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Lessons from lockdown – the best of 'Crisis Talks' · Project Podcast

0:04
Welcome to the APM podcast, brought to you by the
0:06
Association for project management, the charter body for
0:08
the project profession. In this episode.
0:11
We look back on 20/20 and reflect on some key project
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management lessons from a turbulent nine months soon.
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After the first UK lockdown in March, we found that this
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podcast to share the stories of project professionals who are
0:24
managing adapting and pivoting their projects to meet the
0:27
demands of the covid-19 pandemic.
0:30
Because series want crisis talks in each episode was presented by
0:34
project journal editor, Emma DaVita.
0:37
I hope was that we'd end up with the valuable resource during a
0:40
time of Crisis for project professionals who are doing
0:43
their best to navigate a situation.
0:45
The almost none of us had imagined happening.
0:48
What we ended up with was a Chronicle of work and life
0:50
through the covid. Pandemic, the six people, we
0:53
interview for the podcast structures honestly and openly
0:55
about the challenges they faced and the huge lessons.
0:58
They were learning along the way.
1:01
The pandemic in Jaws, but the advice given in the crisis talks
1:04
podcast will be relevant way past 2020.
1:07
In this episode. We've picked out the best in
1:09
nuggets of wisdom. In the first series of this
1:11
podcast topics ranging from mental health, to delivering to
1:15
seemingly impossible targets. To start with.
1:23
I'm going to take you back to April, probably feels like a
1:25
lifetime ago. In episode 1 of Crisis, talks
1:28
podcast. Host Emma, interviewed, Lizzie
1:30
Meadows, a project manager at the quad room Institute for
1:33
bioscience. Her biorepository project went
1:36
live, just as coronavirus, hit the UK.
1:38
The project has since been able to provide crucial resource and
1:42
support to the covid-19. Genomics.
1:44
UK Consortium. Lizzie's project to launch an
1:47
electronic platform to manage. Human.
1:49
Tissue samples in collaboration with Norfolk and Norwich
1:52
University Hospital NHS and the University of East Anglia went
1:56
live on Monday. The 23rd of March the day, the
1:58
UK went into lockdown and everyone's World turned upside
2:02
down. She described the Monumental
2:04
effort of her team members and their dedication to getting the
2:07
project over the line when external events of an unforeseen
2:10
magnitude threatened to derail everything as a last-minute,
2:14
what we didn't envisage with it was that coronavirus would come
2:17
up and hitters so quickly, blind sizes that we actually had.
2:23
You know, I'm so glad that we had our, you know, very rigorous
2:27
approach to our raid log that we had also had a very robust, very
2:31
thorough robust approach. To contingencies and resilience
2:36
planning and that, you know, I felt that people were confidence
2:41
in in that knowledge of knowing what the Alternatives were.
2:44
What name, what the contingencies were.
2:46
So when I said jump they didn't just look at me that and say,
2:52
okay. They said how high and we got
2:54
that we got that from our you know, biorepository team.
2:58
We got up from the end and then ICT team and And also laterally
3:04
as we went live from the research nurse who know was we
3:10
would have been quite happy to work from home, but because her
3:14
swivel token wasn't working. She made her way into the Bob
3:19
Champion building. It was close, but she got
3:21
special dispensation to she came in.
3:24
And that first Monday morning, when we went live.
3:27
She was there for all the hand holding sessions.
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The team demonstrated, you know, everybody was So committed to
3:34
this going live, you know, we had friends and allies in place
3:38
the shared vision and commitment success.
3:41
And boy, did that underpin everything?
3:45
Is he also spoke about her view. The project management style is
3:48
highly personalized. Each individual.
3:51
She also explained her willingness to do things
3:53
differently to meet changing circumstances.
3:55
She and her team had to think on their feet, like, never before
3:59
she admitted the getting things done required her to be a bit
4:02
unconventional. This reflects the changing
4:05
profile of the project. Professional a Core theme of the
4:07
past few months. Gone are the days where the
4:10
project manager can, simply follow process in a systematic
4:12
way. Modern project professionals are
4:15
Dynamic willing to adapt and comfortable with navigating
4:18
unexpected crises. It's taking that flexible
4:22
approach to project managing being aware that sometimes you
4:26
have to do what it takes to get the work done.
4:29
Bring an agile approach. It's being able to think.
4:32
We'll what if And again, it comes back down to fundamentals
4:36
of planning having assumptions having scenarios and just
4:40
thinking you know, what if that happens.
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But a lot of it I think is you know project management can also
4:46
be a very individual approach. You can be very personal if if
4:50
that makes sense. My way of doing it might be very
4:53
different to someone else but I think it was being able to think
4:57
on our feet and that that really did come down to me thinking on
5:02
my feet and say, no, this This, we are going to do it this way
5:04
and luckily having the commitment and the support from
5:07
the team to say, yeah, and being probably don't know.
5:11
I've been unconventional. Is that the right word thinking
5:14
at 8:15 at night? How am I going to get this to go
5:18
live? I'll just email somebody who
5:21
might be able to help and then and where we are now then.
5:24
Also, beginning to think, hang on a minute.
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We've got this resource. How can this add value to know
5:30
what the wider teams are trying to do?
5:33
Sonia Sharma, head of planning and corporate pmo, a broadcaster
5:36
channel for was, someone working in a completely different sector
5:39
of the economy and a highly ambitious project manager.
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Prior to lock down in March Sonia, been working on building
5:45
up the Enterprise's pmo while in February channel for
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kick-started a significant transformation program.
5:53
When the pandemic hit the organization experienced a
5:55
chaotic, few weeks with staff. Unsure, how to react The Wider
5:59
picture for the broadcaster. Look challenging major events,
6:02
such as the Paralympics for Spohn to leaving.
6:04
Channel for facing a revenue, hit the task of rescheduling
6:07
through the summer. After difficult few weeks, Sonia
6:10
found, that staff managed to adapt, effectively to new ways
6:13
of working. She related to the podcast, how
6:16
her team approach, the prioritization of their
6:18
portfolio shift in the pace of work, the challenges of a
6:21
virtual Workforce and more through the crisis Sonia has
6:25
kept a focus on achieving a lien State and maintaining it at the
6:28
broadcaster with senior Executives growing in their
6:31
awareness of the importance of project management.
6:34
Like many project professionals have spoken to the APM podcast.
6:37
Sonia told us that the pandemic was accelerating changes within
6:40
the organization that would help Propel project management
6:44
upwards and outwards. The first couple of weeks.
6:47
We really quite chaotic. So people weren't really sure
6:51
what to do. So there was a sort of period of
6:54
do. We keep doing what we were doing
6:56
before or you know, how do we adjust?
6:58
So I think it took about a week or so to get into some Some form
7:05
of order. And actually, what we did is use
7:08
the transformation director and her experience of working with
7:13
crisis situations and very, very quickly within a week.
7:16
Actually. We set up some covid-19
7:20
governance. So we got even running now for
7:24
work streams. People Finance procurement and
7:27
Tekken projects, and we kick them off within a week twice a
7:31
week. So eight calls in a week.
7:34
For an hour with a quite a clear agenda in terms of what we were
7:37
trying to achieve within each one and who was going to be
7:40
involved in that and then that governance started running.
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And then alongside that there was some reporting to the exact
7:46
that went up to help and enable them with their decision-making.
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So I think that was really key at that time a crisis.
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So there was a lot of work that was being done.
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Then I think the other thing we had to do was really look at
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then our priorities and our portfolio and then start to
8:02
think about how do we actually To manage that Hannah Gledhill,
8:06
senior project manager, a British chocolatier Hotel
8:09
Chocolat meanwhile shared her experience of working in a
8:12
retail environment. One of the hardest-hit sectors
8:14
of UK business. The British chocolatier has a
8:18
small project team focused primarily and product
8:20
development. Just prior to lock down the
8:22
hotel. Shakalaka had begun a process of
8:24
transformation. Working closely with the Kaizen
8:26
Institute, to foster a culture of continuous Improvement and
8:29
greater efficiency that commitment to transformation is
8:33
continued throughout lockdown and Beyond despite the mounting
8:36
challenges as Hannah explained. Hotels, chocolate experience the
8:40
same initial challenges as many businesses unfamiliarity with
8:44
Virtual Technology and practices and a period of uncertainty
8:48
around which projects will be affected and how?
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However, as Hannah explained the team was already geared up to go
8:54
through an element of pain in her own words, as it kick
8:57
started, the Kaizen Transformations become a Slicker
9:00
operation. They hadn't bargained on a
9:02
pandemic perhaps but the period of uncertainty has provided a
9:06
test of their new culture. We're trying out different ways
9:10
of tracking projects. If you like.
9:12
So the Kaizen principle that we agreed.
9:15
The beginning of the year was that we would have almost a
9:18
project control room, a physical space and everyone had to be
9:22
physically present. This was a place that we could
9:25
track the status of our projects, almost like a NASA
9:28
control room. So you could all you could walk
9:31
into that room. And you could know the status of
9:33
of your project just by looking at the wall.
9:35
We can't do that now. So what we've done is, we've
9:38
created a virtual project control room through Trello.
9:43
So Trello is that an online app? Essentially a place to log lists
9:48
of activities. So we log all the activities to
9:51
needed to place this week and the following week and it's
9:55
accessible by all the development team.
9:57
So we encourage individuals to go into the Trello board.
10:01
To update their actions. That's the way that we're trying
10:05
to keep control of a number of projects at the moment that
10:09
paired with with some other tools that we're developing with
10:12
guys. And I guess the challenge we're
10:14
facing at the moment is we're trying to develop tools whilst
10:17
trying to run live projects all Hilton program director
10:22
management and development company, Mott, MacDonald lives
10:24
in, Singapore and oversees the delivery of 13.
10:27
Future cities projects, across nine cities in six countries.
10:32
Over southeast Asia. The program aims to promote
10:35
inclusive, and sustainable, economic growth, full and
10:38
productive, employment, and decent work for all it.
10:41
Prioritizes the needs of girls women and the most excluded
10:44
people in these communities and is aligned to the un's 17,
10:47
sustainable development goals. Poor begun work on the program
10:51
when it kicked off in, 2019 has carried on leading it through
10:54
the covid-19 crisis. While Singapore has been locked
10:57
down and is local teams in the Philippines Myanmar, Vietnam.
11:01
Malaysia Thailand and Indonesia have been contending with the
11:05
pandemic, the 13 projects range from a smart ticketing transport
11:09
system. In Ho Chi Minh City to
11:11
earthquake and tsunami warning system in Surabaya.
11:14
Paul related, the challenges of managing the program.
11:17
As the world heads towards New Normal, how being an expat has
11:21
made him more resilient to the trials with the covid crisis,
11:23
the trick to getting the best out of people.
11:26
He said, was simply to learn to listen to them.
11:30
It's completely about people, manager is about getting the
11:33
best out of people, but equally you avoiding risks by getting
11:36
the best out of people by understanding what's going on
11:39
listening. And a lot of those skills, the
11:42
tools and the harder things program management risk, sort of
11:46
schedule management, risk management, change management.
11:49
They're all necessary to keep it all tidy in the background, but
11:53
they're not, I wouldn't say they're the the underlying good
11:57
stuff that's required to Seed really.
12:01
I think project manager. It's quite an interesting
12:04
discipline because those who are experienced often anchor back to
12:08
these skills. And those who are inexperienced
12:11
often believe that the tools will save the day and get them
12:13
through their problems. So you can quite easily reflect
12:17
on where success lies. And I think that reflecting on
12:21
it is is of is a key learning processes.
12:23
Is why a person a believer that, you know, you need to be
12:26
constantly fresh and constantly learning and refresh yourself.
12:30
I don't think leadership is a, is a Inherited property.
12:33
It's a thing that you have to work on all the time and keep
12:37
reminding yourself of and the techniques you use.
12:40
So and a lot of those techniques are about managing perhaps your
12:44
own personal mood because it is a people and sort of interaction
12:48
skills that you're off to deploying.
12:49
It's about managing how you're coming across, how your
12:51
temperaments is about what your mood inside is stuff.
12:56
Under Hickson the project manager at Baalbek a specialist
12:59
in the repair strengthening refurbishment and protection of
13:02
buildings and civil structures is an expert in both project
13:06
management and mental health. He manages the successful
13:09
delivery of infrastructure projects including at the time
13:12
of recording. Our interview Palatine Road
13:14
undertaken on behalf of Highways England.
13:17
The project involves significant temporary propping to facilitate
13:20
critical repairs to 15 peers. The carry both carriageways of
13:24
the M60. Motorway.
13:26
Across the river mersey in Greater Manchester, but Andrew
13:29
is also a key Mountaineer and founder of the black dog
13:32
Outdoors mental health charity, which promotes the benefits of
13:35
outdoor recreation and mental well-being.
13:38
In his interview with the APM podcast.
13:40
He explained why now more than ever.
13:42
It's important to spend time in nature and to allow your mind to
13:45
wander. Hopefully, this doesn't come
13:47
across as preacher because, you know, it's easy to say hard to
13:52
do sometimes, but I definitely recommend that people.
13:55
People get that like that work-life balance, right,
13:58
especially spending time at home, you know, just just half
14:01
an hour of exercise. A day can have a massive effect
14:04
on your well-being, her positively and it doesn't have
14:07
to be high in perhaps our insurance you To go out running
14:09
with, we're not all athletes, but had it out for a steady work
14:13
and you in your local area. So it's a great way to unwind
14:17
and leave your phone at home and just let your mind wander.
14:20
There's also exercises you could do, like, what, yoga, or even
14:24
coloring in her great for for just checking your mind
14:27
elsewhere. I know that a number of people
14:30
that have been contacts with, they've they're actually
14:33
exercising when ordinarily big to be in a commute to work.
14:36
So if they're at home, the distinguished.
14:38
Akin to a routine, the still getting up early.
14:40
But instead of sitting in the in the car behind the wheel, they
14:43
are going up some morning exercise, which is a great idea.
14:46
And I think, another thing that I would recommend is if you've
14:49
got children at home and again, it easier said, than done, block
14:52
out and out in the day, and spend some real quality time,
14:55
because there's the be stresses in the back of your mind that
14:58
you're not home, and your children, want your attention
14:59
and you should give it to them. Yeah, why not be strict about
15:03
it. We all need, we all need our own
15:05
time. Work work can still happen.
15:08
Would all work. More flexibly now, so just just
15:10
just find a different way of working fine to find a way of
15:13
introducing, some, some quality family time in the day.
15:16
That means that that means doing a little bit more at night when
15:19
the children are asleep. Well, try and make it happen.
15:22
Just being able to think about the needs of others and ever bit
15:25
more empathy, and allow the teacher to leave work, early to
15:29
take work home and spend some time with their families up that
15:32
I think is important in in, you're just building that trust
15:37
and getting the best out of Of them as well.
15:39
He'll keep people happy less stressed.
15:42
It's a really positive thing. So, yeah, the I'm quite quite
15:47
flexible with a sightseeing. If this is work that can do from
15:50
home. I don't need them to travel down
15:52
the motorway to sit in an office.
15:53
You know, it's a song as that in contacts and they getting on
15:56
with what they need to do is dump for more than happy for
15:59
people to work flexibly. Rounding off the crisis.
16:02
Talk series was an interview with Joanna Roland director of
16:05
hmrc's covid-19 Response Unit, which is responsible for the
16:09
Department's strategic approach to the pandemic.
16:11
Joanna, is a senior responsible officer in charge of delivering
16:15
the Chancellor's Flagship economic interventions.
16:18
The job retention and self-employment Income Support
16:20
schemes as well as the eat out to help out and job retention
16:23
bonus schemes. Joanna is also the head of the
16:27
project delivery profession for hmrc and a fellow of a p.m.
16:31
She's been at the heart of the government's response to the
16:33
pandemic and in her interview with the APM podcast, you
16:36
explain the value of controlled yet.
16:37
Adaptive governance to carry her team through the crisis phase of
16:41
the initial covid response. There were a few elements in the
16:46
early days. That was certainly crisis
16:48
management. But I think the first thing I
16:53
recognize coming into the real was actually this was going to
16:57
stay with us for quite a while and in a way.
17:00
The last thing we needed was Crisis management.
17:03
And what instead what we needed was very controlled leadership
17:08
and management of this being a project person through.
17:11
And through, I love a bit of governance.
17:13
We all do governance is your best friend.
17:16
It keeps you in control. So one of the first jobs of that
17:20
Friday, was to set up the governance structures both for
17:25
the projects, but also the wider organization to make sure Sure
17:31
that we could coordinate this in a way that was very controlled
17:35
and not reactive or crisis management.
17:40
Can sometimes mean that you know, you're all headless
17:43
chickens and and and high octane and and that generally doesn't
17:48
drive the best decision making that said, the governance was
17:51
kept light touch. So it was really important, but
17:56
neither was there time for for our meetings, so, I needed to
18:02
put in place the governance structure that was able to be
18:06
highly adaptive really, really efficient fairly light touch but
18:12
have a iron grip of control around our projects and
18:16
responses. Joanna, also shared her approach
18:20
to Bringing together a wide array of Specialists, dubbed
18:22
accountable, owners and empowering them to make
18:25
decisions for the project. One of her, long-term Ambitions
18:28
is to establish a project structure that transcends
18:30
boundaries. These and retained a razor sharp
18:32
focus on Simplicity to keep Minds focused on the core
18:35
concept. Underpinning, the project and
18:37
ambition. She was able to realize with
18:39
this project. She was Keen to to extol The
18:42
Importance of Being assertive to prevent distractions from taking
18:45
over. There were three things that
18:49
were very deliberate choices in those early days.
18:53
So the first was to set up what I call a hub-and-spoke model.
18:59
And this is where I literally grabbed from all corners of
19:04
hmrc. Just a handful.
19:07
I think no more than about 10 or 15 project people to run the
19:12
central project for seedrs. And then the equivalent for
19:16
self-employment. But then we reached out across
19:20
hmrc to get what I called accountable owners for all the
19:24
different specialisms. So you'd get somebody who
19:28
specialized in compliance. You'd someone who specialized in
19:31
operating, our contact centers. You'd get a lawyer.
19:34
You'd have obviously, they're very important and very talented
19:38
digital teams. All of those accountable owners,
19:41
were were responsible for doing their bit completely empowered.
19:46
Be trusted but they could not make decisions anywhere other
19:50
than, as part of that Central project.
19:53
If they were designing an element, they would need to come
19:55
back to the project just to make sure it matches the other
19:58
elements. So that was the first thing,
20:00
this Hub and spoke model where the people actually doing the
20:05
delivery. We're empowered, but the control
20:09
remained with the central project.
20:11
I'm a great believer that projects should transcend normal
20:15
structures and For not be pigeonholed into structures that
20:20
they should work across an organization, because that's
20:22
where you get the whole organization.
20:24
Partaking as head of project, profession for hmrc.
20:27
It's been a long-running ambition of mine to set up
20:31
projects in that way. And here was my chance.
20:34
He was my opportunity, the, the other two elements to how we
20:40
approach. This was the ruthlessly simple.
20:44
That was actually a phrase coined by RC.
20:46
EIEIO he was fantastic at keeping us, all on that
20:51
principle of ruthlessly simple. And it meant that we did not get
20:55
scope creep. What we did notice is in the
21:00
early days, when four weeks to set up a major
21:04
multibillion-pound scheme like this felt impossible, keeping.
21:08
It ruthlessly simple was actually quite easy.
21:11
People got the concept as we started to sort of, you know,
21:16
make a stand. In leaps and progress, that's
21:19
when people started to that sort of.
21:21
Can you just syndrome started to nip in Mark?
21:25
And I had to be all over that. And actually that was our third
21:29
principle. You need to bulldoze out the way
21:33
the blockers sometimes, you know, it's a ask politely
21:36
sometimes. It's actually just really quite
21:40
assertive structures in place to make sure that you are not
21:45
letting anything. It distracts you from getting
21:48
the job done. We hope you've enjoyed the
21:54
advice. We've picked out for you in this
21:55
episode. Listen to The Crisis talk series
21:58
and full simply search for the APM podcast on your platform
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choice. You can find us on Spotify Apple
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Google and more will find plenty more content there to including
22:08
our second series project innovators.
22:10
When we look at how project professionals doing things
22:12
differently to meet the ever growing challenges and
22:14
complexity of our changed world. This podcast has been brought to
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you by APM the charter body. For the project profession more
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information on how to join a p.m.
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Is at 8 p.m. Org.uk.