« Post Control - Project Control Techniques
3 Ways to Kill Focus in Agile Projects »

Helpful Advice for Managing Project Sponsors

December 10, 2009 | Author: PM Hut | Filed under: Project Stakeholder Management

Helpful Advice for Managing Project Sponsors
By Michael Stanleigh

Dear Project Coach:

My project sponsor is a problem. He doesn’t read my status reports, change requests, etc. He often doesn’t let me present to the steering committee on key issues yet he doesn’t have all of the facts to be able to present in my absence. Nor does he ask me for this information, prior to the steering committee meeting.

When I do have meetings with my sponsor, he seems to have an excessive use of his Blackberry. When I need him for a decision he is most often unavailable in a timely manner or gives me a cursory approval, scolding me afterwards for implementing a change without his explicit knowledge. When things fall behind schedule, the stakeholders protest or other members of management express a concern about the management of my project, he’ll accuse me of not knowing what is going on with my team and not being sensitive to the needs of the stakeholders.

Should I quit?

Signed: Desperate

Dear Desperate:

Don’t quit. There is hope. Your sponsor suffers from a lack of understanding of his role and responsibility in ensuring project success. It’s what I call “A Sponsor who doesn’t know what they don’t know about project management”.

It is not uncommon that your sponsor will not be aware of their responsibilities in helping to ensure project success. Realistically, they won’t devote the time necessary to take a course to learn about project management. This isn’t for reasons of disinterest; rather it is a lack of time on their part. Their role is strategically focused, not task focused and as such they do not need to understand the details of managing a project. That’s the project manager and project team’s responsibility.

The sponsor does need to understand the role they have to play in helping ensure the project’s success. This requires far less of a time commitment on their part than attending a workshop. Now this is going to seem a little strange but it is your job to educate your sponsor. You’ll want to do this verbally since it seems he doesn’t read your reports. Advise your sponsor (thereby providing him with knowledge and education) on some of his responsibilities including:

  • The Scope Statement - give him a quick overview of the key elements of your project’s scope statement including the goal, deliverables, assumptions and constraints. Gain a verbal agreement that these are correct, as he sees it.

  • The Project Plan - give him a high-level overview of the major pieces of work to be performed. This is where you can identify some of your execution challenges i.e.; resources, time, etc. Do not ask for help yet. You’re just trying to gain his understanding.

  • Milestones - Give him a high-level list of the project’s milestones. The importance to him is that he’ll want to follow-up on these to ensure they’ll be completed according to the planned date. If one of them is late, there is likelihood that the entire project may be late.

  • Updates - ask him how often he would like to be updated on the project’s progress, in what format and to what level of detail. This is where you might find out that he only wants to see a 1-page update overview once per week, emailed to him.

  • Issue Management - let him know that if issues arise on the project you’ll handle them but will advise him just so he is informed. Then, if an issue remains unresolved and possibly leads to a request for change, he’ll have been forewarned.

  • Change Management - let him know that if there is a request for change i.e.; a need for more time, budget, resources, etc. that you will advise him of the change, the impact the change is having on the project, the recommended solution and the options. Include the impact if the solution is not accepted as well as any of the other options presented. By providing him with this much data, it is more likely that he’ll approve one of the options than to give no approval at all.

  • Risk Management - let him know that you’ll be assessing, on an on-going basis, risks that might prevent project success so that you can develop either mitigation strategies or contingencies.

It sounds like a lot of information but honestly, this won’t take more than 10 minutes. Afterwards, document every meeting you have with him, what decisions were made, etc. He may not always read every report or sign every document, so put a note on each one indicating the date that it was presented and/or approved. This ensures that you at least have the data to support when you have tried to keep him engaged and supportive.

He may be on the Blackberry a lot so emailing short reports will be more in keeping with his mode of communication than anything left on his desk. As well, let him know that you’d like to give some presentations to the steering committee so that they’ll have all of the right facts. Ensure that he recognizes that rather than taking power away from him, he’ll look good because they’ll get all the information they’ll need.

Please keep me updated on your sponsor relationship and do let me know if you need any more help managing him.

Signed: Project Coach

Michael Stanleigh is the President and CEO of Business Improvement Architects. He works with executives and senior managers around the world to help them improve operational effectiveness through strategic planning, leadership development, project management and quality management. Michael has been instrumental in helping his clients reduce waste and increase efficiencies and profits with his clear processes and quality approach.
For more information about this article, please contact bia(TM) at info@bia.ca.

Share this article:
  • Digg
  • del.icio.us
  • Facebook
  • Google
  • blogmarks
  • LinkedIn
  • Reddit
  • StumbleUpon
  • TwitThis
  • Yahoo! Buzz

Related Articles

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 10th, 2009 and is filed under Project Stakeholder Management. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

4 people have left comments

Your patience is most beautiful.

Anatoly I. Tatarco wrote on December 11, 2009 - 12:54 am | Visit Link

I greatly appreciated the style as much as the contents. Thank you for this post Michel.

For French readers, here is an approximate translation: http://dantotsupm.wordpress.com/2009/12/11/conseils-utiles-pour-manager-le-sponsor-de-projet/

Michel Operto wrote on December 11, 2009 - 3:08 am | Visit Link

Hello Project Coach,

I need advise from you

My project sponsor just cut 30% of the funds and am really confused and short of ideals at the moment

What is the best practice and how am I to resolve this issue?

This my first project with this sponsors and I don’t want to loss face, truth or the project in any way

Thanks for your time

yemy wrote on December 30, 2009 - 5:39 am | Visit Link

Dear Yemy,
I know that this is a very difficult situation, especially since this is your first project. However, don’t despair. It is very common though I know it is very unsettling. When a Sponsor cuts project funding they usually are unaware of the impact this budget reduction will have on the project. Rather, they believe the project manager will figure it out. We all know this isn’t as easy as it seems.

The most important first thing for you to do is some research. Identify the impact this 30% funding cut will have on your project? For example:
• Will it make it impossible for you to complete the project on time?
• Will you have to reduce the number of resources working on the project? How will this impact the project?
• Will it reduce the likelihood that you will be able to meet your customer and other stakeholder requirements? If so, how will it impact them?

The second thing for you to do is to develop possible solutions. For example:
• You can extend the end of the project since you will have fewer resources.
• You can change what you are able to provide to the customers and other stakeholders to meet their requirements. Or, you can deliver some of their requirements through Stage 1 of this project and defer other requirements to a Stage 2 of this project.
• You can reduce the number of project deliverables you are able to complete as identified in your project Scope Statement.

I’m certain there will be more areas of impact on the project that you can identify. As well, there will be more possible solutions. The next stage is to complete a Change Request. It is important that you document the impacts that this 30% cost reduction will have on the project and follow each impact with a recommended solution.

Your goal is to educate your Sponsor. You want them to understand that you can manage with a 30% cost reduction but you need them to understand the impact that this will have on the project and what you recommend as possible solutions to continue to successfully manage this project. In most cases, the Sponsor suddenly becomes aware of the true impact of this significant change and gives more consideration to your suggested alternatives. They will appreciate your concern for keeping the project on track.

Please keep me updated on your sponsor relationship and do let me know if you need any more help managing them.
Doctor Project

Michael Stanleigh wrote on February 2, 2010 - 10:17 am | Visit Link

feel free to leave a comment

Comment Guidelines: Basic XHTML is allowed (a href, strong, em, code). All line breaks and paragraphs are automatically generated. Off-topic or inappropriate comments will be edited or deleted. Email addresses will never be published. Keep it PG-13 people!

XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

All fields marked with " * " are required.

Project Management Categories