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People related mistakes can cause project failures.
"Many of your valuable geeks are most at home while working on big projects. Because these IT projects can make or break managers, it is critical that you consider how to best utilize the people who carry them out.

Some project members make the mistake of viewing all IT with a "Seen one, seen 'em all" mentality. The successful PM takes the time to tailor an image of each individual team member and how those can be used to achieve project goals.

In some PM circles, small doses of conflict are viewed positively because they can fuel the creative process and produce a more sophisticated product. But failing to address personality-based conflict among IT staffers can also be a really massive demotivator and will deflate energy."
Baseline, 3/18/08, “10 People Related Project Mistakes”
Give your team members a user's manual—to you 

Making it easy to understand your communication and decision making style can help your colleagues work more smoothly with you.
     
  A "User's Manual to Your Manager" can cut out office dysfunction. By letting your staff know how you operate, you can teach them how to deal with you and avoid conflict.  

BusinessWeek, Aug. 25, 2008, “Forewarned Is Forearmed”

By Ben Dattner

In implementing "lean" management techniques, companies solidify practices that engage employees in improving services.
  “Since IT solutions must be delivered by teams of people working together, one of the most important behaviors needed is teamwork… One evolving organizational attribute being used to attract and motivate employees--younger employees, in particular--is a workplace that lets them participate in directing the work of the company. It just makes sense that employees--of all generations--would be more highly motivated in a participative culture in which they have more control over the success of their company.”  

Information Week, April 26, 2008, “Hiring and Motivating the Best IT Workers”

By Jacquelyn Barretta

Effective knowledge workers build diversified networks.

The most effective knowledge workers cultivate networks that are an optimal blend of the personal and professional.

What separates high-performing knowledge workers from their more-average peers? Superior ability is part of the answer, as is superior expertise. But according to Rob Cross, Thomas H. Davenport and Susan Cantrell, what really distinguishes high performers from the rest of the pack is their ability to maintain and leverage personal networks. The most effective knowledge workers create and tap large, diversified networks that are rich in experience and span all organizational boundaries.

Contrary to the popular image of the networker, the authors say, the building and use of such networks is rarely motivated by explicit political or career-driven motives. Effective knowledge workers focus on building deeper relationships that will be mutually beneficial over time.

The authors discuss the three tactics used by high performers to build and maintain their networks. Ideally, they say, organizations should use tools and readily available human-resources practices to hire people who are likely to develop large, widespread networks. Once on board, people should be encouraged through incentives to maintain their networks. Such important work — and it is work, even if isn't usually visible — shouldn't be left strictly to chance.

MIT Sloan Management Review, Fall 2003 “The Social Side of Performance”

By Rob Cross, Thomas H. Davenport and Susan Cantrell

IT personnel should participate in cross-functional teams.

Sometimes, there's a barrier between a company's information-technology department and other departments. That barrier has to go.
  "IT personnel should be groomed as integral components of the enterprise, just as personnel within functional areas like marketing or accounting are developed to take on increasingly significant and broader-ranging responsibilities that ultimately extend beyond departmental boundaries. They should participate in management classes, cross-functional training, and rotations through non-IT functions, and should be included on planning and control committees and cross-functional teams."  

The Wall Street Journal, 3/10/08 "How to Tap IT's Hidden Potential"

By Amit Basu and Chio Jarnagin

The most essential attributes for IT professionals are communication skills, leadership skills, and strong teamwork orientation.

According to the annual 2007/08 CIO survey conducted by Harvey Nash, a global professional recruitment consultancy and IT outsourcing service provider, building and maintaining relationships with business partners is a critical, but underdeveloped, capability for IT professionals.
 

“When the respondents were asked how important various skills or attributes were to their own role as IT leader, the need for in-depth IT awareness or technology was not deemed critical. The most essential attributes were communication skills (76%), leadership skills (73%) and strong teamwork orientation (59%).

With regard to their own team, the respondents ranked the capability of building and maintaining relationships with business as very important (77%). When then asked to rate how effective their team was in terms of these exact capabilities, IT leaders indicated a significant shortfall between the importance they placed on the attribute and the percentage of staff that are excellent at it.”

  

CIO Survey: Insights & Perspectives from IT Leaders, 2007/08

by Harvey Nash

Marketer-engineer conflict has negative impact on business.

Marketer-engineer conflict is a common and long-standing problem of critical importance to high-technology companies. This study updates and extends marketing literature by applying qualitative research methods to this interfunctional conflict.

When high-tech firms engage in research and development activities, marketers must work closely with R&D-engineers. Conflict between the two groups delays development, reduces product quality, and even contributes to business failure. Resolution of marketer-engineer conflict is crucial for firms that operate in rapidly changing high-technology markets. Diverse cross-functional teams are comprised of individuals of different ages, genders, and ethnicity. This diversity can exacerbate conflicts already triggered by functional diversity.  Increased interdependence among functional teams leads to increased levels of conflict.    

Anecdotal evidence suggests marketer-engineer conflict is characterized by relationship-conflict as well as task-oriented conflict.  Recent management studies indicate that relationship-conflict leads to more negative effects than task-oriented conflict, and requires different strategies for resolution.  Relationship-conflict is believed to inhibit creativity and distract team members, causing them to work less effectively and produce suboptimal products. Managers should facilitate understanding across different personality types, and stop relationship conflict as early as possible in team formation.

Forthcoming in Industrial Marketing Management, 2008 “The Blame Game: An Attribution Theory Approach to Marketer-Engineer Conflict in High-Technology Companies”

By Susan M. Keaveney, Ph.D.
Leaders create and use networks.
 

“Successful leaders have a nose for opportunity and a knack for knowing whom to tap to get things done. These qualities depend on a set of strategic networking skills that nonleaders rarely possess. Typically, managers rise through the ranks by dint of a strong command of the technical elements of their jobs and a nose-to-the-grindstone focus on accomplishing their teams’ objectives. When challenged to move beyond their functional specialties and address strategic issues facing the overall business, many managers do not immediately grasp that this will involve relational—not analytical—tasks. Nor do they easily understand that exchanges and interactions with a diverse array of current and potential stakeholders are not distractions from their ‘real work’ but are actually at the heart of their new leadership roles.”

  

Harvard Business Review, January 2007 “How Leaders Create and Use Networks”

By Herminia Ibarra and Mark Hunter

Supply-chain professionals need new skills.

Supply-chain managers used to have one primary goal: get the best value. Now they need additional skills. They must have strong management skills, be able to build strong relationships with suppliers, and develop in-house teams to solve problems. 
  "Even as relationships with outside suppliers are getting more complicated, relationships inside companies are getting trickier, as well. As companies downsize and shed middle managers, the remaining bosses are left with more employees to oversee. Meanwhile, teams are becoming a favored method of dealing with the heavier workload, as employees from different parts of a company are brought together to handle a task, and then sent back to their respective departments.

So, supply managers must become more adept at traditional managerial functions. Planning, communications, team-building and relationship-management skills are necessary for success. Managers must also learn how to integrate outside suppliers into internal teams -- a critical move as companies and partners collaborate more closely."

  

The Wall Street Journal, 3/10/08 "Beyond Buying"

By Larry C. Giunipero, Robert B. Handfield and Douglas L. Johansen

The HR department can help the organization improve communication skills.

The HR department can help managers at all levels become better leaders by encouraging them to improve their communications skills and motivate people.

The Wall Street Journal, 3/10/08 "The HR Department: Give It More Respect"

By Edward E. Lawler III

IT professionals benefit from building communication skills.

"The IT department has long suffered from a bad reputation, for which it has only itself to blame. In the years before the tech bubble burst, IT was king; a huge demand for technical prowess and a shortage of able bodies put IT professionals in an exalted state.

Tech workers could pick their job and name their salary. They could wear jeans and T-shirts to meetings, and nobody would raise an eyebrow. They often rolled their eyes when an employee did not know where to put his or her Ethernet card. If they didn't feel like doing something, they often didn't.

The dot-com bust and the ensuing IT job cuts largely killed off this ‘stupid users’ attitude, but surprisingly enough, remnants of unprofessionalism remain.

‘CIOs are finding that incoming IT professionals are more technically savvy than ever before but very weak in interpersonal skills,’ said Liz Brady, senior analyst for Forrest Leadership Boards.

Essentially, many IT professionals are blowing their job security on the small stuff: dotting their i's, minding their p's and q's, and not speaking in only ‘ones and zeros’—or tech-ese—to business departments.’

‘You need to build your communications skills,’ Brady said. ‘This is especially true if you're in the millennial generation, and you're used to e-mailing and IMing all of the time. It's concerning for CIOs to have people in their organizations who are afraid to pick up the phone and interact face to face to represent the department to business.’

While IT roles in the past were not communication-centered, it is the professionals who excel in this area who are already in the greatest demand and will continue to be as IT becomes more central to organizations.

‘More and more, it is these communicating roles that are slated to grow,’ said Brady."

eWeek, 10/22/2007 "IT Planner: 5 Steps to Better Job Security"

By Deborah Perelman
 

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