Blueprints for Success: An Underestimated Tool for Driving Change
What is the value of templates, and why are the posts that offer thousands of templates so popular?
The revelation came to me several years ago, while I was managing a small, yet groundbreaking project. Everything was under control until an email landed in my inbox. It was from a senior stakeholder, someone with limited interest in the project but significant influence – the kind of person whose messages you can't just skim and forget.
The email was about the selection of a provider for a minor deliverable. Standard stuff, apparently. But then, almost as an afterthought, he mentioned, 'I assume you will also deliver the due diligence in some form.' That simple sentence catapulted me into panic mode. Due diligence? It wasn't a typical step in our project playbook, and I was at a loss.
But then came my eureka moment – finding out a template. Sure, the one I found was designed for larger-scale projects and barely fit our needs. Yet, that humble template was my lifesaver. It helped me decipher what 'due diligence' entailed for our context and, more importantly, guided me through assembling a response that not only satisfied the stakeholder but also made a good addition to my own project management toolbox.
Where’s the Value?
Let's examine how templates offer benefits to each key participant in a project, considering their distinct roles.
For the Project Manager
Implicit Guidance: templates inherently provide guidance on how to complete a task or process. They often come with pre-defined structures, which can be especially helpful for entry- and mid-level professionals who might be less experienced in certain processes.
Consistency: templates enhance project management by ensuring consistency, which has several benefits:
For the Project Team
Templates offer several advantages for project team members.
They ensure consistency in the organization of content and layout across different projects, which simplifies the process of reading, understanding, and contributing to project documents. This consistency reduces the cognitive load on team members, as they do not have to adjust to different formats or structures for each project.
Moreover, templates serve as a valuable tool for skill development. They provide team members with an opportunity to learn and apply standardized project management practices, fostering professional growth and ensuring that everyone is working with a common understanding of processes and expectations.
For the Portfolio Manager
Templates offer significant advantages to a Portfolio Management function, particularly in terms of consistency. They enable streamlined reporting and ensure that information from different projects, especially regarding key performance indicators (KPIs), is comparable and consistent.
This uniformity is invaluable when executing changes to portfolio management processes, as it simplifies the integration of new practices and modifications across various projects.
For the Project Management Office
By leveraging templates, PMOs can enhance their operational effectiveness, maintain high standards, and ensure consistency in project management across the organization.
Quality: by enforcing organizational standards and practices, templates ensure uniformity and quality across all projects.
Knowledge Management: templates assist in systematically documenting and sharing knowledge, promoting learning and retention within the organization.
They also serve as a guide for new project managers, facilitating a smoother transition into their roles.
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Efficient Project Initiation: templates can help standardize and therefore streamline the process of starting new projects, saving time and resources.
MVP (Most Valuable Paragraph)
One of the most difficult challenges I recently faced in project documentation was creating a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) for the first time.
Even if I've done it a couple of times, I can tell you that experience removes the anxiety, but it doesn't make the task easier. It's still an intricate and time-intensive activity, demanding your full attention to small details ...and frequent calls with your experts.
Here are the good news…
The Swiss Association for Corporate Data Protection (Verein Unternehmens-Datenschutz, or VUD) has developed an AI-based template to facilitate the creation of a DPIA, harnessing the power of artificial intelligence. Remarkably, VUD has made this tool available as an Open Source resource - all you need is an OpenAI API key.
Scope creep
In project management, “scope creep” is the uncontrolled expansion of a project's scope. Here, it represents the expanding scope of a project manager's knowledge and interests into diverse fields like culture and art.
"Fill in the Blank" by Car Seat Headrest, through its exploration of autonomy, individuality, and the struggle against imposed narratives, serves as a poignant metaphor for the dual nature of templates.
While templates can be invaluable tools for providing structure and efficiency, they also run the risk of oversimplifying complex tasks, or limiting creative freedom.
By guiding you into a structure, they make it more difficult to find what lies outside that structure.
The balance lies in using templates as a starting point or a guide, while still encouraging individual thought, adaptability, and innovation.
Upcoming next
As a seasoned project management professional, I've experienced first-hand how templates can transform chaos into clarity. That's why, in the upcoming newsletters, I’ll be sharing some of the exclusive templates I've developed over the years. Think of it as an addition to your personal toolkit for project management success.
Your Turn: I’d love to hear from you: is there any template that you secretly hate? Share your template horror stories in the comments!
For 2024, I am brewing a surprise that will help ease that pain.