Taking over a project

One of the biggest challenges for a project manager, is to take over a project that has been running for a while, the high likelihood is that the project won't be in the best of shape, if it was in good shape you wouldn't be asked to take it over would you!

The first thing to remember is to have no pre-conceptions on what has happened before, take time to listen to all the stakeholders, find out what has gone well on the project so far and more pertinently what is not going so well. To take a learning from Stephen Covey, seek first to understand before seeking to be understood, you may well see very quickly where the issues are, and want to make immediate changes but these can be dangerous until you understand all the moving parts of the project.

It is unlikely that the project is stand alone and will probably sit as part of a bigger programme, so you will need to ensure you understand where your project sits on the critical path and where your dependencies sit.

Once you have grasped a good understanding of what is happening on your new project, share your thoughts and findings with your steering group, they need to appreciate the current position and validate they agree and support your initial findings and thoughts.

If the project is in a red status the Steering group will be keen to understand the plan to get it on track, be careful not to commit until you have all the facts, aiming to please the steering group early can come back to bite you.

The final piece of advice in your first weeks on the project is to build up incrementally particularly if you are asking the team to do different things, you can normally find something that can make the team's life easier and this will quickly get them on board.