Tuesday 1 February 2022

The key to success of Project - Team cognitive management

A project that fails can find many reasons, but one thing must be true, that is, the team members' perception of the goal is inconsistent, and then there is a difference in action, which ultimately leads to the failure of the project. from the perspective of the team sport of football, this article explains the important role of team cognitive consistency and team success, hoping to be helpful to those engaged in project management.

football with team



speaking of teams, it is inseparable from the most popular team competition in the world today - football, as a person who insists on watching national football matches, just recently the national football team is still quite hot, so we must start from the national football team:

first of all, to make it clear, i think the biggest change that lippi has brought to the chinese team is that the team's cognition has changed.

anyway, i also briefly analyzed the three games of the belt:


  • the first game, against qatar, 0:0, in fact, the ball from the scene, played very well, is the luck of the bad ;
  • the second game, against south korea, 1:0, frankly, didn't play as well as the qatari scene, but with good luck, we won;
  • the third game, against iran, 0:1, this game, there is indeed a gap in strength, but on the scene, we dare to attack, we can also defend, is the embodiment of the real level, but luck is not on our side;
  • looking at these three games, in fact, the most obvious point is that the overall formation of the chinese team is quite good, and whether it is behind or ahead, the mentality is better.


so, what does this change have to do with the so-called team cognition, in fact, it is too much to do, you think, of the 11 people, we are usually divided into three lines of front, midfield, and backcourt (it seems that i want to popularize the formation of football).

when the team's understanding of the goal of the game is inconsistent, the forward wants to attack, the defender wants to defend, the midfielder will attack with the forward, and the other will be tired of defending, and the three lines are often disconnected, so it is strange not to lose.

therefore, whether the ideology and cognition are unified, from the formation of the whole field, the running position between the team members, the reception can be clearly felt.

looking back at the national team games we have seen in the past, we are ahead, we don't know how to play, we don't know how to play when we are behind, and everyone's ideas and goals are not consistent, so it is inevitable that we will lose regularly.

therefore, at this stage, the biggest change in the national football team brought by lippi is: when everyone plays football on the field, the goal cognition is the same; this is consistent, in fact, in the asian scope, the level of the chinese team actually looks like a level (well, scrap such a tongue to talk about the national football team, enough to prove that i am truly in love with the national football team).

now that we're done with football, let's get down to business management.



cognitive management of project objectives



the core of goal management is not the definition of goals, but the consistency of team cognition.


WE KNOW THAT IN PROJECT MANAGEMENT, THE GOAL IS THE FIRST ELEMENT, AND IN THE DEFINITION OF THE GOAL, WE USUALLY FOLLOW THE SMART PRINCIPLE:

  • S=Specific ——- specific
  • M=Measurable – measurable
  • A=Attainable – Achievable
  • R=Relevant –– Relevant
  • T=Time-bound ——— time limit




WHY DO YOU NEED TO DEFINE THE GOAL ACCORDING TO THE SMART PRINCIPLE, BECAUSE SUCH A GOAL IS EASY TO UNDERSTAND AND RECOGNIZE, AND THEN IT CAN PRODUCE GOOD EXECUTION; ACCORDING TO STATISTICS, MORE THAN 90% OF THE EXECUTION IS NOT GOOD, IN FACT, IT LIES IN THE DEFINITION OF THE GOAL.

here, i would like to say that the goal is clearly defined, clear, just the means, so that the team members understand in place, the cognition is consistent, is the key point.

I REMEMBER THAT FU SHENG SAID IN ONE OF HIS ARTICLES FOR ENTREPRENEURS THAT THE CORE TASK OF THE CEO IS TO CHANGE THE ENTREPRENEURIAL GOAL FROM AN OPEN-ENDED PROBLEM TO A CLOSED-LOOP PROBLEM, AND THE SO-CALLED CLOSED-LOOP PROBLEM HERE IS ACTUALLY A SIMPLE AND FEASIBLE GOAL.

I DEEPLY BELIEVE THAT THIS IS INDEED THE TRUTH, THE TRUTH THAT MANY CEOS KNOW BUT REFUSE TO ADMIT.

therefore, i would like to say that when you do project goal management, in addition to defining the goal, focusing on the team's consistent understanding of the goal is the core meaning of good goal management.

in fact, in turn, when your focus falls on the "goal recognition consistency" point of the outcome, it will definitely force you to define the goal clearly, concretely and executably.

after talking about the cognitive management of project goals, let's look at the requirements management of software.

requirements management for software

the essence of demand management is still the consistent management of demand cognition.

in a software project, the most important thing is requirements management, and in a failed software project, the requirements are always inseparable;

requirements management, in fact, there are two points:


  • determine the scope of requirements; ——— – this is especially important in outsourced projects;
  • manage changes in requirements; ——— – this happens often and often has a fatal impact;
  • speaking of two points, it is really difficult to do, almost all the places where demand is ridiculed, not in the scope of demand, everyone disagrees, or whether the demand belongs to the change, there is ambiguity between the two sides.


therefore, you see, the so-called demand management is actually a problem of consistent cognition of the scope of demand and change, and if the cognition is unified, it is natural not to be ridiculous.

let's review the evolution of software development projects:


in the past traditional software project development, we will issue a detailed requirements specification, but the requirements specification, only more professional personnel can understand, you want customers to understand the specifications you combed, and then the brain to make up the corresponding product interface, that unless he is the product manager.

TODAY, THE REQUIREMENTS SPECIFICATION HAS GRADUALLY EVOLVED INTO A PRD DOCUMENT, WITH MORE EMPHASIS ON DESCRIBING THE REQUIREMENTS FROM THE USER'S POINT OF VIEW.

PREVIOUSLY, BASED ON UML, WE WOULD HAVE VARIOUS USE CASE DIAGRAMS, CLASS DIAGRAMS, BUSINESS PROCESS DIAGRAMS, ETC.


today, we still draw all kinds of business process diagrams, interaction logic, functional frameworks, etc., but more, we add the output of the prototype.


in particular, the output of the prototype visualizes the original text-based speculation and understanding into the understanding of the graphical interface, which greatly improves the consistency level of the needs cognition of all parties.


so, as you can see, the process of changing the intermediate outputs in a software project is essentially a process of continuously improving the consistency of requirements cognition.


saying so much in fact seems to be a very simple truth, in fact, i still want to let you project managers understand: the project management process, pay attention to the results is the most important, and focus on cognitive consistency management, is an effective results management method.


otherwise, we can often see a situation where the process seems to be right, there should be some processes and links, but the result is wrong.

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