How to get people on board with project management

But that’s a big “if.” Many business owners come to EMyth thinking that systems are the solution their business needs.  But systems can’t operate on their own. They need people to work. And project management is no exception.

Over the years, the EMyth Team has designed and led many initiatives in our own business. We've learned from experience that the most important hurdle we need to clear at the very beginning of every project is getting employee buy-in. We're fortunate to have a team of people who genuinely want to contribute because they care about the result, but let's face it: Project management sometimes has a reputation of being about command and control—and people don't like to be told what to do. The project management system, with its lists of tasks and people and dates assigned to them, can feel like a loss of autonomy over the work they want to contribute.

The truth is that project management is a gift that provides a collaborative space in which everyone can contribute with ease and help produce the best results. When you have a great project management system in place, when you clearly communicate it as a gift of productive co-creativity,  and when your whole team is trained to understand and participate in the system, your business becomes just that much less dependent on you. You can confidently delegate projects with a high degree of trust that the system and the people running it will complete your projects according to plan.

Like we always say at EMyth: Structure leads to freedom. As a business owner, it’s your job to lead your team by showing them how true this is—by developing incredible systems and by overcommunicating with clarity that systems are about productivity, co-creativity, teamwork and results. Your project management system is a key part of your systems strategy because it's critical to accomplishing the work of managing and growing your business.

Once you’ve created a project management system that works for your business, how do you get your team engaged and committed to the process? Here are three steps.

Like with any big initiative, laying a strong foundation is essential. To do that well with project management, introduce your system to your employees in a way that thoughtfully positions its great features and possible gains for your individual team members and their work within the project framework. For your team, some benefits include:

• More clarity around the stages of the project and their role(s) along the way—so they don’t ever feel like they’re guessing
• Total visibility into project progress—so they can see how their work matters to the bigger picture
• The ability to discuss and adjust scope, budget, timeline and assignments—so they never feel trapped in trying to produce a result that they discover is actually unaffordable or infeasible with available team bandwidth
• A project-specific digital work space for team document sharing and communication—so they have a dedicated space to collaborate

Ultimately, though, the biggest value you can share is how a unified project management and tracking system helps your team achieve even the biggest project goals with a predictable, highly positive result—one that comes from strong collaboration, support and pride.

Think of your project like you would a symphony. Your goal is to produce a flawless performance. To get there, the conductor (the project manager) must lead the orchestra (project stakeholders and team members) through the stages of practice and performance. Each player has a different instrument and area of expertise. It’s obviously going to work better if everyone knows their parts, but they can’t just know their parts in a vacuum; they need to practice together in the concert hall with clear leadership. Using a project management system with everyone playing their part creates a collective result that far exceeds the sum of those parts.

During your pitch, your task is to help your team see and believe that this system of collaboration is the best way to accomplish the project’s core objective. To do this, you need to provide a project management overview.

• Every project has five phases: initiate, plan, work, launch and close. Explain what they look like and what happens in them (which means understanding them yourself).
• Train your employees on the specifics of each phase.
• Introduce and train your team on whatever project management tool you’ve chosen to use (Asana, Trello, Basecamp, etc.).
• Roll out and integrate the system, providing ongoing support to help your team own the tools and the process.

Communicating with your team doesn’t stop once this framework is built. Make sure you get team buy-in at every stage. Before you or any of your managers ever assign someone a task, talk to that person about it and make sure they understand and can do the task, and that they agree to your estimated due date and to being accountable for an on-time delivery. Assigning tasks without getting team member agreement is a surefire way to erode confidence in the process.

Projects are little worlds that are constantly evolving. When you get started, you have a best guess of what the beginning looks like and where it might go from there. But unexpected issues are sure to arise, like missed due dates, changes in deliverables or employee skill gaps.

Your team members—both project managers as well as individual contributors—will absolutely need to adjust for unforeseen circumstances. So be comfortable with that, and make sure your team is as well. These adjustments require skillful change management, and one way to tackle that is by making sure regular all-team check-ins are part of your project management system. Check-ins are the place to ask:

• What’s working well, and how can we leverage that going forward?
• Are tasks being completed on time? Why or why not?
• Do any team members need additional support to complete their tasks?
• Have new aspects of the project been revealed that require changes to the project plan?
• Will we need to adjust the scope, resources or timeline to stay on track?
• Who and what can we celebrate today?

Collaboration within your meetings brings everyone into the adjustment process. And for the manager, it’s the best way to control risk and prevent a communication breakdown. Without these regular team meetings, you and your managers will start to hear things like, “I didn’t know I needed to do that,” or, “I thought you were going to do that piece.” It’s exactly like someone playing the wrong notes in your concert: Their music isn’t right; their playing isn’t right; they’re not in harmony.

Everyone needs closure, especially after they’ve invested so much in a project. The “Close” Phase is the last of the five project management phases—and it can be easily overlooked.

Whoever is managing a project (you or one of your team members), it’s up to them to gather the project team, look at the project together, and show the group where it worked well—and be honest about where it didn’t.

This is called the Project Retrospective. Every project team member and stakeholder should join this meeting to discuss lessons learned—the good and the bad—and what improvements to make for next time. Most importantly, it’s an opportunity for the project lead to thank the team and celebrate their amazing efforts. It’s the final note of the symphony—and you have to make sure your team knows not to drop it.

Good luck in your mission to bring your team into the world of project management! You’ll be glad you did. Building and implementing a new project management system is so worth the time and energy it will take to onboard your people. And if you’re still looking for a project management tool that works for your business, check out our guide “The Entrepreneur’s Guide to the 27 Best Organizational Tools for Business.”

I’d love to hear your thoughts or anything you’ve tried in your business already. Please share in the comments below.