transitioning out of that role, but I’ve been doing that for about 18 years.  The project manager takes the reports that those investigators write, and they turn it into the product that the board votes on. Our five politically appointed board members will vote on what we present to them in a report fashion.  That’s what you end up seeing published on the web, that we can then make recommendations, and everyone can go and read the entire report, factual and the analysis, of what happened, why we think it happened, and what we think the probable actual cause of that, either accident, whether it’s a bridge collapse, a motor coach rollover, a school bus fire, what caused that to happen.  So that final product is what I manage as a project manager.  So an investigator in charge will do the investigative part and then work hand-in-hand with the project manager once that investigation’s over to turn it into a report and get it before the board members. BILL YATES:  That makes sense.  So the deliverable is that final report.  That’s what the project manager is ultimately responsible for. MICHELE BECKJORD:  Absolutely.  You’re responsible for the final product of a report.  But encompassed in that report are all of our safety recommendations. BILL YATES:  Right. MICHELE BECKJORD:  So even as a project manager – so let’s say, for example, I just finished a report on Oakland, Iowa’s school bus fire.  All the recommendations in that product will then also tie back to me until they all get closed out by the recipients.  They will contact us, and I will work with them on that.  So the product never really fully ends.  But as a general rule, your product is that project.  That project is the report.  And the report is telling the story of the investigation. Mission and Core Values of the NTSB. BILL YATES:  Michele, give us a sense for the mission and the core values of the NTSB. MICHELE BECKJORD:  Well, the core values, there’s four, so you have transparency, you have integrity, you have independence, you have excellence.  And so those are relatively new terms that we’ve put out there recently.  It used to just be that our mission was investigating accidents that happened in transportation, determining the probable cause, and issuing safety recommendations so that we can try to prevent that type of accident from happening again.  Over the last several years, we wanted to develop more of a core value that we could put out there so people really understood it wasn’t just a mission for us, it was how we went about doing that mission that we take a lot of pride in. And so that’s where that transparency comes about, that we let the entire public know everything we’re doing from start to finish, and how we got to where we are at the end with that project that I put forth to the board members. Disaster Response Teams NICK WALKER:  Now, do you ever work with disaster response teams and those sort of resources to help meet the needs of the victims themselves, so the families of the victims, that sort of thing? MICHELE BECKJORD:  Absolutely, so as soon as we hear about an investigation or an accident that’s happened, we have folks in what we call our Response Operations Center. And so they monitor all the television stations, and they monitor all incoming calls from across the nation reporting accidents to us, whether that’s aviation, rail, marine, any of those.

The podcast for project managers by project managers. From choosing the best strategy and establishing ground rules, to finally implementing an agreed plan, our guest Neal Whitten describes a thorough and effective approach to managing conflict. Table of Contents 01:54 … Meet Neal 02:44 … Defining Conflict 03:42 … Indicators of Conflict 05:30 … Sources of Conflict 08:06 … Conflict Resolution Strategy – Thomas Kilmann Model 08:46 … Competing Strategy 09:10 … Collaborating Strategy 09:37 … Compromising Strategy 10:15 … Avoiding Strategy 12:40 … Accommodating Strategy 12:55 … Choosing a Strategy 14:23 … 7 Steps to Conflict Management 16:08 … Step 1: Choose the Strategy 16:17 … Step 2: Establish Ground Rules 16:48 … Step 3: Define the Conflict 18:02 … Step 4: Explore Solutions 18:17 … Step 5: Select best Solution 18:11 … Step 6: Agree to Implementation Plan 18:55 … Step 7: Implement and Verify 19:00 … Collaboration 20:09 … PM’s Role in Conflict Management 21:34 … A Benefit of Conflict 22:36 … Overcoming Emotions and Egos 25:04 … Face to Face is Best 26:53 … Instill Confidence in a Team 29:47 … Conflict Mangement with a Boss 32:11 … How to Escalate 32:59 … “I Will Not…” Post Conflict Statements 34:28 … Get in Touch with Neal 35:17 … Closing The podcast for project managers by project managers. Conflict management advice for the project manager on resolution strategies and how to implement a conflict management plan. NEAL WHITTEN: We need each other more than ever.  There’s so much data, so much information there, you cannot be an expert on everything anymore.  We need to work and collaborate with one another.  So that’s part of the theme through conflict resolution. NICK WALKER:  Welcome to Manage This, the podcast by project managers for project managers.  This is our chance to talk as professionals in the field of project management.  We want to address your concerns, your needs, and to give you, not only some tips on bettering your game, but to encourage you in it.  We feature guests who have developed their skills and want to help you develop yours. I’m your host, Nick Walker, and before we get to our guest, I’d just like to personally thank our listeners for the comments we’ve received about our podcasts.  This is how we know if we’re succeeding, how we know if we’re really helping you, so please continue to leave your comments on Google, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or whichever podcast listening app you use.  You can also leave us a message on our website, Velociteach.com, or on social media, we want to hear from you. And right now I want to hear from Bill Yates because our guest today is somebody that you have known for a while.  And he’s going to be speaking to something that is, well, I guess inevitable in any project manager’s line of work. BILL YATES:  Conflict is going to happen, when you have two or more people working on something, you’re going to naturally have conflict, and I’m delighted to have Neal Whitten speak into that.  When he and I were talking several months ago about what topic should we address next for project managers, we landed on conflict management.  And I got excited about that right off the top because this is just a part of life, especially in projects.  We have conflict at home, we have it in school, we have it in every phase of life, but absolutely in the workplace.  So addressing that with Neal is going to be a great conversation. Meet Neal NICK WALKER:  And of course we’ve had Neal on before.  But let me reintroduce him to our listeners.  President of the Neal Whitten Group, Neal Whitten, PMP, is a course author and contributor to Velociteach InSite’s elearning courses and has also been a contributing editor of PMI’s PM Network Magazine for over 15 years.  Neal previously worked for 23 years at IBM, in both project leader and management positions.  Neal is a popular speaker, trainer, consultant, mentor, and best-selling author in the areas of leadership and soft skills, project management, and also employee development. And Neal has just completed a new course with our InSite elearning department, the course is titled “Seven Steps to Successful Conflict Management.”  Neal, welcome once again to Manage This. NEAL WHITTEN:  I am honored to be here.  Thank you so much. Defining Conflict NICK WALKER:  All right.  Let’s get right into it.  What all are we talking about when we talk about conflict in the workplace?  Do we have maybe a definition? NEAL WHITTEN:  Well, I do have a definition, but as you would know, conflict is a natural part of the workplace environment, you cannot get away from it.  As a matter of fact, if you work around people consistently, you’re going to run into conflict, and by the end of any given week, you’re probably going to have had that conflict several times a week. So as far as defining conflict, a definition that I use is it’s a disagreement or disharmony between individuals arising from actual or perceived differences or incompatibilities.  And I want to emphasize the “perceived” part because a lot of conflict is because we have a perception. We have our own lens that we’re looking through, and we don’t fully understand the other person’s position and what they’re going through, and consequently the conflict evolves. Indicators of Conflict NICK WALKER: So you know I’m sure for some people they maybe either like to maybe deny that there’s conflict going on, or sweep it under the rug, or kind of, let’s look on the bright side.  But there’s probably some indicators out there of what conflict is, and what should we be looking for? NEAL WHITTEN: So I’d say some obvious indicators of conflict could be open hostility and lack of cooperation and people missing commitments, that sort of thing.  But there’s subtle conflict that’s everywhere, and it can manifest itself as one or more team members demonstrating a change in communication, such as body language, or tone and volume of voice, or being indifferent or low key, but deliberate sniping and gossiping. Those kinds of things mean that there’s also something going on in the back office, and that we need to get to the root of. BILL YATES:  That’s good, Neal. So the key word of “subtle,” that really resonates with me.  There are times when you walk into a situation, and you see two people at it, I mean, they’re that close to just going physically at each other.  So you’re like, oh, I think I have conflict.  But more often, what I’ve discovered with project teams is what you describe, it is subtle, it’s a different tone of voice.  It’s a lot of times I’ll walk into a room, and there’s not an energy level there that I normally sense, there’s no laughter, there’s no chatting.  You know, there’s no side conversations going on.  And so it may be everybody’s just totally focused on work. But sometimes, after a while, I think it becomes kind of a warning signal of, hey, wait a minute, there is some underlying conflict here. People are at odds.  They’re quiet.  They’re also kind of out of their normal behavior.  So then we need to get into it and see what is the source, what’s happened?  What did I miss, you know, that kind of thing.  So I think the subtle signs are the ones that, as I grew as a project manager, those I had to become more aware of.  So I think it’ll be interesting to see what we get into with some of these examples. Sources of Conflict NICK WALKER:  Is there a common source?  I mean, does it all stem from the same place? BILL YATES:  Well, Nick, that’s why you’re here in the room with us. NICK WALKER:  Ah. BILL YATES:  This is an intervention. NICK WALKER:  To instigate the conflict. BILL YATES:  You’re it, dude.  Yeah, you’re the conflict guy. NEAL WHITTEN:  I hear people often say that breakdown in communication is a major root cause, but it’s not always that. So I’ll give you some examples of causes of conflict, in my course I have over a dozen of them.  But I’ll just throw a couple out from memory here.  Limited resources.  For example, we all need access to resources, whether it’s time or funds or IT services. Maybe you just need a meeting room or help from colleagues, and when there’s too little resource to satisfy that need, conflict can arise. BILL YATES:  Absolutely. NEAL WHITTEN:  Personality clashes.  We all think a bit differently, sometimes the slightest offense can fester into a more serious conflict. And another one’s unfair treatment.  So we’ve got our own perceptions of what is fair and not fair, and oftentimes without the other party having a clue that we feel like we’ve been wronged.  I’ll tell you one that I really like a cause, and that is psychological needs.  Most people have some desire for power, control, and status recognition, and these desires can also lead to conflict.  So let me throw one more out that comes to mind, poor implementation of recognition and awards. Most of us feel that we’re not appreciated enough, and so seeing your coworkers being recognized can sometimes leave you with a feeling of being overlooked and can become a breeding ground for resentment and conflict. And so as you can see from the few examples I’ve given, there’s a lot of causes for conflict, and there’s many more I don’t have. But one thing is certain, conflict is exceptionally pervasive in any work environment.  Even teams that are high-performing teams, there’s still going to be some conflict.  And in fact, in high-performing teams, you actually want conflict sometimes because what it does is it refines the thinking and the thinking process and helps a team to actually move forward more quickly and so forth.  And when I think of conflict, I actually don’t think of negative, I think of something positive. I actually – so I’m not going to say I look forward to a conflict in a negative way, you know, people yelling or something like that,

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