Leadership of and Through Projects

On Monday evening, I attended an ITP presentation given by Colin Ellis. The presentation was entitled “The Project Rots from the Head” and provided his perspective on project failures and how to prevent them.

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Colin’s key proposition was that project failure is a direct result of leadership failures. Either by the Project Sponsor, the Project Manager or them collectively. This arises due to them not being effective in their respective roles.

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The role of the Project Manager was to:

• Build the Team;
• Build the Plan; and
• Deliver the Project

Colin stressed the importance of doing these items in this order – building the capability, defining the approach and doing the work to realise the outcome.

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Personal Reflection on Projects

In reflecting on this proposition and assessing them against the projects I’m currently involved with – both client-facing, internal to LPS and those outside of work. They ring true for us achieving our goals.

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For me these are:

• Expert360 – the current client needs – building the capability to deliver;
• outside of work – my leadership of a School Board and mentoring a Principal with the SpringBoard Trust; or
• personal – getting rid of a few kilos as we head towards Spring/Summer (with the help of the “Biggest Loser” competition at SKYCITY)

Each of these activities has the need to manage challenges across my work with others, to proactively collaborate and in being true to myself.

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Expert360 Context

It is these softer skills that are a common challenge for us all - in building and contributing to effective team cultures, positively delivering for our client organisations and maintaining a commitment to our values.

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As we look at the growth Expert360 is seeing across our clients and our market, it is important that we continue to focus on the right people doing the right things to get the right results.

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Next week we will celebrate an important milestone in Expert360’ history. There are now 200 people in our collective team. I look forward to celebrating this with you and continuing our plan towards our next milestone. In conclusion we will continue to enable quality project outcomes for our clients.