As a “Simple Noter” you will often have read my work pointed at shifting life and work emphasis. Be it from Urgent to Important (Urgentia); towards Acceptance; the battle of Effort and Momentum vs Friction and Resistance; and my views on Drains and Boosts (of energy and progress). This week I have been in dialogue with clients on potential culture and performance changing projects that are demanding more and more (from them) to sustain and I have returned, in varying degrees, to all the above thoughts.
If you are the ‘owner’ of a project and it’s performance sits centrally on your objectives and scorecard, it’s understandable that you feel a significant weight of responsibility to create momentum, win supporters, increase pace and hit the deliverables. In essence, to fulfil all the roles required for progress. For many this is often a lonely and draining challenge!
Fear not - you’re never alone!
I notice though that this aloneness persists if you (the project owner) spend your days seeking to influence others to be like you in your commitment, support and belief in the project. This can be futile, a waste of your energies and burdened with disappointment.
Once you have been assigned your project, or have clarity on that change for which you are hugely passionate and really want to bring to life, for it to become liberated and reach full effect my first suggested step is ‘Acceptance’ – accept that all colleagues will have varying degrees of connection and ‘botheredness’ with what is important to you. Second notice the distinctions between the types of connections you need and what shows up. Third, adapt your approach to each distinct type and manage each relationship accordingly.
Client discussions on this topic highlight two distinct categories of people involved in the life of a project., differing by their attitude. One is accelerating, the other is braking. Both will add value to your journey.
Accelerators:
· Involvers – low passion, task completion focus
· Contributors – interested, get involved more
· Supporters – connected, seek ways to do more and influence others the same
· Champions – committed, project is their main focus and comes first regularly
· Ambassadors – passionate, find opportunities to publicise, evangelise and win hearts and minds
Your role can be aside from this. Notice how your efforts may be in filling what may be (currently) missing on your accelerator team.
Decelerators:
· Preventers – absolute opposition, rigid position
· Resistors – opposition, on principles, change reticence, favouring stasis
· Questioners – demanding evidence, validation, research
· Challengers – can see positives, but push for certainty and removal of ambiguity, slow the pace
· Clarifiers – agree in principle, constantly checking relevance and best practice
In almost every situation on the path of a game-changing project you will encounter Accelerators and Decelerators. Both bring value and with a mindful approach to the types within each category that value can be garnered, developing robust projects and performance.
If your project landscape seems more heavily populated with Decelerators this may be a moment to review the timing, let it take a back seat or find a completely new context.
Assess your population – who and what is there - and re-plan your connection and support appropriately.
Consider:
Who is involved in your project right now?
What role do they seem to naturally be fulfilling (within the Accelerators or Decelerators)
Where are your gaps?
Accept (what you’ve got, stop resisting) and Recruit!
Shift your expectations and dialogue with this virtual team.
A funky graphic may work well here! I’ll explore creating one this week.
Keep it simple
Simon