Podcast episode 034: Managing small projects (part 1 of 2) [31:54m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (7601)

Today’s post is part 1 of a roundtable discussion held recently on managing small projects.  I am happy to welcome back to the show Cornelius Fichtner of the PM Podcast at www.thepmpodcast.com.  Congratulations to Cornelius who recently celebrated his 100th episode on The PM Podcast with an interview with legendary producer and musician Alan Parsons. Also joining us again on the show is Shawn Futterer of the International Community of Project Managers, which can be found at www.theicpm.com. Be sure to check out both of their websites for great pm process advice, tools, and techniques.

Shawn Futterer, PMP®, is a certified project management professional with a broad range of experience. He started his career in 1992 managing quality control projects for a small manufacturing company and is currently working in a PMO for a Fortune 50 telecommunications company where he supervises project managers for the North region. Over the course of his career, Shawn has managed projects of all shapes and sizes. Shawn has a keen interest in the methodologies, strategy, planning and operations. He has over fifteen years of hands-on project management experience and has led, consulted on or contributed to: process development efforts, various methodologies and multiple training programs. Shawn attributes a project managers success to their ability to provide a strategic view and a demonstrated ability to interact and communicate effectively with all levels of an organization. Shawn runs the Project Management Learning Center as part of the TenStep Global Community.

Cornelius Fichtner, PMP®, is the host of The Project Management Podcast and The Project Management PrepCastTM. The Podcast is a general PM related podcast and the PrepCast prepares listeners for the PMP® exam. Cornelius worked as a Project Manager in his native Switzerland, in Germany and in the USA for the last 16 years. He received his PMP® credential in April 2004. He has led projects for a management consulting company, a national retailer and an internet startup company. Currently, Cornelius works as a project manager for one of the oldest financial service providers in the USA. His passions are project management methodologies and PMOs. Cornelius is also an instructor for the PMP® Workshop for his local PMI chapter and serves as the chapter’s chair until the end of this month. He currently lives in Silverado, California, USA with his wife and their two computers.

During today’s show, Cornelius, Shawn and I will be discussing how managing a small project differs from managing a larger project.  Is managing a smaller project always easier? Do you have to use the same process and templates? How do you define a small project?

Show Commentary

Shawn defines small projects in his organization as those projects that are short in duration; somewhere between 30 to 60 days in length.  Whereas Cornelius suggests that the criteria for a small project is really determined by the company’s policies on what is considered a small project based on certain criteria.

There is a difference between a small project and regular job activities.  A small project has fundamental deliverables like a charter, schedule, scope, and a management plan, where activities like creating a template or gathering data is more informal.

Frequently multiple smaller projects are assigned to a single project manager, and as a result sometimes setting stakeholder expectations and being careful not to get caught in bad multitasking between the different assigned projects comes into play.

Shawn works in an organization where the project process is a “one size fits all” methodology based on PMI’s best practices.  A previous employer of Cornelius had a very large (500 page) methodology for all projects, large and small.  Cornelius was given the task to create a greatly reduced (1 page) methodology for smaller projects.  The key is to a good process is that it is scalable is flexible to provide enough process, but not too much.

Small Project Applications

Cornelius uses a lot of the same approaches on a small project as he does on larger projects, but to a reduced scale.  For example, there may not be a formalized charter provided in some cases on a small project, but project approval could be documented by a simple email from the sponsor.  Cornelius uses Microsoft Visio to help create a work breakdown structures, and the size or complexity of the project helps to determine how detailed the WBS needs to be.  Then Cornelius sends this out to the stakeholders as a pdf document.  During the execution portion of the project, Cornelius recommends using management by walking around as an informal way of insuring the project deliverables are completed.  Cornelius does a quick weekly status reports for his projects focusing on what was completed since the last status report, what is expected to be completed in the coming week, and some details on those areas where the team is struggling.  Then finally, once the project is over, Cornelius takes his team out for lunch as a celebration.

Shawn uses a similar approach that Cornelius does.  He takes the time to do some basic scope definition and project planning with assumptions, risks, and requirements.  He then transfers these items to a Microsoft Excel-based action list, since Excel is an application that is readily available to all team members.  He has a list of what needs to be done, when it needs to be done, and by whom.  Once the team starts executing to plan, Shawn too uses weekly status reports.  The key is constantly be communicating with team members through one-on-one informal meetings and informal communications like email, phone calls, and videoconferences with those off-site.  90% of a project manager’s responsibility is communication regardless if it is a large or small project.

The maturity of the organization helps to determine how formalized the process needs to be for a particular project.  For example, in Cornelius’ organization a project that requires more than 240 resource hours requires more formalized documents like a signed charter and contracts.

In Episode 35, we will continue our discussion with Shawn and Cornelius.  Leave us a comment and tell us how small projects are managed in your company?

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