Mission-Aligned Communications

● Teams with better connections discovered and transferred the knowledge they needed within the organization.

● Managers with “better connections” (inside and outside the organization) spotted and developed more opportunities for their departments or organizations.

● Project managers with better network connections were more successful in reaching project goals within time and financial parameters.

Research shows that most project communities start as small emergent clusters organized around common interests or goals. Usually these clusters are isolated from each other. They are very small groups of 1–5 people or organizations that have con- nected out of necessity. Many of these small clusters are found in underdeveloped communities. If these clusters do not organ- ize further, the community structure remains weak and under- producing. Without an active leader who takes responsibility for building a network, spontaneous connections between groups emerge very slowly, or not at all. We call this network leadership role a “network weaver”. Instead of allowing these small clusters to drift in the hope of making a lucky connection, the weaver actively creates new interactions between the clus- ters. Through this activity, useful community structures emerge (Krebs and Holly, 2002).

5.2 Creating a communications strategy All communication is associated with initiating some form of action or behaviour. Communication is generally one of three types (Table 5.1). At its simplest level, top-down communi- cation is used to instruct, control, and direct impersonally. Top-down communication is commonly associated with hierar- chically structured, centrally driven organizations in which decisions are taken without too much consultation at the lower operating levels within the hierarchy. Feedback is not a require- ment though team briefings are usually undertaken by middle managers.

In contrast to top-down communication, the purpose of two-way communication is to create the conditions under which people freely contribute more to the achievement of the goals of the organization. Two-way communication is associated with partic- ipatory styles of management, best practice, and the alignment of project goals and personal goals.

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C o p y r i g h t 2 0 0 6 . B u t t e r w o r t h - H e i n e m a n n .

A l l r i g h t s r e s e r v e d . M a y n o t b e r e p r o d u c e d i n a n y f o r m w i t h o u t p e r m i s s i o n f r o m t h e p u b l i s h e r , e x c e p t f a i r u s e s p e r m i t t e d u n d e r U . S . o r a p p l i c a b l e c o p y r i g h t l a w .

EBSCO Publishing : eBook Collection (EBSCOhost) - printed on 8/15/2021 1:55 PM via SOUTHERN NEW HAMPSHIRE UNIV AN: 189617 ; John McManus.; Leadership : Project and Human Capital Management Account: shapiro.main.eds

Three-way communication that is downward, upward, and lat- eral are a feature of “project organizations” in which people are encouraged to cross barriers to get the information they need to do the job.

In creating a communication strategy for project management, it is sensible to ask who in the organization (and outside the organization) will be affected by the project. It could be argued that communication delivers most when everybody owns it. Deciding who has a stake in the project and the com- munication process falls invariably to the project manager. The more complex the project, the more you need to involve stakeholders.

Catering for different stakeholders involves developing good communication channels between the project and its stakeholder community. One method of achieving this is through the appointment of a communication liaison officer. This person acts as a focal point for channelling information from and to the proj- ect identifying and administering communication training and preparing project and stakeholder reports.

5.2.1 Communicating with project stakeholders

During the lifecycle of a project, it is highly unlikely that the expectations of all stakeholders will be met. Therefore, the project manager must somehow ascertain which stakeholders should be satisfied. Since stakeholders have the ability to positively or negatively influence the outcome of a project, com-

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Table 5.1 Types of communication

Type of communication Explanation

Downward communication The process is management owned and controlled and is used to pass information down through the organization

Downward and A two-way flow of information is exchanged between upward communication management and operating staff – ownership of the

process is sometimes shared Downward, upward, and There is a free exchange of information across the

lateral communication organization

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municating and integrating stakeholder expectations is essential. Specific organizational and project strategies used to integrate stakeholders will differ, depending on the issue and the group’s potential to cooperate or threaten the project.

In developing communication strategy, the project manager needs to consider that each stakeholder has the ability to both threaten and cooperate, the objective of the strategy must be to reduce the threatening element and increase the cooperative behaviour of the stakeholder. It is important to realize that the stakeholders’ potential to act and their willingness to act are not directly related. Therefore, when looking at communica- tion or involvement strategies, it is important to examine not only strategies addressing stakeholders who are positively dis- posed towards a project but those who are negatively disposed towards a project as well. Some strategies may only be appro- priate for a stakeholder with a specific disposition towards the project, that is, positive or negative. In other cases, a given strategy may be appropriate for either type of stakeholder, i.e. both. As shown in Table 5.2, there are several different strate- gies for different types of stakeholders. Each strategy is not mutually exclusive; some are appropriate for more than one type of stakeholder group.

In cases where stakeholders cannot be communicated with, due to their negative disposition towards the project, alternative communication strategies should be developed. Such strategies may attempt to change the stakeholder group’s disposition or minimize its negativity. Strategies to undertake this change may require the project to use bridging stakeholders to “com- municate” on behalf of the project with these negatively dis- posed stakeholders. In cases where stakeholders’ expectations cannot be met or changed, the firm will at least be able to develop contingency plans to minimize any potential harm (Polonsky, 1995).

5.2.2 Communication participation and collaboration

As discussed in Chapter 3, many project decision-making processes include a stakeholder participation stage. In this stage, project managers disseminate information and request the stake- holder feedback and input. This may be accomplished through meetings, the submittal of written comment, or various sorts of forums and other outreach activities. Following this stage, the

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Table 5.2 Stakeholder communication strategies

Type View Strategy

Mixed blessing These stakeholders are One appropriate strategy for mixed- extremely important, for blessing stakeholders is to integrate they have the ability to them into the project strategy cooperate with the project development process. This will or threaten the ensure that the objectives of the achievement of the stakeholders are included in the project objectives strategy as it is formed and thus

will not require a later “redevelopment” of strategy

Supportive These stakeholders have This group may require extremely the ability to be cooperative innovative strategies to be with the project, but have developed in order to diffuse little ability to threaten its negatively disposed stakeholders activities within the group

Nonsupportive These stakeholders have the Use collaborative strategies, for ability to threaten the example, Joint Project Boards. project activities, but have Using a collaborative strategy little ability to cooperate minimizes the potential of with the project threatening behaviour form and organization. increases its cooperative behaviour Governmental bodies are often considered to be nonsupportive stakeholders

Marginal These stakeholders have Interest may change over time and little ability to threaten the therefore the potential for project activities or to cooperation or threat may change. cooperate with the project. Under such circumstances a This group may have little collaborative strategy minimizes interest in the project the potential for threatening activities at a given point behaviour in time

Bridging One definition of the term One positive strategy would be to bridging stakeholders is have open communication channels all groups who forward with the bridging stakeholders. their own ends as well as This would allow projects to to serve as links between “influence” the bridging group’s other stakeholders actions and therefore indirectly

affect the “influenced” groups’ expectations or behaviour towards the project itself

(Source: McManus 2002; adapted from Polonsky, 1995).

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