PoddarCo

Any customization handling request discussion is not complete without exploring steering committees.  Who should be on them?  Why are they important?  How frequently should the committee meet?

Steering committees should include a development manager, professional services manager, client or project manager (and/or program manager), sales/account executive and project sponsor/senior executive.  The sales executive and client (or project/program/account) manager knows the customer’s pulse.  The development and professional services managers help assess functionality’s LOE and feasibility.  Project sponsors or senior executives help create alignment with broader strategic goals.  Collectively, the committee creates a structure for planning resources, funds, timelines and priorities.

Steering committees help teams and companies of all sizes, from start-ups to multi-nationals.  In small companies, they avoid development going in one direction with the product while the customer wanting something different.  In large companies, they help manage scope creep and last minute changes.  In any organization, they help the project manager or client manager better manage stakeholder’s or customer’s expectations.  Because the committee meets frequently and keeps good documentation (they don’t? BAAAD Committee) there is a traceable record of how the requests were handled.  This helps with communication and avoids things slipping through the cracks.

Steering committees can meet weekly, bi-weekly or monthly – it depends on the project and organization.  In most cases I recommend meetings be bi-weekly.  This avoids blocking key people for longer durations, while allowing everyone sufficient time to follow up on the committee’s action items and prepare for the next meeting.

Tomorrow – Handling Customization: Taking a para out of Agile

Click here to leave a comment (or click the speech bubble next to the title)

Since my last Friday flare-up was on handling customization, this week I’ll explore some basic actionable steps to build into your processes (to handle customization successfully, duh!).

How does one address customer requests in a structured manner?  Establish bi-weekly calls with your customers.  During the calls inform them about new developments at your company.  Ask them about their needs.  Document their requests as wish list items so these requests are traceable.  Assess which requirements are in greater demand – maybe multiple customers are asking for them.  

Take these items to your organization’s professional services or development teams, or steering committees.  Push for them to be incorporated into your product or service.  In follow up meetings, proactively give your customers a status update.  Give them an approximate idea of the timeframe and costs.  Do not hesitate to quote a price.  There will always be room to negotiate.  Prior research into the customer’s budget, functionality’s market appeal and cost will help negotiate better.

Tomorrow – Handling Customization: Steering Committees

Click here to leave a comment (or click the speech bubble next to the title)

You feel your customers keep changing their requests or making “seemingly” unrealistic demands for customizing your product.  So what?  Don’t balk at them!  It pays dividends to keep an existing customer happy.  It pays greater dividends to not lose a customer!  After all, if and when things do come down to that, you may have to give in to all the customization and perhaps more.  And who knows, maybe even for free.  I am not saying you bend backwards from the get-go, but there’s a manner in which to approach any customization request.

Changes will happen.  Customers will look for new functionality and customization in your product so they can adhere to their processes and execute per their strategy (which isn’t static either, esp. in this business environment).  Instead of worrying how the customization impacts your product roadmap, spend your energy researching the requirements first.  Reach out to other existing or potential customers to assess what the functionality’s broader application is.  Then, appropriately plan for it in an iterative release or future product, and perhaps even charge extra $$$ for it.

Many times a product gets enhanced not because the genius in R&D had a brainwave (no offense to my R&D friends) but because you listened to your customers.  This may not apply to Microsoft and Yahoo, but at least the small to mid sized software companies out there, listen to your customers. Comcast – know that you never listened to me and I am waiting anxiously for the day I replace your service!  Fios – where are you?

Click here to leave a comment (or click the speech bubble next to the title)

If you don’t know where you are headed, you never know where you may land up!  As a project manager taking on a new project, one of the first things to do is ensure the vision – the big picture – is clear to everyone on the team.

Your team looks to you for guidance on how all the moving parts fit together, how the dates align, how each unit’s work adds up to create the whole and when does that happen.

A successful project manager has the aptitude to quickly develop a helicopter view of any situation in conjunction with a deep-dive view; he or she also has a knack to read between the lines and see the forest beyond the trees.  Flaunt your project management talent – take charge, do your homework and create a unified vision for the team to strive towards.

(On the homepage, click speech bubble next to the title to leave comments. On the post page, scroll down)

A conversation I heard in an elevator ride to my office: Two people were discussing the extremely cold weather in New York, when

Person 1:  I feel good thinking it’s March.  What I don’t feel good about is the 1000-page project plan I received this morning.  When I have time, maybe in another life, I’ll read it.  It’ll take me at least a few hours.

Person 2:  Hours?  Maybe days!

As they were leaving I glanced at their badges; they were both senior executives at their company.  

If you think updating lengthy project plans weekly is a trifling task (who reads them anyway?) check out the 1-page dashboard under Templates.  Many executives have complemented on its effectiveness.  Like a network diagram, inputs, outputs and many key metrics can be displayed along side processes, phases or teams (represented by hexagons).  Truly, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Click here to leave a comment (or click the speech bubble next to the title)

Stakeholder management is critical to the success of any project.  Numerous projects get derailed leaving behind demoralized teams when stakeholder changes are not managed effectively and carefully.

Any change in stakeholders should alert you to: a shift in power, change in budget control, realignment of priorities and resources, or redirection of key functionality (addition of new requirements, removal of old requirements).

Projects can fail when you do not account for an important stakeholder or a new stakeholder.  Always keep a list of your stakeholders.  Know who they are and engage them frequently.

(On the homepage, click speech bubble next to the title to leave comments. On the post page, scroll down)