Communication for Project Managers - A LinkedIn Live Event Recording - PM-Mastery

Episode Transcript
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Intro/Outro (00:12):
Welcome to the PM Mastery Podcast.
This podcast is all abouthelping you master your project
management skills by sharingtips, tricks, tools and training
to get you to the next level,while sharing the stories of
other project managers on theirjourney in project management.
And now here's your host, waltSparling.

Walt Sparling (00:35):
This episode is a recording of my first ever
LinkedIn Live, where I pulledtogether a group of talented
project management professionalswith a plan to do a quarterly
series called PM Nights andLadies of the Roundtable.
Although, honestly, this is theonly episode of this series to
date, I promise there will bemore.
The topic for this live wascommunication for project

(00:58):
managers.
If you'd like to see the liverecording, I'll post a link in
the show notes along with thelinks to the other panelists.
Enjoy the episode.
So this is my first time, sowe'll see John.
Feel free to jump in at anypoint and point out anything.

John Connoly (01:17):
That's great, we're live, so I hope we get a
lot of people joining us thisevening.

I think we had 254 sign up, so if we can, get a
few of those.

All right.
So, walt, I'm going to defer toyou, though, in terms of our
agenda for the evening, and Idon't know if you can explain to
us, kind of, how you see theconversation unfolding for
everyone this evening.

So I sent out kind of an agenda on the group
and I'm basically going to do awelcome, do introductions.
Everyone here is going to get aminute or so, go around, say
who you are, what you do, whereyou're from, and then we'll jump
into like a brief overview whatit's about.
And then I figure for the firsthour or so we're going to
primarily talk amongst ourselvesand if we see something

(02:11):
interesting pop up we'll answerit.
But once we kind of go throughthen we'll open it up to
questions from the audience,which two hours is a long time.
I'm thinking about taking abreak.

Yes, partway through, but we are live, so
folks are watching us right nowand I could see like lots of
folks commenting, so I'm reallylooking forward to hearing.
Yeah, I'm hoping that we'll geta lot of good questions later
on.

So, John, how can I tell how many are on?
Because, like I said first time, it says 34.
Okay, 701.

Clinton "Brooks" Herman (02:51):
So far, Canada is standing the
strongest.
So, Joe, you've got to keepthem occupied.
I don't know how to do that.

Joseph Phillips (03:00):
Canadians, you know, get some bacon and
crullers, some Bob and DougMcKenzie.
That may show my age a littlebit.

Hey Kelly.
So where are you seeing thenumbers?
And I apologize once again.

You have to look on LinkedIn to see them.
Streamyard does not have accessto that.
Who wants to be my number guy?
See them.
Streamyard does not have accessto that yeah, all right.

Who wants to be my number guy?

38.
I got it up on a side screen.

Let's wait until 50.
We'll banter a little bit andwe hit 50.
We'll get moving.

All these poor folks.

Patrick Shrewsbury (03:41):
That number.

Walt is concurrent .
It's just however many peopleare watching all at once.
Yeah, bigger breakdown later on.
I'm sure as to who all is here,but I'm really excited to see a
lot of new names popping uphere to me, like a lot of people
that I'm just not familiar with, and hoping that everyone will

(04:05):
connect so we can talk and, youknow, help everyone learn
together.

Agreed the furthest one so far from Bosnia
stayed awake.
Saw that To see this live, sowelcome, selma Wow.

All right 47.
Oh, three more.
We've got to have a threshold.
Hey, Logan Joseph.

Jeff Plumbee (04:49):
Oh, got somebody from.

Turkey, there's a good one.
Wow, yeah, I see a lot offamiliar names 51 all right, all
right I'm gonna move or islauren?

beat me to it.
She said 50 yeah, all right.

So welcome everyone to the first PM Nights
and Ladies of the Roundtablediscussion, and the plan is to
do this quarterly.
Tonight we're going to betalking about communication for
project managers and I have anexcellent panel on here this
evening and what I'd like to dois kind of go down I'm going to
do this in an alphabetical orderand do a quick intro of

(05:23):
yourself, where you're from,what you do, and we'll start
with Brooks.

Clinton "Brooks" Her (05:29):
Appreciate it Clinton, brooks, herman, and
you can see my name on thescreen.
I do have three first names, sousually that's how I start off
conversations, because it canget confusing and I go by all
three.
But typically, as Walt said, Igo by Brooks.
I'm in the Houston, texas area.
It is nice and warm here, as Ithink most of the world is

(05:51):
feeling too.
I actually work for a contractPM firm and am contracted out to
a large healthcare facility.
It out to a large healthcarefacility.

Healthcare group within the Houston region.

All right, thanks, jeff.
All right, hey guys andeverybody else.
I'm Jeff Plumlee.
I live in Charleston, SouthCarolina.
No-transcript.

(06:37):
I taught project management toundergrad and grad students at
the university level as a tenuretrack.
Faculty for a while Hosted aproject management podcast, had
a couple of you on.
I've hosted a community ofpractice with that as well.
I, in the past year or so,started my own consulting

(06:58):
company, which I've been doingfull-time.
I spend a lot of time nowhelping early stage companies
develop the project managementstructure they need to succeed.
I've currently got some prettyfun projects with Clemson
University, the UN Food andAgriculture Organization and the
National Renewable Energy Lab.
So, yeah, happy to be here.

(07:19):
Thanks for getting us set up.

All right, thanks , jeff Joseph.

Hey, thank you all.
Joe, phillips, or Joseph, ifI'm in trouble I teach project
management.
The director of education atinstructingcom and probably one
of the top project managementtrainers on Udemy just broaching
750,000 people in my classesthere.

(07:46):
So not how I thought my lifewould turn out, but happy that
it has.
I'm in Michigan in the summerand in Sarasota, florida, in the
winter months and Alt and Ihave connected.
He's just up the street from me, so happy to be here with this
group.
A lot of great talent on thiscall.

All right, thanks , joe and John.

Yeah, I'm John Connolly.
I am a project manager, beenmanaging projects for about a
decade.
I spent 16 years as a librarian.
I am really passionate aboutcommunity and the exchange of
information between individualswith lots of experience and
people who are just gettingstarted Really love to connect

(08:32):
with people on LinkedIn.
I've been active on LinkedInfor about a year plus now and
met so many wonderful people, soI'm just very happy to be here
alongside this group, this panel.
I think it's going to be a funtime.

All right, thanks , john Patrick.

Yeah, I'm Patrick Shrewsbury.
I have been in projectmanagement of some form for 20
years.
It's kind of scary when you saythat number.
It may start showing your ageat this point, but it's been
that long.
It may start showing your ageat this point, but it's been
that long.
I actually currently work forJones Ling LaSalle for a large

(09:10):
financial institution, so doinga lot of projects of ground ups.
We do infrastructure and a lotof interior renovations, so tons
of project managementexperience from a construction
background.
Previously to that, I've held alot of leadership roles, some

(09:34):
with Family Dollar, alsoprevious to that with Freedom
Group, which was a vendor forAT&T's engineering here in the
US, especially Southeast, andalong with that I'd say that
probably the biggest strength Ihave in those roles is people
management.
So I love to manage people andsee them succeed.

Thanks, Patrick.
All right, so last but notleast, Walt Sparling.
I have been doing projectmanagement for about 15, 16
years now, Started out in thedesign world, moved into an
owner's rep position with JonesLang Nassau.
Same as Patrick, Serve as anowner's rep for a large utility

(10:18):
company across the US.
I am the current PDS lead forthe state of Florida, so I
manage a small team of PMs inFlorida and then a big fan of
project management in general.
So I started a podcast a fewyears ago called PM Mastery, and
every one of these finegentlemen has been interviewed
on that podcast, as well as alot of the audience that I see

(10:41):
signing in.
So it's good to see you all,lot of the audience that I see
signing in.
So it's good to see you all andI've helped.
I've learned a lot andhopefully shared a lot with some
of the guests that we've had on, with other people that have
listened to the podcast.
All right, so now that we're allhere, let's talk about
communication.
So the topic of communication Ithink is very common in project

(11:04):
management, in the projectmanagement world.
I think is very common inproject management.
In the project management world.
I think there's a few skillsthat project managers are most
known for, and the better theyare at these key skills, the
better they are or more likelythey are to succeed.
And communication in my book ispretty much number one.
So we're going to talk a littlebit about different aspects of

(11:27):
communication and then get someinput from experiences on the
different people on the panel,and then we're going to go into
some questions and hopefullyanswer some questions that the
audience has.
So, Joe, you teach a lot onproject management, so you've

(11:47):
covered communication a lot.
Everyone here has been throughyou know that, certifications
and teaching and, Jeff, you'vedone podcasts on this stuff.
I've heard some of your guests,so a lot of experience on the
topic of communication.
So where do we start, Joe?

(12:15):
I'm going to let you kick usoff with something on what you
would teach your students oncommunication and then we'll all
jump in on it.

Well, I always tell project managers that if
you want to do one thing to makeyour project better, just one
thing is to communicate more.
I think that it's so easy tomake assumptions what other
people know because we're in themiddle of it as PMs and you
know you have to look at it fromother people's perspective and

(12:41):
all the things that they havegoing on and that your project
is in that mix.
But it's kind of this separateentity and people don't always
know what you know.
And it's easy to make thatassumption and then to
communicate on a regular cadence, whether it's weekly or every
couple of days, but keep peopleposted.
I think that all goes back torequirements gathering is

(13:04):
understanding what ourstakeholders want from us,
what's important to them.
That's what we have to listen.
It's a big part ofcommunication, of course, is
listening what's important tothose stakeholders and that
tells us what we need tocommunicate.
So if you miss that step at thebeginning, then you've got some
work cut out for you.

(13:25):
I think new PMs sometimes get alittle timid and they're like a
waiter taking down orders ratherthan asking questions.
You have to consider thestakeholder.
They want you to be interested.
They want you to ask questionsfor clarity.
Everybody wants to get theproject requirements right up
front but you know some ofthat's going to come with

(13:45):
experience of you know be ableto look into and understand what
people are really saying.
But anybody can ask questionsand be curious about what your
stakeholders are asking for andto really listen and have them
tell the story and to not be theperson that's talking through

(14:08):
the whole conversation, but letthem communicate to you and take
that in and really payattention, really get involved
and focus on what that person'stelling you.
I think that is fundamental toany role if you want to be
successful.

Yeah, and communication is a conversation.
It's not a one-way street,unless you're married.

I'm joking.

I think you know just to kind of pile onto this,
joe makes a great point herethat you know, when we're
project managers, like otherpeople, are generally the
subject matter experts.
Right, we know what we know,but we're not necessarily going
to be subject matter experts ineverything we do, and we
shouldn't be.
But that's, that's fine, that'sperfect we are.

(14:57):
We can be idiots in somecircumstances, right, we just
have to be able to ask thequestions and don't be afraid to
ask those questions.
You only come across as anidiot if you don't ask the
questions and three months laterit comes up.

Yeah, and one of the first things on the agenda
was communication management.
And it's because, during theentire project, there is no
phase that requirescommunication.
Every phase requirescommunication, from start to end
.
And it's true, you may know howto manage a project and that's
why project managers can go fromindustry to industry.
They might do better in certainones, especially with

(15:33):
background, but it's knowing theprocess, knowing how to
communicate, gather thatinformation and then lead the
people through the project iswhat's going to make you
successful.

And a lot of people on this panel have some
great experience, I think,working with stakeholders,
working with gatheringrequirements.
But I'm curious what everyoneon the panel would say.
Those questions need to beright.
I think a lot of times ouradvice is really general.
You know, get in there, askquestions and listen actively.
It's like great, got it.
But getting true insight out ofpeople is not easy in my

(16:12):
experience.
And I just ask them what do youneed?
Like 90% of the time, I think.
A lot of times thosestakeholders they either don't
know what they need or theydon't realize that they don't
know what they think they need.
And, um, so like when we'regetting in there, we, it's good,
get in the room, have theconversations, but are there any
questions that you all ask?

(16:34):
That would be like practicalapplication just to get in
people's minds and start gettingthem thinking about what the
requirements need to be I thinkat the get-go you should start
start off with who, what, where,when, how.

And the biggest one is when.
When do you need this by Right,because that makes a huge
difference.
It may stop a project rightthen, and there, if you say,
well, this is probably a12-month process, not a
two-month.

Hopefully one of my most important questions is
asked before we get to the tableis why?
Why are we doing this project?

I like to ask what does done look like?
You'll paint me a picture ofwhat this looks like and you're
going to be happy when we'redone.
So show me the vision, and thenJohn to your point.
We're done, so, show me thevision, and then the John to
your point.
Sometimes they don't know whatthat vision is, so then it's
like well, back to like okay.
Well, why are we doing this?
What's the pain that we'retrying to resolve?
So let me see that pain fromyour perspective, from your,

(17:37):
your LOBs perspective.
And that leads me to what theresolution should be, because
oftentimes you're right, theydon't know what they want.
I don't know what I want, butit's not this.
You get into that circle, yeah,dangerous.

Yeah, for sure.
And something that I've leanedon a little bit too, that I've
found helpful, is asking youknow you ask probing questions
for sure.
Try to listen, make sure you'refollowing those up right.
Follow the thread back if youcan, but at the end of the
conversation, something that Iusually will ask a key

(18:15):
stakeholder when we're doingrequirements gathering is what
you know.
Do you have questions for me?
Sure, check Got it, and isthere anything I didn't ask that
you think I should have asked?

Oh yeah, that's good.

It's like hey, I don't know what, I don't know, I
need to broadcast on allfrequencies that I'm not the
subject matter expert and I'mtrying to get in.
I need to work with them to getin their head.

I need to work with them to get in
their head Going off the SMEsubject matter expert.
I mean, our job as projectmanagers is to drive.
We are driving the ship to theend result of whatever the
client is requesting.
So if we're not driving them,then that's where we're not
going to be the subject matterexpert.
If you want to know everything,you might be in the wrong boat.

(19:11):
Being a project manager, maybeyou need to focus in on a
smaller scale, but we have tomake sure all the three ring
circus gets to present toeverybody.

So that's true, yeah, and just one thing also
to add is so that's true.

Yeah, and just one thing also to add is it
and I see it a lot because wehave a lot of new project
managers that come through andthe first thing that happens is
they're assigned a project there.
There usually is a scope that'sattached to that.
This is kind of what you'regoing to do on this project, and

(19:59):
before they do anything, theywant to hit the ground running
and so immediately they starttrying to get the stakeholders
involved, project and you'redoing well, but you've never
really talked and see exactlywhat that end user really does
want.
And that's something that wecoach and practice often,
because it's very often missedfrom someone new, really just

(20:20):
trying to please and get inthere and just jump into that
scope that they just learned.

I think, to build on what John mentioned with the
we don't know what we don't knowwhen we think about that, when
we ask who else should I betalking to, sometimes we end up
going two or three levels downwith that too.
So it's kind of like the fivewhys exercise, except for it
ends up being the five whosright.
Our stakeholder analysis isn'tcomplete until we ask our

(20:49):
stakeholders who else we shouldbe talking to.
If we miss an importantstakeholder, we've completely
lost track of what we're doing.
You know, we need to be talkingto our SMEs about that.
We need to ask them what otherconstraints or risks we might be
missing.

I mean like you said, john, we don't know what
we don't know, right, yeah?
So this kind of leads to one ofthe other items on the agenda,
which is a communication plan.
So you can't just willy-nillygo out there and say, well, I'm
going to call some guys, I'mgoing to do a kickoff.
Sometimes we'll do multiplekickoffs an internal kickoff
with just a core team, and thenwe'll do a project kickoff with
all the ISPs and all the SMEsand bring all of those in.

(21:30):
But you have to have a plan tohow you're going to get there
and you have to have.
How are you going tocommunicate with high-level
stakeholders and with everydaystakeholders and with SMEs?
And when are you going to doyour updates?
How often?
In what format Are they goingto be visual?
When are you going to do yourupdates?
How often?
In what format are they goingto be visual?
Are they going to be email?
Are they going to be in person?
So you have to put a plantogether to.

(21:51):
You have to have acommunication plan.
What do you guys?
Anything on that?

I'm a big fan of.
I'm not a very smart person, soI like things simple.
So I need a communicationmatrix of our stakeholders and
what do they want and who talksto whom is something that I do
in every project.
And then you know, then youcoordinate that Are these two
people talking?

(22:18):
Are these folks getting theright information at the right
time in the right modality?
So it kind of I use that as aguide every week of you know
like a checklist, you knowfollowing through who's talking
to whom and when.
What's the information thatthey want and they should be
receiving on that regularcadence, and then what's the the

(22:39):
right modality?
Then where does thatinformation go?
That's just not lost in email,that they've got a folder for
that project or a SharePoint forthat project.
That it's centralized.
We can get it when we need itquickly.

I err on the side of
over-communicating and involvingmost of the parties.
I mean there might be specificsituations, if it's involving
the O&M group, where I may justreach out to them directly
because if I have the end userinvolved, but otherwise the end
users tend to enjoy the factthat they're being kept in the
loop even if they're obliviousto what's being discussed, and

(23:17):
that may open the door wherethey end up calling me and
asking questions and then we canadjust scope because it might
need, obviously, avoiding scopecreep, but it might adjust scope
where we need to focus in alittle closer because we were
missing a step.

I want to highlight something, though,
with the overcommunication piece, because I had a conversation
with actually somebody who's inthe audience earlier this week
about a problem with a juniormember of their team
over-communicating with anexternal stakeholder, and they
ended up airing out some dirtylaundry that really didn't need
to be aired out.
So it's important to know whatis and isn't acceptable to

(23:55):
communicate to a client, and Ithink for a new project manager
it's important to realize whatis and isn't.
But even as a veteran projectmanager understanding which of
your staff may be new or not,know that and laying that out up
front, because you knowtransparency is great, but at
the same time, you don't wantyour client or customer worrying

(24:15):
about something that they don'tneed to be worried about
because you, as a projectmanager, already have a
contingency or solution in place.

That's a very good point, Jeff have a
contingency or solution in place.
That's a very good point, jeff.
Yeah, I've seen that with newPMs and we want to be open and
as transparent as we can be.
But there's certain things thatthe client doesn't need to see,
because we need to put that ina format that it covers all
costs, all details, and if youdon't deliver it in the right
way, it just creates morequestions and more delays.

(24:46):
So, as a PM a new PM I wouldask what can I share?
What should I share?

Yeah, going back to the communication plan
as well, I think another thingthat kind of popped in my head
was one, I think, like you guyssaid, is who's the role players,
who's the stakeholders?
Do we need to have an in-person, do you need to have a phone
call?
Does it need to be a web, avirtual?
But also what kind of I wasthinking about was the frequency

(25:18):
.
A lot of times the folks willwant to have a weekly meeting,
biweekly meeting, monthlymeeting, and what's the right
cadence for the type of projectthat you have?
I mean, we will have someprojects sometimes that are very
long and you're in a designphase for several weeks and

(25:39):
maybe it doesn't warrant to havea meeting every single week
with that client, and so youwould want to stretch those out.
But let's have a monthly touchbase until we kind of get into
that construction phase or asyou start to get into that
execution phase, and so it'ssomething else to think about.
Is really that frequency?

And I think that leads to.
What are the other tools thatwe can use besides meetings?
Right, can you set up adashboard for them where they
can visit it at any time, notwaste an hour of your entire
team's week to be sitting on acall where you know maybe
there's one or two updates, butyou've got an hour booked for it
and of course you're going tohave, you know, the intro to the
meeting and the waiting oneverybody to show up and then,

(26:27):
yeah, so you end up taking fiveor 10 hours of staff time for
what could be a 30-second lookat the dashboard and see what
the update is, and then we'lltalk monthly, right?

So I noticed one of our members
stated some of the stakeholdersprefer text, and that kind of
opens up an interesting caveatthat came up with my firm, my
full-time employer.
Apparently, texts are becomingthe manner that if a project or

(26:56):
whatever is going to beinvestigated, they can go and
take your phone and downloadeverything.
Now, granted, this is UnitedStates-based.
I can't speak for some of ourforeign countries that are here,
but they can take your phone,download everything.
Now, granted, this is UnitedStates based.
I can't speak for some of ourforeign countries that are here,
but they can take your phone,download everything, and then
the person you're communicatingwith via text and they will
download everything on yourphone, along with whoever you

(27:17):
are communicating with too.
So just keep that in mind.
On the text piece, I know thesimplicity that it has, but
definitely try to stay withinthe confines of what is covered
underneath your employer.
Now, if you have a specificcell phone provided by your
employer, that's a differentstory.

But it's also the .
There's certain communicationsthat might be able to be done
through text.
You know a quick hey, I heardthere was an issue over there at
the site or on something.
Can you get back with me?
Maybe call me or email me somemore detail?
But I wouldn't be doing broadcommunications through text.

I mean it's going to depend on the nature of the
project as well, right, you know, a tiny project that's only
taking you a couple of months,maybe it's something that you
can communicate safely a littlebit more informally, I think it
does.
It varies so much project toproject.
I think you know I'm here in theWashington DC area, so like 50%
of the people I work with inproject management, they are on

(28:21):
government contracts and it'seasy to forget that if you're
working with the government inparticular, all your
communications could be a matterof public record under FOIA and
that's just something you needto keep in mind, right, that's,
if you're planning for yourcommunications, that needs to be
front and center.
If that's a constraint on thecommunications that you have and

(28:43):
I'm really interested incommunication management plans
when I'm putting them togetherto approach them from a
constraints point of view,because for me it's a matter of
eliminating points of failure,because the failure of the
communication is really what'sgoing to hurt your project in
the long term.
So for me it's not about, like,facilitate or optimize

(29:06):
communication I mean, that'sgreat if you can, but it's to
minimize the risks ofcommunication going wrong.
I had a PM I talked to a coupleof months ago and she was
working in the medical field andthey're constructing things and
you know they had a doctor ontheir team, key stakeholder.
He's 85 years old, he didn'thave a cell phone, he didn't get

(29:28):
texts, he did not have a pager,he did not have a fax machine,
he had a landline phone with noanswering machine attached and
the plan was if you need me, youwill call that number until
someone answers.
There was no backup plan, andthat's the kind of thing you
need to identify early andcreate workarounds for, because

(29:52):
that can kill your project Ifyou have a key stakeholder,
critical stakeholder, that youmight need very quickly.
All of those things are goingto have to be accounted for in
the plan and it's a thoughtexercise for me to start getting
ahead of those things thatcould throw a monkey wrench in
the works.

Okay, I just mind if we circle back really quick
to dashboards.
We've got a couple of commentsin the chat about what to use
dashboards for, so I just wantto make one quick comment here.
I think dashboards are reallygood for certain things.
They're terrible for otherthings.
I think dashboards are reallygood for certain things.
They're terrible for otherthings.
Dashboards are really good for,like task status or budget
status or any sort of likequantitative or binary, yes-no

(30:32):
information.
Dashboards are really good atgiving data, but not necessarily
information.
It'll tell us the what, but notnecessarily the why.
So to I think it was Patrick'spoint.
Like you know, when we have, ifwe have the, if we have a
dashboard, we still need to havesome sort of status update
meetings to explain why thingsmight look out of whack or why
things might be the case thatthey are.

(30:53):
But it just kind of gives aquick pulse check to maybe avoid
those daily or weekly meetingsif they're at too often of a
frequency.

And depending on how often they update those
dashboards.
It's a point in time and, likeyou said, there's no real detail
there.
It's great for leadership ifthey're overseeing a bunch of
projects and they want to knowthe success rate or the current
phase in a project or how manyprojects we're doing, how much
money we're spending, but if youreally want to know the details

(31:22):
, you need to have a meeting orsend out a more detailed report
that covers that data.

Yeah.

Back to John's point for a moment.
Like the text thing we'retalking about and I agree a lot
with what you say, john or thetrim, the possibility of failure
or breakdown.
So I was consulting at a reallybig insurance company in the
Midwest and had people, they hadcontractors, they had people

(31:54):
internally and just the if youneeded something printed out and
you're a contractor, you'd haveto email it to yourself as the
workaround because we didn'thave printers.
So you email it to yourself tohit print and then some of those
contractors could text.
Other people couldn't, you know, couldn't text, you know, so
they had to get their personalphone to text.

(32:16):
And then, you know, somebodycreated a Facebook group in one
of their projects.
It was just such a mess.
There were all these differentavenues to circumvent the rules.
And to some extent, like my rolewas to standardize, so there
weren't a lot of rules andthat's how we uncovered a lot of
that mess, but to have thatcommunication up front as to how

(32:39):
we communicate, the schedule ofcommunication, what we're going
to communicate.
And I totally agree with whatJeff was saying with dashboards.
You know there's that conceptof an information radiator.
It's dreamy, but if it's notupdated then it's old, it's
outdated, it's not fresh.
So yeah, I hate meetings, Ihate what I call WOT meetings, a

(33:02):
wasted time meeting.
So you get 12 people on a callfor an hour.
That's 12 hours lost, for youknow something that might be an
email, but I agree, you've gotto have meetings, but to have
the agenda for that and then toguard that agenda closely.
If it's a 30-minute meeting,then 30 minutes or less, less,

(33:23):
not to carve out an hour, andthen we've got to sit here for
an hour because that's what wehave slated.

Uh, so I, meetings are my nemesis, I, I
hate meetings and I think thatthat all gets spelled out in
your communication plan is itexactly just how often, what
method?
And for me, I, I, I don't mindmeetings, but if it it's half an
hour and we can do it in 20,I'm good as long as we covered

(33:49):
everything.

And just speaking of text, one more thing to just
kind of warn the audience ofthat.
I was looking at some newsarticle in the past week or so
about a ruling I think it was inCanada, over an agreement that
was made via text and theresponse was a thumbs up.
The thumbs up was actuallydeemed, I believe, legally

(34:12):
binding as a yes to move forwardwith something.
So you know, we're moving intothis weird gray area of you know
an emoji is basically a signoff, a, a formal sign-off for
moving forward on something.
So yeah, just something foreverybody to be aware of that.
You know that may come intoplay at some point.

So it was an LOL.
No way Right.

Then going through that, I had a
personal experience where I sentWalt an LOL to a client and it
was something.
There was a hiccup thatoccurred and it was just oh
goodness, why did this happen?
It's the same contractor andthey went and cut through a
particular line.

(34:58):
Well, the end user took thatand ended up causing me some fun
hiccups with HR and getting todo a little bit of extra
training, but there was noimproper use.
It was maybe a littleunprofessional, but lesson
learned.

Yeah, for me .
I was just thinking about justpersonally, if I had to
communicate in text and makeagreements, how hard that would
be for me to go back and lookfor something that I said two
months ago or even a year ago inmy text.
I have a hard enough timekeeping up with yesterday's text

(35:40):
text.
But if I were going to do it orgive the advice, if you did
make some sort of agreementthrough text which I feel is
probably a scary thing I wouldgo back and send an email.
It's easily findable, somethingthat you also kind of have a

(36:04):
tracking system through email towhere you can keep track of
that and not have to thumbthrough everything in text or
use that search feature to tryto figure out where something
may be, and you can call out thefact that it was originated in
a text per the text message,just like I don't know how many
live conversations I'll have andthey go.

yeah, I think that's a great idea.
Let's do it per theconversation that we had
yesterday afternoon about this.
We are going to proceed withthat direction now I've done
screenshots with just that.

And then uh, but to patrick, to add
on to that point is any phonecalls you have.
Follow it up with an email aswell, documentation of
everything and even yourmeetings.
I have one notes up on everymeeting that I am.

I'm in, even if it's just to take attendance so
that kind of rolls into the nextpoint, which is tracking
communication.
So email, you can track Meetingminutes, one of the things with
communication a verbalcommunication, a visual
communication, an email they'reall forms of communication.

(37:14):
So when you have a meeting,you're sitting around and you're
talking to a bunch of peopleMaybe you have a slide deck,
maybe you don't Questions comeup, answers are given.
That's got to go in minutes.
It's got to be then shared witheveryone.
Otherwise what did youaccomplish?
You know you set an agenda butyou didn't come back with any
answers.

(37:34):
So you have to track thatmeeting and you need to send out
an update.
I mean any thoughts on that?

I mean you definitely need to keep up
with meeting minutes and, like Isaid, even if it's to an extent
of just making sure you knowwho's at the meetings, I've
gotten to the point recentlyjust having it's not a concern,
it's being state entities,occasionally projects get
audited and making sure thatwe've even covered in-person

(38:07):
communications with some of themeetings.
Sometimes you have meetingsthat are in-person and you need
to make sure you've documentedwho was actually there at that
particular walkthrough and thencover a few of the notes in case
you ever get questioned on whatcame of that meeting or why
didn't you have any in-personmeetings.
Well, actually we did, it'sjust not documented.

Yeah, I've worked with some folks in the past who
have been Google platform users,and so setting up a running
Google Doc with my team formeeting minutes has been really,
really nice.
You go ahead and throw in theagenda, pre-populate it.
Everybody knows what to come intalking about.
You put the attendees to yourpoint, brooks, put the attendees

(38:49):
up at the top of the the daythat you're meeting with them
and and, yeah, then you justbuild out the minutes based off
the agenda.
It's really easy to keepeverybody on topic because
everybody's looking at the samedocument.
You know it's a great way tokeep it stored.
Everybody has access to it andthen if you ever need to go back
and look at it, it's easilysearchable.

That's exactly what I've done, jeff, and not
Google Docs just in Word is justkeep a running Word doc of our
meetings and same thing who'sthere.
You know our agenda, who'sthere, key points, what was
discussed or promised.
And then that's so easy too foremail, because I've got you
know what was done, that I can,or what do people promise.

(39:34):
I can pull that right out ofthat document and follow up as
per our meeting with Walt'slanguage and get people to
commit, and then if we go to thenext week it's just depend to
that.
And there's our next meeting.
It's so easy to search too, andI know somebody promised
something and then I've gotevidence of it from our kind of

(39:55):
a running minutes per project,per meeting yeah, one thing that
I've noticed too, and goingback to just experience of folks
having, you know, 20, 30projects going at one time and
really up against it.

The last thing you want to do after a
meeting is jump in and domeeting minutes, but it's very
key to do it quickly, also asdetailed as possible.
Even if you're trying to get itdone quickly, folks have the
tendency to be vague.
These are things that you'retrying to get it done quickly.
Folks have the tendency to bevague.
These are things that you'regoing to go back to it.
You know, for lack of betterword, it's, it's the CYA, so

(40:34):
you're going to go back to thatat some point where someone's
going to call out something thatcame up in a meeting, where
you're going to have to go backand and retrace your steps, and
leaving those breadcrumbs alongthe way is basically what that
meeting minutes is for, and it'skey to be detailed and timely.

I agree 100% there, and it does depend on
your workload because you mightbe jumping from one to the other
.
Some days.
I have meetings that I havelucky if I have five minutes in
between, and that's only becauseI've scheduled it with a
five-minute window.
But calendar blocking is one ofthe things I recommend for PMs
is like you're going to have ameeting from 2 to 3, and

(41:17):
hopefully on my team it's 2.05to 3 on Wednesday.
Did you allocate a half hourbefore and a half hour after to
prep and post?
You know, do your meetingminutes, because the rest of
your day looks pretty packed.
When are you going to do them?
Our standard is within 24 hoursof the meeting.
So you got to plan to do yourminutes because they are very

(41:39):
important and you want them whenthey're fresh on your mind.
If you're doing something inOneNote, some people get a
little nervous.
I'm a terrible speller.
Sometimes I don't like havingOneNote up on a shared screen
and typing because I'mbackspacing and doing stuff, but
the quicker you get them in.
If you're on a tight schedule,you can get them in.
Like you said, people see ithappening, they go no, it's not
what I said.
This, okay, let me fix that,and then you're done.

(42:06):
And then you send them out whenyou're complete and then save
them to your project folder andnow you have a record.

Well, I think, having the time, one of
our viewers called it out, butthey're asking the thoughts on
AI in relation to transcribingand summarizing meetings.
I just wish that I could putthe software on because I want
to play with it.
I've been doing a lot oftraining on AI and seeing how it

(42:32):
can assist project managers tobetter themselves, take away
some of the mundane pieces andrepetitive pieces, and to an
extent it's by no means AI, butI have Outlook Calendar invites.
Click a button on there to openup OneNote.
It pulls up my attendees and mylinks and cuts down half the
battle.
And if you can create Joe, yousound like you have some word

(42:54):
templates.
If you could somehow put thatinto OneNote, you'll be able to
speed up the process because atthe end of that I click email
all attendees and move on andkeep going.

Yeah, I'm using AI algorithms generative AI pretty
much on a daily basis at thispoint, but I'm not using it for
transcribing and summarizingmeetings.
I just haven't had the need forit yet.
However, I think just anybodyworking on any type of sensitive

(43:25):
data or government contractshas to be aware of what the
different policies are for usingthose types of tools and what
the kind of data security is forthe companies A lot of like
chat GBT.
If you plug them into chat GBT,I believe they have rights to
access it and use it for theirown data analysis and refining
their tool and use it for theirown data analysis and refining
their tool.
There's some others out therewhere I think if you have the

(43:49):
ChatGPT API, they don't haveaccess to that.
So there's ways to get aroundit.
It's just about being smartwith it and understanding that
something you're putting into anAI system may not necessarily
be your data anymore.
It may be either public data orbelonging to whoever owns the
AI you're throwing it into.

Yeah, the otter is like the big one I see out
there in the streets.
It's basically an AI bot thatyou can pop into a meeting
invite and the bot goes and sitsin the meeting for you and it
transcribes everything it can dovoice recording of the
highlights and it'll packagethat all up and give it to you.

(44:31):
Now I'm nervous about a futurein which I call a meeting and
all my stakeholders sendOtterbots and sit there
listening to me for 15 minutesand then just transcribe it and
send it back to them.
But just on this point, as longas we're talking about AI, I
think on the PM Mastery podcastrecently there was a guest who

(44:51):
was talking about this featurein PowerPoint that will, if you
present to the PowerPoint AI, itwill transcribe you and then it
will also analyze you for andsand uhs and ums and all the
different like.
It'll give you advice on how topresent anything to your

(45:14):
stakeholders.
There's a lot of really powerfultools out there that I hope
will reduce kind of the friction.
The time suck that getting goodmeeting minutes is there.
Friction, the time suck thatgetting good meeting minutes is
there.
I just you know.

I have my own qualms and concerns with
AI as well.
Well, I think that'll, and byno means are any of us providing
legal advice with my tech'scomments earlier.
But if AI is transcribing, ifyou're working for a government
entity, If AI is transcribing ifyou're working for a government
entity, that opens up the dooragain for discoverable.
And then, when you werelegitimately joking, it is there

(45:56):
in the documentation, it hasbeen recorded and there for
interpretation later on.
So there's some interestingaspects.

And I threw out that warning.
But, like I said, I'm usingthis on a daily basis.
I'm not one of the people whothinks it's going to come in and
take all of our jobs, but Ithink it's going to make us
better at our jobs and take awaythe tedious stuff.
Like you mentioned, brooks,there doesn't necessarily need
to be this level of just mundanetasks for a project manager.

(46:28):
Let's bring back the value ofthe project manager being the
primary communicator, buildingrelationships and making sure
that things are done right andputting out fires when there
needs to be someone putting outfires rather than just sending
emails all the time Right, let'smake some value of project
managers just sending emails allthe time right, let's make some
value of project managers and,yeah, maybe it means you end up

(46:48):
managing more projects, butyou're also bringing a lot more
value to the company.
So, yeah, I didn't say that tobe negative on AI.
I'm definitely a proponent, butit's got to be used the right
way.

And not everything is about chat GDP.
I mean, there's so many toolsout there that have AI features
in them.
Like, I'm a huge fan ofGrammarly.
Like I said, my spelling isatrocious and my grammar
sometimes I mean usually I'mpretty good, but it's nice to be
able to write and it says didyou really mean this?
Well, yeah, I did.
That sounds much better.

Well, I'm a big proponent of 80-20.
And if it's, you know 80% ofyour value, 20% of your work,
and if it's, I do a lot ofconsulting for a German
manufacturer and our creed is ifit's not adding value, then
it's non-value add.
Let's get rid of it, it's awaste, it's a time suck and yeah

(47:47):
.
So we go back and forth onmeeting minutes Is that value or
not?
And there's a threshold there,I think, where we get lost in
the weeds, because it's the PMIPMBOK way and not to bash the
PMI PMBOK way.
But that's the largest scope ofpossible project management

(48:08):
activities.
That doesn't mean that you haveto do all of that stuff.
So you have to do what'ssmartest and of most value.
And if we're getting intowriting minutes and documenting
email on email and documentingevery conversation and I'm not
saying it's bad, Certainlythere's projects you have to do
that.
But if it's not adding value,it's just overhead and get rid

(48:31):
of it.
And I'm a big proponent oflet's streamline and get to the
good stuff as quick as possible.

Agreed.
So one of the things that wetalked about internally a little
bit, or at least in our agendanotes, was know your audience.
So a lot of these things thatwe're talking about will vary
depending on your project butalso on your audience, how you
communicate, how often youcommunicate, the level of
communication A couple termsthat I like to use a lot is

(49:04):
executive summaries and bluff.
Bluff is something I learnedfrom a military guy which stands
for bottom line up front.
Get me the meat.
That's what I want to know, andif I want to know about the
details, I'll read on, but justgive me where we're at.
So, on any large projects thatI do where there's high-level
stakeholders, every meetingminute starts with an executive

(49:27):
summary, and sometimes it's twoor three sentences, sometimes
it's a paragraph, but it givesthem.
They can read that real quickand go okay, that's all I need
to know.
I don't need to know specificsor whatever, but if I want to
know something more, I can readin.
So that's important.
And then some.
You just need bullet points.
We talked about this, this andthis.
This is the answers.

(49:49):
Move on, we'll see you nextweek.
So what are you guys' thoughtson?
You know, knowing your audience, how you do your communication.
I mean we all in agreement onthat.

Totally agree.
I hate getting what would be athree-page email and having a
request buried in the middle ofpage two.
It's one thing if I'm notfamiliar with the project, but
if I'm intimately familiar withthe project it's great to have
the context in there forsomebody else.
But bottom line, up, front,right Like.
Give me that on the front end,tell me what you need and then

(50:22):
give me the context if you want,or at least put it in bold,
right Like.
Give me some way of picking outwhat your point of the email is
, rather than having me read amini novel and having to figure
out what you're trying to say.

I think I was sitting there thinking,
Walt, you're saying theexecutive summary, oh, that'd be
great to add in.
And then, Jeff, when you werespeaking, it made me think about
it.
When I send out my notes toeverybody, I usually, if there
is something I need fromsomebody, at the very top of
that email it'll say I need thisfrom so-and-so.
So it's a low-level executivesummary where I'm seeking it

(51:02):
from the particular members thatare receiving the notes.

So for us, oh sorry, John.

No, it's okay, Sorry To be of email.
Something that I've used togood effect has been to make use
of that subject line forexactly what Brooks is talking
about.
Right To say oh hey, I'msending this to Bob and I'll say
whatever the subject is and inbrackets I'll say whatever

(51:29):
feedback requested or decisionrequired by whatever it is
that's needed.
So that way they know whichones to skip over the email
inbox and which ones not to.
Because I've worked with peoplewho, straight up, they say I
don't answer email.
If they really want to talk tome, after three emails they'll
call me.
Um, you know, it's just again.

(51:52):
It's part of that communicationmanagement plan up front.
But yes, if you can helpcategorize it and get people as
up front as possible beforeyou've even opened the email,
here is what I need from you.
I found that that helps with alot of high-powered stakeholders
who have a lot of emails comingto their inbox to their inbox.

So, yeah, sometimes on larger projects you
have the executive summary, butright ahead of that, a really
short agenda list.
There's going to be anexecutive summary, there's going
to be a bullet list, there'sgoing to be a two-week look
ahead and there's going to be anaction items.
So hey, take a real quick peekdown at the bottom.
Is there anything assigned toyou in the action items?

(52:36):
So those are common.
Most of my notes will start outwith an attendance list, a
summary, a bullet list ofdiscussion topics, and then it
ends with an action items listwith the person's name at the
front of it in bold and thenwhat they have.
And if you're going to do anaction items list, the one thing

(52:58):
you need to do is include a duedate.

Yeah, I think, in addition to emails and
the action item list, anotherthing that was going through my
mind was just agendas in general.
I know in presentations evenlike to client presentations a
lot of times those aren'tsuccinct to where you're
presenting to the client, kindof giving an update of where

(53:25):
things are.
It can just be a lot of garbageof words kind of just sputtered
throughout the page and itreally just needs to be the
succinct bullet points, maybe aphoto or something of the
project going on or some sort oftable or chart.
But you can see those getcluttered too very easily a lot

(53:45):
of times and having to correctfolks of trying to go back and
make those more succinct.

I'm a big fan of in reports as pictures,
exactly what you're saying,patrick.
So I do my reports in excel.
We use spark notes or the uh,the little spark lines, so it's
little mini graphs next tothings, and then speedometers.
You know red, amber, green.
I can look at it.
If I see a lot of red, I betterpay attention to it.

(54:12):
If it's green, then okay, thenokay, because I you know
stakeholders busy, so I want toknow what they want and then
with my team it's I do.
What Walt says is you know theaction items at a date, but I
also do red, amber, green forthe team, like what's imminent
is red, and then that's you knowpart of where are you on this
right now and you know how faraway are you being done and is

(54:37):
this a good date or not.
So those types of questions, sotwo types of communication, I
think there so I saw someonementioned marking items as
urgent or important.

So I have.
I have some pet peeves andthat's one of them.
Some people get in the habit ofdoing that too often.
So you can use that, but use itsparingly.
I actually have a filter inOutlook.
My Outlook opens every morningin the priority box and that
priority box is my manager, myco-leads in other regions, my

(55:10):
team and items marked asimportant and items marked as
important.
So when I start the day, I'llstart out with anywhere from 5
to 87 emails on that prioritylist which kind of tells you
what the day is going to be like, and I don't want to read
through something that's got anexclamation point on it and it's
just an email.
It's just that could have beenin my regular inbox.

(55:33):
I would have got to thateventually.
So use it when it's reallyimportant, but use it sparingly.
All right.
So tracking communications, do'sand don'ts.
We've kind of covered a littlebit as we've gone along, as
we've covered different topics,do's and don'ts, and then the

(55:54):
next one was influence versusauthority.
So people have touched on thata little bit.
Some people may look at PMs inone of the two roles.
I kind of think you're kind ofa mix, but who wants to touch on
influence versus authority?

All right.
So I have thoughts.
I think that there's always atemptation to err too far to one
side of this road or the other.
It's both and it's not either,or it's both and it's not either
or.
And I have seen projectmanagers who they fail because

(56:50):
they're obsessed with theirauthority at the expense of
influence.
And I've also seen projectmanagers fail because they are
not exerting themselves in theway that they need to to guide
the project across the finishline.
So it's a two-edged sword here.
I think that you need to haveinfluence with other people.
You need to always have youreyes on the horizon.
I tell people all the timediplomacy is a hugely underrated

(57:11):
project management skill.
You know, people think ofproject management.
They think of processes,process groups, inputs, tools,
techniques, outputs.
They're thinking about thetechnical stuff, right, which is
important and it is good.
But if you can't get differentpeople with different
perspectives to all pull therope at the same time in the
same direction, you're reallygoing to have a hard time

(57:33):
getting your project across thefinish line.

I want to take it in a little bit different
direction for my thoughts onthis, and this is a conversation
with someone else I had who'sin the audience as well within
the past two weeks, and theywere running into a situation
where they had someone fromanother team that they needed
something from and the personwas just dragging their feet,
dragging their feet, draggingtheir feet.

(57:58):
They had no authority over theperson and, realistically, it
wasn't a priority for thatperson to get this work done.
There was no incentive for itto get it done.
So one thing just for youngerproject managers to be aware of
is that it can be a worst casescenario in having someone you

(58:19):
need something from and havingno authority over them or no way
to get that from them.
It was literally pushing thisproject back by months because
and it wasn't a priority projectfor the company, but it was
something that this personneeded to get done, but it was a
short task, but the personwasn't doing it and the project

(58:41):
manager had no authority overthem to get it done.
And so it's just something tobe aware of when you're looking
at your stakeholders who do youhave authority over or who do
you have influence over, and ifyou don't have either, you're
going to have a really hard timeworking with that person.

And that's where relationships come in.
And if this is a one-off, itmay not work.
But we work with differentgroups, business units, no
authority, minimal influence,but we work with them on every
project.
So the only way we're going toget them to work with us is to
build a relationship with them.
Explain the why work with themwhen they need something, so

(59:20):
that it becomes a two-way street.

And you could argue that that relationship is
some level of influence, right,because it is a two-way street.

at that point, I almost recognized a
two-week delay, but utilized myinfluence to call someone and
work with them to see how wecould speed this up and instead
of it delaying the project twoweeks, which in the grand scheme
of things is minor, but it alladds up.
They helped me out and we'regoing to be doing what we need

(59:51):
to do this week instead of intwo weeks.
So it's always good to knowpeople around the campus or
institution that you're workingwith.

Joseph Phillips (01:00:03):
I like to call out people, not in a bad way,
but in my status reports who'sworking on what.
When I have that individualthat doesn't want to play ball,
that's okay.
I just continue to put them inthe status report of the tasks
they're working on and put theirname out there and then I give
credit.
When people are done and theydid it, I put a little kudos to

(01:00:23):
that person for going out of theway to help the project.
But I don't let peoplesteamroll me.
I'll do what leverage I can,even though I don't have any
authority over them.
These are the people working onwhat task and I put that
person's name on there and Isend that out to all the
stakeholders every Friday orevery Thursday and I make sure

(01:00:43):
that person gets a copy too, andsometimes that gets people
moving.
Sometimes not Sometimes youhave morons you have to deal
with, but that's life everywhereyou do.

Clinton "Brooks" Herm (01:00:54):
Technical term right.
Yeah, I'm sorry.
Technical term right.

Yeah, I'm sorry , technical term, right
Technical term.
Sometimes they call thoseproject sponsors, not true, yeah
, so Sorry Walt.

Walt Sparling (01:01:12):
Go ahead, that's calling out people.
I mean that's sometimes it's.
Some people are like, oh my God, I can't believe you just did
that.
And I mean I have pet peeves aswell with like meetings.
You know you don't payattention.
You know my team knows thatsomeone's on their laptop doing
something.
This was, like you know,pre-covid.
It's like laptops and phonesare off.
We're having a meeting here andI'll just stop the meeting and

(01:01:37):
everybody will eventually turnand just stare at the person
who's got the laptop open andthen they'll sigh and close it
and say, all right, or we'll askquestions to the person who's
not paying attention.
But there's different ways anddifferent situations of how you
do that.
You had mentioned Clinton aboutinfluence, and influence is
good to have.

(01:01:58):
Once again, it's like thatexclamation point.
Be careful how often you use it, because then it's going to get
old at some point.

Clinton "Brooks" Herman (01:02:11):
Yeah, you don't always want to be
calling in a favor, what's thebook?
You Don't Always Want to CryWolf in a favor, you want it's
the what's the book?
Um, you don't always want tocry wolf, um, and if you
constantly are crying wolf,eventually people are going to
stop listening and stop helping.
So, um, now, if you'rereturning the favor and able to
help them in some way or fashion, then you kind of will start to
even things out.
But you don't know if that'llever come up.

So All right.
So next one is communicationmethods.
Once again know your audience.
So we've talked a little bitabout texting, we've talked
about email, we've talked aboutin-person meetings, phone calls,

(01:02:56):
so probably the most common isgoing to be email.
I think by far Somecommunication is done through
dashboards, where maybe thedashboards also include
downloadable data or links tostatus updates that they can
download.
But emails, from what I see,see is by far the most common,
and Teams is another one I keepseeing pop up in the chat as

(01:03:21):
well.
Teams is a very common way toshare communications.
What do you guys have to sayabout that?

Jeff Plumbee (01:03:29):
Yeah, I was going to mention Teams and Slack.
I'm using Slack on a lot of myprojects now as well as Teams.
Personally, I like theinterface of Slack a little bit
better, but I think Teams hasmore integrated functionality
for those that are using theMicrosoft platform primarily.
So, you know, it's kind of a.

(01:03:59):
Those are more real-time chatsversus, you know, text, as we
talked about.
You know we still leads to thequestion of what can be used in
discovery and I'm sure Slackobviously can you know, because
most of it's done on the kind ofinternal platform of whatever
company you're working with.
You know I've heard of HR usingit quite a bit for different
things.
So, yeah, I definitely leantowards Slack.

(01:04:23):
I like the ability to pindifferent activities or
different documents at the topfor easy access for the
different groups I'm in, andeven Discord, I think, is used a
bit now.
I don't particularly like usingDiscord for work purposes, but
I'm hearing more and more offolks going in that direction as

(01:04:44):
well.

So where I'm at, they utilize
obviously the Microsoftplatforms, but with Outlook,
teams, teams and Skype forBusiness and I like how Teams
works it definitely hasfunctions.
That's what I do all mymeetings through pretty much.
But Skype for Business theyhave not integrated Teams into

(01:05:11):
the way that Skype for Businessdoes.
If I have an email chain orthread that I can go into, I can
click on the particular emailcontact that I want to talk to.
It will then put the emailtitle within that Skype subject
block and then I can havecommunications with that and
then it actually saves within mychain of emails that we're

(01:05:33):
having the discussion on.
So then it allows me to haverecords of some of those
communications.
But again, that goes into, jeff, just like you said, the
discoverable piece.
It's definitely discoverable.
So you want to close out, ifyou're done, having discussions
that aren't related to theproject within that particular
chat, because it'll come uplater on.

John Connoly (01:05:57):
So one of my favorite communication methods,
it's a dying art.
It is the art of picking up thephone and calling someone.
I think a lot of people in mygeneration and younger are
starting to trend further andfurther and further away from
that.
You know, I spoke to a projectmanager a couple months ago and

(01:06:20):
her project was two weeks latebecause, you know again as the
example we were talking about,right, someone else had the
project deliverable and neededto cough up some key information
and email after email afteremail keeps getting fired at
this person and there's noresponse.
And I said, well, have youpicked up the phone and called
her?
And this person was like no, Ihaven't.

(01:06:42):
I'm like, well, that's yournext move, right?
You're two weeks late.
This other person doesn't care.
And I think we tend to focus alot on the written record, and
that's really important.
I'm not advocating we go on thewritten record and that's
really important.
I'm not advocating we gowithout a written record.
But I think that a lot of timesthat touch of the interpersonal

(01:07:05):
, even in a phone call, candislodge something much more
quickly than the written wordever could.

Agree, and it is something that is going away.
I mean, I know youths that have, uh, no voicemail.
They they don't want.
So it automatically just saysthis this person has not set up
their voicemail or this person'svoicemail is full.
It's like do you ever empty it?
No, I don't want people leavingme voicemails.
So I ask a lot why?

(01:07:37):
Why do we not have an answer onthis?
I've emailed them four times.
They will not get back with me.
Have you called them?
Well, no, we'll want to trythat, and sometimes that may be
the only time they don't havetime to answer an email.
They're like oh, I want to getto that, or they may miss it
because 100 emails came through.
They're like oh, I want to getto that, or they miss it because
100 emails came through.
They're like if I'd have seenit, I would have responded Let

(01:08:00):
me find it.
Oh, okay, I see it.
All right, give me a minute,I'll respond to you right now.

Thanks for calling, maybe we'll see
some improvements oncommunications and calling
people with the new FaceTimevoicemails coming up with iOS 17
for all the Apple users.

I had that client.
I was talking about themanufacturing company
standardizing.
He had a similar problem.
They had not received aresponse.
Four or five times, no response, no response.
And it was like she's here atthis facility.
It's a big campus, but she'shere, we need it.
Why don't we walk over to heroffice and say hi.
He goes.
I don't know where she is, thisbig campus, turns out she was

(01:08:41):
100 yards from this guy, didn'tknow who the lady was.
Walk over and say hi, and thenall of a sudden she's like oh
yeah, I know, I'm just buried inthis and I'll have it today.
And she was almost embarrassedthat we're in her cube.
Asking for this easy piece ofinformation is like that
face-to-face communication, Ithink, is, you know, part of
that lost art and it's.

(01:09:01):
It's really hard to be rude tosomeone face-to-face.
Uh, we're an email, you cankind of ignore it, you know I
think a lot of that got lost inthe pandemic.

Patrick Shrewsbury (01:09:11):
Oh, absolutely yeah, work from home
and I know in a constructionfield even getting folks to go
on site to look at a site ormeet for a punch walk.
It's pulling teeth at timesjust to get folks all around
together to take a look atdifferent things like that, and
it was sometimes a strugglebefore but it's definitely a

(01:09:32):
struggle now and I think that'salso seen kind of going through
another Pandora's box of beingin the office versus virtually
Right, yeah, I think that'saffected everyone's business, no
doubt, but the communicationand projects, I think, has
become more.

We've never been more technologically
connected but at the same timedisconnected.
It is a constant struggle, Ithink.
But we've got all thesedifferent ways to communicate.
But here we are still talkingabout the challenges of
communication.

I think too and this is still very connected in
my mind too as we've eschewedinterpersonal communication,
live communication, in favor oftexting or emails or whatever,
that the meaning starts todegrade over time.
I remember, you know, 10 yearsago or so, there was a big

(01:10:25):
controversy about having periodsat the end of your text
messages where all themillennials and Gen Zs said that
means you're angry.
Everyone else is like no, itjust means I have good grammar.
Z's said that means you'reangry.
Everyone else is like no, itjust means I have good grammar.
And you know these things.
As soon as it's written down andwe tend to think written down
is the most solid form ofcommunication but as soon as

(01:10:45):
it's written down, it's subjectto interpretation.
Right, as someone had said onthe call, right as soon as you.
If you said something joking ina meeting and it's transcribed
now, then someone couldmisinterpret that as something
that was serious.
That's again immediatelysomething subject to
interpretation, and I see thisall the time, and I think the

(01:11:08):
biggest example of oncesomething is written down, it's
not clear is we have a courtsystem for a reason, right,
everything that gets writtendown is subject to
interpretation and litigation ifthings go wrong.
So, um, there's always thatelement as well.
I think we risk a lot byde-emphasizing the phone call or

(01:11:32):
the the walk down to the office, for example.
Um, and I do worry about thatin the future.

I think Zoom and similar to what we're
doing now, or kind of.
What I think you're leaningtowards, john, and it was called
out by one of our viewers too,is body language.
Sometimes your body languagesays everything and there's
actually a call out of whoutilizes cameras and who does

(01:12:01):
not.
Um, I think it's a mixed bag, I, I know with my uh contracted
leadership, I am always oncamera, uh, but maybe with the
projects, if it's a more low-keydiscussion or recurring
discussion, it may not have thecamera on.
So, and as the PM that goes to,most are probably going to
follow whatever the projectmanager does, because we should

(01:12:24):
be the end-all, be-all for theproject.

That is definitely something that varies
greatly and we pretty much knowin our meetings who's going to
be on camera and who's not,because, like we're, when we
deal with leadership or ourteam's meetings amongst our
local team, we're on video andit's like I want to see that
you're engaged and you'reinteractive.

(01:12:49):
You're, you're, you're askingquestions, I, I know you're
there.
It's frustrating, frustratingif all I see is a black screen.
But we have people we work withthat never go on camera and
there's some that do thatshouldn't be on camera, you know
.
So it varies by.

(01:13:11):
You know the situation thatyou're in and sometimes I catch
myself.
I'll be on a call with a bunchof people and someone will say
something.
I'll roll my eyes and I go ohGod, I'm a camera.
That's no different than ifyou're in the room with them,
but so that is something thatvaries quite a bit.

But I think, you know, we're in some ways, I
think, downplaying the benefitsthat this technology has enabled
for us.
I mean, most of my projectsright now are international.
I'm communicating with peoplein eight or 10 different time
zones that I wouldn't be able tohave a nine to five meeting
with otherwise, and I'm able todo it via email, via WhatsApp in

(01:13:48):
some circumstances.
I've got some of these folksthat can't use Zoom because they
don't get good enough cellreception, and their field
workers in Tanzania or IvoryCoast, but I'm still able to
work on a project with thembecause we have this type of
technology.
But to that point, the culturestill comes in.
The misinterpretation stillcomes in.

(01:14:09):
And understanding what are thecultural norms, from where
they're at, and walking the lineof what's acceptable here,
what's acceptable there and howdo we find that middle ground,
the misinterpretation stillcomes in.
Having them face-to-face onZoom is great, but a joke will
land flat and you can't have itland too flat, otherwise you've
offended somebody right?

(01:14:29):
So all of this still applies.
But I think it's just up to usas project managers, if we're
planning on working in a globalcontext, to learn and adapt.

Yeah, I, I agree, I agree a hundred percent.
I'm not saying that you know weneed to, we need to.
You know, give up on email oranything like that.
I, I and you're correct 100%that there are things we're able
to do with the technology we'vegot, are correct 100 that there
are things we're able to dowith the technology we've got
that we never would have beenable to do before, and that

(01:15:02):
there's huge value in that.
I just also, I, I put more ofan emphasis on the, the, the
interpersonal levels of thecommunication, because I see
them at risk of fading a littlebit and and as pushing back,
because I think they'reunderappreciated.
But the live component isvaluable as well.

(01:15:23):
But you're right, there areways of working that you can
accomplish a great deal withouthaving that element.

All right.
Any other thoughts on that?

I think one thing I just since we're talking, I
kind of brought theinternational piece.
I'd love to hear anybody else'sexperience with international
work or even the audience.
I mean, I think this issomething that was a bit of a
learning curve for me.
One of my first projects,starting out, was working in
rural Haiti and you know it'sjust very different culturally.

(01:16:00):
And you know I learned one ofthe first things in a meeting if
you didn't ask about the kindof the person you're meeting
with, family first thing, thatwas immediately going to be
offensive, right Like youstarted off the meeting on the
wrong foot.
If you don't ask about theirfamily first thing.
One of the things I alsolearned is, if it's in the rainy
season, you don't plan ameeting in the afternoon because

(01:16:22):
if it's raining, 90 percent ofparticipants aren't going to
show up.
So there's certain littlethings you learn and work in
different places and I'd love tohear from other people if
they've got kind of littlelittle nuggets that they've
picked up.

So I haven't had a personal
experience getting to workinternationally, but I have
traveled internationally I thinkI'm somewhere around 24
countries so far and I alwaystry to do a little investigation
to what are the norms there.
So I'm a Texas A&M Aggiegraduate and so one of the

(01:16:57):
things that we do and of courseI will get call outs if there
are any Aggies on here, but wedo a gig them, and I do not have
my ring on, I do have one islike telling them and giving
them the bird or telling themthey're number one, but not in
the correct way, the way that usAmericans might show out there

(01:17:20):
in the local highway system.
So, knowing some of that and Ithink that's kind of what you
called out, jeff, with the Haitipieces knowing some of the
differences than where we workand honestly it goes state by
state, not just country tocountry Working in Texas is

(01:17:40):
completely different thanworking in Louisiana.
So just my two cents.

I did some consulting in Belgium and in
Germany and then even down intoRome, and the one common thread
that immediately gained groundwith each of these teams was I
had a little cheat sheet oftheir language.
So there's some Flemish wordsthat I could try to say, or some
German phrases or Italian, andthey loved it.

(01:18:10):
That's putting forth an effort.
They all spoke English, butthat I was putting forth a
little bit of effort to try to,you know, not have this American
superiority over that country.
I'm working in their country,in their backyard, in their
neighborhood, and to make thateffort to respect where they are

(01:18:32):
, and I gained so much I'm stillfriends with a lot of those
folks in each one of thosecountries by just doing that
little bit of effort.
Of course now we could do theGoogle Translate or whatever.
It's been a few years ago, butI had a little cheat sheet that
I would have to say some wordsin immediate buy-in and mutual

(01:18:53):
respect and just to show that Iwas trying some effort to
communicate in their language,even though I was probably
butchering it, but just the youknow the making an effort.
I didn't expect them to speakEnglish, that I tried to speak.
You know some of their language.

I actually worked with the UK a lot, with
the Freedom Group, and they wereout of the UK and I reported to
the group out of there.
So I actually went thereseveral times as well.
But one thing that they alwayssaid when they came to the US
kind of just about our culturebut working with us is that we

(01:19:30):
are too serious, we need tolighten up.
And I could see that with theway that and they were very
successful.
I could see with that, the waythat they just kind of
interacted with each other.
Although they could get the jobdone, they were lighthearted
about it.
They also were very seriousabout making sure they took
their holiday and they had a lotof them.

(01:19:52):
But one thing I do keep in mindand it comes comes across my
mind at times is are we beingtoo serious?
Are we trying to do too much?
And that came from that justkind of learning from that
United Kingdom background.

We have stressful jobs.
Laugh it off a little bit,that's right.
Throw some humor out there.

Totally, totally agree.
I love that, patrick.
I think that we get too caughtup and too serious.
As you know, the projectmanager and there's a lot of
stress in the PM I mean, you arethe monkey in the middle
between management and your team.
But I just believe we live onceand you may as well enjoy
everything you do and you knowto be a good influence and a

(01:20:36):
good attitude, and that goessuch a long way.
People like to work with peoplethat are fun to work with.
So unfortunately that's not me,but people do.
People do like that you got tohave fun.
If you're not, why are you here?

So enjoy what you do with all your
heart.
You made people laugh with thetechnical terms, so keep it up.

Hey, moron, that's the term of the day, yeah
.

Yes, humor is good.
So, for all the users that sitin meetings with me, remember
that Humor is good, all right.
So I think this next topic issomething that we've touched on
in various ways, which is softskills.
So humor is is soft skills, sohumor is a soft skill.

You know how you approach people, how you
deal with people, so what can wecover when it comes to soft
skills related to communications?
Do you mean power skills as PMI?

calls it now.

Yes, yes, okay, good.
Well, I think so much of whatwe talked about.
You know, communication iseverything.
It's everything we do.
You know you've got to interactwith people and I think you
have to be, you know, likableand have a good personality.
And sometimes people aren'tgoing to like you, but that
doesn't mean you can't worktogether, you can't respect that
person and get the job done.

(01:22:00):
It's called project management,not project leadership or
project like.
It's about getting things done,but it's, I think it comes with
experience.
I think that in in myexperience, younger pms and I'm
not saying we all startsomewhere, but they're so
nervous that they come across asbeing really stiff and, you

(01:22:22):
know, awkward and bossy becausethey want to do a good job, they
want to get it done.
But then as you gain experience, you get a little bit more
relaxed.
It's the nuances of you knowback to what we started, knowing
your audience and knowing howyou communicate like just the
mindset, having that PMA back towhat we started, knowing your
audience and knowing how youcommunicate like just the
mindset, having that PMA.
As I say, a lot, that positivemental attitude affects

(01:22:43):
everything that you do.
I'm a big believer of that.

Yeah, empathy is a big word when it
comes to managing and makingsure that we have a million
different personality typesreally, and some introvert,
extrovert, emotional, some wantto kind of keep to themselves

(01:23:09):
and being empathetic to eachpersonality.
And that goes even further thansomeone that you're managing.
It's even the stakeholdersyou're dealing with and trying
to learn who they are and justmake sure that you can get your
point across with those softskills and develop a
relationship.

You're muted, walt, you're muted Walt.

Some people like that.
So empathy is definitely.
I was going to use the sameword and I'm noticing in the
chat a lot of people arebringing it up too.
It's.
It's so important to be able toput yourself in the shoes or as
close as you can get,understand the problem and you
know it's not necessarily yourproblem, but it could be your
problem on the project.

You've got to listen and understand the
best you can, and that's whyyou need empathy.
So what else?
Just because your leadership iscalling out something that you
may need to work on, don't takeit personally.
Just try and take it and growwith it.
As PMs, we go through lessonslearned.
We constantly need to improveourselves.

(01:24:28):
That's part of Walt's wholethought process with PM Mastery,
PM Mastery, and if you have PMPdoing continuing education or
any other certification that'sout there, those do require it
as well, but always being opento hearing it.
Now, understandably, somebodymay not present it the best of

(01:24:50):
ways.
Patrick, I think you need toknow are you working with an
introvert?
Are you working with somebodythat can take the heat you throw
at them?
You completely screwed thepooch on this one, or we might
need to work on that a littlebit better next time.

Yeah, I think somebody threw in the chat.
How do you lead in a kindmanner that doesn't make you
appear as a pushover?
And I think for me, holdingpeople to a high standard is a
sign of respect, and I try tomake it clear to everyone who
works for me and with me that ifI'm expecting something of them
, it's because I trust them andbecause they're part of my team

(01:25:32):
and we're working on thistogether.
But I think how you convey thatto them goes back to everything
that everyone just said.
It's about empathy andunderstanding their motivation
and perspectives, Because youdon't necessarily you don't
throw somebody under the bus infront of their peers, especially
if they're new, right?
You don't want to break themdown that far because you don't

(01:25:53):
know what that's going to do tothem, right?
Want to break them down thatfar because you don't know what
that's going to do to them,right?
There's a way to handleeveryone, but it's very nuanced
and very situation specific andyou have to learn about the
person to be able to understandwhat motivates them and what's
going to get them to do what youneed them to do.

Yeah, a lot of large corporations have
different models of personalitytraits and labeling people and
ours, patrick, I'm sure you'vebeen through this with the owl
and the eagle and the teddy bearand I can't remember the other
one and some of them sound likeI don't want to be a teddy bear,
but actually teddy bear ispretty cool when you read

(01:26:34):
through the specifics.
But it helps when youunderstand other people's
personality type.
Not everybody likes to to getinformation shared with them the
same way, like how, if youaward someone some, someone
might say you know, you can justcome to my desk and tell me
thank you and I'm good.
Or some might say, well, that'sfine, I'll take a raise for
that.

(01:26:54):
And others are like well, couldyou share that with the whole
team?
So everybody knows how awesomeI am.
It varies by person.

One of the things that I do is thank you
cards.
I love to send people thank youcards, vital cards, all the
time, and I was.
I was consulting at a placeyears ago, like 20 years ago,
and I sent this person a thankyou card.
Hadn't been back in that placein 10, 15 years and I stopped by

(01:27:24):
to see if this guy was stillthere.
He was still there and he stillhad the card hanging up in his
cubicle and he's like you're,like one of the only people that
ever and it costs nothing to doyou know very little and just
write, you know a thank you andpeople remember that.
As part of building thatrelationship and I have a big
proponent on my team you knowwe've got a very small team that

(01:27:45):
work with me.
One of them is on the call thatI, unfortunately, but I send
her, you know, flowers andlittle gifts and it's just so
important to do that.
That's something you're notrequired to do, but it's that
you're invested in their timeand their success and that you
appreciate what they've done andit's so important.

And I want to put a thank you out there for that
team member of yours, joe,because I mean the fact that
she's dealt with you for so longand that she actually
volunteered to do all thegraphics for this event, so
thank you.

I didn't even know.
That's how, that's how greatshe is.
So, yeah, and she does have toput up with that.

So well , no joe, uh, sometimes, uh,
those little gifts oracknowledgments, uh, just to a
random text thanks for doingthat, or appreciate you saying
hi today, or just minor things,may save you dividends later on.
You may not be working withthat person right now, but, heck

(01:28:46):
, I beat the executive VP to aconversation that I had first
met him at and I sent him anemail and he was like how'd you
beat me to it?
And now he sees me in thehallways and we have further
communications that way.
So keeping the open open foreverybody.

It's so true, it's so easy to do and you have
to be genuine.
I think when you do it andyou're doing it expecting
something in return, but you'reso right, clinton, that this
will come back in dividends,maybe in ways you don't even
know that.
You know people talk about usas the PM and they're like yeah,
you know that Jeff's a good guy, you know he sent me a card,

(01:29:25):
looked out for me or whatever itcomes back, you just part of
developing your, you know yourattitude and you get people in
your community where you work oryou're consulting, that are
going to go to bat for youbecause they know you're a good
person.
I really think that's soimportant.

Yeah, call-outs are something that is a culture
in our account where when westart every meeting, it's like,
okay, does anyone have anyacknowledgements that they want
to share with someone?
Because we have multiple teams,multiple regions and you want
to call anyone out in this groupand how they helped your group

(01:30:06):
or anything that you've seen,and they share that.
And then we do our quarterlyall-hands and they'll do an
employee of the quarter based onkudos that they've received
during the quarter through theuh recognition system and
sometimes they uh I think thequarterly one they actually get
a uh pretty large uh credit cardfor going to dinner.

(01:30:27):
I'm gonna say not pretty large,150 bucks, but they go to, they
can go to dinner on it and it'slike wow, recognition.

I, they can go to dinner on it and it's like wow,
recognition.
I think that nothing beatsgenuinely caring, right?
Joe says the genuine word,right?
That's the really big deal Ithink, for all of this is people
can figure out pretty quicklyif you're insincere and if you

(01:30:58):
can find it in you to care aboutyour team and to care about
those you're trying tocommunicate with.
Like it just makes a world ofdifference in terms of the
effectiveness, um, the buildingof transparency, the building of
trust, um it.
It starts there, I think whatelse do we have?

I like the call out thank you is
sometimes even more important tosay thank you for a try, even
if it failed.
It motivates the person to tryagain.
I completely agree with thatwith that.

That's so good.
We want people to be innovativeand to take some risk and to
not have this fear ofretribution if they're not
successful in that attempt.
We teach the wrong lessonssometimes, or some managers do,
and they get punished for tryingsome innovation, but it's so

(01:31:59):
important, it's like it's allright.
You've heard the phrase thatyou fail early, fail fast, so
you make a mistake, but do itlittle.
Do it little, but learn fromthat and then work and improve
upon that.
Yeah, it's an opportunity forimprovement, as Blake said here.
It's so true.
No failure If you learn from it.
It's an opportunity forimprovement.
As Blake said here.
It's so true.
No failure If you learn from it.
It's true.
In every project there aregoing to be issues that come up

(01:32:24):
and if you learn from it now,that's part of your education.

Joe, I love that you said issues.
That's a great communicatingpoint.
I don't like to say problems.
Yeah, throws negativeconnotations and everybody heads
back to grade school math class.
It is not a problem.

It's an issue, it can be solved I had a manager
a long time ago say we don'thave problems, we have issues
and that's.
It's just a risk that's come tofruition.
So how are we going to managethis issue?
And it's that framework of howare we going to do it, not how
are you going to do it too.
Yeah, it's so good.

(01:33:04):
Yeah, I've removed that from myvocabulary as a problem,
because that means this when anissue is, let's confront it,
let's work together to get thisthing out of our way and keep
moving forward.

Well, it's an opportunity as well to do
something different and creative.
Yeah, true.
All right.
So we've covered pretty mucheverything on our core list.
I've seen some questions comeup.
If you guys want to just throwsome questions out there, by all

(01:33:38):
means do so.
I also want to recommend I haveput together a little list of
books.
Maybe some of you guys haveseen them already and I will
post these in comments later.
One is by John Maxwell, calledthe 16 Undeniable Laws of
Communication.
There are three or four laws inthere that are more of my

(01:34:02):
favorites.
There's a project managementfor the unofficial project
manager, the surprising scienceof meetings.
This is where I got myfive-minute-after-the-hour
starting meetings five minutesafter the hour.
There's a bunch of differentoptions in there walking
meetings, time slots.
I get laughed at a lot for that, but the people then appreciate

(01:34:24):
the fact that they were able togo to the restroom and get a
coffee before they got to mymeeting.
Harvard Business Review has 10must reads on communication.
Crucial Conversations is one ofmy favorites by Carrie
Patterson, and then I know thatthere are a few authors here on

(01:34:44):
the panel.
Joe has written a handful ofbooks, haven't you, joe, over
the years.

I've been fortunate enough to write a few
books.
Yeah, I've written about 30books on management, so it's a
lot, of, a lot of words.

John's got one out there and he's working on
another one.

It's true.
I have a tiny littleself-published book last year
and a bigger project movingforward right now and hopefully
more details on that to comesoon.

Good deal, all right, let's see what on that to
come soon.
Good deal, all right, let's seewhat we've got out here.
What?

is the major cause of lack of feedback by project
team members.
So I can take a stab at whatwe're getting at with this, but
this reminds me of what one ofmy podcast guests said one time
that just really stuck with me,that managing your team members
or contractors is a lot likedealing with a toddler in a
different room.
If things get too quiet, youneed to start worrying.

(01:35:54):
So the lack of feedback maymean that something's wrong.
It means you need to check inone way or the other.

They may not understand what you're
seeking.

Yes, I was going to say clarity, and I think that
Jeff, that's exactly whereyou're headed too.

I mean, it's just an understanding, a
lack of clarity, walt.

Yeah, if they don't understand, they're not
even sure what question to asksometimes.

So why respond?

My experience probably you guys are too.
You go in as the new guy,You're the consultant, or you're
the PM, and everybody thereknows each other but they don't
know you.
Or you're the PM and everybodythere knows each other but they
don't know you.
And so there's this a lot offear and doubt.
That is a wall sometimes.
I think that goes up betweenyour team and your role as the

(01:36:50):
PM that you have to overcome andtake time and some assurance.
And back to that empathyconversation and to understand
why people have fear and doubt.
You know, what do they have intheir mind of why you're there
versus why you may truly bethere?
That perception is reality forpeople sometimes.

So this was an earlier question For us wanting
to transition into PM world.
Do most PMs have a comm plantemplate or just utilize a basic
comp matrix?
I think that varies.

Go ahead Walt.

It varies greatly by where you work.
Some corporations have specifictemplates and sometimes entire
standards that you have to gothrough and follow their plan.
Some have a matrix that you use.
You fill out at the beginningof the project.
There's other matrices too,like RACI, which talks a little

(01:37:48):
bit more about responsibility,which could affect how you
communicate as well.
What do you guys got?

I think just the bigger the project, the more
detail you need.
So if it's you know, if you'remanaging a small project, if
you're new in the PM world,you're probably going to
probably going to go with somesmaller projects and you aren't
going to need a war and peaceproject plan.
You're going to need, you know,pretty bare bones, but you
start there.
There's some threshold you getover to with the budget size or

(01:38:18):
the duration of that project,based on the scope, that now you
need more detail, morestakeholders, more detail, and
so it's just the size of theproject is going to influence
everything you do when it comesto communicating and
documentation, communicating anddocumentation.

So this isn't a question.
This was a statement that cameup earlier and it kind of
addresses the same thing.
They agree in their kickoffmeeting.
Everyone aligns and agrees oncommunication methods as a team
and they use Slack, zoom andemail.
So it's good to have a plan, nomatter what.

(01:39:04):
At the beginning, I've seensome communication plans that
were basically just a bulletlist of hey, this is how we're
going to move forward.
One of the big things that ourteam stresses is all
communications flow through thePM.
Contractors and vendors do notgo directly to the client.
They do not take direction fromthe client.
The client may ultimately bepaying the bill, but if we don't
know what's going on, how do wecontrol the budget and the

(01:39:26):
schedule?
So the PM is the point.
So you've got to establish thatup front.

I tell the contractor if they take any
notes from the owner and they'renot going through me, they're
getting to flip the bill thatday.
So have fun.
You have to stand strong as aPM and that goes into your
authority piece that we werediscussing earlier.

One of the funniest things we had happen is
my boss, which was the top ofthe food chain at the time, went
on to a site and asked acontractor why they were doing
something.
They said we already talked tothe client, we don't need you.
In fact, you need to leave.
It's like I had to go back upand go.
I don't think you know who thatwas.
One more of that and you'll beleaving.

(01:40:12):
What else let's see.

We got a question in the chat about communications
plan in an agile environment.
I'm not the best one to fieldthat, but I think it's a good
one to bring up.

What was the question?

What would you say regarding a communication
management plan in an Agileenvironment?
A must or overdue, overdue,overdue.

I'm sorry to jump ahead of you by there.
That was pretty.
Why I was pretty for my overdue.
I don't think I was on Jeopardyfor a moment.
Agile we don't want to document.
Agile is pretty averse todocumentation.
Documentation is one of ourseven wastes Papa Dyke's seven
wastes in Lean, in Agile.

(01:41:09):
So Agile is to be shallow.
So you have three roles.
You have the scrum, master,product owner and your team and
that's it.
And your stakeholders are goingto talk to the product owner.
You may have liaisons orwhatnot, but the communication
plan is going to be.
It's already baked into theapproach is what I'm trying to

(01:41:31):
say.

There's a good one.
I see this come up a lot onlinkedin.
Who wants to tackle?

I think this is as simple as as not being afraid
to ask the stupid questions.
We're all still going.
Every one of us on this call,I'm sure, still faces imposter
syndrome in certaincircumstances, where you jump
into a project where you're likeI'm in a way over my head.
These guys know way more aboutthis than I do, but the reality
of it is you're not being paidto know everything about it,

(01:42:13):
you're being paid to manage theproject, and so I think,
stepping back and rememberingwhat your role is and not being
afraid to ask questions andadmit that you don't know things
.
But I think you have to admitthat you don't know things,
otherwise that's when it becomesthis real barrier to success.

Yeah, if you actually act like an imposter
and you try to do more than youknow, it shows it's not good for
you, not in the long term.
And to your point this has beensaid multiple times you are not
an SME.
Most project managers aremanaging the scope, schedule,

(01:42:53):
budget, but not the specifics.
They just keep that projectmoving forward, right, joe, and
they don't need to know everydetail.
Focus on doing the best you canas a PM in managing the project
.

The stupid question is the one that
goes uh, unasked jeff yeah,admitting that you don't know is
super powerful.

You know, I've been in circumstances where I
made zero progress leading myteam until I found it in me to
be transparent to them when Ijust didn't know.
I don't know is a key thatunlocks certain doors.

Yeah, yeah, one thing I've talked to new
project managers about is whenyou're setting these agendas on
project calls and leading yourclient calls and things like
that, that you're basicallysetting the agenda because you
have other stakeholders that arethose subject matter experts I
know, jeff, you were talking alot about that at the very

(01:44:01):
beginning to lean on and so playthe quarterback.
All you need to do is set up theconversation what's the project
?
Give that summary and thenreally at that point try to get
the point across of what's thismeeting about.
What are you trying to get theW's we talked about earlier, the

(01:44:22):
who, what, when, where's andthen, as you get in with the
folks on the agenda, yourstakeholders pass the ball, each
of those things.
If you need to know somethingfrom technology or you need to
know something from your generalcontractor or things like that,

(01:44:43):
let them give the updates andyou just take the information
and mediate and kind of be thatmanaging quarterback until you
start to learn a little bit moreabout the project, until you
start to learn a little bit moreabout the project.

I think we saw Jeff do that just a
minute ago when he brought upthe Agile piece and I
immediately there was a few ofus that were like oh heck, no,
not happening, not going to godown that road, and Joe was like
nope.
I got the answer, at least inmy own thoughts how you take.
Agile.

I love Agile because it just trims out the
fat.
Let's focus on value.
That's one of the problems Ihave with the waterfall or the
cinnamon roll.
It's very top-heavy.
I'm not saying it's not, You'rein construction.
So it's very appropriate in theconstruction where some things

(01:45:39):
have to be done in a set order.
Where agile is, you know, Ialways think of the office for
like parkour, they're jumpingaround and everything that's
agile.
We get to go to whatever wewant.
What is most important.
One thing I would add back tothat imposter syndrome is stick
with it, but we all startsomewhere.
I say that all the time.

(01:46:00):
Everybody has to startsomewhere and one of the best
traits anybody can develop isthe resilience and just to keep
doing what you're doing andlearn as you're being.
The quarterback analogy thereis listen, Listen and learn.
That osmosis communication,that osmotic communication that

(01:46:23):
just by being present you learnand soak it up.

So the one that's on the screen now asks about,
you know, tips on how to improveyour communication skills as a
PM, and I think there's a lot ofanswers to this, because
there's a lot of aspects ofcommunication.
So is it that you have troublespeaking in front of an audience
?
Is it where you have trouble,maybe, formalizing a meeting

(01:46:50):
summary?
Is it you're not good withemail?
You're not good with spelling?
There's so many aspects of this.

But I think it's a trial and error.
Walt, you've got to learn andyou should learn from your
surrounding PMs Maybe not us onthe call right now, but somebody
that's sitting right next toyou where you can ask them and
call them and say, hey, this iswhat I'm thinking.
Does this seem okay?
But it's trial and error.

(01:47:18):
And then develop your own wayof communicating and you'll find
out where people appreciateyour communication skills.
And if you don't get anyfeedback, it doesn't mean it's
bad, but maybe you just try andalter it a little bit.

Again, trial and error a little bit Again, trial
and error.
One of our onboarding policiesis that the new PMs are to
shadow existing PMs, and not asingle PM, but multiple.
And I'll tell them just shadowall of these, and I'll tell the
rest of the team.
Invite him or her to as manymeetings as you can, I don't
care what they are.
Invite them, let them see howthey're ran, the different

(01:47:55):
styles, the different types, andthen I'll tell them you create
your own style, take the goodand bad or take the things that
you like, except for that guyDon't, don't do what he does,
but the rest of them, take fromthem and come up with a way that
works for you.
No, shadowing is a great way.
Thanks, brooks, for bringingthat out.

Yeah, I definitely love that idea.
And from the tool standpoint,if we're talking like your
grammar is terrible, leverage goback to what Walt mentioned
about Grammarly.
Right, like leverage the AItools that are there, but learn
from them.
Don't rely on them solely.
Have it rewrite something foryou in a better way, but then

(01:48:37):
take that and try to use it nexttime instead of just directly
relying on Grammarly.
So use it to build yourvocabulary and build your
sentence structure intosomething better.
But then, if we're talkingface-to-face communication, just
do it right.
You've got to get out there.
And if you're afraid of beingin front of an audience, the

(01:48:58):
best way to get over that is tobe in front of an audience over
and over and over.
Start with a small audience andbuild it.
You know you may still get someanxiety about it, which is
natural, and for some peoplethat helps them perform better,
but you know the best way to doit is lead meetings, get in
front of audiences, be willingto be the keynote speaker and

(01:49:21):
then find instead of justshadowing people, really
critically analyze what thepeople are doing.
So it's not just aboutfollowing them around and
learning about what they'redoing, but it's about how
they're doing it.
How does someone you look up torun the meeting?
What does their agenda looklike on the front end?
And you've got to thinkcritically about how to analyze

(01:49:43):
those rather than just saying,yeah, they did a really good job
, but why?
Why did they do a good job?
What made it good?
And what does good even meanfor you?

Well, and that junior PM can help us
out and think about in a neweraspect.
Playing with AI may not be partof everybody's wheelhouse, but
I'm trying to take a key effortbecause I don't want to be left
behind by the Gen Zs.
I don't want to lose out on thejob just because I don't
understand some method of usingAI not necessarily how to build,

(01:50:18):
but just as a point ofreference.

Yeah, another aspect of that is like when we
do our team meetings, one of thethings in our client and our
culture is safety.
So every meeting starts out withwhat they call a level one,
where we establish whereemergency equipment is, where
the egress routes are, whatwe're going to do in case of an
emergency.
And I know when I first startedthat was like I've never done

(01:50:45):
that before, but it was likethis is required for every
meeting.
It doesn't matter if it's afive-minute meeting or a
20-minute meeting or a two-hourmeeting.
You've got to do this.
So I kind of wrote my ownscript after following a bunch
of other PMs around.
But now when a new PM comes in,we have slides and we go read
through that and in our teammeeting it's like all right, you
are now leading a meeting, walkus through it, and they stumble

(01:51:08):
.
And then, after doing thatthree or four times in a team
meeting, they get in front ofthe client and they go through
it because they've done it.
And it's not practicing infront of a mirror, it's
practicing in front of otherpeople because that is so much
harder.

All right.

When I first started teaching, I used to keep
a mint in my pocket, and whenthat mint was dissolved I knew
it was time to quit talking.
And it worked great.
And then one day I had a buttonin my pocket.

It's time, joe.
It's time, all right.
All right.
So how do you deal with a PM?
So this is obviously someone onthe outside that deals with PMs
that won't ask questions neededor go outside the box if need

(01:52:10):
be.
Well, I guess you could ask thequestions.

You ask the questions or kind of start.
Yeah, I mean it's asking thequestions and guiding and seeing
where it goes, because maybethey're just not thinking that
they need to ask any morequestions.
They think that they have allthe answers, which right there,
tells you it's most likely ajunior PM.
I mean, I'm sure there's somesenior PMs out there that

(01:52:43):
definitely think they know all,but if you're not constantly
learning in this industry, thenyou're going to be behind very
quickly.

Yeah so I'm going to assume this is someone who's
on the outside trying to getinformation from a client and
the PM isn't going to the clientand asking the right questions,
and the only way you can dothat is ask the PM to ask the
questions and eventually they'lllearn the importance of that.

Yeah, I was going to say something similar,
walt.
I was thinking that it's reallya situation of you don't know
what you don't know.
Something similar, walt.
I was thinking that it's reallya situation of you don't know
what you don't know and really,as a manager of someone like
that, whether they'reexperienced or not, that it's
where the coaching is going tocome into play and it's that

(01:53:31):
crawl before you walk, walkbefore you run, and really
trying to teach them, to ask thequestions and kind of lead by
example.
I think, like you guys weresaying, sometimes you have to
yourself and kind of lead themand show them what some of the
questions should be if theydon't know.

Maybe that goes into the aspect too,
that the PM doesn't know whatthey are trying to ask because
they don't understand what's infront of them, and then again
that's more so where you do needto ask the questions, or that
PM needs to ask the questions tolearn.

So for this one, get stuck in meeting minutes
when there's a technical topicthat is not my expertise.
What are some tips to handlethese notes without getting too
into details, to avoid sayingthings that are not correct?
Well, I'd be very careful aboutwhat I said and that might be
an opportunity to reach out tothe SME, because if that came up
, hopefully there is an SMEinvolved on the team.
You can reach out to them andsay this came up.

(01:54:46):
How should I address this?
Or can I refer them to you fora more detailed answer?

And there's also times where, if you're in front
of a client, it's useful to havea back channel.
So if you're on a Zoom meetingwith a client, sometimes I'll be
slacking with people that arepart of the team, saying, hey,
like what's the deal with thisor can you feel this question or
whatever else.
There's a need in certaincircumstances to have that back

(01:55:14):
channel.
So a lot of times I go aheadand get those set up ahead of
time and let them know, like,hey, you know, be able to have
your Slack open in a differentwindow, just in case.
We need to have a conversationabout this.
Because within Zoom, unlesssomething's changed recently,
you can only message oneindividual at a time and
sometimes you need a small sidegroup chat of what's going on to

(01:55:35):
kind of get some support onthat on the back end.
So yeah, that's kind of atangent to this, but I like
having a back channeloccasionally when the meeting
needs it.

Yeah, we deal with engineers all the time
and I have no idea what's goingon on some of the electrical
terms or HVAC when it gets intosome of these different odd
situations, and would hate to bethe one to write the meeting
minutes after a lot of thosetechnical topics or technology
topics come out.
So if it's after the meeting'sover you're trying to remember

(01:56:12):
these things, there is nothingwrong with going back to that
stakeholder and asking themagain to repeat that or send you
something in email explainingfurther what that is, so you can
add that note to the meetingminutes as well.

I think it's so important.

Clinton "Brooks" Herm (01:56:30):
sometimes it's not what you say, but what
you don't say what you don'tsay when I use my notes
sometimes just to support the AEfirms that are hired in the
construction industry, becausenormally they're the ones that
are doing the CA and areresponsible for putting together
the meeting minutes, or it mayeven be the general contractor,

(01:56:52):
so then they'll receive what Itook notes on.
Unless it's an internal.
It does get a little difficultwith our viewers' comment if
it's internal team and notnecessarily a third party that's
also managing the project.

So that's a great point and we actually have had
this discussion.
We've got some new PMs and itwas one of the topics of who
delivers the minutes.
So in the beginning of aproject, when we do our internal
and our initial project kickoff, the PM runs, that, creates the
minutes, sends the minutes.
When we go into the designphase, the PM does the initial

(01:57:30):
design kickoff, introduces theteam, then hands it over to the
design professional and, throughthe rest of the design process,
the design professional andthrough the rest of the design
process, the design professionaldoes all the minutes because
they're the ones that are askingthe design questions and giving
the answers and they then sendthose notes to the PM who then
does the distribution.
And then when we move intoconstruction, the PM takes over

(01:57:54):
again for the pre-construction,introduces the team, talks about
where we're at, hands it overto the contractor and then,
through construction, thecontractor then does the minutes
and sends them to the PM andthe PM then distributes them out

(01:58:18):
to the audience.

Is that similar in any other?
Similar for me, other than Itend to have the AE or the
contractor issue out the notes.
Just I will be the lastreviewer before they get
officialed and sent out, but Itry to let them hold that piece.

But otherwise everything's very very similar,
and part of that is all thecontacts that they need to go to
those people.
A lot of the, especially whenyou get on the GC side.
They have systems where theytrack and if you're on the list
you get the minutes.
If you're not on the list, youdon't.
So with the PM doing it, andthere may be emails that they
don't want out in public.

(01:58:58):
The PM knows who that is, butthey don't want the vendors and
other people being communicatingwith them directly.
So that's why, for us, we justwe have the PM do it, but each
organization obviously isdifferent.
It's 8.58, so we're going totake one last one.

(01:59:20):
This is the bonus round.
So how do you maintain a solidwork environment?
With the rise of remote work,there are aspects of physical
congregation that just cannot bereplicated with a screen.

So if this is just trying to learn the
team and have some fun, I'veshoot, I think, the whole time.
Covid, my wife and I wereprepping to get married and we
played games with our differentcoworkers there's virtual games
that are and we played gameswith our different co-workers.
There's virtual games that areout there.
I'm drawing a blank on thenames.

(02:00:02):
I'll have to find it and sendit to you, walt, so you can put
it out there, and we used thoseand it built huge relationships
between our wedding party.
That one was some of them werein Switzerland, some were in
Nebraskaaska, california, texas,oklahoma, so all over and uh

(02:00:23):
for just the wedding, but thenalso going to the work piece, we
utilize that for work too.
We would take an hour or twohours.
Our boss would allow us to playthose games and kind of
maintain some of that.

So, and then one thing I would assume with this
is you're talking more of a teamtype situation, so you don't
always have to just haveeverybody on here like this as a
big group.
One of the things that personalinteraction works is you
actually spend time one-on-onewith an individual and that's
how you get to know them.
So you can always do especiallyin a manager environment is do

(02:01:05):
one-on-one virtual coffees orsomething with each member of
the team to get to know them.
Then you can still have yourteam meetings and encourage the
team to do the same with therest of their teammates.
So now everybody does get toknow each other and they start
to find commonalities betweenthem, hobbies and interests.

Yeah, during COVID I had a team that we would get
everyone together on a groupcall like this, but it would be.
The only agenda item is a15-minute call.
Only agenda item is you're notallowed to talk about work.
We call them water coolermeetings and it's just like get
everyone together.
Some of us were in the office,Some of us were not in the
office.

(02:01:44):
Get on teams and just try toget the people who are not in
the office to be part of ourlives and what's going on.

Yeah, we did a lot of that too, especially
throughout the pandemic.
We still are remote where weare today, and so one thing that
we've done to really try tokeep a positive atmosphere is,
even when we have team meetingswhether small, but even as a
full team, when we have a large,large team, when we're all
together it's about 30, isstarting to come up with the

(02:02:21):
different ideas, and one ishaving our full team meetings at
a coffee shop or somewhere likethat.
That's not in the office, butit's still somewhere that you
can all get together and you'restill doing work and those type
of things.
We've also talked aboutcommunity service together, so
you are laying down the laptopand you're actually going out

(02:02:43):
and supporting the community anddoing some things like that.

Yeah, there are pros and cons to having that
co-location and, obviously,working remote in the virtual
teams.
I think often we look at thenegative, that we, especially
those of us who are older, wethink about being a one spot,
one room, being able to walkover somebody's office and get

(02:03:09):
the answer you want, um, andit's like this wave.
This wave that's diminishing ofolder PMs and how we used to do
things, and there's a wave thatis increasing of PMs that this
is their good old days of howthings get done, and so we have

(02:03:30):
this overlap, I think, of PMsthat how we used to do it is how
we liked it, and this overlapof the next generation of how
they're doing it and how theylike it.
It's a culture between thegenerational gap between those
two entities.
I'm not saying just becauseyou're older that you don't like
remote work, but it's how weused to do things.

(02:03:53):
It's a comfort level of how weused to do it and change is hard
, even for PMs.

I do miss the practical jokes that
you used to be able to play inperson.
We had somebody needed to be innorthern Florida and flew to
southern Florida and was closerto Cuba than they were the
project they needed to be at, sowe decorated it with a bunch of
oranges in their office whenthey returned Nice.
So we had some fun with that.

Well, you still can do a little bit of joking.
We have a status meeting withthe leadership of our client
every Thursday and the person.
We have a slide and then wesend it up to the presenter to
present.
And one of my peers in theother region did his report and
said well, you know, walt, he'sgoing to have all kinds of
balloons and all this fancystuff, because you know how he

(02:04:47):
is.
So while he was talking, theguy went and added a bunch of
balloons and stuff to my slidewhich were not on there when I
sent it and then popped it up soeverybody got a good laugh
which were not on there when Isent it and then popped it up,
so everybody got a good laugh.
All right, so I want to thankthe panel for great job, great
information.
Thanks for sharing.
I want to thank the audience.

(02:05:08):
Lots of people joined, lots ofgood questions and comments, and
so there's a lot of informationshared out there beyond just
the panel member.
So that is appreciated.
This will be available onLinkedIn as a recording.
I will follow up, probablytomorrow, with some links to
books and Clinton.

(02:05:28):
If you'll send me your gameideas, we'll throw them in there
as well.
And then I am going to figureout how to do an audio only and
put it out on the PM Masterypodcast so that it will be there
and probably do some show noteson that with a little more
detail.
So thank you everyone, and thisis a quarterly event so the

(02:05:50):
panel may change, but we've gotto work now on a new topic.
If you guys have some ideas,throw them in the comments as
they continue to grow onLinkedIn and we'll consider that
for the next PM Nights andLadies of the Roundtable.
Thank you all.

Thanks everybody, Thank you, Thanks everyone.

Intro/Outro (02:06:13):
Thanks for listening to the PM Mastery
Podcast at wwwpm-masterycom.
Be sure to subscribe in yourpodcast player.
Until next time, keep workingon your craft.

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Communication for Project Managers - A LinkedIn Live Event Recording

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Communication for Project Managers - A LinkedIn Live Event Recording