MANAGING PROJECT TEAMS

MANAGING PROJECT TEAMS

Managing software project teams is a complex task further complicated by a combined increase in the size and complexity of software intensive systems and distribution of project team (Smith, Bohner & McCrickard, 2005). In my opinion, this is general for IT related project that come with its fair share of distribution and complexity.

There are inherent problems with projects as size of team members increase. It becomes more difficult to interact and influence the group and individuals begin to get less fulfillment from their level of involvement in the project. Also, there will be increased need for a centralized decision making.

Elyse (2006), suggests that managing a project team world include tracking individual performance, providing feedback, defining roles and responsibilities, generating reports amongst others.

Schwalbe (2009) lists a couple of tools and techniques for managing projects teams. It states that observation and conversation is key to assessing how team members are feeling and general perspective towards the team goals and targets. It also highlights managing by walking around and engaging in formal and informal conversation with team members. A project manager should aim at listening to team member’s opinion as it highlights the cooperation and team spirit amongst team members. Project performance appraisals is also a tool aimed at giving feedback to team members and it can be used to clarify member responsibilities and develop future training objectives and plans. Conflict management aims at eliminating every form of disagreement that might bring the project to a halt. An issue log  could be applied to a project as a document used to track and monitor issues that require attention as the project progresses. All importantly are people-management and interpersonal skills.

With virtual teams, teams are no longer what they used to be. A virtual team is characterized by a shifting team membership, team members separated geographically, team members drawn from outside the organization and team members can be members of multiple project teams.

In managing a virtual team, the project manager must have a shift in perspective, noting well that face-to –face communication is not paramount anymore and differences in environment can also support high quality interaction depending on how it is used. With virtual teams collaboration happens in a borderless way just like we have in this class and technology should be people oriented as much as possible.

With virtual teams, the project manager must ensure project objectives and targets are well stated and there must be a regular check in to ensure project team members are on the same page. Lisa Kimball (1997, says that an explicit purpose is one of the critical factors that determine the success of a virtual team. A project manager should also ensure that roles and responsibilities are spelt out and also define some additional roles related to communication strategy, such as technical support, use of different communication media etc.

Lisa Kimball (1997) says a project manager should keep in mind that he is to create an environment to support relationships and not just to exchange information. Virtual team projects are more effective this way.

Apart from a strong business objective that drives the establishment of virtual teams, it is the technical infrastructure that is propagates it. Technologies such as meeting and conferencing tools like the WebEx by Cisco, enterprise messaging systems such as blackberry messenger and so on are example of technology infrastructures virtual teams may use.

Finally, there are a whole lot of techniques and tools available to help a project manager best manage a project and its people whether locally or virtually but the important thing is to know when and how to apply them

References

Jamie L. Smith, Shawn A. Bohner, D. Scott McCrickard (March 18, 2005) Center for Human-Computer Interaction and Department of Computer Science Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA 24061-0106 USA: Project Management for the 21st Century: Supporting Collaborative Design through Risk Analysis [Research Paper] Available from: ACM digital library.

Lisa Kimball (1997), “ Managing virtual teams” Text of speech given by Lisa Kimball for Team Strategies Conference sponsored by Federated Press, Toronto, Canada, 1997 available online from: http://www.groupjazz.com/pdf/vteams-toronto.pdf

Elyse (2006) “Managing a project team”  available online from:   http://www.anticlue.net/archives/000799.htm

Schwalbe, K. (2009). Information Technology Project Management. Sixth Edition, Boston, MA: Cengage Learning