Workforce Management Challenges

One of the biggest challenges facing project managers (PMs) is how to manage and provide leadership to people who most likely do not report directly to the PM. This chapter explores the challenges facing project and functional managers during staffing projects. On the surface, it seems that the easiest way to reduce or eliminate “organizational toxicity” is to fire the individuals exhibiting toxic tendencies and refusing to change their behavior. Prima donnas can create products and services that are overpriced in the marketplace. Lazy workers can take shortcuts to save time and money, resulting in exposure to product legal issues. Each project and accompanying workforce will be different, and the PMs must decide the specifics of how they will implement management by walking around. Cognitive biases in project management environments can best be explained by looking at the definitions of heuristic psychology and cognitive psychology. An optimism bias is generally good for project management.