Page 177 - Project+

interactions, industry standards and regulations that must be followed, and your

expectations of their work quality. You’ll want them to know the best way to contact
you and that you are available for any questions they may have.

Performance feedback should be given in a timely fashion. It is of little value to attempt
corrective action on something that happened several weeks or months ago. The team
member may not even remember the specifics of the performance in question. It is best
to deal with negative situations as soon as they occur. Be objective about your
observations and ask the team member to explain the issue from their perspective. The

best case is that you and the team member come to an understanding on what occurred
and how the behavior should be corrected. The not-so-best case is you’ll have to
remove this team member.

You must work with your human resource department if the team member refuses to
correct their behavior or if they don’t have the ability to perform their tasks. If your
team member came from a functional area, you’ll need to write up the issues and

provide this information to the functional manager.

It isn’t fun to have to remove or replace personnel from a project. But if all other
actions fail and the team member refuses to improve, you must take steps to prevent a
serious decline in morale. Taking this action also builds trust in you as a leader. Your
team will see that you’re willing take the actions needed in a compassionate manner to
deal with team issues.

Rewarding Superior Performance

Recognition and rewards are important elements of both individual and team

motivation. They are formal ways of recognizing and promoting desirable behavior and
are most effective when carried out by the project manager or management team.
Project teams work hard and often overcome numerous challenges to deliver a project.
If your company has a functional organizational structure, the project work may not
receive the appropriate recognition from the functional managers. That means it’s up
to you to recognize the job your team is doing and implement a recognition and reward
system.

When you think of rewards, you generally think of monetary rewards. And that’s great
if you’re lucky enough to have money for a reward system, either as a direct budget line
or as part of a managerial reserve. But there are options besides money that you can
use as a reward—for example, time off, movie tickets, sporting or cultural events, team
dinners, trophies, and so on. We’ve worked in organizations where an ordinary object
was designated the “trophy” for outstanding performance. Individual team members
were responsible for recognizing each other and passing on the trophy.

Another no-cost idea is a letter of recognition sent to an employee’s manager, with
copies to the appropriate organizational executives and the project sponsor. This can
be a powerful means of communicating your appreciation for outstanding
performance.

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