“Please can you have this done by next Friday?”
A. You schedule time every day to work on the task and deliver it by the deadline. 🤓
B. You faff around, and then blitz it with evening and weekend work to try and get it done before the deadline. 😝
C. You ask how much time has been allocated for you to do the task before the deadline. 😊
If you’re working with a #Salesforce partner, the right answer is (C).
You ALWAYS ask how much time has been allocated to the task before you start burning up time trying to do it.
This is because our time is billable to the client. 💰💰💰
Whether you’re working on a Fixed Price project or one that is on a Time & Materials commercial approach, you cannot really take your own sweet time to finish a task.
As a #ProjectManager, I always make sure that my team is cognizant of the two aspects of Time whenever we talk about project tasks.
⏰ Elapsed Time = how long before something is due.
E.g. Data Migration to begin in 8 weeks on date xx/yy/zzzz when data cleansing operation is complete.
⏲ Allocated Time = time to work on the task.
E.g. 16 hours to build the flow, to be ready for show and tell at the end of day 5. You could blitz it all out in 2 days, or do 4 hours a day for 4 days. In total, you will book 16 hrs on this particular user story/task item.
If allocated time is not enough, or if you’ve worked 50% of the hours/days and you’re nowhere near 50% through in terms of progress, then please let your project manager know.
This might mean it was poorly estimated, or that an unforeseen technical issue is blocking the progress, or that a more senior resource is required to complete the work.
Whatever the reasons may be, the project manager needs to know, so that we can do something about it.
If you don’t, you’ll make us cross. 😠
And you can’t un-cross us easily, not even with an Im-Sorry-Cheesecake 🧀🍰 or a Please-dont-give-me-a-bad-360-review Donut🍩
Ok… maybe you can with a plate of donuts 😁
I’m such a sucker for them 😋😋😋
But yes – always make sure your PM is up to date with your progress, whether you’re struggling or not!
The best of us aren’t the finger-pointing-blamey-type, most of us really want to help you and help the project get to where it needs to be… so help us help you, help us… ok I better stop now.
Btw I learned that trying to draw while on the train home from the London Admin User Group event will only result in wonky bar chart, but I’m too lazy to re-do them, so enjoy! 😁
#OnThePeiroll
#ManagingExpectations
