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Ron Rosenhead, coauthor of Strategies for Project sponsorship. Recently, I spoke with the authors of Strategies for Project sponsorship. Peter Taylor shared his tips on how to build professional relationships and trust with project sponsors, even if you don’t like them. Vicki James shared her tips to get the best from your project sponsor. Ron Rosenhead discusses the challenges facing project sponsors today and shares some stories about sponsorship.
Here’s what he had a to say.
Ron, what would you face if you were a project sponsor today?
The biggest challenge is to ensure that the project sponsor understands and performs their role effectively. The book provides a “primer” to the sponsor that aligns with our Sponsorship checklist of 17 project sponsor responsibilities.
We identified nine types of difficult project sponsor situations when we wrote the book. We offer tips on how to deal them. The absent sponsor is one of nine. This is when there is no assigned sponsor, or if you have never met or been able meet them.
Our research has shown that many sponsors are just sponsors. They don’t play enough of a role in the projects they sponsor.
This sounds like a challenge to project managers and sponsorship in general. Do you have a story to share about a sponsor who was successful or not?
OK! These stories were submitted to us by project managers who responded in kind to our Call for Stories.
My career began when I was working on a project with a sponsor who was a very intense micromanager. The sponsor’s preference for due dates should have been a warning sign that he was going get more involved.
As the project progressed I found myself spending more time gathering materials to keep him updated. He was reviewing work product line by line, and I was having hours-long meetings with him every morning and afternoon to discuss project status. The fact that the sponsor reversed and re-reversed decisions made weeks ago due to his change of mind was further complicating matters.
Although it was not appropriate for the sponsor or to have any involvement in these decisions or work products, I didn’t feel I had the authority over my direct supervisor. I sought the advice of very senior project managers as I tried to explain the risks to the project that my sponsor’s actions were posing. Next, a senior contract manager for project management told the sponsor to back down. The sponsor wanted it his way. The sponsor wanted to do it his way. Team morale plummeted.
I learned the valuable lesson that I had to intervene earlier with a micromanaging sponsor and to stick to the roles & responsibilities in the Project Charter starting from day one.
Here’s another way to balance it:
Our client was a state agency on a fixed-price project. The project’s lead sponsor was a state director. He was extremely knowledgeable about policies and procedures and had a great vision of what could be done. He would spend hours explaining the details of design and policy to project managers, business analysts, developers, and even to help them with their daily tasks. He was a key contributor to the success of the project.
I was fortunate to have worked with such a sponsor. He really set the standard against which I evaluate other sponsors.
This shows the variety of sponsors project managers must work with and the two very different outcomes. Thanks, Ron!
Amazon.co.uk: Buy Strategies for Project Sponsorship
Ron
Ron Rosenhead is well-known for his pragmatic approach to life and project management. With the last 17 years, Ron Rosenhead has been a trainer and consultant for over 25 years.
