Communicating Effectively

I interpreted the email delivery of Jane's message to Mark to be well mannered buy yet serious and concise about the information she needed from him. I feel this way because, within her email, Jane expresses consideration for Mark's possible situations that has kept him busy. At the same time, she explains the importance of why she is asking him for the information. The voicemail version of this message had a tad bit different affect on me. Even though it's the same verbiage that was sent in the email, the tone of Jane's voice had a slightly different feel. At certain times her voice had an irritated tone to it. It was not a strong tone of irritation at all, but it was noticeable enough to me to have a different effect on how I perceived the message. The sincerity that I heard in her voice when she said "I really appreciate your help" made me not hold on so tight to the "not so nice" vibe I received initially.

In my opinion, the face-to-face modality was the best representation of Jane's message to Mark. The points that needed to be expressed seemed to have been done so just right. Being able to see someone as they speak allows the comparison between body language and tone. That, in turn, helps to interpret how a person intends for a message to come across.

These different modalities are an implication that how one communicates with other members of a project team is very important. It's important for several reasons but mainly because it determines how one will respond to someone's attempt to communicate. With working on a project, there will be times when completing your work depends on the completion of another person's. In the case where one person has to approach the other about it, no matter how bad the case, it's key to come to that person with total respect. Once someone sees that you have respect for them as a person and their possible situations, they are probably more likely embrace your concerns or questions. Engaging stakeholders and communicating with them is an art (Achong, 2010). So getting to know how they respond to communication types is crucial to your relationship as team members and to your survival in the project processes.

When it comes to asking others important questions or questions that may potentially cause an eyebrow to be raised, I think it would be good to rehearse it a few times and then place yourself in the other person's shoes. Doing this, I believe, is one of the best ways to decide on how to say/word something. Word it like so, then ask yourself how you would I feel or react if asked that same question in the same manner. I can see this putting things into perspective fairly quickly, and as a result, it may seem easier to proceed.


References

Achong, T. (2010). Practitioner Voices: Strategies for Working with Stakeholders. [Online video]. Retrieved January 20, 2010, from http://sylvan.live.ecollege.com/ec/crs/default.learn.

Learning from a Project “Post-mortem”

The project that first came to mind for this assignment was fairly small. It refers to the very first time I attempted to bake a pound cake following my mother's (family favorite) recipe. I was hesitant about using it as an example because of its small nature but I think it is a simple example that may work well for this purpose.

The main thing that contributed to the failure of this product was the lack of time that was put into completing some of the processes that were tied to the quality of the wanted finished product: a perfectly baked pound cake. Certain things called for in the recipe, such as having the eggs and butter at room temperature, made a difference in the texture of the cake. Also, the baking temperature and time for the type of cake pan used made a difference as well. If I would have followed the guidelines given instead of melting the butter via the microwave, using cold eggs directly from the fridge, and baking the cake longer then necessary for the type of pan used, I probably would have had a cake of better quality.

For this project, the project manager (PM) was myself - the baker, and the subject matter expert (SME) was my mother. Being that I was acting as both a PM and a supporter of this project, it was I that failed at realizing and enforcing the importance of following the plan designed to complete the project. Corners were cut that still resulted in an editable finished product. However, the product was not nearly as good as it could have been if things were taking more seriously.

A project is defined when the project manager knows the project's needs needs, strategies, objectives, and limitations (Portny, Mantel, Meredith, Shafer, & Sutton, 2008). Therefore a project is successfully completed when these things are satisfied and properly taken into consideration. With that said, a lesson was definitely learned from this experience: If you want the same finished product, one sure way to get it is the follow the processes exactly as they are given to you.

References
Portny, S. E., Mantel, S. J., Meredith, J. R., Shafer, S. M., Sutton, M. M., & Kramer, B. E. (2008). Project management: Planning, scheduling, and controlling projects. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.