“Telling your boss bad news and surviving

Presented to San Dimas Chapter

SCQAA-IE

March 13, 2008

– Philip E. Quigley, CFPIM, PMP

– Senior Portfolio Manager, CSC

Presented by

What this workshop is

• It’s a workshop

• It’s a little lecture-then you do case studies

• You will present your ideas on what to do

• There are no perfect or correct solutions

Bad news

• Telling the boss good news is fun and rewarding

• Telling your boss bad news can be “Career Limiting”

• Unfortunately “bad” things happen on projects and must be dealt with

Telling your boss bad news takes special skills to survive

• A lot depends on your boss, your relationship and the organization

• You have to have a plan

• You have to have a network of relationships

Telling your boss bad news takes special skills to survive-your boss

• You need to assess your boss

– How does he/she take bad news?

– What is their relationship with their bosses, executive management?

– How does executive management take bad news?

Telling your boss bad news takes special skills to survive-your organization

• You need to assess your organization

– How does it take bad news?

– Are messengers of bad news shot?

– Are mistakes accepted as part of the business or as a criminal offense deserving the career death sentence?

Assignment #1

• Each person in your group assess their organization in their acceptance of bad news, mistakes and failures– Share that within your group

– Prepare a summary and present to class

Case Study #1• Major IT project-putting in SAP

• You are running behind in collecting and

approving requirements

• Users aren’t attending the meetings

• What do you do?

Case Study #1-Cont’d

• You report to steering committee-VP of Finance, Marketing, Engineering and Production

• CFO is the executive sponsor

• Users who aren’t attending the meeting are the finance people

• CFO is known as a “screamer”

Case Study #1 Continued

Steering committee meeting is scheduled for this week

CEO has decided to attend-wants to know what is going on

What are you going to recommend?

What are you going to do?

Case Study #1-Instructions• Each table is a study group

• Have 15 minutes– What are you going to say in the meeting?

• Analysis of situation

• Recommendations

– How do you handle CEO and CFO?

– What allies do you need to have?

– What prep work, people to see and talk to, do you do before the meeting?

– Pick someone from the group to present

Case Study # 2

• New product has been launched with aggressive schedule and demanding sales plan

• Aggressive cost cutting moves-especially with suppliers- were demanded by CEO, CFO

• Problems are now being encountered•One supplier, chosen for cost, can’t produce•Quality issues are being encountered from another supplier

•Design was “thrifted” to reduce cost

Case Study # 2-continued

• You are the Project manager-report to VP of Manufacturing

• Your VP of Manufacturing has scheduled a meeting with CEO, CFO and other executives

• Wants an explanation of what is going wrong-there is “Concern” at the executive level

• Your VP has a strained relation with the CEO, CFO

Case Study #2-Continued

• Each table is a study group

• Come up with a plan for the meeting

– What are you going to say?

– How are you going to say it?

– What allies can you get?

– You have 15 minutes

– Pick one person to speak for your table

Some thoughts, ideas-may work-may not work

• Understand what has and is happening

– The facts only, but dig

• Get options to correct things

– Get at least two

– Be prepared to recommend one

– No finger pointing-just the facts

• Get allies

– Where ever possible get finance to work with you

Some thoughts, ideas• Do prep work

– Meet with different people before any meetings

– Brief them, get their support on analysis and

actions to be taken

– Don’t go into an executive meeting with key

people being “cold” on what is going on

• Never surprise executives with bad news in a

meeting

Case Study #3-

• You are PM of a large, 100 plus team

• You are implementing new CRM package for a major auto company

• This system has been touted by CEO and board as the solution to sagging US sales-will let the company re-connect with customers

• You have been brought in because project is behind schedule, over budget and users are mad because they don’t like the system and believe it won’t work

Case Study #3- Cont’d

• Previous PM was fired

• CEO wants a steering committee meeting and he wants to know what you are going to do-you have had a week

• By the way-

– Consensus from team is that this package isn’t very good

– But system was bought by the CFO because he came from the consulting company that recommended it

• CFO is considered “fair hair boy” by CEO and Wall Street

Case Study #3-Continued

• Each table is a study group

• Come up with a plan for the meeting

– What are you going to say?

– How are you going to say it?

– What allies can you get?

– You have 15 minutes

– Pick one person to speak for your table

Final Thoughts

• All Projects will have problems

• Schedule starts going wrong the first day, first task

• Difference between “successful” projects and “failed” projects is that problems are identified early and resolved before they have impact

• The difference is the PM and the environment they establish

Final Thoughts-cont’d

• As the PM your must tell, show and lead the team in how it deals with problems– Look for them, be proactive

– Identify them

– Communicate the problem

– Identify alternative solutions, pick one and move on it

– No shooting the messenger

– It’s OK to have a problem-issue is to deal with them

Final Thoughts-cont’d

• The team must know that mistakes are accepted and are to be learned from.

• But there are rules to mistakes

– Admit them

– Clean up the mess

– Learn from them

– Keep moving-only people who don’t make mistakes are people doing nothing

• Can’t have a project team not doing things because they are scared of making a mistake

– Big issue is scared to make a decision-will ruin a project team

Final Thoughts-cont’d

• Must manage “expectations” of your bosses

• Tell them things will go wrong-that is the nature of projects

• Your approach is to quickly identify them and resolve them

• You will tell them the good and the bad every week

• You will do it in writing

Final Thoughts-cont’d

• The approach is professional

• Understand you will run into the “politicians”, people with agenda’s, the power players

• They will use any mistake, problem, bad news to advance themselves

• Only defense– Know who they are

– Build alliances to minimize their impact

– This is another seminar.

Final Thoughts-cont’d

• Hope this helps

• Remember you will have to give bad news

• Plan for it

• Be prepared to take a beating

• Good luck

Final Thoughts-cont’d

• You need to monitor your organization on a weekly basis

– Who has power? Gained some-lost some?

– What is your relationship with them? Good? Bad?

– What is your boss or bosses in the power game

• Winner or loser?

– Must constantly monitor-things can change

Final Thoughts-cont’d

• Stuff to read

– Harvard Business Review-”How to Manage your Boss”

– “Dress for Success-Men and Women”

– “How to win friends and influence people”-Dale Carneige

– Take a sales class at UCSB etc. Should be one or two day course on professional selling

Thank You

Are There Any Questions?