The concept of "unqualified (and qualified) performer" in project management

This article is a continuation of the topic of “ unqualified customer ”, as well as an attempt to analyze the reasons for mutual dissatisfaction of managers and specialists in unsuccessful projects. I think that my colleagues are familiar with the situation when the project failed and the team tries to understand the reasons.

The impetus for the formulation of the concept of "unqualified performer" was the "Black Book of the Manager" of Slava Pankratov, or rather, a piece from Chapter 5 "People".

If a person does not do something, there are 4 reasons
')

Not understood
Can not
Can not
Does not want "

It is in this sequence that these reasons should be considered. But how to understand which of them led to failure? Go top down and use observation methods? Just talk "clean"? But not the fact that as a result we get the right understanding.

I found the solution in the methodology of the theory of activity, the elements of which are described, for example, in the article by Elena Mundrievskaya (references to the authors are given at the end of the publication). The author of the article gives a certain axiom (or predicate) of activity, following which the result at the output will correspond to the task at the entrance. It seemed to me that the analysis of errors and failures using this technique helps to correctly determine the causes of the lesion.

A bit of theory (predicate activity)

This section of the publication is exclusively a quote from the article by Elena Mundrievskaya.

When there is activity, then:

Must be a doer (D).
D must have activity rate.
D must understand the norm.
D must take the norm.
M should be able to fulfill this standard.
There should be a norm for product activity
There should be a rule on the source material to obtain the product of the activity.
There should be a rule on the process of converting the source material into a product.
There should be a rule on the means of converting the source material into a product used in the conversion process.
There should be a rule on how to use the conversion tool.
There must be a realization of all norms.
Activity takes place if and only if all of the above is available.

Look carefully at this predicate. Do you agree that this is activity? If not, then you can not read further. Enter your definition of activity, and we will check how much better it is. You may be right. But if you agree that the definition of activity is true, then we can move on. ”

Qualified and unqualified performer

The definition of "unqualified" does not bear any negative hue, and means only the impossibility of a specific performer to complete the task. Using the predicate logic, then I will try to disassemble the causes of the “unqualified” activity and understand, from the point of view of the manager (customer), which will enable us to turn to the “qualified figure”.

Take for analysis a hypothetical situation. The project manager (= customer activity) has a team: analyst and developer. The developer constantly breaks the deadlines, the functionality of the features does not correspond to the TZ, errors in each release, etc. The manager needs to understand the reason. Here's how the analysis of the situation can fit into the framework of the proposed methodology:

1. Must be a doer

With this moment, everything is simple. If there is a developer in the manager’s team, that is, D.

2. The Worker must have activity rate

Standards of activity are fixed in the company's culture, regulatory documents, as well as in secret agreements between team members (for example, the source of standards is PMBOOK, best practices, SLA, internal arrangements for the distribution of areas of responsibility, etc.). To understand whether this clause is being implemented, the manager must determine an exhaustive list of these norms.

If the norms are not defined, (at least partially), then our developer is guaranteed - the leader will not know about them, and he risks being “unqualified” “by incomprehension”.
Therefore, the maintenance of an up-to-date and complete regulatory list is an obligatory function of the manager to ensure the qualification of the performer.

3. The worker must understand the standard

As soon as the norms begin to be determined, it is very important to ensure that the team members have the same correct understanding of these norms. This activity is the second important function of the manager. An integral part of this function is feedback, which makes it possible to understand that the performer “understood” the standard broadcast to him - the value, moreover, “understood correctly”.
If the norms are not transferred to the performer and (or) are not understood / understood incorrectly, our activist - the developer turns out to be “unqualified” for the same reason - he does not understand what is expected of him.

Therefore, ensuring a worker understands the norms (values, goals, etc.) is the second mandatory function of a manager in the process of obtaining a “qualified” performer.

4. The worker must be normal

This item seems to me one of the most interesting. Accept - is to share values and goals, to have agreement on fundamental points. Adoption does not exclude productive discussions, but cuts off empty and empty disputes. The ideal result of the implementation of this item is a team of like-minded people; I agree that in real conditions the manager has to work with the team that was able to gather, but in order for our developer to do his job professionally, he must maintain at least the basic values of the team.

If the actor does not accept the norm, he definitely does not want to participate in this activity. No matter how good he is on all other points, the manager should think about the need to have such "opposition" in the project.

5. The worker must be able to fulfill this standard.

Everything is simple here. The question is exclusively related to the competence of the contractor. I draw the attention of the reader that only one of the 9 factors associated with successful activity is determined by the competence of the performer. This is exactly the case about which Slava Pankratov says - “he does not know how.” In this case, the manager (customer) usually knows what to do - develop competence or change the performer.

However, it is important to understand the relative skill level of the performer. Those. first the norm is determined, then the ability of the performer to fulfill it. The qualification requirements are primary. Therefore, if we begin to evaluate specialists (HR decides to introduce the practice of appraisals, or development plans for developers), the primary definition of the scale and evaluation criteria.

6. There should be a norm for the product of activity

The product norm is the formulation of the characteristics of the desired result for the customer. It includes: requirements for functionality, cost characteristics, compliance with a particular technology, scalability and a lot of what should be combined in an ideal result. In fact, these are acceptance criteria.

Uncertainty of acceptance criteria is one of the main reasons for the unsuccessful delivery of products or projects to the customer; a qualified performer who understands this should not take up such work.

Consequently, if the manager does not define the norms for the product, then the performer does not understand what is required of him, as a result, he becomes “unqualified”, i.e. unable to get the job done right.

7. There should be a rule on the source material for the product.

In essence, these are requirements for accessory goods for a product (semi-finished product) of the previous redistribution. For example, for a developer, such a norm may be the requirement for the content of the TOR, or a test case in which the development requirement is visualized, etc.

It is unlikely that the formation of these requirements depends on the developer, I think that the requirements for inter-functional interaction are formulated primarily by the manager. Armed with such rules, the developer understands that the TK received by the analyst contains enough information and does not require clarification.

Consequently, the manager should be perplexed by the qualitative filling of information flows in the team. Within this paradigm it is not enough for a task to formally appear in the tracker, it is important that this task contains exactly as much information as the contractor needs for work.

If this rule is not respected, we get “unqualified executor” again by “misunderstanding” - all problems like “we thought that by creating a frontend, the specialist himself would agree with the backend expert from which database to take the data” should be included. In my opinion, this is still the task of the manager - to determine the requirements for entering the process.

8. There should be a rule on the process of transforming the source material into a product.

Another rule that only determines how the work process is constructed. Bad practice, when the performer himself has to first invent a process for himself, and then act on it. Imagine that each team determines for itself the project management methodology, the duration of the sprints, the conditions for completing tasks, etc. The role of the manager in such a situation is reduced to the position of the observer (even if he is hiding behind the words about “self-organization” in the team) and the project starts to roll uncontrollably somewhere. The performer finds himself in a situation of misunderstanding how exactly he should work, and again - he gets the label “unqualified”.

9. and 10. There should be a rate on the means of converting the source material into a product, used in the conversion process, and on the way of conversion

Here, it seems to me, too, everything is simple. The manager and team must decide which technology stack will be used, which architecture is optimal, etc.

11. and 12. There should be an implementation of all norms. Activity takes place if and only if all of the above

The reader certainly paid attention: among a dozen reasons why the contractor is recognized as “unqualified”, only one is directly related to the level of the performer’s training, the situation when he cannot fulfill the assignment. In other cases, the level of qualification is determined primarily by the ability of the manager or customer to correctly formulate the requirements for the product. Those. the qualification of the manager / customer in the production of the product is primary.

In any situation where the norms for activity are not defined, even the most experienced performer always risks “not guessing” and giving out “not exactly what they wanted to receive.” In fact, we can only recognize the contractor as “unqualified” in cases when he either does not accept the norms or is not able to fulfill them. In all other situations, it should be recognized - the performer “did not understand”, and look for gaps in management. The manager (customer) is the carrier of norms. The inability to formulate and communicate these norms leads to the fact that in the process of activity there appears a so-called. "Unqualified customer".

Findings:

In my view, the unqualified performer in most cases appears only in a pair with an unqualified customer.

The exceptions are cases when the performer does not accept the value of the company (“does not want” by Pankratov’s definition) or simply does not possess a sufficient level of knowledge or skills (“does not know how”).

All other causes of failure should be sought at the level of the customer (or manager), or rather, start looking from this point.

Certainly, management is an inaccurate science, more likely even an art form, but using elements of the theory of activity, in my opinion, allows you to streamline the process of finding and identifying errors, if the team has a desire to get to the truth.

I should also note that it would be a bad practice on the part of the performer to come to the manager with this article and demand to begin to establish and prescribe all norms. In real life, these norms are always there, often in an unwritten form; quite often they are formed spontaneously and situationally as the team develops. Following the predicate allows us to identify these norms, sort them out and understand where improvement is needed.

For a thinking manager, it is more important to understand what standards the team is currently guided by and adjust these norms with management methods than trying to document everything that can be visualized with Visio; the norms themselves are subject to rapid transformation, documentation will always describe the "yesterday's" process.

I also do not urge to completely abandon documentation - because records are needed in order not to forget important arrangements. Truly important norms should be fixed as the team reaches consensus on them. For example: criteria for acceptance and delivery of the product; interfaces of the modules in the product; terms of employment contracts in a team, etc.

Conclusion

Digging up the theory of activity, in particular, product valuation, led me to the formation of a product management methodology, which, if possible, I will develop in the following publications. And also to the questions of the manager's motivation - the search for such a system of stimulating activity, which encourages the manager to organize production cooperation as efficiently as possible.