Open and honest relationships are an important part of the process of forming an effective project team. The selection of psychologically compatible employees is another key component. It is imperative that the project manager has the freedom of action when choosing team members.
When recruiting a team, it is useful to use Briggs-Meyers personality assessment tests to try to assess in advance the ability of team members to interact with each other.
Another component is the concept of team roles. Many project managers focus on purely "technical" roles, such as database designers, network specialists, user interface experts, etc. All of these are important, but one also needs to think about the "psychological" roles that one or more team members may play.
These roles are present in normal projects, but in hopeless ones they become especially important. Rob Tomsett identified eight key roles in the project as follows: Unfortunately, even the presence of performers for each role and psychological compatibility do not guarantee that the team will be a single whole.
Chairman
Chooses the path by which the team moves forward towards common goals, ensuring the best use of its resources; is able to detect the strengths and weaknesses of the team and ensure the greatest use of the potential of each team member. One might think that such a person is usually the official project manager; however, in self-governing teams, it can be anyone.
Shaper
Gives a complete form to the actions of the team, directs attention and tries to give a certain framework to group discussions and the results of joint activities. Such a person may have an official position of "architect" or "lead designer", but the main thing is that this role is "imaginary". In a hopeless project, it is especially important to have a single and clear idea of the problem and its possible solution.
Idea Generator (Plant)
Plant – Puts forward new ideas and strategies, focusing on the main challenges the group faces. It seems to me that the name "provocateur" is more suitable for such a role - a person who is trying to introduce radical technologies in the team, to look for new solutions to technical problems.
Monitor-evaluator
Analyzes problems from a pragmatic point of view, evaluates ideas and proposals in such a way that the team can make balanced decisions. In most cases, such a person acts as a "skeptic", balancing the optimistic proposals of the designer and the generator of ideas. The critic is well aware that new technologies do not always work, suppliers' promises about the possibilities of new tools and languages sometimes do not come true and everything can go wrong as intended.
Company worker
Turns plans and concepts into practical working procedures, systematically and effectively fulfills the commitments made.
In other words, while the designer gives the finished form to the big technological solutions, the idea generator offers radical new solutions, and the critic is engaged in looking for flaws and flaws in these proposals, the worker bee is the person who works without attracting attention, and gives out tons of code on the mountain.
Obviously, any hopeless project needs at least a couple of such bees, but by themselves they are not able to bring success to the project, since they do not have the necessary breadth of horizons. And to make them work better, buy them corn biscuits.
Team worker
Supports the strength of spirit in the project participants, assists them in difficult situations, tries to improve the relationship between them and generally helps to raise the team spirit.
In other words, such a person performs the role of a "diplomat" in the team. It can also be a project manager, but it can also be any of the team members who is more attentive to their colleagues.
This role is especially important in hopeless projects, as the team often experiences a lot of stress, and at least one or two of its members begin to behave as indifferent to everything "supermen".
Resource investigator
Discovers and communicates new ideas, developments, and resources outside the project team, makes external contacts that may be useful to the team, and conducts all subsequent negotiations.
I prefer to call such a person a "garbage collector" because he always knows where to find an abandoned PC, a free conference room, an extra desktop, or almost any other resource the team needs.
Such resources may or may not be extracted through official channels; but even if they can be obtained in a "normal" way, it often requires filling out 17 forms in triplicate, after which you have to wait six months for all bureaucratic procedures to be completed.
A team earner has many friends and connections in their organization with which to beg or borrow the necessary resources. The main thing is that the miner loves his activities.
Completer
Completer – maintains the team's perseverance in achieving the goal, actively seeks to find work that requires increased attention, and tries, as far as possible, to save the team from mistakes associated with both activity and inactivity. Such a person plays a dominant role during the testing of the system in the final phase of the project life cycle, but his role in earlier phases is also important.
The team needs to be reminded from time to time (or better yet, every day) that they are not making a career for life, but are only participating in a project with tight deadlines and intermediate checkpoints that need to be reached in time so as not to fail the project.
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