From as early as the mini sim we were told to consider outside factors such as vacation times for inspectors when planning a schedule so we don't get delayed unnecessarily. Because the job of a PA is group centric and requires the cooperation of many other people, how do you suggest dealing with unresponsive members or members who don't communicate as often? As the PA you need to keep track of peoples activities to make sure we are on schedule but since we aren't supposed to get too caught up in micromanaging, what do you suggest a PA does when there is an uncooperative person? This can be that guy who has been a the company for 25 years and is getting ready to retire, or that person who differs all their work to their subordinates. What do you suggest doing when all members cannot meet at a single time to bring everyone up to speed?
As a PA, I would bring up that effective (not necessarily constant) communication is needed for the successful completion of the project, and that x amount of meetings per month should happen to make sure everyone is up to speed every time we meet, and make sure everyone can agree with the plans set. When there is an uncooperative person, it is best to reach out to them individually and ask if they're able to make the meetings, and if they have any issues with the meeting times. If they cannot make it, I would set up a separate meeting or email meeting notes to them and make sure they go over everything so they are aware of the current situation. It's important that everyone is aware of the status of the project and what is needed to keep moving along in order to continue progress.
I believe it is important to understand how the employee is being unresponsive and what may be causing them to not cooperate. Once this is established, arrange a time to speak with the employee about your expectations and see if there is anything you can do to make their situation more manageable. It’s also important to explain the situation to them from your point of view in hopes of instilling responsibility.
Effective communication between team members can either make or break a project. This is especially true now given the remote and virtual world we live in. With lack of in-person meetings, it is now harder than ever to ensure not only that every member of a team is on the same page, but also that every member pulls their share of the weight in order to reach the goal of the project on time. For situations where communication is lacking, whether that be from a project team member or someone of higher status in management, a project manager should first propose solutions to an issue before calling out the person who appears to be slacking. It may be best to first ask that person the reason for their lack of communication or ask if there is any changes that could be made, such as scheduling or project roles, so that that person could better contribute to the project. Obviously, if this doesn't work, stricter actions should be taken against someone who is repeatedly not contributing to the project.
In the little experience I have working with a project team and an advisor who was not very responsive, my team found the best solutions to this issue to be overcommunication and intentional scheduling. We documented every step of the project for our advisor in an organized manner, so that we were always prepared in the event that the advisor had any questions for us. Even though the advisor was not exactly responsive to our emails, we set up weekly meetings and made sure to cover any questions and ideas we had during this time as we knew we would have to most likely wait until next week's meeting for any more responses. Although dealing with people who do not respond in a timely manner or when you would like them to can be frustrating and challenging, learning how to make the best of these situations and find solutions is a great project management (and life) skill to have.
Nowadays with COVID-19, this is a very common issue. Not getting a hold of someone is definitely possible since it is not that easy anymore to just stop by someone's desk for 15min and get the answer to question. The project manager has to provide the best tools for the team to have the best communication since communication plays a huge role in the project's success. Weekly meetings are definitely helpful to talk to all team members and their functional updates, it works really well to bring all the team members up to speed on the project as a whole and assign action items to people in order to follow up with them in the next meeting. If the project manager is providing all the available communication tools to the team and still one of the team members is not responding or cooperating then the project manager should take to this person directly to find out the reason behind it and try to work out something with that person if it is due to workload. If it turns out that there is no reason for that person to be nonresponsive, then sending him emails his tasks and copying his manager always raises a flag and makes him get on his tasks. I would personally escalate this issue to his manager as the last option after I have tried everything with him.
In terms of large-scale communication, I feel that emails or smaller scale meetings would be sufficient rather than trying to get a meeting with all members. Recording meetings or having people call into meetings is also always an option. For employees that are not cooperating on their work a simple meeting or email should hopefully suffice to understand why they are underperforming or missing deadlines. If the issue persists or cannot be solved quickly then discussing having another employee join the project is possible or giving the work from the employee to current team members that are capable of completing it alongside their work. These cases are really for employees that have some uncontrollable outside issue like a health or emergencies. For employees that have simply stopped meeting the goals set for them without an explanation then termination may be the only option.
In every organization, when handling a project, there is always that one person that is difficult to deal with; either they lack communication or are unresponsive and do not cooperate with the team members, which ends up having an impact on the productivity, morale, and progress of the project. It doesn’t just derail a project, also, it can be costly, and it has the potential to harm the company's reputation and cost the business clients. When the stakes are high, it may be hard to be compassionate or have patience with people who seem to be outrageously uncooperative, but you can’t afford to lose your cool. Before you approach any uncooperative team member about resolving an issue, make sure your head is clear and you’re calm enough to have a productive conversation.
Address the issues directly and swiftly to ensure your project doesn't go over budget, miss deadlines or otherwise become negatively impacted. Listen to that person’s side of the story to determine if their complaints have merit, but otherwise reiterate the needs of the project and what your expectations are as project manager. If necessary, limit the contact the difficult employee has with others on the team to ensure productivity. Sometimes, independent tasks are better for difficult personnel than group projects.
Stay on top of the difficult employee’s progress and contributions to the project. Document every interaction with the difficult employee to create a record of how you’re handling the issue.
In conclusion, is not all about just letting the difficult person go or replacing them as many have said. You should also consider how deep into the project you are, weighing the outcome before resulting to removing this individual from the project and recommending further steps, including performance review, suspension or even termination. You should also know that dealing with difficult project team member is as much about YOU as it is about THEM. The first part is about changing your own thinking and perceptions so that you will have the right attributes to execute the second part which entails the actual strategy and processes needed to resolve your difficult project team member issues.
Speaking from past experiences especially when dealing with team members who do not communicate effectively their availability is a huge problem, as projects are usually very dependent on each others task. Especially if they are not available for a certain time as that would result in bottle necks, which can elongate the project with out any valid reasons. IN most cases the availability for team members can be clearly communicated as vacations are planned well in advance. However there are some cases in which team members have family emergency which is completely and understandable and important for the PM to adjust.
First, as mentioned in the lecture, it is important for the PM to obtain the best methods of communication from each of the team members. Especially in a time when many in-person meetings are limited and projects may have to rely largely on virtual communication, it is essential that each members provide more than one way of reaching them. I think it is also extremely beneficial to plan multiple meetings with the team and with individual members ahead of time. If dealing with a team member who is always busy, scheduled meetings are a way to ensure that you have a set time to discuss assigned tasks, progress, etc.
As a few people have mentioned, I think it is important to assess the situation first and find the cause of why a team member is being unresponsive. If it results from a situation that is out of the person's control like family emergencies or health issues, then a temporary solution could be reassign his/her tasks to other members of the team. This ensures that the tasks are completed by their deadlines without removing an otherwise valuable member of the team. If the stem of the issue is rooted in laziness or lack of diligence then the PM should become more persistent in trying to reach out whether it be through emails, in person meetings, or calls. If the person remains unresponsive despite the PM's persistent efforts, then removing the individual from team could be the best option. It is a waste of time and effort to keep reaching out to a team member who shows no effort in contributing their part of the project.
If I needed to deal with members that are not cooperative or communicative as a project manager I would try to change the Communications Management Plan. The changes I would make would be to increase the frequency of project status meetings and creating more channels for information transfer. This would encourage team members to be more responsive with the project manager and other team members.
From as early as the mini sim we were told to consider outside factors such as vacation times for inspectors when planning a schedule so we don't get delayed unnecessarily. Because the job of a PA is group centric and requires the cooperation of many other people, how do you suggest dealing with unresponsive members or members who don't communicate as often? As the PA you need to keep track of peoples activities to make sure we are on schedule but since we aren't supposed to get too caught up in micromanaging, what do you suggest a PA does when there is an uncooperative person? This can be that guy who has been a the company for 25 years and is getting ready to retire, or that person who differs all their work to their subordinates. What do you suggest doing when all members cannot meet at a single time to bring everyone up to speed?
Being responsive in communication has a very specific, but obvious meaning once you know what it is, and responsiveness is absolutely critical for creating better relationships, trust, and rapport with people at home and at work. And the neat part is you already know what it's NOT.
Responsiveness, in communication, refers to the degree that what YOU say, responds clearly and directly, to what the other person just said. If you are being responsive, the other person knows you are paying attention, and care enough about what he or she is talking about to "stay on that topic".
Communication is key to any project that involves multiple individuals. I want to think that anyone working on my team has been deliberately picked, which wouldn’t be a huge issue. Nonetheless, nothing is perfect, and these types of problems can arise. I always like to default to the human first to understand the issue at hand, so I would reach out to them and ask how everything is going and if there is a way that I can assist them after noticing the lack of communication. I would also still lead, with communication being key to make sure things run smoothly for them and the team. We are in it this together. If they cannot meet personally, we can meet virtually or by phone, whichever is most convenient. If no one can meet simultaneously, notes can be sent in from each person with updated detailed notes. For the individual who refuses to communicate by any means, I would be left to consider what effect it is having on their work completion and the team’s overall plan. If there has been no issue with work completion and the team has progressed at the proposed pace, it wouldn’t be as big of a problem. However, they would still be informed by mandatory meetings, email, or writing to adhere to communication policies as a risk management issue.
From as early as the mini sim we were told to consider outside factors such as vacation times for inspectors when planning a schedule so we don't get delayed unnecessarily. Because the job of a PA is group centric and requires the cooperation of many other people, how do you suggest dealing with unresponsive members or members who don't communicate as often? As the PA you need to keep track of peoples activities to make sure we are on schedule but since we aren't supposed to get too caught up in micromanaging, what do you suggest a PA does when there is an uncooperative person? This can be that guy who has been a the company for 25 years and is getting ready to retire, or that person who differs all their work to their subordinates. What do you suggest doing when all members cannot meet at a single time to bring everyone up to speed?
This is a great question! From my experience from doing group projects with people in various time zones with various day-to-day lives, having all the work easily accessible is ideal. For example, keeping all the work on one platform that can be accessed from anywhere is extremely helpful. Also, taking excellent project notes will be helpful. Providing a quick synopsis of changes or amendments made to the project is important. Many platforms have a way of tracking additions and edits to documents, so having something like that will help because someone can skim over it to see the project flow without having to inquire to every individual. This will also help with keeping everyone accountable and on schedule.
The communication challenges described in this question’s scenario are reflective of challenges within the culture of the company, or lack thereof. A good HR business partner will be a solid remedy to provide influence external to the project. Therefore, the company may need to adopt leadership principals. This will help all employees to coalesce around best practices approaches that can net result. 360 surveys can also help to motivate non-engaged employees. Open calendars are another strategy to add transparency to projects and tasks employees are responsible.
Still, project manager competency is an issue continuously studied and through the project manager competency development framework the skills needed through the PMI Talent Triangle are technical project management, leadership, and strategic and business management. An emphasis on leadership training: knowledge, skills and behavior needed to guide, motivate, and direct a team, should be implemented. The right leader skills can get the employees to be more organized about meeting.
If an individual on a group project is not cooperating, as a PA, I would do my best to reach out to him/her. I would contact the individual directly and ask them if they need any assistance to fulfill their portion of the project, just to see what their progress is. I would also inform them of how valuable they are to the completion of the project. Afterwards, tell them how communication is also a valuable trait to successfully completing any project and I need more communication from them. Informing them the importance of communication and possibly working with them to find solutions for effective communication.
Depending on the complexity of the project, if everyone cannot meet at a single time, due to varying schedules, having a biweekly meeting, via zoom/teams, of their progress would suffice. Being kind and understanding/flexible to those who work for you or with you, increases morale and work performance. Individuals are more willing to excel at work when they feel appreciated and not belittled/micromanaged and treated as an equal.
The only way for a PM to communicate to unresponsive members of a team, or members with clashing schedules, is to make the necessary information readily available in a communication forum. This forum could be an email, it could be a group messaging app like Slack or GroupMe, or the information can be posted in person in designated work areas. Notifications of these posting should be made regularly to keep the team up to date. All permitted necessary information involving the project should be made easily available to those unable to meet. The PM can make individual meetings with task managers if necessary to make the workplace seem more personable. If the schedule permits visit task sites, a quick way to convey important information would be the methods above.
