Learn Project Management Soft-Skills With Six-Sigma

The Project Management Institute made a point of emphasizing the need for soft skills or “people skills.” Of the project managers surveyed as part of the report, 32% said soft skills have as high importance as technical skills.
Project management entails high-level skills in technical areas. They include an understanding of the collection and application of statistics and process improvement methodology.
It looks like common sense. Project managers take on leadership positions. Soft skills such as communication and conflict resolution are essential to leadership.
However, in careers driven by the quantitative, soft skills often don’t get the consideration they deserve.

The following represent some of the vital soft skills project managers need.

This involves understanding what positive forces motivate individuals. Each comes with their views on work, and each requires a different type of motivation.

This requires communicating goals to others. But it also includes active listening skills. An interface is not a monologue by a leader. It’s a two-way street that involves listening to input and putting it into action.

In this context, leadership addresses practical skills leaders need for success. For example, the attributes of a good team and how to assemble people with the right skill set for a project. Understanding team dynamics, and how to get the best performance from team members, is an essential soft skill for project managers.

One of the principal reasons firms seek out project managers is to find someone proficient in organizing a large number of moving parts. A good candidate can track the multitude of tasks, issues, action items, milestones and decisions, all while ensuring accountability.
Time management is vital and is an area where some principles must be recognized. For example, projects tend to expand to fill the time allotted. For example, a project due in two weeks is often ended at the last minute. Change the deadline to two weeks beyond that, and the same will happen two weeks later. Longer time frames can lead to more anxiety over a project because people perceive those projects to be more critical. Issues such as these can affect team behavior and therefore are an essential part of a project manager’s organizational efforts.

Finding positive ways to resolve issues among team members. Transparency in this process is critical.

Trust is one of the hardest things to earn, but once won it lasts. Honesty in communication is important, as well as modeling behavior for the team.

Leadership positions are not designed for those who always delegate decisions. The ability to make decisions requires work. Managers must build trust in themselves to make the right call. This also requires managers to define issues that need resolution clearly, brainstorm potential solutions with appropriate team members and carefully consider all the alternatives.

Those in project management take on the role of leading a team of people in accomplishing a specific business goal. Once the project is done, they move on to something else. The focus is on achieving a goal that makes a business operation more efficient, less costly and one that delivers a better product or service.
The overall goal is to complete a project on time, on budget and by accomplishing the original business intent.
Much of this aligns with Six Sigma methodology. Started at Motorola in the 1980s, the people-oriented methods has spread from manufacturing to all facets of private business, nonprofits, and government agencies. The overall goal is to identify issues, address them with changes and measure the outcome of the effort, all while limiting mistakes.
Both areas leverage process methodology to improve performance and achieve goals. Both also take similar approaches. Goals are defined. Teams are formed. The plan moves forward in distinct phases with concrete milestones.

The method for producing more efficient business operations can also apply to developing soft skills. In Six Sigma, DMEDI helps define the parameters of a process that leads to improvement.
The acronym stands for the following steps. Think of these in context of developing soft skills.

Define the nature and scope of the goal. This is not only crucial in setting a process in motion but also provides clear goals to measure success.

The key to further developing the measurement for success is that it must be quantifiable and understandable.

At this stage, the time has come to build out a concrete plan to follow.

Carefully consider all the options to pursue that will achieve the goal.

Putting the plan into action. This also requires frequent testing to ensure a program is working, using the measurements developed in step two.
While typically used to improve processes, these steps also can aid in developing soft skills. Setting goals in soft skills and using a Six Sigma method such as DMEDI can help project managers attain the soft skills they need and put them into action.