The Key to Project Management success is people
Am I stating the obvious?, well probably yes, but with a lot of emphasis these days on governance there is a danger that we employ Project Managers purely based on their technical ability and who can build and run a plan but if things take a turn for the worse then without people skills they may not be able to fully recover the project.
So how do we get success with people? And let me say that I am talking about 3 to 4 groups where people skills are needed for Project Managers.
- Business – your stakeholders
- Suppliers – your providers
- Management – your reporting lines
- Team- your delivery team
The key to all of them is communication, honesty and an open approach but applied slightly differently because each group will need different levels of information at different times. This is where stakeholder analysis comes in. Identify all the people with some involvement in the project whether that is using the end product or part of its creation and for each person identify their impact and attitude to the project and how you are going to communicate with them.
Some people skills can’t be taught, although some may disagree, but a lot comes down to personality which you are born with or develop in your early days. The basics however can be applied and even if you are not a natural leader or don’t have a magnetic personality you can still employ the basic levels of people skills and achieve success.
Here are my 5 basics:-
- Involve People – Seek their views, playback to them before finalising; ensure all have a view (the strong and the weak)
- Empower People – Give responsibility, Trust them to deliver
- Inform People – Tell them what is happening and share your views, the issues and problems you and the project are facing. Be straight with them and don’t let problems fester
- Join People – Create a team. Get them together and facilitate discussion. Encourage team working
- Reward People – Praise people, recognise good work/ achievements but don’t forget they are part of a team
Project governance is very important but if you can build project governance around people then success will surely come.


