| Bringing the f-word back in projects |
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| Written by Jacques Dunselman | |
| Monday, 01 November 2010 21:10 | |
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Many articles and books have already been written on success (and failure) factors of projects. Strangely enough, “Fun” is never mentioned as a success factor. In my experience, one of the common factors in successful projects is almost always a high fun-factor. Some may argue that this is because it’s not a factor but an indicator: when all other factors are properly addressed, people feel more comfortable and fun is allowed into the equation. I would argue that it also applies the other way around: when project team members enjoy working together, they can handle anything – thus increasing the chance of a successful delivery. If we all know happy team members are more productive, why shouldn’t we make a conscious effort to make our project fun to work in? Here is a recent example from the world of aviation - where one airline understood this and came up with a way to put the fun back in the safety briefings.
Click here if you prefer to see the male version. If you have seen the above safety briefing video, you likely agree with me that this way of briefing is at least 10 times as effective as a regular briefing (and if you don’t agree: when was the last time you paid attention to a safety briefing?) What I particularly like about this approach is that it’s fun for both crew members and passengers. Can you be as creative and come up with a fun way of doing a project task that is a joy for both your project team and your customer? I would love to hear from you.
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Comments
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by."
Douglas Adams (Author of 'The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy')
You have to laugh; well I think you have to laugh.
Without a little bit of fun in every project then the project world can be a dark and depressing place.
Setting a professional but fun structure for your project can really be beneficial for when the problems start to rise up to challenge your plan of perfectness. And problems will inevitably arise.
In the years I have done many things to encourage team bonding, lighten the darker moments of project hell, and diffuse difficult project related situations. I have even accepted the full and complete blame for every problem, issue and challenge to a project in front of a room full of project team members, before walking outside and firing myself (in a loud voice, well voices - one mine and one me pretending to be my boss). The net result was a diffused situation, where it had previously been extremely confrontational between teams and individuals.
Done well this does not damage your status or authority but can actually be a very positive act in people seeing you a human being, and not just a project manager, and thereafter wanting to share a smile and a laugh with you during the day.
It is just the same in that hotbed of confrontation, the home!
Try looking at one of your children when they are in a really bad mood. Look them in the eye, with a serious face, and point a finger at them and say' Don't laugh! Don't you dare laugh! If you laugh you will go straight to the naughty stair!'. I bet at the very least you will get a smile out of them.
My family finds that, even in the most stressed out, aggressive, emotional and 'in your face' moments, if you can make the opposition (and I use that term loosely) laugh then the war is soon over.
It is hard to kill someone when you are laughing.
Well I guess that is true except for some of the more extreme psychopathic types ('No, I expect you to die Mr Bond' ... cue maniacal laughter).
For me a team has to have fun doing their work, a quiet team is a bored team (one could argue that they are head down working, and if this is the case great, but they are not working as a team).
Project work has to be fun to achieve results, so lets stimulate ourselves and our teams and have FUN!
This company culture is so important to us, and we are very proud to have our IT Project Blog co-host the #projectfuncompe tition! Thanks for including us!
The project manager gets things started by passing along a bouquet of flowers to a team member with one thing they like/admire about that person on the card. That person, in turn, keeps his/her card and passes the bouquet with the compliment-card along to someone else, who continues the chain until everyone in the project receives the bouquet and it returns to the project manager. This is fun at the time and gives everyone something tangible they can keep.