CHAPTER 2
Clarifying Team Goals

Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common vision. It’s the ability to direct individual accomplishments toward organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common people to attain uncommon results.

—Andrew Carnegie

Building a team is a combination of selecting individuals, assigning them to project roles within an overall project structure, and ensuring the team members share the same view of why they are together and what they are trying to achieve. Contrary to what you have practiced in the past or what you might have been told, clarifying team goals does not need to be a time-intensive step in the team-formation process.

Benchmark data show us time and time again that projects fail when there is poor communication, skills are mismatched, or there are resource shortages. Alternately, we know project success occurs when there is a high degree of end-user involvement, executive management actively supports a project, realistic expectations are set, and there is accountability.

Project success is further promoted through effective communications, efficient risk management, and a hard-working, focused project team. Efficient operational handoffs are also a key success element.

We know that teams perform well when they have a clear purpose, they have unmistakable roles and work assignments, and there is active participation and collaboration among team members. For project teams to succeed, a project manager must ensure that:

Team roles and responsibilities are clearly defined and communicated. Ideally, only one person should be accountable for one or multiple things, although any number of team members may contribute toward a deliverable.

Roles are clarified, with clear lines of accountability and reporting relationships. This is particularly true when staffing a large program that requires a large number of resources over a long period of time.

A clear project organizational chart is created once all team members are confirmed. The chart must be updated if the project team changes.

Much of this work can be accomplished as the project progresses through the initiation and planning phases; the more information you have about the goals and objectives of the project, the easier it is to define team roles and responsibilities. Likewise, the team objective is normally tied to the project objective, but it might look at that objective from the team’s perspective on quality, delivery schedules, and cost/incentive accomplishments.