Implementing Your Vision
By Bob McGannon, PMP, and Conrad Imel

When John F. Kennedy was elected President the United States was embroiled in a Cold War with Russia. In the early 1960’s Russia appeared to be moving ahead of the United States in science and technology. Kennedy knew he needed something to rally the country; he needed to give the country a vision. On May 25, 1961 Kennedy gave a speech that challenged the nation to land “a man on the Moon and [return] him safely to the Earth.” Kennedy did this at a time when NASA was having trouble just getting an object into low orbit. What Kennedy knew was that the people at NASA had very big dreams and truly believed in themselves. What Kennedy needed to do was take those dreams and aspirations and turn them into a vision that the entire country could rally around.

As a project manager, when you enter an organization, you will need to create a vision that the organization can rally around. The vision that you create may be that you want to work more effectively and at lower cost. You will need to elaborate on that vision, tell people what it does for them and the company; paint the picture. In order to create a vision that people can buy-in to you must understand the employee’s perception and the environment of the organization. Once you understand the environment, you can then introduce your vision. Your vision must stretch the organization, but be attainable, and utilize metrics in order to clearly measure progress. You then need to use a variety of techniques to execute the vision and build upon it once the original vision is completed.

Change the Perception and Environment

The first step in creating a new vision is changing the perceptions of the organization. More important than what you CAN do to change perception is what you CANNOT do. You cannot change perception in one action; it takes many steps and a considerable amount of time.

Small, everyday demonstrations of support and clarifications of your vision, along with a few grand defining moments, such as publicly tearing up a memo detailing an antiquated or short sided policy, can drive home your vision. This is required to assure your staff that you and they are in synch. A staff that does not feel in synch can feel alienated by management (and project managers typically fall into that category). Ensure consistent alignment - hold monthly meetings to report on and celebrate goals related directly to your vision.

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