There are two types of project manager: those who live in the past and those who live in the future. Those living in the past are so busy dealing with tasks that were due yesterday that they haven’t got time to think about what’s going to clobber them tomorrow – they’re reactive. Those who live in the future think ahead, mitigating future risks and finding opportunities for project gains – they’re proactive and as a result, effective.
Leading indicator checklists are a great tool to help you become proactive – but how do you know what your leading indicators are? To identify them, first look at the disciplines you need to be outstanding in your project management role.
The disciplines
Good project management disciplines include:
- Pro-activity: Thinking ahead, anticipating risks, seeking opportunities to advance ahead of the plan.
- Stakeholder communication: Making sure stakeholders feel informed and included.
- Professionalism & reputation: Being prompt in response to calls, emails and queries. Managing meetings effectively.
- Leadership of project team: Being an effective leader, building team cohesion, fostering communication flow.
- Adding value: Finding ways to ’stand out from the crowd’ – to contribute something extra to stakeholders or to the project at no real cost.
You may identify other disciplines that are important for you – great, keep going.
Actions from the disciplines
Now identify all the actions that you can to do to help build that discipline. Some won’t make it into your leading indicators checklist, but they’ll still be useful for focussing on project health, team performance etc.
Make a daily checklist
The secret to success with leading indicators is to turn them into a checklist. This Harvard article about checklists shows why they are so powerful.
From your list of actions, make a checklist of those you can do daily that, combined, will support all the disciplines. You’ll find some actions you can use as a basic core, and some that will vary from project to project depending on targets and people. Pick an effective yet manageable number – too many and you’ll end up back in the past.
My personal checklist always contains at least the following six actions:
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Daily Leading Indicators |
Why I use this action |
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Have I spoken with each of my team? Leadership, Adding value |
Talking with team members provides insight into their strengths, weaknesses and motivations – vital for good leadership. |
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Have I updated task status in the WBS and reviewed future tasks? Professionalism, Leadership, Pro-activity |
Using conversations with the project team members, you can tell exactly where your project is up to and can quickly identify and deal with any potential problems. Reviewing future tasks also helps you think of optimisations you can make to progress the project. |
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Have I reviewed and updated project risks? (Pro-activity, Professionalism) |
If you want to think about the future, reviewing risks is a great place to start. |
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Have I spoken with my stakeholders? Stakeholder communication, Leadership, |
I believe that talking (not email) is essential to building effective working relationships. A phone call is quick and establishes a personal connection. The more you talk with customers, the easier it gets, and the easier it is to add value. I find reasons to speak with stakeholders as often as I can. |
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Have I sent actions/minutes from my meetings on the same day as the meeting? Professionalism, Leadership, Adding value |
By being consistently efficient, you set an expectation of performance and professionalism for all members of the team, internal and external. Meeting attendees will learn that your minutes will contain all their actions and makes it far more likely the actions will be done. |
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Have I followed up phone conversations with email? Professionalism, Leadership, Communication, Adding value |
This reduces the risk of you or the recipient forgetting or misunderstanding what was discussed and provides an opportunity for them to clarify anything. Keep the email short, and use bullet points – it’s easier to read and more effective as a reminder. |
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When completing the checklist, keep it simple. The answer to the indicator question is either yes or no.
Use your checklist every day and reviewing your results each week and you will easily identify if you’re consistently missing an action. This lets you rectify it before you slip back into reactive mode.
Leading indicator checklists are a powerful tool to
help you to become more proactive and effective- they keep you on top of your projects and free up more time for you to think about the future.
What could YOU do with your life if you had just a few more hours each day?
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