Questions tagged [communication]
This tag includes questions about communication-related topics like information flow, meetings, and reporting; communications plan development and management; and challenges that a Project Manager or project team can face in regards to communication issues.
198
questions
0
votes
0answers
6 views
I'm a freelancer PM working with a remote client- I was hoping someone had some communication management advice
I'm PM with a reasonable amount of experience, both in person and remote. This is my first time working as a freelancer and I'm struggling a bit. My main problem is communication I think. My client ...
1
vote
2answers
83 views
Project management approach to take and presenting information about a product to User?
Recently, I faced 2 interview questions as below:
Q1) Explain to us how you will present information about a product to the user?
Q2) What project management approach would you take and why?
Now, I ...
2
votes
4answers
103 views
What to do when the team prefers private communications on mail and chat over collaborative tools like Jira?
I've noticed that a lot of discussion between a developer and a Product Owner happens in private conversations in various communication tools (Skype, Slack, email, etc). The reason is because these ...
1
vote
1answer
39 views
PM's monthly report includes the stats of the work hours, bug fix per developer
We are a cross functional product development teams that does monthly release.
There are 3 teams work together: my team works on web-development, team B works on embedded system and team C bridges us ...
3
votes
3answers
108 views
How to communicate effectivelly with less knowledgeable individuals
Possibly related to How to communicate technical obstacles?.
In my current position I have found myself in difficulty when it comes to communicating technical difficulties or project management ...
3
votes
2answers
190 views
What kind of peripheral information do you put on a Kanban board?
We are currently in my team in the process of applying Kanban to our project. It's currently a very iterative process which is not (yet) meeting the expected success.
However, we noted that the big ...
23
votes
6answers
7k views
Should I ask my boss not to come to retrospectives?
I am a Scrum Master for a small team (8 devs). I have been having trouble getting engagement from many of the team members, especially the junior team members. My boss missed two retrospectives ...
5
votes
5answers
2k views
Communicating between agile project teams and shared services
My organization has several teams that are all attempting to use Scrum. Some of the teams are tied to a project, e.g. implement a new web site. Some other teams are shared services, e.g. search engine,...
6
votes
4answers
326 views
Responsibility of scrum master
We are new to scrum and team with most are experience devs. (even decades).
The project manager (experience dev but new to project management) gave a scrum master role to a junior BA. She is ambitious ...
1
vote
1answer
63 views
How to efficiently manage large project where each team may be doing independent work?
Iām going to be managing a very large project across many teams; I anticipate close to 20. For smaller projects, I typically schedule weekly (or some regular cadence) meetings where a representative ...
22
votes
11answers
17k views
How can I map stakeholders without offending anyone?
I want to map the stakeholders on a project to help form a communication plan.
The typical power vs. interest matrix (below) is very helpful, but I fear I can't store it in a document others may read....
-2
votes
1answer
76 views
task/workflow management best practice [closed]
I know this is not a specific question and I could rephrase it as such if necessary.
I am seeking recommendations on how to manage an individual (my own) task list or how best to create a work ...
9
votes
6answers
298 views
Quicker Retrospectives? They are taking longer and are less effective now we are working from home because of COVID
I am after ideas to make things run more smoothly and more quickly.
I have been using a combination of MS Teams and online tools like GroupMap and Stormz.
But there are long pauses, and less to and ...
3
votes
2answers
132 views
How to keep part-time members of an agile software development team informed?
TL;DR
I'm looking for a recommended way of updating team members in their days off so that they are more or less informed of the changes in the product, the process or the company.
Full Story
...
21
votes
13answers
16k views
Is it correct to refer to a 'post mortem' session even for successful projects?
It might be a silly question for non-latin speakers, but it's odd to hear about a post-mortem meeting for a successful project since this expression means 'after death'.
I know that this can be also ...
6
votes
3answers
921 views
Is a mid sprint check-in/catch-up a good idea
Scenario: With scrum teams doing a daily stand-up to inform team of progress (yesterday and today) and any impediments. I wonder sometimes do they actually bring up impediments, concerns or issues. ...
2
votes
3answers
240 views
Safe spaces in scrum retrospectives
Background:
The development manager (my boss) and the scrum master like to introduce changes. My approach to changes is to ask why we need the change, explain why I think it is not useful (if it ...
2
votes
4answers
195 views
How to tell an estimation made by programmers is reasonable or not without technical skills?
I'm currently working on a game project. Since I don't have technical skills at all, sometimes it feels hard to doubt a programmer's estimation on a task is too much or not.
My solution is:
Break ...
40
votes
22answers
44k views
Is it bad manners or practice to request “Read Receipt” to all mails sent from my account?
I'm working as PM, we have developers and senior managers working remotely and in-house.
As a project manager, I'm at the center of all communications. The job of managing N lines of communication ...
15
votes
9answers
1k views
Should I collect all the phones before a meeting?
It's no surprise that when a meeting is in place there are a select few that cannot seem to take their eyes off of their phone. I find that this distracts not only that one person, but it also ...
17
votes
4answers
6k views
Escalation to Leadership about senior management [closed]
Is it right to escalate to senior leadership (CEO) if you feel the senior management is not doing the right thing or basing the decisions based on personal preferences rather than the goals of the ...
3
votes
7answers
359 views
How can I motivate/manage developers who only use email to communicate?
Some teams have to work with collaborators without face-to-face discussions. In our case all conversations are by email.
There is a problem with a this method: it's very difficult to keep developers ...
4
votes
4answers
157 views
Sharing important information effectively in an small group
I'm working in a software project with about 25 students (divided in 4 groups). As right now we use Slack for chatting and sharing important decisions we make. Slack is an communication tool similar ...
6
votes
2answers
250 views
Giving PMs a view of developer resource
I run a dev team of 8. We have a few PMs here and they often ask about getting a good view of what free developer resource we have.
Other parts of the business have a shared outlook calendar but for ...
33
votes
5answers
3k views
How can I manage team distractions like chit-chat?
I work with a team of developers who are talented but often distract each other with chit-chat. They can waste hours of the day with these 20-30 minute, non-project related jam sessions. Since I am PM ...
12
votes
4answers
3k views
How to make sure a task assignment was clear?
I guess you know the situation, that with some of your colleagues you manage to establish a common way of communication right away (whatever you talk about is understood perfectly by the other one), ...
2
votes
2answers
117 views
linked tools together without micro managing?
so I'm managing a project thats larger than my normal scope - and while I'm pretty much on my own, some tasks will be handed out to others, and I need to report nearly daily on where we are at.
Right ...
8
votes
3answers
2k views
How should a Scrum Master deal with an angry stakeholder during a PO meeting?
As a Scrum Master, recently attended a meeting set up by PO with stakeholders, one stakeholder was concerned that the budget was not being spent properly. It got heated.
At the meeting, I was not ...
12
votes
4answers
446 views
Partially introduce Scrum into a team
The CEO of our small company (14) asked me to introduce some elements of Scrum into the working process of our development team.
Problem is: the piece he would like to see introduced is not really ...
3
votes
4answers
921 views
Communicate a project easily without MS Project?
ISSUES
Microsoft Project isn't cutting it as a project communication tool: I have a copy of Project 2010 and so do many other employees, but they cannot be expected to learn how to use this program. ...
1
vote
2answers
201 views
JIRA - Use incoming emails to create tickets
Our team would like to use incoming emails (from Outlook) to create support tickets.
I've figured out how to successfully get this working, however, the formatting is awful.
When the ticket is ...
0
votes
1answer
25 views
Who to pitch my product for placement in their store? [closed]
My team have come up with a product and we are wondering whatās the right person to call to talk about the product being placed in their store.
Itās somewhat a big chain of a tech shop (e.g. Public)
...
3
votes
6answers
263 views
How to deal with client's staff that says “this will be easy”
I am an external project manager. The internal staff at a clients business have started making comments to the effect that "this requirement will be easy to deliver". Such comments are damaging our ...
5
votes
1answer
165 views
Writing Better Milestone/Touchpoint Follow-Up Emails
I am a technical (software deployment) project manager. I regularly have clients request 15+ minute check-in calls, which I am happy to take. The calls are pre-scheduled and have no set agenda.
I ...
0
votes
1answer
56 views
How to tell my project sponsor that few of the requirements cannot be met [closed]
My technical team proposed new features than the initial requirements. How do I communicate the same to my sponsor ensuring he is kept satisfied?
4
votes
3answers
210 views
Earning Respect of Team Members When I Know Very Little About the Topic?
I've recently been assigned project manager of a project which requires moderate-high degree of technical skills in machine learning that are above my level. Originally a programmer, I have previously ...
4
votes
1answer
74 views
Small team in large team, using two boards in JIRA
We have one large project running at the company where I work as a developer. We have developers from different teams involved (different companies even), testers, analysts and whatnot. This large ...
2
votes
2answers
483 views
How do you deal with external customers in agile projects
You are starting an agile project. As a scrum master you are facilitator and you assist the product owner with the backlog in creation as also in its maintance. You also coordinate with external ...
13
votes
3answers
53k views
What does person-month mean in development time?
I have a question about communication channels that is talking about person-month but I don't understand what is a person-month. Does it mean this many persons? or this many months?
Here is the full ...
1
vote
1answer
71 views
How can I encourage remote employees to ask for help?
We've recently acquired a new developer who's working remotely with occasional visits.
The initial period of friction has passed, but they're still very reluctant to ask for help and would spend ...
3
votes
2answers
111 views
What are the reasons that silos emerge within large corporations?
The literature is full of suggestions to break down silos which build over time within large organizations.
I was wondering why they form in the first place.
Is there maybe a benefit or a ...
25
votes
11answers
5k views
How to deliver bad news to a project sponsor?
Report Performance (especially if it is behind plans) is a responsibility of a project manager (according to PMBOK). Very often adequate and accurate reporting of insufficient performance will provoke ...
0
votes
2answers
81 views
Give visibility to work being done by a subcontractor
My company has subcontracted a project and the subcontractor is using their own instance of JIRA to manage their work.
Because we use a different tool I opted to let them use the tools they know and ...
0
votes
2answers
134 views
Best practice for tracking management activities
Situation: My company is using external developers. These developers are working in a Scrum setting with a delivery manager to manage the communication with us.
The team is very satisfied with the ...
2
votes
3answers
62 views
How to work in Implementations when your technical operations is in another time zone?
Any advice on working with implementations when all your devs and QA are on another timezone and not able to communicate too much online? This is my first experience being in a remote silo situation. ...
4
votes
3answers
401 views
Convincing my team that we need to split tasks by feature, not by work type
I'm in an agile team, with some developers, a designer and a ux guy. Sometimes we split some user stories into tasks when we think they are too big.
When doing this, I've always read that we should ...
2
votes
3answers
77 views
How could someone use Kanban or a similar method for community engagement? [closed]
Looking for something process oriented, practical. Just some examples (as detailed as you care to provide) to have on hand. I'm having trouble differentiating between this example and, say, a small ...
-1
votes
2answers
133 views
My manager is a local copy of Dr. House [closed]
How would you deal with your manager if he doesnāt see the companyās cultural problems and tries to convince you to behave passive-aggressive?
Let me explain the situation. Iām a software engineer, ...
0
votes
2answers
76 views
How should teammates discuss program design? [closed]
I'm trying to understand:
how teammates of a software-development team exchange their ideas about how a program's component (any part) should be designed
when requirements of a project changes and ...
27
votes
6answers
50k views
What makes an effective email status report? Why?
In project management, what criteria makes an effective email status report, and how often should a status report be sent to be useful?
