7 QUESTIONS TO ASK WHEN YOU START ANY PROJECT

Welcome to the Project Mindset Podcast, where we combine the science of project management and transformational leadership. I am your host, Thea Brockmeyer, project expert, international leadership mindset coach for top executives, and trusted advisor to business owners for over 20 years. My goal is helping you stepping up from being an expert to becoming the leader that makes big projects happen, seeing your infinite potential, achieving the results in business and life that your heart desires. Thank you so much for spending some time with me today. Let's begin now.

Hello, my wonderful friends, Thea here, and today we're talking about the 7 questions you need to ask when you're starting a project. Have you ever struggled to get your project past the finish line? Have you ever felt lack of support or commitment? Have you ever faced always changing targets and goals? The reason is probably not a missing software tool or that you're not being certified or you're not capable, but probably one of these questions I'm going to dive in today was not clarified in the very beginning and they pop up like mushrooms all the way in your project and can cause a lot of headaches. So I've put them together for you wherever you are, a certified or not certified project manager, having small projects, big projects, large projects, $1K, $100 million, it's all for you. You're in the right place. And I think project management has to be simple, and I want that you learn the art to ask these questions in a systematic way so you can focus your energy on getting results. Within your time and within budget. Now let's dive in so you can save time and money. And here comes question number 1: What do we want to achieve? What is the outcome of this project? Are you clear about that? Could you describe your project vision in a simple sentence? Does everybody in your project, in your company, in your team has the same vision, whether we are talking about a dinner you're planning, or you're planning a change project, or a sales project, or a merger of two companies, or creating a prototype for a new flying car, or you're going to launch a new product, or you're building an app, or you're empowering the leadership team to grow sales, or you're changing the culture. So what is the outcome of that change project, right? Or what is the outcome of the new developed market?

Or what is the outcome of your sales pitch? So be very— have a clear picture. What is the project about? Projects can be developing something, right? Or projects can be changing habits, right? That could be a project. Or it could be building something. It could be delivering a training. Yeah, so be very clear what is your current project about, and for demonstrating all the 7 questions, I'm taking— I choose the example to the mini project "Get a Christmas tree." Now, for the Christmas tree, it was very clear. We wanted to have a Christmas tree without any bells and whistles, and it was very clear that we wanted a Christmas tree and it should be a real tree, right? So we wanted to have that. Um, and I had a picture in my head. Now it comes more complex. Let's dive into question number 2. Uh, the question number 2 is about the purpose of your project.

Why do we want this? Why do we want this? Now with the Christmas tree, it's easy because, um, it— I love to have a Christmas tree. It's a habit in our family. It is a tradition. Now I have children and I want my children to be happy and I want to create an atmosphere and I want to have this smell and I want to have a kind of— for me it's a symbol of family reunion and beauty and I want to have cozy light and for me it's important, it's a symbol of peace, holiday, rest. So for other people, it could be, uh, the reason could be to impress your neighbors or your parents, or you're just going to have a Christmas tree because you need one. So you have to ask yourself how it is important for you. What is the purpose of that Christmas tree, right? What kind of feeling or what is motivating you by this? Just because you want to get it, so you make check off the box that you have one, right? It's very different. For me, it's very important to have this kind of positive emotion. Now, the purpose of many projects could be just because everybody's doing this.

We found a lot of software projects or tools got introduced in the company just because everybody does it or they have it. So, check it. Maybe it's not because because everybody has it that you need it as well, right? Maybe it was a habit for 40 years and now it's not anymore up to date. So just because everybody is expanding into a certain market, not everybody has to do that. Or if everybody is going to the stock exchange, not everybody has to participate in that game. It depends. And I know some big, big companies paid a lot of money for that? Just, you know, thinking about what is the purpose. Very important question. Now, once we know the purpose, we know what we want, we have a clear picture. Now we want the Christmas tree, the purpose is to create atmosphere and to create a symbol for peace and family reunion. The question number 3 is the deadline. And when do we need to be finished? When do we want to have it, right? If it's a Christmas tree for, let's say, a big hotel, maybe you want to have it by the beginning of December because you want to show it to all your guests and create an atmosphere in the hotel lobby. Now, what is the date for delivery in our home? We don't want to have that because we are traveling all the time, so we need it, let's say, by the 20th of December. But I remember we had many times, um, when we had it just, you know, on the 23rd because our family union was like on the 24th in the morning. We were just preparing the tree for the evening, right? So we did not do that like weeks before, but I know people or families, they have them like 2 weeks before prior. Okay, so we as small children were not even allowed to enter the room. We had to wait because the presents were placed, yeah, under this Christmas tree. So the deadline, we need the deadline in a project. And the deadline in our project with the Christmas tree was the 23rd. In other projects, or let's say 24th in the morning, and we sometimes did it in the last day. But when you do projects like software projects or development projects, you should put deadlines as well. Even though when you don't know how long will it take you to make this presentation or to paint this picture or to develop this product. Why do we need deadlines? There is a little joke I want to say you about the deadline. Students are asked, how long will it take you? Professor asks students, how long will it take you to learn Mandarin, what the Chinese speak? You know, 1 billion people, probably we should learn that too. And the first student says, um, send me 3 months to China, to China, and I will Be really cool. I will speak the language. I will go there to taking intensive classes. Student number 2 says, "Mm, yeah, I will probably need a month and then, you know, day and night and intensive and teachers and I will do that." Student number 3 asks, "Mr. Professor, tell me when is the exam?" So this deadline We all have probably experienced that, that what can we do in a given time. So this is why we have different projects, but we should really know the deadline. When is the date of delivery? That does not mean that any project we can do in a certain given time, but there is some really cool law about time management we dive into deeper in our project management trainings. About the psychology of deadlines. Now, question number 4: How many resources are available, or what is the budget? So, we remember we had the, we have the outcome, what we want, we have the purpose, we have the deadline. Now, what is the budget? There's always a budget, or the costs. In many companies, when I ask this question, And they said, "We have the people in the company. We don't have a budget for this." Especially when you have organizational change projects. "Look, we have people. The budget will be, let's say, the cost for a consultant and that's it." And that is not true, right? Because we all know that your hour, your time, even if you have a change project and you get your salary, costs money. Money you or time and money you cannot spend on your other tasks because you have to spend them now on changing whatever processes, workflows, and so on. Now, the family CFO in our company, in my family, he said, oh, if you ask how much to spend, he says, oh, please don't spend more than necessary, let's save on it because we still want to put a lot of new decoration on it and little new bells and little new lights because, you know, the fashion is changing and maybe we want to have some very expensive new fashionable decoration. Then you need, as for the budget as well, a car for transportation because I wanted to have a high car, so I wanted a high tree, a 2-meter or 3-meter-high tree and glass figures.

I remember we transported the tree sometimes with a convertible because you just open the top and then a 3-meter tree fits in easily. So when it was not snowing that day, right? And so we had the budget for that. But I remember that— how much would you spend on the tree? How much would you spend on the decoration? These are things to consider. And depending how important it is, this budget can expand, or who do you want to impress, this budget can expand. It really is a very, very personal decision. And so it's important to get that CFO on board of your family, of your company, so he is invested and can find still a little budget for the extras, because this year you have some whatever new decoration you want to put there on, some, some new color. One year we do it all in golden, the other year we do it golden and red, the other year only red, the other year only blue glass balls.

So that is very important that you know that before. And I love to have little golden angels sometimes. So have a good CFO who finds the money for your bells and whistles, right, for your Christmas tree. And it can be really even unrealistic budget because somebody can say, hmm, We don't have any money to buy the tree, so then we have to become creative and maybe to start a little earlier and to ask somebody where can we cut the tree off legally. Sure, not to get caught or do something wrong. I remember my son or my father, they even brought the tree from the forest, but they had some good relationships where to get them trees. Yeah, now we have the budget.

Which is important.

And we don't know that exactly how much it will cost, but we should have a budget so we know in which budget we can stay. Even if I want to extend it, I need a person who I can go to and ask. So here we come to question number 5: Who is the final decision maker? Because that is the guy who can overrule this given budget and says "Hmm, I'm the final decision maker, so I'm going— I'm vested in this project. For me, it's very important that this project gets done in high quality, and I will probably help to expand this budget." So we need somebody to ask, and this decision maker is very important. So in case of the Christmas tree, he decides on the lights, on the height, and will be happy to give us some additional funds, right? But if we don't have that decision maker in big projects, especially when you are talking about municipalities or large corporations with several departments, it could become very complex. And/or in charity organizations, identifying the decision maker because everybody says, oh, I'm the biggest one and I'm the only one. And it could really kill our project if we don't find the real decision maker. Here is a story from real life with a Christmas tree. I always found some money if I had, because I was, I think, the decision maker in my family when I wanted to have new colors for decorations. But in large organizations, For example, clients of mine are selling medical equipment, computer tomographs, yeah, for diagnostics. And the discussion— you always have tenders, so you have competitors. And I think in the hospital you have at least the professor, and then you have as well somebody who is the top administration in the hospital, let's say the boss. Who was deciding the financial parts and purchase things in the hospital. And it was interesting, as these very expensive equipments of several millions could cost. The competitor had already negotiated or bribed the administration, even though the professor wanted to buy our equipment. And then I spoke to the sales manager. Hmm, there's a quote. "Look, what can we do? Who is the final decision maker? Who is finally paying?" And then he said, "Hmm, the bank is financing everything." So we knew whom to talk to. We spoke to the bank, and the bank explained to the administration that they should take our equipment. So sometimes it's really important to understand who overrules who. And that is not one pattern for all projects. It depends really very much on the country, on the location, and on the specific project. So this is why we have to clarify this, and it takes some time. But if you don't do that, you could really run into troubles. Now, once we have the result, we know why we want to do it, we know exactly how much time can we spend on it, we know when do we We want to be finished. We know how much budget and resources we have. We know who's the decision maker. Now we come to somebody who is very important because who is going to use it? Who's going to have a benefit for— of this project? If we're talking about a Christmas tree again, coming back, in our family, it's our family, and we have to look about, are there small children coming, like they're 2, 3 years old, so we don't put the decorations so low when we put it on, or we should be aware of having natural candles or electric lights, or to have not so sensitive decoration put on the Christmas tree, or how stable we have to put it, right? Or do we put it on a white carpet, or do we put it on the stones in the hall?

So, these are all things we have to consider. And then, who are the users as well?

Are going to have it outside, inside, and so on. But if we are looking about users and benefits, there could be people that say, "But don't put it in the living room because I have a new carpet in the living room. I don't want to have it there." Like, you know, could be grandma or something, somebody like that. And the same is in projects. I remember still the time when people started, and when you're in change project with technology, People need to change habits if you introduce some new technologies, some new workflows, some new apps, some new tools. And everybody who should benefit, in your opinion as a decision maker, maybe feels not really happy to change habits. So they might not even be supportive to your project. How do you get them on board in the very beginning? If they don't understand their why, they might really jeopardize your project. So you purchase the cool apps, you introduce the new apps, you spend thousands on consultancy, and you don't get any results because people are just not using it. So the same with the Christmas tree here, um, we put on the lights and we used it like we put it there. But then there is one more question we should ask, and that is question number 7: Who are the experts? Who has knowledge and expertise? Yeah, we don't as a project leader have to be the expert. No, we don't have to know where to get a Christmas tree. We don't have to know how to mount it or how to make it stable or where to get the decoration, how to decorate it, in which order to decorate it, and so on. We just have to know whom to ask. So I could ask my mom, how did they do that? Or my daddy, how did they do that? And to get their advice. I could as well today go to Mr. Google and have a look at different inspirations. I could look what kind of new lighting systems they have. I could watch YouTube videos. I could get somebody who's a professional decorator, right, doing it for shops and hire them to do that for me. So depending on my budget, I can outsource the whole process. And, um, or I can hire somebody, somebody, or I can even— the question is, if I'm not an expert, I can ask friends. So this is important to know where to get advice. In our time today, it's very easy. And but not looking for expertise, being ignorant to the knowledge which is there, knowing where to place it, and Being aware of cables, they should not be, let's say, jeopardizing that, you know, you walk and then you stumble about the cable and then you break your leg on a family holiday.

That would not really be good, right? You know, all those risks. So you really should be aware who are experts, who has knowledge, who has expertise. Maybe if you ask your parents, they even give you a lot of stuff for free because they have a lot of stuff collected. Yeah, all these years. And if you ask them before, you may save even a lot of your budget and can buy a bottle of champagne for your family.

So this is why I think it's important to start before we dive into all the, let's say, really goal setting where we say, oh, we want so many decorations and so many lights. Before we all have that, we should collect all this information and then consider all that in the next process, planning goals and activities to achieve these goals that are accompanying our Christmas tree before you make that scope of that project ready. And experts— yes, I'm a business consultant and I can say as a project leader, usually for small projects we are the expert, but the larger the project becomes if we have millions and we are not the expert in every single area. So maybe you are proficient in the technology because you're coming from the technology side. You may be not as proficient in the financial side, or if you're coming from financing, then maybe you have not so much clue about the technology, and it's important that you get some experts and learn a little bit about before you make some Oh, we just take the cheapest one. In a lot of projects you have in the tender documentation, hmm, we take the cheapest one, which is not always what is useful. And balancing all this, this is the task of a project manager. So let's recap. We have been talking about the 7 questions that we need to ask in the beginning of a project. The first: What is the result? What is the outcome of the project? Number 2: Why do we need this project? What is the purpose? Number 3: When is the deadline? Number 4: How much does it cost? What is the budget? Number 5: Who is the decision maker? Number 6: Who is a user? Who are user groups? Number 7: Who is an expert? And once you have been doing this, or you want to do this exercise today, we have prepared for you some prompts and workbooks. You can go forward slash, uh, you can go to www.projectleaderacademy.com/7questions and download your workbook. Thank you so much for listening today, and I wish you all the best for your project.

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