Saturday, November 8, 2014

Learning from a Project “ Post-mortem”

Learning from a Project “ Post-mortem”





One of the project teams that I served on was tasked with developing and implementing a mandatory performance management training for all managers in the organization.  Although it was exciting to think that we were contributing to the creation of a much needed training, the end result was not as positive as we had anticipated.  Even though the training was mandatory and there was a robust communication plan that included several reminders, the completion rate was an abysmal 63%. 

In terms of project phases, I would say that the stakeholder analysis was not thorough.  The project team was charged with the creation of a mandatory training without understanding that there would be resistance from managers who did not like the idea.  As a result, the training feedback and completion rate suffered because the perspectives of managers was not incorporated.  Even though the training was well designed, it was seen as a negative in the eyes of managers.

2 comments:

  1. Hi

    Completion rates is such a tough thing to work on. You go and design what you think is great training but you also need to do the PR for it so people want to (or know they have to) take it.

    Knowing as much as possible about your audience's context is necessary to design something that they want to take (Dirsken, 2011).

    Thanks for sharing your story and being so open about problems you faced.

    Kevin

    Dirksen, Julie (2011). Design For How People Learn (Voices That Matter). Pearson Education (US). Kindle Edition.

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  2. Jason - Managers resisting mandatory management performance training...nahhh, no way! Lol! I think the real surprise is that you even got a 63% completion rate. Considering the resistance that you had, that seems great in my eyes.

    Brenda

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