PM: Do They Know You’re In There?

It is one thing to be calm, cool and collected as we carry ourselves throughout the day. That said, if we are so even-keeled that we never show emotion our team members will have a tough time determining what is truly important in our communications with them. And, they may wonder if we are in there and/or care about what we are doing…

A number of years ago I was leading a project for which we had an extremely time critical issue that needed a prompt, yet thoughtful response. At the prior team meeting we agreed that I would collect key pieces of information and share with the team via email in advance of our follow-up discussion.

Everyone agreed how important this action was and confirmed they’d be watching for the email (to be sent 24 hours in advance) and be ready to discuss and make our decision at the follow-up meeting.

Upon 8 of us arriving at the follow-up, I began the discussion by cuing up the topic, indicating a crucial decision was needed and that the information sent in email should have everything we agreed was required to do so.

It was at this point one of the key subject matter experts indicated that they hadn’t read the email…

At this point I paused, took a deep breath, bowed and rotated my head to stretch my neck and responded with: You’ve got to read your f*ing email!

At this point I had to walk the entire group through the info in the email to catch this one person up. A decision was subsequently reached…

After the meeting one of the senior managers in the room came up to me and said: I’ve never heard you drop the f-bomb, but you absolutely needed to that time. You certainly saved it up for a good one!

As my personal coach and mentor says, we are to bring to the present moment what the present moment requires: nothing more, nothing less.

That is, if we find ourselves getting heated we MUST first pause and determine why. That is, am I pissed because someone cut me off in traffic, I had a disagreement with my spouse, my dog is sick, or whatever?

If those are the reasons we are ticked we do NOT bring that into our project-related discussions as they have nothing to do with it!

If, however, the topic directly relates to the project and the people before us, it is OK, in fact important, to let it be know that we are upset. Doing so ensures they know I’m in here and that I truly care!!!

To be clear, this cannot or should not be a frequent occurrence. Otherwise, we have something else to deal with (namely ourselves).

Know that it is OK to let people know exactly how we feel, especially when there are absolutely critical situations that need our team’s full and immediate attention.

In closing, if you are looking to improve PM capabilities in yourself, or organization, feel free to reach out so that we can discuss how I can help!

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