Project Hero Blog - Weekly Best Practices and Tips

Nearly every workplace has its share of challenging and difficult to manage stakeholders. The trick is to know how to approach and manage these people without letting them get the best of you. When you can do that, the entire team will also be better off!

A challenging stakeholder is anyone who is difficult to work with and who regularly or occasionally makes your life difficult. They can be...

Leaving a key stakeholder out of project decision-making may have consequences. Stakeholders that are affected may have an interest in or power over your project. If left out, they may not care, but some may have hurt feelings, or worse yet, want to cause harm to your project. It is always better to over, rather than under identify stakeholders - you can always remove someone from the list, but...

Whether you have a predictive or agile project, you will always need to have the team on the same page and satisfy the client.  Today, we're going to look at the two best ways to get team and client buy in.  Involvement and clarity are two of the best ways to obtain buy-in.

Involvement: The #1 Tool for Buy-in

Let's suppose you developed a course.  If you were asked to approve the...

Last week we looked at 4 Steps to Diligently Delegate.  There are five very common barriers to enacting a successful delegation. Good project managers understand what these are and avoid the pitfalls.

1.  The project manager may have a personal interest in the task. While you may have a personal interest, your job now is to manage and grow the team. Don't let your personal interests...

While agile methods may not fit every project, every project that uses agile automatically gets a boost in customer experience, satisfaction, and engagement.  This is a substantial benefit that most businesses crave!  Check out these  5 ways that agile, if done correctly, can improve customer relationships and propel your business forward.

1. Customer involvement is elevated and...

Always foster good relationships with the client and the team, and remember that the client has the final acceptance of deliverables. If you are practicing Agile, the client will also be a part of the team. Here are four ways you can use to demonstrate respect for your client.

1. Respect the client's time. Conduct efficient meetings, starting with agendas, and ending with action items and...

Whether you are a project manager or a business analyst, these five open-ended questions posed to the project sponsor and other senior executives can get you vital information you need for project success in a short amount of time:

1. What does success look like to you? – Learn what is most valuable to manage the triple constraints appropriately.
2. What are your biggest challenges and...

The execution phase of a project, while not immune to issues, can be as effortless as possible if you follow these principles:

1. Do the right amount of planning: too little and things "fall through the cracks", too much planning risks "analysis paralysis".
2. Get the right team: people that want to do the work, have the skills and have a supportive network.
3. Exercise key soft skills: delegation,...

It's always better to over-identify, rather than under-identify stakeholders.  Missed stakeholders, particularly those that are self-appointed, can hold your project back from achieving success.  Here are five easy ways and places to identify stakeholders:

1. Consult Project Charter: Project Sponsor, project manager, possibly project team members, and other stakeholders may be listed...