How do you align your project management with your company culture?

Understanding cultures and such at the first time can be difficult at first. But as time passes by, most or everything will sync in. To learn effectively, it would also be helpful to ask following smaller questions: 1. What are current roles in the company? 2. How reliable and agile are they in terms of knowledge and experience? 3. Using answers from given questions above and also in the passage, how can you make the project be successful? By asking additional questions about the company and current projects, you have a wealth of key information about how each particular team or member operates. With those important elements, you are able to formulate more cohesive and strong plan to make your company run successfully.

Two tools within the Project Manager's reach that are used to identify a company's culture are the stakeholder analysis process and the second tool is Emotional Intelligence. In most cases, especially with newly hired project managers, we just do not know what the culture is when we walk in. Without a proper stakeholder analysis, you are flying blind on who, in the organization wants the program or project to succeed and who in the business and/or in IT may enjoy the status quo. Seek allies throughout the company structure using Emotional Intelligence and build authentic relationships. Project managers often play detectives, as they search for clues that foster a culture of healthy change in their projects.

Learning your company culture is part of the onboarding task to adapt yourself to this new work environment. The goal is to align accordingly your behavior and communication style. However, it would take more time to confirm and understand clearly the reality of this corporative culture. Unfortunately, there are companies with core values only written on paper with lack of coherence.

I have found in previous experience that where there has been difficulty in aligning project management, it's as much about the business maturity as it is about culture, they are intertwined. An organisation that for example - dives straight into solution mode, creates knee jerk fixes to issues, no clear goals, and initiates projects without firm foundations, clear scope and defined objectives struggles to realise any benefits. It makes for a greater challenge for the PM, but once project controls are introduced, structured decision making is put in place, and the PM can demonstrate value, buy in follows, projects start to deliver, as the business becomes more mature, the culture changes for the better. The PM can influence this.

Para extrair o melhor da gestão de projetos é necessário entender a cultura e os stakeholders da organização. Conhecer a cultura e subcultura instaladas, como tomam as decisões se de forma centralizada ou descentralizada. Conhecer os valores, princípios e como funciona as bonificações por entregas relevantes. Realizar uma mapeamento dos stakeholders para entender o grau de influência formal e informal. Além de identificar as personas e elaborar o mapa de empatia.

To align project management with the company culture, first off I recommend understanding how the organization takes decisions and how those decisions are communicated throughout the organization. Second, understand how the teams operate, how they interact about changes and transformation. And third, understand the subcultures about collaboration and how the jobs are done. With all in mind, as project manager I recommend to connect project management processes to the organization’s culture to engage and motivate the teams to make the project happen.

Choose a suitable framework: -If you support both development and implementation of off-the-shelf apps, think about a hybrid framework. -If hard deadlines are super critical to your executive team, consider going with waterfall -Align your recommendation with finance and accounting. It does no good to launch an Agile framework if the budget process requires deadlines and hard deliverables that your framework won't provide -Give the executive team as much involvement as they want. If possible, set up boards, intake committees, etc. You'll benefit by greater support for decisions made with their participation.

In my experience and I alway beleive in "One Size doesn't fit for all". With that ideology, I have adopted and applied multiple project management frameworks for various business units depending on their needs. Agile Scrum has been my standard framework, however, we did use SaFe and ScrumBan (for operations teams).

Conhecendo a cultura, o mapa dos stakeholder, o próximo passo é entender o formato de trabalho instalado nas áreas e o formato esperado pelos executivos. Com essas informações o gerente de projetos tem elementos para aplicar as metodologias, frameworks, ferramentas e processos que estejam em linha com o uso e costumes da organização. Em minha experiência, ao chegar em um projeto normalmente temos um repertório de técnicas, métodos e boas praticas, aplicamos a que mais tem aderência a necessidade da organização como espinha dorsal e ajustamos a medida que as necessidades e a cultura vai se transformando.

There are many Project Methodologies to consider, however, consideration should be based on your industry and the types of projects you have, i.e.,IT projects may have a different process than PD projects within the same company. I have spent my career in Product Development within the Transportation sector and have used the Stage - Gate methodology in every case. It’s critical to have a well defined, well communicated and fixed process for projects. This process needs to include how and how often you report status (R,Y,G definitions), program reviews, how decisions are taken, etc. It equally important that Management reinforce the process, I.e., When a major problem occurs, the first question should be, “Did you follow the Process?”

Exactly! Much like in almost all real-life situations, in project management, there is no one-fits-all solution. In my experience, when it comes to adapting at any situation, always take some time/moment to learn about the process: 1. Start meetings or discussions with stakeholders. 2. Obtain feedbacks and work together with strategies and plans. 3. From Step 2, keep more than one more-likely suitable framework that can work and think a bit more out of the box as if one takes additional steps ahead in a game of chess. 4. Decide with clients. Project management is a trend of never-ending lessons to be learned. It would also help discussing with your department or team, so that they are more than happy to consider the most viable path!

Your projects have a relevant impact on the ways individual people do their work on a day-to-day basis. Each change impacts different groups within your organization differently. Change management professionals employ a structured approach that includes helpful knowledge, processes and tools. Within, the collaboration of all stakeholders is key to modeling the business process that will impact your project. Also, the governance of decision approvals and the documentation hub where each stakeholder can access to be informed about the approved workflow is essential.

Customizing the project management framework to align with the specific project context and needs is a crucial step in ensuring the success of the project. It reflects the adaptability and flexibility that effective project management requires. By making tailored adjustments based on project requirements, constraints, and stakeholder input, project managers can optimize their approach to deliver successful outcomes while accommodating unique project conditions and preferences.

The collaboration of all the stakeholders is key to model the business processes that will impact in your project. It is essential the governance of the decision approvals and the documentation hub where each stakeholder can access to be informed about the approved workflow and provide any related feedback.

Customizing your project management framework involves fine-tuning processes, tools, and documentation to fit your project's unique demands. Modify communication and reporting to match stakeholder preferences, ensuring they remain informed and engaged. Adjust risk management procedures to the project's risk landscape for more effective mitigation. Streamline documentation to focus on critical information, and establish feedback loops for continuous framework improvement. Ensure the framework is flexible to adapt to changing resources and complies with relevant regulations and governance standards. This approach ensures the framework is both practical for the present and adaptable for future project needs.

Communicating and aligning your project management framework with the company culture is essential for successful project execution. By explaining the rationale behind your approach and how it connects with the company's culture and values, you build trust and commitment among stakeholders. It's equally important to demonstrate how your project management framework directly supports project objectives, quality, time, cost, and risk management. This transparency, along with clearly defined roles and expectations, fosters a collaborative and effective work environment that enhances project success.

Agree, the communication helps align your project management framework. Remember, during project execution, the risks or context changes can impact the processes, the resources and the scope. Often, organizational changes end up meeting the requirements without delivering the expected results. This is what happens when the organization focuses its efforts on the solution itself, rather than its benefits among the stakeholders and the end-users. Communication helps bridge the gap between expectations and outcomes by focusing on the people who must use change every day. Communication tools should help find solutions along the way, where all stakeholders can agree on decisions.

A comunicação é chave para a adoção e aderência ao gerenciamento de projetos. Ela deve ocorrer em três patamares no executivo, no gerencial e no operacional. A forma de comunicação é ajustada para atender os diferentes públicos e entendimentos. Mostrar o benefício específico da aplicação e uso do gerenciamento de projetos aos diferentes públicos gera um engajamento e adoção do formato e estrutura de gestão. Além de gerar uma cumplicidade de entrega dentro do projeto muito positiva. O benefício destes frameworks e práticas já trazem intrinsecamente uma organização em papéis e responsabilidades, gestão do escopo, previsibilidade e custos de forma integrada, além de gerenciar as mudanças que normalmente ocorrem ao longo dos projetos.

Align to company values/vision and use this as a framework. Also language is super important the more the terminology and language reflect any other embedded internal processes the more likely it is to be adopted. Finally look for other communication channels to piggyback and keep updating on a regular basis.

It’s vital to articulate how the project management approach resonates with the organization’s values and supports project objectives related to scope, quality, timing, cost, and risk management. This not only fosters transparency but also builds trust and ensures everyone understands how their role contributes to the project’s success. However, this aspect is frequently undervalued. Without clear communication, even the most well-designed frameworks can fail to get buy-in, leading to resistance or disengagement. By actively addressing this, you can preemptively tackle concerns, clarify expectations, and reinforce commitment.

Be aware that projects have multiple branches that bear different fruits. Here, using KPIs helps you properly monitor each of your processes such as budget, resources, schedule, and effectiveness. However, KPIs meant to guide you and help make your operation less hectic, not to make problems go away. In the end, you are still responsible for making magic happen in your projects.

Don’t forget to put in original benchmarks at the beginning of the project. These not only help with providing evidence of success but are also great reminders of how far you have come.

Pues aquí yo utilizaría inspección y adaptación, porque realmente ese debe ser el resultado de un monitoreo constante de nada sirve tener un kpi o varios y saber que va mal y no tomar acción. De igual forma es clave que los aprendizajes no se queden en el papel o en un tablero de aprendizajes que nunca se implementan...

Be aware that projects have multiple branches that bear different fruits. Here, using KPIs helps you properly monitor each of your processes such as budget, resources, schedule, and effectiveness. However, KPIs meant to guide you and help make your operation less hectic, not to make problems go away. In the end, you are still responsible for making magic happen in your projects.

Be aware that projects have multiple branches that bear different fruits. Here, using KPIs helps you properly monitor each of your processes such as budget, resources, schedule, and effectiveness. However, KPIs meant to guide you and help make your operation less hectic, not to make problems go away. In the end, you are still responsible for making magic happen in your projects.

When choosing an overall project management approach, it is also important to think about how it aligns with your company leaders' mode of operation, so to speak. In one of my own observations recently, an executive directed the company's project management workforce to shift to a project methodology (as in, all of its projects should follow the new methodology going forward). However, the rest of the company's leaders and sponsors of work continued to think and requested data/metrics based on the old methodology. How successful do you think you'll be in changing your leaders' mindset? Awareness of company culture is a key aspect in shaping/strengthening its project management. Not having this alignment can become a hindrance.

Very insightful. My interest also is in areas where the company culture does not support the achievement of project objectives. The project manager thus has a lot of work to do. And this is the alignment challenge. In an agile environment, this may be less of a problem. However, for a waterfall practitioner, I will be curious in determining how the negative cultures are addressed because of impact on a schedule driven project for example.

Integrating a program management framework with time-to-market strategies is crucial for competitive advantage. When refining program management practices, it is mandatory to consider how these practices intersect with our goals for rapid delivery. This means a framework must not only be robust and comprehensive but also streamlined for efficiency. Regular assessments of project timelines in light of market demands will ensure that delivery schedules align with customer expectations and industry standards. By integrating these perspectives into the program management framework, our customers can achieve a balance between meticulous project planning and the agility required to bring products and services to market swiftly.

Let go of the PM framework templates and stop trying to force a culture to operate in a way that it doesn’t. 1) Observe and learn how the culture operates, 2) Build a new framework in your head & stop trying to explain it or “get it approved” or whatever. 3) Implicitly use the pieces of the framework that function naturally with that culture (until it doesn’t), and then… 4) Repeat Step 1.

Great perspective and excellent point. It's always a good practice to continually examine and adjust timelines and ensure they are aligned with business (and client) needs.