PMI CAPM – Lead and Manage the Project Human Resources for the CAPM exam

1. Section Overview

We are now moving into Chapter 9 of the Pinbox, talking about planning human resources management. There is a lot of information to discuss. In this section, we’ll begin our conversation about creating a human resource management plan.

This is all about identifying our project team needs, determining who reports to whom, assigning roles and responsibilities, and creating a staffing management plan. This is how we get people on the project and how we release people from the project. Our staffing management plan in this section, we’ll also look at some different theories that you need to know. Some HR theories, like Maslow’s hierarchy of needs or Herzberg’s theory of motivation, McGregor’s, X, and Y.

So pay attention to that and know the difference. We’ll see. McClellan’s theory of needs, sometimes called the acquired needs theory, This is one you want to watch for in this section. In our discussion of other theories, I’ll ask you some questions about this. The Expectancy theory is one of Ouchy’s theories to be aware of. That doesn’t mean you think you’re going to have kids; it means something else. So we’ll talk about the expectancy theory and the halo effect.

So there are lots of theories to pay attention to. In this section, we’ll have a little refresher on our organisational planning. Remember, project the matrix and then the functional. We’re going to see that again because that affects how we manage, how we acquire, and how we lead the team. So we’ll talk about that in this section, acquiring the project teams.

How do you get people on your team? And then, too, how will you release people from your team? So doing some negotiation and influencing—begging, pleading, threatening—whatever it takes to get the right people on your team So we’ll look at that. In this section, We’re going to talk about working with virtual teams, about getting people on our team who may not be collocated with us, so they’re “non-colocated,” and why that’s so valuable. So, working with a virtual team or a noncolocated team Of course, once we have a team, we must work hard to develop it so that our team members are reliant on one another, interdependent.

So we’re going to talk about improving teamwork and motivating people, keeping our turnover rate down, and just promoting project performance overall. We’ll look at some communication and emotional intelligence, as well as some interpersonal skills, as part of team development. And I want you to watch for the five stages of team development. So watch for that in this section. With leading team development, this is really important. Five stages of team development manage the project team. Yes, you want to motivate people, but it’s also about getting work done. So we’re going to manage the team, track performance, give feedback, and make certain that people are doing the work they’re supposed to do. All right, let’s hop in and talk all about human resources management right now.

2. Plan Project Human Resources Management

Here in chapter nine of the Pinbox, we need to start our conversation by talking about planning a project in human resources management. This is all about planning, how to lead, and how to manage and develop your project team. So let’s look at this process. This is plan number nine of the Pinback Guide fifth edition. Human Resource Management It’s all about first identifying the project team’s needs. What do you need in order to make this team more cohesive and have more competency to do the work that they need to do to satisfy the project scope?

We also need to understand our reporting relationships—who reports to whom on your project team—and we’re going to talk about assigning roles and responsibilities. The outcome of this is to create a staffing management plan. The staffing management plan really defines three major things: staff acquisition—how we can get people on your team. This assumes that you were simply assigned to a team and then released staff. How do people end their time on your project? And of course, we have to acknowledge the organisational policies and structures. What are the enterprise environmental factors that you must abide by when you go through the planning process for human resource management? For planning human resource management, we need the Project Management Plan activity Resource Requirements, which tells us what activities we need. There are the enterprise environmental factors I was just talking about and organisational process assets. So what templates or prior projects can you use to help you better manage your current project? Some tools and techniques for planning the Human Resources Management (HRM) organisation chart and position descriptions are provided here.

talking about an ORG chart for your project. Obviously, this is more likely to apply to larger projects, whereas it may not apply to smaller projects. Then networking required going out and talking to people, networking, and determining what resources are available and which may not be. And then there is organisational theory. And this one receives a lot of attention in PMP’s organisational theory because the Pinbox does not always tell us what these organisational theories are. So we’re going to look at those in this section, expert judgement and meetings, and then the only output of this process is the human resource plan. Let’s look at the org chart. This is the idea that, for your project, you create an ORG chart. So imagine a project that has people on your team in Chicago, New York, Atlanta, and San Francisco.

So you’re the PM of these different teams, or maybe it’s all one big team, but you have the Chicago team, the New York team, and so on. It’s geographically dispersed. Well, the people in each city report to a team leader, and the team leader in turn reports to you. You could also do this with the different discipline crews on your team. Like, these are all the application developers; these are the testers; these are the instructional designers; and these are the technical writers, or whatever the case may be, but it’s just a way to visually see your resources and how they are dispersed by different roles or geographic locations. A matrix chart is a really handy way to see roles and responsibilities. Sometimes this is called a role and responsibility chart. It can also be called a Ram chart, a responsibility assignment matrix, where in the first column we have our activities and then all the other columns list the team members. The intersection of an activity and a team member will show the level of responsibility.

A Racy chart, as we see in this example, is a type of responsibility assignment matrix, but it uses the acronym Racy for responsible, accountable, consult, and inform. So you can see here with the web content that Sam is responsible, Shelley is accountable, Frank will be consulted, and Lloyd will be informed. So a racy chart Now, that is a matrix chart. There are three different flavors. I’d love to see the Racy charts for all three, but they’re all pretty similar.

Let’s talk about some HR theories. Now, we’re going to talk about a couple of different theories that you should know for your exam. Be able to recognise these characteristics. The first one is Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. You’ve probably seen this in any psychology course you’ve ever taken. Maslow posits that there are five layers of needs that we all have as individuals. You start at the bottom with the physiological, and you can’t move up this pyramid or this hierarchy until the need below has been satisfied. So, for example, physiology dictates that we all have a need for food and water and the ability to breathe. So there are some physiological needs.

The next level is safety. that we all have a need for safety. If you think about this in a workplace environment, where we expect some safe working conditions and don’t feel threatened or afraid of getting injured on the job site, then we have social. Work obviously has some social aspects to it. You have friends, peers, colleagues, and so on. So there’s a social need, and then there’s esteem, which means that we want to take pride in the work that we do and that we value. And we want to feel valued in how we contribute to the project. So you think about your project team members and decide that they need some esteem, and at the pinnacle of this is self-actualization. And that’s where you feel like the work you’re doing is your calling or purpose. So you think about this from your project team members’ perspectives and how they view your project based on these needs. So for your exam, I would encourage you to know this hierarchy of needs: physiological, safety, social, esteem, and self-actualization. Another theory is Hirstberg’s theory of motivation.

Frederick Herzberg says that we have two types of agents as an employee or an individual: hygiene agents and motivating agents. Hygiene agents are things that you do on a regular basis, such as brushing your teeth or washing your hair if you have hair. So hygiene agents, as far as employment goes, are things that you expect as part of the employee-employer contract. So you think about job security, getting your paycheck, acceptable working conditions, and relationships with your peers and your manager. So just things that you expect to show up and do their job Above that, we have motivating agents like opportunities for advancement or taking on more responsibility, feeling appreciated, some recognition, and maybe educational opportunities. So those are things that we strive to work harder for as an individual. Hygiene agents have to exist first. If you don’t have hygiene agents in your role as an employee, then you’re not going to be really excited about more opportunity or more responsibility. If you don’t have a paycheck, you probably don’t really care about education, opportunity, or so on.

So the only way that motivating agents work is under two conditions. One, hygiene agents have to exist, and two, the individual has to be interested in the motivating agents in order for that to promote performance. This little arrow going from low to high talks about the level of performance that hygiene agents really provide; you’re just going to get the minimum. It’s a low level of performance, so having opportunities or motivating agents—things that I’m interested in and that I want—that will promote performance, So that’s Herzberg’s theory of motivation. Next, we have McGregor’s theory of x and y. Basically, McGregor’s theory of X and Y is a management perspective on employees—we have X people and Y people. X is bad, and Y is good. X people believe that their project team members have to be micromanaged and that you can’t trust them. And these people are lazy, and they want to avoid work.

As a result, it has a very negative connotation for the project team. People are just the opposite of what they believe. The project team members are self-led, they’re capable, they’re motivated, and they want to contribute and be of value. So X is bad and Y is good. That’s a quick summation of McGregor’s x and y. The next theory is McClellan’s theory of needs. This is David McClellan. It’s sometimes known as the “acquired needs theory.” What McClellan posits is that our individual needs are acquired over time and are reshaped by our life experiences. So we have things like achievement, affiliation, and power. Where achievement individuals seek to excel, it means they want to advance in the company or in their career, that they want to accomplish things, and that they are goal-oriented. Affiliation is where people want harmonious relationships, to feel accepted, and to be part of something, like a team.

And then power is when an individual wants to be in charge, and we have personal power where they want to feel like they’re in charge of lots of people, and they’re personally motivated to be in charge. and institutional power, where an individual wants to be a manager or a CEO, and they want to feel that they are worthy of that title in that position. So achievement, affiliation, and power Now, in McClellan’s Theory of Needs, if you were to take a thematic perception test, this test would have some different themes of things that are going on and then ask you questions. And then, based on how you answer the questions, it would come to a conclusion: are you driven by achievement, affiliation, and power? This is all shaped by your life experiences. Now, here are some other theories that you should be aware of. We have Wi Chi’s theory. Z. This is not auchi. It’s known as the cheese theory. Z. This is the Japanese management style. It’s the concept based on Japanese management that we have lifelong employment, that it’s a familial environment, and that when we do have to let people go from the company, those are some of the first people that we want to bring back. So it’s Japanese management style. Theory of We Cheese Z.

The expectation theory states that people behave based on what they believe their behaviour will bring them. So, for example, if I tell my project team, “Hey, you guys get this done by Friday, I’m going to give you all a bonus.” And they’re thinking, “bonus,” a financial bonus. So they work overtime and all night. They get the work done by Friday, and I come in with a box of donuts. Here’s your bonus. That’s a lot of disappointment, and there will almost certainly be some resentment. So we fast forward a couple of months, and I say again, “Hey, you guys get this done by Friday, and I’ll give you a bonus.” Their response is going to be, yeah, right. a box of donuts for working 80 hours this week to get it done. So people behave based on what they believe their behaviour will bring them.

Now, where we see this in particular is that we’re in a matrix environment. When you have lots of different managers that a person has to report to, they behave and respond to how the managers treat them on those different projects or in operations. So people behave based on what they believe their behaviour will bring them. And then we have the Halo effect. The halo effect is a false belief based on a person’s experiences. So Susan over here is a great application developer. Well, that must mean that she would be a great manager of an application development project. That’s not necessarily true. She may not be able to manage. There are a lot of other skill sets that go with managing, but she may be just fine and comfortable and love developing applications. So that’s the halo effect. Okay, good job. brings us to the end of this lecture. The key thing here is to know these HR theories or organisational theories. I’ll see you in the next lecture, but we’re going to talk more about roles and responsibilities.

3. Define Roles and Responsibilities

In this lecture, we’re going to talk about defining roles and responsibilities. We’re going to talk about who does what versus who decides what. We begin this conversation by looking back at our organisational planning. Because of this, the structure that you’re operating in will have a big influence on what level of authority and how much power you have as the project manager. So recall that it is a functional structure. You have very little power as a project manager. You might be called a coordinator or a project expediter, and the functional managers are in charge. Then there’s that weak, balanced, and strong matrix, where the adjective describes the level of authority and power you can expect as a project manager.

So you recall that in a balanced matrix, whether shared with functional management or a strong matrix, you have more control and authority over project decisions and various aspects of your project. And then at the top of this hierarchy is the project, where you have the most authority and are completely in charge of the project. So, organisational planning, on your exam, you want to pay attention to what type of organisational structure you are operating in because you might have one question where the best answer is functional. Then they ask the same question, but this time you might be operating in a projectile. So you would respond differently depending on how much authority you can expect. Roles and responsibilities There are four terms that are tied to roles and responsibilities. To begin with, the role is simply a way of describing what that person is responsible for. So you consider hiring an application developer.

Well, it describes what they do and what their accountability is as “application development.” Or you think about a carpenter or a mason. So it’s a way of describing their accountability and the types of activities they’d engage in. Then we have the authority. This is an individual that can apply resources, like the project manager or the team lead, or even the functional manager; they apply resources, they make project decisions, and they can even sign off on approvals. So you may have different levels of authority depending on what’s being signed off for approval or what decisions are being made.

Now, responsibility is the work that a team member is expected to perform. So it’s a very specific task that has to get done. So take responsibility for what you have to do and perform. Then there’s competency, which is the skill and mental capacity required to complete project activities. So what’s your competency level? The staffing management plan In our first lecture here, we talked a little bit about the staffing management plan and how to create one. Human resource planning entails HR planning. So the staffing management plan is part of the HR management plan. It describes staff acquisitions. This is where the resource calendars are. The resource histogram Recall that a histogram is a bar chart that shows the utilization of resources. This is also where you might have a staff release plan. So when people are done with their activities, they don’t need to linger on the project. They can be released and moved on to other tasks within your project. Then we have training needs. Your competency level should be reflected in your training requirements. We need to train the team if they don’t have the skill sets required.

So, for training needs, if you have a rewards and recognition system that is documented in the staffing management plan, what are those rewards? How will you recognise people? and so on. And then, depending on your industry, you may have some compliance and safety concerns that you want to address for people in the staffing management plan. Again, this can all be part of organisational process assets, where you take something from a previous project, HR, or your PMO, and adapt it to your project based on your organization’s policies. So based on your enterprise’s environmental factor Great. So that brings us to the end of this quick lecture. A really quick lecture about the staffing-management plan roles and responsibilities I’ll see you in the next lecture, when we’ll talk about acquiring your project team.

4. Acquire the Project Team

Do you get to go out and interview people who will work for your company and cherry-pick your project team? Or are you more like most project managers in that your team is assigned to you, and those are the folks that you get well prepared for your PMP exam? You’ll have to know both perspectives. On the exam, you should think of yourself as one of the lucky people who gets to go out and pick the people who will be on your team. And you’ll also have to play the role, which is more common, that your team members are assigning to you. So this is all about how people will join your team—all about acquiring the project team. So we look at this from both perspectives.

Acquiring the project team If you could go out and choose your team, you’d have to do some negotiations. You’ll have to influence decision makers to get the people that you need on your project team and, of course, the people that you want on your project team. We know as project managers that the wrong resources are just going to affect the project’s success. If you don’t have the right people on your team with the right skill sets, you’re just setting yourself up for failure, and it becomes a risk in the project. We have to think about alternate resources. So should I use a senior engineer or a junior engineer? So you think about those individuals who might be more skilled, but they might cost more. Then you think about the team members who may not have the same level of competency.

So how are you going to accommodate that or work through that on your project? Patients, planning, subject matter experts—those are all ways to deal with competency. But the real way is to deal with training; we want to raise people’s competency level. Of course, training is really always just the foundation when we’re talking about increasing competency level, and it still takes time. People are still learning beyond the classroom or web-based training. So I imagine if you go back to your early days as a project manager and think about how much you didn’t know then as opposed to what you know now, that it takes time to build up that level of competency that you have. But we need to have the same understanding for our project team members who may be new to a certain skill set. Also on our project team, we have to think about the resources that we need because of legal reasons, regulatory requirements, or mandatory criteria. So you think about different disciplines—health care, pharmaceuticals, for example, or construction. even in it. There are some legal and regulatory requirements for project team members that we may need based on the type of work that your project encompasses. So acquiring the project team is something to think about.

Let’s look at the EDOs for acquiring the project team or inputs we have in the HR plan that we’ve already discussed in this section. Enterprise environmental factors and OPA tools and techniques There’s the one I talked about. assignment, here’s your project team, and good luck. And then we have negotiations. Can you get out and negotiate with managers to get the people that you want? Acquisitions: can you hire people to be on your team, or can you use contractors? So acquisitions, virtual teams—of course, virtual teams. We’re talking about people that work remotely; maybe you’re using web conferencing, something like Microsoft Link, or going to a meeting. And that’s how you coordinate your efforts to have conversations remotely. We’ll talk more about virtual teams and those challenges in module 10 of the PMBOK. When we talk about communications, virtual teams are sometimes called noncolocated. It’s kind of a weird way of saying people aren’t in the same space.

We are all collocated, so we all work in the same space. Non-colocated individuals were dispersed or virtual. Some other tools and techniques include multicriteria decision analysis. Just a way of saying, “Well, what are the pros and cons?” What are the different things that we need an individual to do to be on our team? And from there, we make the decision about what team members we want. This process will result in project staff assignments. So basically, your roles and responsibilities for your project team members, the resource calendars, and then you may have updates to your project management plan acquiring the project team. So there are three main ways to get people on your team: assignment, negotiation, and acquisition. I talked a little bit about working with virtual teams. We know it’s people who are not all in one space, so they’re geographically dispersed individuals.

So now we can use experts from different parts of the world to contribute to our team. People can work from home. If you’ve ever had the opportunity to work from home, I always feel like I’m more productive when I don’t have to be in an office somewhere, just because I can be somewhat isolated and somewhat unavailable to focus. I don’t have those distractions, but it’s also kind of lonely. But I can. Members with varying schedules are accommodated by including people who work from home. You consider different time zones, people with mobility issues, and how they can now be a part of a virtual team.

They don’t have to travel to an office. It also did just this, in that it gets rid of travel expenses or at least can reduce travel expenses to save on funds. So virtual teams are a big part of Pinbox 5. We’re going to see this when we talk about communication. As I mentioned, multi-criteria decision analysis We’re just thinking about the different characteristics that will influence who you choose to be on your team. So, are they available? What will it cost for the project? What’s their experience, their ability, their knowledge and skill set, and their attitude towards your project? And then you might also have some international factors, especially with a virtual team, to consider in the results of team acquisition.

Well, you’re going to have your project staff assignments; you’ll have people on your team, and now you can begin assigning the resources to the task that we talked about back in Chapter 6 of the Pinball on Time. Remember to keep resource calendars that describe when people on your team are available, and then you may have updates to the project management plan. So that’s it. That’s the end of this conversation about getting people on your team. It’s pretty straightforward, and a lot of this will be influenced by your enterprise’s environmental factors, the policies, and other things that you must adhere to in your organization. All right, good job. Let’s keep moving forward. We’re going to talk about leading team development in the next lecture.