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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZNkLyQSZVg

Quite some time ago I wrote a piece for John Mancini’s Eight Things series. As promised in my 1^st post as an Expert Blogger I’m going to revisit some of the points I addressed in that article.

Let’s pretend you’re working on a major project that has multiple stakeholder groups, each with agendas, priorities, philosophies, etc. Now let’s also pretend that the project (it’s actually a program) has been envisioned by the CEO or some such all powerful being. Let’s agree that all the stakeholder groups, in order to keep their jobs, have bought into the CEO’s vision of the future. Why, then, is it that no two groups can actually agree on how to move forward? Why, in some cases, does one group actually try to diminish the value of another (it’s not a .net vs Java thing)? It’s because they don’t communicate effectively.

Communication is not about the loudest voice winning. Communication is about articulating your points in a manner that can be understood by your audience. Communication is also about LISTENING. The communication issues on this entirely fictitious project are really due to nothing more than a bunch of alpha dogs peeing on the same spot to mark their turf.

The reality is that they are going to have to find a way to communicate effectively; because this project is not going to be scrapped (someone would lose face – another communications gaffe). Coming in hard with an iron fist in a velvet glove isn’t going to work because there would be a massive backlash from the user community, resulting in really bad things happening to a lot of people.

One of my roles as a consultant is to facilitate communication between stakeholder groups. It’s my job to take everything in and send it back out in a way that offends no one (or offends everyone equally). The toughest thing to accomplish is to convince everyone that all the good ideas are theirs (fosters buy-in and ownership).

My point is this: if your project is being hit by internecine warfare, you need to do something about it. It’s all well and good to have a communication plan that includes posters, coffee mugs, cult-like rallies and all that blather, but if the people that have to define and build the solution can’t come to some sort of agreement the whole thing’s a waste of time.

If you don’t have the resources internally to fill the facilitation and liaison roles, engage a consultant.

The totally fictitious project is an ECM project, but poor communication will kill any type of project.