I’ve been riding the rough waters of various projects for the past few months. And while there’s a wealth of things to blog about, the one thing that I’m starting to get is that there is a definite feel to a project that’s healthy. Like healthy families and dysfunctional families, you know where you are as soon as you walk in the door.
One trait that’s starting to pop up as a symptom of dysfunctional projects is the dead issues list.
Boy does this PM have....issues!
On live healthy projects, issues lists are like wipe boards. They are active, usually worked on in collaborative, online spaces -like Sharepoint. They become a thing that is always changing, never perfect, never spell checked. They have numbers or indicators that are alive and have meaning. And you overhear things like ‘Hey – where are we with issue 123?’ or ‘Let’s pull up that issue again, I need to see what the user wrote.’ They usually are accessible to all team members, including users. Active issues lists are kind of like immediate usable reference boards, like flight information at the airport, or a TV guide listing.
On dysfunctional projects, issues lists become the death knoll of doom…the dreaded list of infamy where people are blamed over and over. These issue lists are usually silo’d; as in one person keeps the list and it only surfaces 10 minutes before a meeting. Chances are you’re going to be asked to speak (and get attacked) over the issue that’s been on the list for 10 weeks. And the issues are never ever resolved. They just persist.
Live healthy projects are like healthy families – they talk through issues, they work them out, maybe fight a little, but ultimately, based on a foundation of good will, a resolution is reached. Therefore the issues list becomes the thing that you work on to maintain health. Health is the goal, because healthy projects and teams produce healthy results and products.
Dysfunctional projects are like unhealthy families – they never want to deal with the real issue, which is a certain history of unaddressed actions that have eroded good will. So the issues list is just the tip of the iceburg of hurt feelings, blame and shame. And it’s a heavy, burdensome task to go through it. Because going through means touching on the real issue, which is the lack of good will, but always skirting around it skillfully, and politically.
So next time you get thrown on a project…observe the issue list process. It’s the immediate first indicator of the life and health of the project, in the PM diagnostic kit, it’s your thermometer and stethoscope all rolled into one.
