Chapter 11 CLEAR COMMUNICATION

To be a Project Manager, communication will occur in many forms, with many individuals, including project stakeholders, your internal team, management within your organization, vendors, and more. Communication may pass through verbally or e-mail, as well as charters and project plans, addenda and status reports. These long lists are a small indication of the significance of communication to a Project Manager. There are some simple ways to maintain clear and constant communication efficiently with all parties involved.

1. Plan ahead to info people

Your project plan should include an outline for an ongoing contact strategy, meaning how you will communicate with your team and client, how often and in what form. This could be presented through a simple chart explaining that there will be a weekly status call from you to the client each Monday morning with written action items as a follow-up. Regardless of the details, the point is to set-up expectations by describing your intent before the project commences. This will allow the team and the clients to request a different approach if they feel it would be more effective. People feel confident when they understand what to expect.

2. Repeating –Keeping tracking issues

When decisions or direction is provided verbally, whether it's to your team or your client, always restate these items in writing. The minute details of a project are numerous, what may seem understood today may be forgotten tomorrow. Never take this for granted - do your due diligence by recording and distributing actionable items and decisions for the team. A simple e-mail will often suffice, and having a paper trail of a critical path can prove invaluable when important details get lost in the shuffle.

3. Focus on the main point

Project Managers need to be able to speak well, lead meeting effectively, and resolve conflicts constructively. In addition, they need to listen well, so they can really understand what is being said and get into the point.

As project team members need to have four major communication needs: responsibility, coordination, status and authorization. If all the team members have these four needs and project manager also gave the clear direction. It will be easier and smoother to process all the projects.

We need “Communication” on our daily basis. If we make sure we check our message clearly, provide sufficient context, and make the expectations for any outcome apparent. As with most critical PM skills, communication is something that can be improved continuously.