Leading a Project Team: Humble, Prepared, and Open to Feedback

The NFL always showcases great talent, and it is worth considering how the world of sport relates to project management. Reflecting on a game where the winless Cincinnati Bengals faced the Los Angeles Rams, it is fair to wonder whether the favored team's coaches and players walked in thinking this would be an easy win. That mentality plays out in projects too, and the outcome is usually not good.

Team members who are overly confident fail to prepare for meetings, show up late, or wait until the last minute to complete tasks. Each of those leads to missed deadlines, unpredictable performance, and failure. Leading a project team well is less about the plan on paper and more about how you keep people humble, prepared, and honest with one another. Three habits make the difference.

Keep the team prepared, never complacent

No project is an easy win, regardless of how simple or repetitive it looks at first glance. The job of a project manager is to guide the team to prepare for every challenge rather than assume the outcome. A few practices keep a team sharp:

• Reward the good. When a team member is consistently prepared and on point, acknowledge it in front of the team. People want to be recognized for their work, and recognition reinforces the behavior you want.
• Use shared tools and trackers. Track every future milestone in a tool everyone can see and update, so the whole team knows the goals and owns their part. In status meetings, focus on the areas the tracker shows are behind or need help.
• Change up the routine. A prepared team can handle impromptu demos, surprise stakeholder visits, and last-minute requests. Set the expectation that things can change at any moment. Run a meeting in a different order, switch a call to in person, or have someone else kick it off. Small changes train the team to stay ready for anything.

If someone is regularly shooting from the hip, take them aside and give concrete examples of how to prepare better. The goal is to guide, not to scold.

Welcome feedback, and shed the thin skin

All athletes need continuous feedback to improve, and the same is true of project teams. Frank professional feedback can be unpleasant, but it should always be viewed positively. It might even rescue your project.

Legitimate constructive feedback helps you grow in your role, mature as an individual, and stay aligned with what the project actually needs. It also clarifies what is expected of you, which increases your efficiency.

Consider a common scenario: an important stakeholder calls a meeting to raise concerns about the project. The wrong instinct is to stall, hoping to quietly fix things before you have to hear the criticism. The right move is to welcome the meeting.

• Do not take feedback or professional criticism personally. Encourage it.
• Ask questions to understand exactly what is required, and try to see the situation from the other person's perspective.
• When feedback comes from a team member, welcome it and seek the truth in it.
• Thank the person sincerely, and invite more.

A team that gives and receives feedback without defensiveness solves problems faster than one that hides from them.

Build trust through transparency

Preparation and feedback both rest on a foundation of trust, and trust is built through transparency. Project managers interact constantly with team members and stakeholders, and the surest way to a productive relationship is to be fully transparent from the start.

Unplanned issues will put projects behind schedule. New factors will affect budgets. The best policy is to share that information in real time with the people who need it. There is no such thing as good news or bad news, only factors affecting the plan.

• Take the emotion out of it. Do not avoid delivering unwelcome news or fixate on who should hear it.
• Adopt a consistent, open meeting policy with no sidebar damage-control conversations.
• Keep stakeholders in the loop whether progress is going well or not.
• Share information with the whole team rather than deciding what each person gets to see.

Transparency builds trust, and trust is what allows stakeholders to empower you to lead.

Execution is a craft

Executing successful IT projects is much more than technical knowledge. It is a craft that requires practitioners to adapt creatively to change, and those revisions in the face of new challenges require collaboration. The most effective people in the field transcend their individual passion for the technology, connect it to real human needs, and keep the bigger picture in view.

A humble, prepared, feedback-driven, transparent team is what turns that craft into results. As a project manager, you are a guide, not a dictator. Leverage the knowledge and skills your team brings, and lead in a way that lets them do their best work.

T2 Tech Group's project management methodology combines principles from PMI and Agile to support exactly this kind of collaboration and team empowerment.