Table of Contents
Last Updated on 2024-06-16 by Kassandra
Regardless of the project you are starting or have recently joined, there are 5 pillars to establish before you can get your project going quickly & effectively.
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The Pillars
When I did the live videos, I was trying to keep it short. With this intention, I had to split up the training into 2 parts. You will see the videos for each set of pillars first, but below each you will find the text follow up for them.
Project Pillar 1
The first thing you should always do is determine what do I understand?
You are a valuable member of the team. And your basis of knowledge will help guide any necessary research or planning as part of this process.
But it is up to you to document (or at least note) what your background knowledge & experience can do for the current project.
Here are just a few additional items to consider as part of gathering your base intel for what you understand of the project:
- Who are the key players? Who are your stakeholders? Leverage workshop templates like this stakeholder map to determine who they are and how to prioritize communications with them.
- Who are the end users or the people that will receive the product or service? What are their demographics? Their needs? If you put the end user first in your planning & include them along the way, you are far more likely to have a successful end result.
- Understand the overall goal of your team or project. Often we can get really excited about something and lost sight of the big goal. This can cause confusion, misalignment, and lost time – let alone lost money!
- Have a clear outline of role expectations.
Project Pillar 2
The second pillar is where are we now?
Do you have any current processes? Are they documented?
If they’re documented, could someone who is brand new take the process and be able to complete the task without an issue?
These are really important, because this is your base. This is where you’re starting from, and if you already have things in place to support you … why reinvent the wheel?
Be sure to also understand your workload. Too often teams take on more than hey can chew without taking other things off of their plate or finding other way to free up time.
This is where you might also have a brainstorming session to get insight on all of the different things that COULD be done for successful project completion. (Which would include your requirements.) Once you’ve been able to ideate, you would sort through them into two camps. Requirements and nice to have!
Project Pillar 3
The third pillar is where do we need to be?
This pillar is understanding your requirements. You need to ensure that your stakeholders & end users have an opportunity to voice their needs, not just your leadership.
It is essential that you try to do some brainstorming before putting in the work. Sadly, too many projects start with poor acceptance criteria. So without you doing your due diligence, it can make your journey a lot more harrowing.
If you’re not sure about how to go about brainstorming, I highly suggest checking out Miro – Your Best Digital Planning Tool. I use it all the time when planning projects, events, and even software!
You can also leverage a phenomenal tool (or a set of tools at this point) with Pip Decks.
Regardless, be sure to create a communication plan and project roadmap.
It’s ok if you don’t stay completely on course, as things tend to change. But having this information will ensure that you are more transparent with your stakeholders as well as have a guide for when to expect completion of project milestones.
Project Pillar 4
The fourth pillar is where do we want to go?
So you’ve already determined your must haves … But what about your nice to haves? The things that may be small but could really improve the user experience. Or might be a great addition but are out of scope of the immediate project needs.
What could you do if you had all the resources available to tackle this initiative?
Whatever this may look like, you likely found these during your brainstorming session for requirements.
Or they came up later in the project.
Either way, knowing where we need to go vs where we would like to go helps keep things in perspective and better prioritize tasks.
Project Pillar 5
The fifth and final pillar is determining your potential risks.
What is holding you back now? What could hold you back in the near or distant future?
How might you mitigate (resolve) these issues?
While you may never run into the issues you fear, it is in your best interest to have some semblance of a plan for resolution. While it may not benefit you to write a standard operating procedure (SOP) on how to address the issue, knowing some key facts about who should own the task and how they might accomplish it will be really helpful should the need arise.
Additional Resources
If this resonated with you, you may also appreciate the following:
- Improve Meeting Efficiency With Lean Updates
- 5 Simple Steps to Easily Create Any Project Plan
- Workshop Facilitation
Follow Up
In my lifetime, I’ve held many hats – including but not limited to software engineer, project manager, community manager, and more.
I enjoy bringing clarity to the chaos by breaking down what I know into easy to understand byte-sized pieces in the hopes it will empower you to create greater prosperity in your life.
If you like what you saw and would like to work with me, connect with me through the contact section here.
I am going to be hosting a special workshop soon. So be sure to follow me on your preferred platform!
Thank you & have a prosperous rest of your day!
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