I thank you DJ for an excellent and very well written dissection of corporate procedures. You raise to the level of consciousness a problem which plagues us all. I personally find it helpful to be reminded of the benevolent origins of all procedures – you might even save me some hair.

As requested by Stephen, I will try to relate some experiences to illustrate the points from my previous post. At the outset I should point out that most of my PM experience is from my time in the Process Industries (30+ years), rather than my more recent time in IT. The working environment, but definitely not the principals, in the Engineering/Construction world of PM can be very different. Nonetheless the “people” skills, and getting and keeping your “team” on side apply right across all industries. PM in IT is very much a late comer to the “game”.

Before I get into my Process Industries PM work in China (in part 2 of this post), which was for me probably one of the most defining experiences in my professional life, I would like to give my thoughts on “leadership”,which I hope you will see later (in part 2) has some relevance. In the case of PM, I think of “leadership” as “benign manipulation”, “benign” because there is good purpose in the intent and “manipulation” because the PM is often faced with situations where people lack confidence in themselves or in the team’s ability to be successful.

A PM has to make the “team” truly believe and keep on believing even in the tougher times without showing inner concerns! People naturally want to succeed, not just for personal gain but because there is no better feeling than being part of a “winning” team. On the other hand, if things start to go sour, there are those people who will try to distance themselves from the impending “disaster”, entirely for personal reasons. Watch out for those! They can be the “bad apple in the barrel”.

How often do we start a project with people saying, “It is impossible in the time available” (the start was delayed due to client negotiations for example) or “It will never work with that technology” (the client insisted but we know better)? Rarely does the PM get to set the “scene” but is expected to get the “job” done.

The PM is usually only too painfully aware of the “starting point challenges” and has probably battled hard behind the scenes to try and change things, likely without much success. Therefore the first challenge that the PM may face is motivating the “team” into believing in the project and that it “can be done”. This is the first place where the PM’s leadership skills are important. They are important throughout the project for different reasons at different times. However, if you start out on the “wrong foot”, it is likely to be a “self fulfilling prophecy”.

It is all too easy as a PM to become pre-occupied with keeping the client and one’s Senior Management “happy” and with the traditional working components of PM; scope, schedule, cost and quality. After all there never seems to be enough hours in a day to do it all! However, if you forget the emotional and motivational state of the “team”, it will all come crashing down like “a house of cards”.

I guess that the debate over whether Leaders are “born” or “made” will probably never be quite resolved. I personally believe that it is some of both. Some people are born with certain character/personality traits, which at first may be masked by their upbringing, and then education, opportunity and experience shapes them to harness those traits. Once they realize that for themselves they cannot “turn off” those natural leadership tendencies!

More in part 2 (which I hope that you will read if I haven’t bored you already!)

Graham Jones
President, VANTUG

In my previous post on PM I gave some of my views on leadership. In this post I would like to go on and begin to outline my experience in working in China and some of the challenges that it posed. I would like to stress my only motive here is to illustrate the importance of leadership. People who know me well will attest to the fact that this is definitely not some unashamed effort at self-promotion. I only hope to give some food for thought. Ultimately, actions speak much louder than words.

When I went to work in China about ten years ago, the importance of leadership was hardly new to me (I am no spring chicken). However, it literally wasn’t until the project was over that I fully realized what the “team” had achieved. You may have noticed in my previous post that I mention the importance of “team”. The “leader” must be part of and yet apart from the “team”, a delicate balance, and I very much believe in a “team” concept. It may be cliché but “lead by example” does matter. At no time during the project was I really conscious of the impact that I had. I simply followed my instincts; admittedly experienced instincts.

So what was so special about this project? Let me do a little scene setting:

1. I was “parachuted” in to try and salvage the project. It was losing money (a lot of money). Failure could have resulted in legal action ultimately costing enough to seriously affect the company’s viability. Perhaps most importantly our reputation in China with all of its prospects would have been shot! China is a huge country but a small “community”.
2. The technology was very challenging. Two earlier plants built elsewhere in China had been very costly and not really that successful. Consequently, we had a justifiably skeptical client.
3. We were dealing with a recently formed company and an unsophisticated client when it comes to the process industries.
4. The success of this project was vital to the local economy since it was part of the introduction of secondary industry (the main industry was an oil field but it was going to run dry within 20 years). Success would bring great kudos from Beijing and more investment but failure…. Well there are no “failures” in China (loss of face is a very real issue). So we started out with a very non-cooperative client (at the outset they were convinced that it would fail) and yet their help was essential for success; classical catch 22!
5. We were in a rural location (many locals had never seen a Caucasian or even knew they existed) where living and working conditions were very much less than desirable; cold and damp in the winter and unbearably hot in mid summer (40-45 Celsius and humid). We had heat pumps (when there was “juice” to run them) but it would be quieter at the end of the runway at YVR. We had to “share” our food (not exactly western Chinese food) with the rats that lived with us and came to visit us at night, et., etc.- you get the picture.
6. The company senior management was also convinced that the project would fail and my job was to minimize the damage! BTW my day job was IT Director and this project was only supposed to occupy 20% of my time. Pardon me while I laugh out load…..

Ok, no pressure, right?

When I was given the task I wasn’t sure whether to be flattered or just go away and “cry”! I took a deep breath and started to formulate my plans. First of all I don’t believe in starting out thinking that you are going to fail; that’s what’s called a “self-fulfilling prophecy”.  No matter how hard you try, if you believe that, it’s like the smell of bad cheese; nobody will come near you. I have to say that I had an excellent “team”, which I inherited from the other two projects, without which I would be telling a very different story. Unfortunately, most of them had spent many long days (often 14 to 16 hrs day after day) in something of a losing cause. So I basically inherited a good but very demoralized “team” – my first leadership challenge. Knowing what we were facing, going in like that would have made us “lambs to the slaughter”.

Unfortunately, this is turning into a rather long post so I will close part 2 at this point and post part 3 (the last I promise ) shortly………

Graham Jones

President, VANTUG

Part 3

The company had built a successful plant in Canada and a personal review of the technology (my Chem Eng background) convinced me that we had a “viable product” for China despite all of the obvious differences and previous problems there (culture, lack of experience, climate, etc.).

But, how to convince the team? I enlisted the help of a colleague who specializes in “critical analysis” of technology/systems. He did an outstanding job and the team had renewed faith in the product. I now had the team “pumped up” for the challenge! It turned into a great “team building” exercise. We even made up a slogan (“JH KPO - Job One”), which we put on all of the internal documentation, communications to the client, and the absolutely indispensable baseball cap (made in China of course).

The official plan was to be there for 3 months. In the end we were there for about 11 months (wink, wink – I told the company management and the client 3 months to give them something acceptable but actually budgeted for 12 via a large contingency that I managed to persuade the President to put in – still not sure how I managed that!). To explain why it took so long would literally require a “book” and is not germane. Indeed it would take a “book” to describe my total experience in China. What are germane are the challenges where leadership played a part.

If “pumping up the team” was essential at the outset, it became a regular challenge over time. I had not expected to spend much time there, just visit occasionally. It rapidly became apparent that I would have to “lead by example” and be there most of the time and work the same long hours (7:30am to 8:30pm daily with the very occasional day off). Visibility and accessibility are essential components of good management and leadership, eg if you say that you operate an “open door policy”, the door had better be truly open, literally.

Being there to provide “morale” support was one thing but I needed to demonstrate a useful purpose to the company and the client. As it turned out “doing contract amendments, keeping the client under control, getting them onside and keeping them out of the team’s way” was almost a full time job. In my first post I mentioned tackling and fixing the things that “bug” the team if you want loyalty and respect from them.

Despite many “rallying” speeches over a beer (American beer brewed under license unfortunately) after work, occasional recreational pastimes like ball hockey (Canadian, eh! – hockey sticks are “essential” plant site equipment) and the regular discharge of thousands of Chinese firecrackers, 10,000 on one occasion (boy, that was fun), it was impossible to maintain good team spirit and motivation.

The company travel and site work procedures made provision for a one week break every 8 weeks, in order to visit home and the family. Since it took 4 days to get there and back, it was hardly worth it! Plus people would have been more tired than before they left. The procedure never anticipated our situation. 8 weeks in JH felt more like 6 months! On my office wall “back home” I had the following to remind me of what I would be going back to and what my team was enduring on a regular basis:

Day 1 Beijing: The hearty man ate a hearty breakfast
Day 2 JH KPO: The hearty man ate a condemned breakfast
Day 14 JH KPO: The condemned man ate a condemned breakfast
Day 28 JH KPO: The condemned man couldn’t face breakfast!

I was clear that without a change I would have a revolt on my hands. In anticipation I had already redrafted the site work procedure for submission to the company based upon consultation with the team; a break every 4 weeks for a 4 day weekend anywhere they chose, within reasonable cost of course (3 days in Hong Kong in a ***** hotel definitely wasn’t on) plus an actual week at home every 16 weeks if needed. Sidebar: one of the team got home after 6 months to discover that his wife got fed up with cutting the grass and had the front garden replaced with concrete painted green!!! Ouch!

I knew that getting approval, if at all, would take too much time to be of any use to me. So I risked the “it is easier to get forgiven than permission” route and told the team that it was approved (well it was, if only by me) and moved right ahead. Success “magically” turns you into a genius from a villain. However, failure probably turns you into, well…..“gone”. Team morale immediately improved and people came back from their breaks refreshed and ready to continue to “fight the good fight”.  

Did I get total sh…….. from the company? You bet I did. Nobody likes change, especially wrt personnel procedures, and they definitely don’t like people creating precedent. It was all worth it because I won more “browny points” from my team by that one thing alone than almost anything else! It was the TSN “turning point” in the “game”. This was a clear example of where a procedure simply had to change! BTW the company did eventually ratify the changes for extreme hardship situations.

You have probably guessed long before now that we did beat the odds. With excellent help from my team (many of whom were ethnic Chinese working for the company and spoke Mandarin – impossible to work there without them) we managed to change the client’s mindset. Once they saw the difference that their cooperation made there was no holding them back.

Ultimately, the project was a great political and technical success, and a huge financial success for the client; alas not for us. We were interviewed by local newspapers and openly praised by the client at a high level banquet in Beijing that my boss and I attended.

There is no question that this was the most challenging project of my career (so far) and of course a source of great satisfaction. Most importantly I learned a lot about myself along the way. Did I ever have doubts? You bet; many times, but being a stubborn, dogged, “never say die” character with a “poker face”, when required, does have its advantages!

At the end of the project I wholeheartedly thanked my team for their support, ideas, resolve, determination and belief that “it can be done”. In turn they told me that they couldn’t have done it without me. It was only then that I fully understood that I had done my job as their “leader” and not just their Project Manager! It is very rare that I am “speechless” but I was on that occasion.

If you got this far in what has been a very long 3 part post (my apologies for that), congratulations and thanks very much for reading. I hope that at least it has inspired you, even a little, to believe that the “extraordinary” is possible with the right collective skills, effort, determination and most of all the right people! As an ex-boss of mine was very fond of saying, “the impossible we can do at once, miracles take a little longer!”.

Epilogue: Despite the challenges and unpleasant conditions I wouldn’t change one iota of the experience. It was life changing for me! Fortunately, I did get to play the tourist on occasion. The history and culture are fascinating. In fact, I returned for a vacation last fall with my wife (go to http://members.shaw.ca/ngljones for some pics if your interested). The culture and history are still as fascinating but the changes are absolutely incredible. We both thoroughly enjoyed our visit. If you get the chance to go to China, business or pleasure, you should take it!

Graham Jones

President, VANTUG