EP80 Building Hybrid Project Management Approaches That Actually Work

Dante Healy [00:00:00]:

Hello, everyone. Welcome to Business Breaks, the podcast where we cut through the noise to get to the heart of what matters in project management. I'm your host, Dante Healy, and together with John Byrne, we will discuss hybrid project management. Now. It's a way to use the best parts from various project approaches based on what your project really needs. This is about being smart and getting the job done, not about picking a team. It's the skill that makes a good project manager great. And in this episode, we will look at the big problems you face, from finding the right mix of methods to dealing with people who don't want to change.

Dante Healy [00:00:43]:

We will give you some simple examples and advice to help you and we will end the show by explaining why a hybrid approach is not just a trend, but the way forward in our field. So let's get into it. So, John, just want to get your ideas around what really makes a project management approach hybrid.

John Byrne [00:01:09]:

Oh, it's blending a couple of different methodologies, usually the most typical ones waterfall and agile. I suppose the key thing is it's recognizing that one size fits all doesn't really fit all, and individual projects need individual approaches. Even if they're very similar projects, they're always something different purely because people are different. So you know that that would be the key thing. I think we've tried to blend different processes. Having a more. A slightly more open mind, I think is needed. Yeah, lots of different types of hybrid as well.

John Byrne [00:01:50]:

There's no wonk, which is hard, which makes it difficult to define it. There's no clear. This is what hybrid is. Now let's go teach you what hybrid is. It's kind of. No, hybrid is something will mean different things to different people and they're all.

Dante Healy [00:02:04]:

Exactly. I mean, even within Agile, you've got Scrum Band, right? You combine Scrum with a Kanban board. But that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about essentially how you combine the best bits of the structure of a waterfall project with the adaptability and flexibility from agile approaches. And I think that's where you get these frameworks like prints2agile, where they try to give you the best of both worlds and blend it together. And you can look at it as the more you understand about different approaches to delivery, the more you can think about, well, which are the bits that I've seen working in my projects and how do I adapt them to the unique circumstances? Because each project is unique. You have a different blend of requirements, different, should we say, strategies that are needed, different levels of change and different levels of risk as well. Plus the compositions of your project teams will be different as well.

Dante Healy [00:03:13]:

Some projects are heavily resourced and you can afford to almost run a marathon having, you know, joined hands and you're running the whole distance together. And other projects you need handoffs for resource constraints where you need to agree, well resource A will work for this period of time, then hand over to resource B and then bring back to resource A to validate. So just, it just varies in terms of how you adapt that and then trying to be agile on top of the structure. There are various ways of doing it. I mean what I've seen, the most common one is waterfall with agile behaviors. So you do essentially the planning and analysis of the requirements upfront for a period and then when you're in the build phases you take a scrum based approach with your development team based on the requirements, but you've listed the requirements in a backlog and then you sequence them and then finally you do you revert back to waterfall testing after the build is at a place where you can start implementing more, shall we say comprehensive testing frameworks. Because even if you use say extreme programming and you have test driven delivery, a lot of the time it's not fully integrated because of the complexities of your component might be one part of a bigger hole and therefore or you can or you're limited to in order to progress within your team is unit testing. And then before you revert to more comprehensive system integration testing and then that probably goes more into a program.

Dante Healy [00:05:03]:

But I would say for bigger projects you can run in parallel where you have teams working independently and then coming together at the end. What do you think, John?

John Byrne [00:05:15]:

Yeah, I mean as I said, lots of different ways to do it and they're all equally valid. I mean my typical approach when I have full flexibility to design a project wherever way I want, I would call hybrids. A lot of people probably wouldn't. That's fine. So mine are usually system implementations and so that by necessary is going to be a waterfall project. I usually try and make it mini waterfalls as much as possible that if there's modules that can go live, I don't wait till the whole thing is done. I'll go live with the modules when it's done. But as we deliver a waterfall module, you know yourself, usually we're finance projects.

John Byrne [00:05:57]:

Finance people don't necessarily know fully what they want until they have something to judge her off. So when you've delivered something there always be tweaks that can be made. And I kind of tend to let a, an agile, you know, sprints type of go for the tweaks. And I suppose that's how I define the difference between, you know, what projects work best, what parts of projects work best. If it's delivering something kind of new and large, I'll use a more waterfall heavy style of things and it's kind of tweaking things that are already up and running and you're adding functionality, you know, small amounts at a time. I'll consider that agile. And that's how my definitions work when I'm, when I'm designing it. Very, you know, I'm sure you, you probably have different definitions of that.

John Byrne [00:06:44]:

I'm sure lots of people do and there'll probably be some people who are banging their head off a wall hearing me define things that basically. But that, that's how I think of things. You know what my idea of hybrid is? Well, I'll just adjust whatever I need the situation. When I'm delivering something fairly big, I use more waterfall and when I'm delivering little tweaks, just adding functionality that I don't, you know, consider to be brand new to somebody, then I've, I'll consider that more agile format that sprint to upset an awful lot of people who have very rigid definition. Well, waterfall and agile.

Dante Healy [00:07:12]:

Yeah, and it's, it's, it's all valid. You know, I've, I've had, when I post about my, my view of agile to the point I've actually blocked people, but essentially everyone's got a valid opinion and it's always important to be respectful because everyone has a unique experience. Right. And there's no real, no real one framework that can do everything for you. You have to create and configure your own unique structures. And in full, I get, I guess embed discipline in terms of getting progress because ultimately what you're dealing with, these tasks and how you sequence them is really, and distribute them across your resources is really how you determine to what extent you're successful. And then beyond that there's the risk to consider. So you may have a plan A, but how long before you need to revert to a plan B or a plan C in order to.

John Byrne [00:08:17]:

Yeah, that's important as well that you know, you're building and implementing the, your hybrid framework for your particular project. You do need to build something. You need to have some idea as to what you're doing. You can't just say I'll make her up as I go along. And that's what hybrid is or even.

Dante Healy [00:08:32]:

That'S what Agile is, because all requirements are not clear. And that could be that you don't know what the organization's existing. Sorry, one step back. We deal with technology projects. We're not building buildings. You know, project management can be construction projects, but we're talking about technology projects. And it may be that when you say we don't have clear requirements, it may be a lack of knowledge because you don't understand the existing digital ecosystem. And that's on you.

Dante Healy [00:09:09]:

Because ideally, as an organization, when you implement a technology or if you have a system, ideally it should be documented. There should be processes in place that outline what the system is. And that's one of the biggest challenges with legacy structures. You remember a few episodes back, we talked about technical debt and the favorite one for me is COBOL system that wasn't properly documented and then it was very well protected by the extremely political IT team. At the time I was a finance project manager. So from the business side and trying to break it up, we ended up having failures just before going live that were then reverted back and blamed on the business requirements, even though they were signed off months back. So I think there's this piece where you can say you don't have clear requirements, but that's incumbent on you because you haven't factored in the lack of knowledge and you just steam ahead without really understanding where you are and what you need to deliver. Now, there may be uncertainty, but it's important to understand what that uncertainty is before you start creating plans.

Dante Healy [00:10:28]:

You can't plan in a vacuum or in a laboratory where you're not actually taking stock of your environment. Sorry to interrupt. Interject Johnson.

John Byrne [00:10:41]:

Yeah, I'm just kind of, I speak taking more from the framework point of view though, rather than like things like requirements gathering and that, which to kind of have almost thought through what you're going to do and when you're going to do it with the project before you start, you analyze yourself for granted, you'd know what your requirements are. Otherwise, how did you get a business case to do the project? That the thing. So. But you know that you can't just say, I'm just going to make everything up as I go along and I'll see how I feel when I get to this piece or that piece. You kind of have to think it out, okay, this is what I need to deliver. This is. This is roughly the order I'll be delivering it in. This aspect here will lend itself to these methodologies.

John Byrne [00:11:24]:

This other aspect will probably. I'll try A different. But to have that. So you know, you, while there's no real framework, as in a one size fits all framework, I think you do need to have your own for your project. A relatively stable framework specific to your project, taught out in advance of actually starting with that. You have no framework at all, no idea for a framework, as you start the project, you do need to know what methodologies, what techniques you're going to use in advance before you start a project. Now, there may need to be changes and pivots during the project, but you still need to have some kind of guiding framework.

Dante Healy [00:12:04]:

Yeah, absolutely agree. And when you, when you set out with a project, you need a strategy. And you know, every strategy starts with where are you, where are you now? Where do you want to be in the future? And what's the, what's the gap between the two? And then within that gap you have a roadmap to say here are the key milestones and like major milestones. So from here I want to have embedded my set up my foundation. Here I want to build on that foundation, and by here I want to have finalized that, that complete build. And then, you know, within those definitions you determine what the success means. And there'll be elements of both the technology and the business reorganization surrounding the introduction of that new technology. But I think a lot of these business cases are built on more aspirations than hard information and verified data.

Dante Healy [00:13:10]:

That's what you find is that an executive will have a helicopter view of the vision. He'll have an idea based on, let's be honest, anecdotes on PowerPoint slides that will tell him this is the problems we face. And then they'll figure out, well, what's the vision we want? And then they'll redelegate downwards to say, now how can we realize that vision? How do you convert those goals into tangible action? But yeah, and then within that there's, there's the discipline. So whether you're doing agile, even scrum, shall we say, the planning is there, right? You deliver in sprints, but even within those sprints you have increments like levels of, or collections of user stories that deliver. Ideally something that you can present to your stakeholders, like a sprint review.

John Byrne [00:14:08]:

I think it's, it balancing the flexibility and the structure is the key thing. And you know, that's the unfortunate thing I think about hybrids being successful with no clear frameworks, which wouldn't work. If anybody came up with a clear framework for a hybrid thing, then they just made one up, you know, which was just grand because that's what I just said, make one up, but you make one up to suit your project. So don't ever confuse them. Where one size fits all, but getting the balance right, I think that's the key thing though is you do need structure no matter what you're doing. Pure agile even, you need structure despite, you know, some people. But flexibility, getting that right, balance right. And that can change.

John Byrne [00:14:50]:

I mean, ultimately that's where I think the hybrid project is. It's in, it changes throughout the project. It's not even within the project. It's not clear, you know, on a, on a, an even keel throughout the whole project. Certain parts of the project you need more structured and flexibility. Other parts of the project you, you can weave in more flexibility in the structure. But I do think in order to be successful you need to know where those points are and have them planned out in advance, not just when you get there thinking, okay, I want more structure here or I want more flexibility that you kind of know in advance of starting the project, you know, with your milestones, as you mentioned there you have your milestones and you should kind of know, well, how will I deliver that milestone in this part of the project? Need a little bit more structure. In another part I need a little bit more flexibility and design them in, and use the methodologies for, you know, they'll change throughout the project.

Dante Healy [00:15:45]:

Yeah, agreed. Completely. And what you find is where a project is completely freestyling it and there's neither a waterfall or an agile structure is that you've missed completely the triple constraint theory. You've got your costs, you've got your scope, you've got your time. And within that, you know, they're all driven by the quality of your work. And if you don't know where you are in your project, like for example, even in a sprint, if you've got a sprint of two weeks and you've put some tickets, user stories in a backlog and at the end of the two weeks none of the user stories are done and you just move them into the next sprint, then you need to be starting to think, hang on a minute, what's going to happen when we run out of time and money? How will we actually make the project? Will we deliver on time? And so I think there has to be, when I talk about discipline, if, if a project is falling behind and you know it's not going to meet the deadline, you need to be starting to have those discussions, flagging risks, making raising scope, change requests or. Yeah. In order to make sure that the executives realize, well actually this team is struggling or they're falling behind and then understanding why, because even if it's, even if it's say poor planning, at least you can say, well I'm sorry but the plan is unrealistic or you know, we're just not performing.

Dante Healy [00:17:19]:

And that doesn't need that can be done either in a waterfall or agile structure, but you have to have a structure. And I think one thing that can work or has worked for me is even when I've been running sprints, I'll at least make sure I have some form of critical path method that says, well, we have X amount of resources, we're going to be running a project for say six to eight months as agile and we've got this scope. Are we actually on course to meet our scope? And then, you know, ideally the more you can anticipate your success as a project manager, the more likely you'll be able to protect your credibility and have discussions that are less comfortable. Imagine, you know, and in my worst cases, I've been two weeks from a project completion date and realizing I'm going to have to say we're not going to meet the timing. We still have too many unfinished items on the project board. So I guess in terms of flexibility and structure, that's one element is the structure. On the flexibility side, you have to understand that plans change but the strategy shouldn't. When we talk about flexibility, you adapt to still meet the outcome, but it's not the outcome.

Dante Healy [00:18:47]:

The goal shouldn't change unless you change the unless something externally from the project has changed, in which case it's a question of communication and adapting. But generally speaking, you need to be thinking about how can we change the approach in order to meet the goal and what are the trade offs, right, and getting that aligned across all your stakeholders so you're managing expectations that's the.

John Byrne [00:19:14]:

Same for no matter what framework you use. And hybrid won't fix that. You know, that's anybody who's kind of thinking, oh, hybrid will solve that for me now, hybrid is just another means to try and mitigate those types of risks. And yeah, I suppose one of the things is with Hybrid, I honestly think nearly everybody, even though they think they are using waterfall or Agile, tastes of Agile, ultimately I think people are using hybrids. They're just not realizing it or in.

Dante Healy [00:19:43]:

Denial of error unless they're being shoehorned by a dictatorial waterfall project manager or a pure scrum master who says if you don't do it, it's not scrum.

John Byrne [00:19:53]:

Even then I think they're using Hybrid. Even if they think they're using pure.

Dante Healy [00:19:58]:

The team members will adapt, won't they? Because you don't have. You don't have. I mean, go on a Reddit group. Most developers hate Scrum.

John Byrne [00:20:08]:

Yeah. So they'll, you know, there'll be a plan, there'll be even a pure waterfall. There'll still be a certain amount of, you know, certainly with the projects I work on, you know, we go live with a functionality, but then there'll be configuration and there'll be different levels of configuration that we will hit a point where we can now say we've delivered. Waterfall is finished, but we're still going to. We have a bit of time, we have some budget and we have the team still available. Let's tweak the configuration. And then you've gone into Agile, even though technically it's a waterfall project and there was pure waterfall and there was no agile about at all. But now suddenly you've moved into it.

John Byrne [00:20:48]:

You've reached the point where you can say you've succeeded, but now you're trying to make it that bit better. And then I would imagine it's the exact same thing if you're doing it the other way around. You're pure agile, they're Scrum Master or whatever, but you've used some, you've put some structure a little bit above what, you know, technically Scrum Manifesto claims you need, but you have, you've had to do it because your manager wants to see some timelines and wants to see what's going to happen, what the milestones are or whatever. So you've done that and you've built a rim, but, you know, you still reckon it's a pure Scrum framework, but you've actually built in a little bit of waterfall. Even if you're keeping it very flexible, there's still a bit of waterfall there built, built in. So almost every, I say, I think almost every successful. Even if the people didn't realize, if they're the, you know, the most flexible ones needed that bit of structure to make them see them through, and the most structured ones needed that bit of flexibility. Solve problems to get, to get workaround.

John Byrne [00:21:46]:

The rest of it was a very simple project.

Dante Healy [00:21:48]:

And I think what happens is you find that you'll stick to what works and you'll tweak it to the context. Because as project managers, we find when we're switching organizations, we'll end up switching the communication style, the cadences and adapting them, especially if you've got PMOs that have certain templates that they enforce within their organizations, but you'll adapt those templates to how you work and how you, how you worked successfully.

John Byrne [00:22:22]:

Yeah, and I think that, you know, brings her in as well as your mirror of organizations and even within the same organization, you, they'll evolve.

Dante Healy [00:22:29]:

Yeah, that's true.

John Byrne [00:22:30]:

Everything will evolve. But the challenge is. Because the challenge is we're all project. We've mentioned it many times before and when we've discussed agile, when we've discussed waterfall, it's people, you know, that's the whole project management is change management and it's people who are resistant to change and therefore it's people who you're managing. You know, systems don't care, systems not resist change, but the people who use the system will. And that's the challenge, I think. And that can actually be a little bit of a worse challenge in hybrids. I say that because, you know, if you go to somebody and you sell them, you're the only user.

John Byrne [00:23:05]:

Waterfall methodology and they've worked on projects before, unless they're a really extremist agile person, they'll understand roughly what you mean and they'll go with it. You tell people you're going to use an Agile or Scrum or whatever technology, again, unless they're a real extremist of one, you know, waterfall or different thing, they're going to roughly understand what you mean and they'll accept it and they'll work with it. But when you tell people hybrids now, suddenly, what the hell does that mean, you know?

Dante Healy [00:23:34]:

Yeah, yeah. And they'll see it as you're making it up as you go along.

John Byrne [00:23:39]:

Yeah. So you have to be really good at the communications piece and the people.

Dante Healy [00:23:45]:

You need to justify why your approach.

John Byrne [00:23:48]:

Yeah. And you need to make sure that you've explained this to the people because one of the reasons why there'll be pushback is as well now suddenly, well, what's expected of me? What do you mean highway supposed to do?

Dante Healy [00:23:58]:

It's easy to say, well, I'm using Scrum because that's Agile best practice or Agile common practice even. And people recognize it because it's already got by definition, a lot of companies use it. It has credibility. When you're adapting your own hybrid style. It's like, who's John, who's Danny? Who are they to tell us to take this approach? Because it's your own personal view, your own personal IP as well.

John Byrne [00:24:27]:

That's it. And also like with Agile, with Waterfall there, if you're sticking to one. Even though I've said you, you'd usually be hybrid, even if you don't realize it. But you're basically. If the communications is, you're sticking to one, it's consistent. Might be consistent good or it might be consistently bad, but human beings don't care. They just want consistent. They like consistent.

John Byrne [00:24:48]:

As a general. It's generalization, I know, but it is, you know, it is a general. You'll get that from experience. They do like consistency somewhere in, in.

Dante Healy [00:24:58]:

All this transformation when things are supposedly changing. But yeah, I think ultimately people want the relia, the stability somewhere. There needs to be something to hook onto that is constant and that's it.

John Byrne [00:25:12]:

You're changing from A to B and that's what the project is to get you from A to B. They want a nice consistent straight line, whether it's going up, going down, going across, whatever, but they want a straight line that gets you from A to B. And when you do Hybrid, it's not straight. It's all over the place.

Dante Healy [00:25:28]:

Yeah, yeah.

John Byrne [00:25:29]:

In the, in the most direct route.

Dante Healy [00:25:31]:

I would add to that that if you do have to have a massive sea change in direction, bring a why to it at least if you can justify why things have to change, then it's more likely to be accepted within the team and they'll try their best to accommodate it. Obviously, if you're changing all the time, the why is going to be, come on guys, do you know what you're doing? You'll get challenged, but at least initially, if they're big changes, if they're just small process improvements, explain why it may be you're introducing a new dimension into your project planning tool and that's just to ease reporting to the executives. And let's face it, a lot of the time what you do when you introduce more information in your reporting is they're getting more nervous and they need more information to show that actually are we making progress or are we just winging it?

John Byrne [00:26:29]:

I think though, that's, that's kind of just standard project management regardless of Hybrid. Whereas Hybrid is, as I said, it's not consistent. Sometimes you'll be using one methodology, sometimes another. And that's where people will get nervous. Pushback that, you know, the reporting piece is going to be no matter what you do, even if you were consistent, you need the reporting piece, but probably does become a little bit more important as you are changing from hybrids to, you know, from agile to waterfall back again to make sure that you are, you have a standard, some Kind of a standard report that will remain consistent throughout so people can see what progress is being made. That even when you've switched methodologies. But people won't like that as a general rule that, you know, why, why am I, we were doing things this way up to this point. Why have we suddenly changed? If that was working, why don't we stick that way? And you have to try and justify then.

John Byrne [00:27:20]:

Well, because changing will actually make it more successful for the next milestone, whereas if we stuck with that way we'd be less successful. And you know, how do you prove.

Dante Healy [00:27:29]:

That in advance or project management, even projects are an emerging. I mean hybrid is an emerging. How you, how you project manages tends to evolve even within a project at speed. I mean, I've been in projects where we've gone to iteration 10 of a plan and how do you communicate that when the plans continuously change and you know, all these developers are screaming, why are we reworking all of this stuff?

John Byrne [00:27:58]:

Again though that's, you know, that happens no matter what you do, whether it's waterfall or whether it's agile. But the added complication is when it's, when it's. Hybrid, people might start blaming the fact that it's hybrid for all those changes.

Dante Healy [00:28:15]:

Yeah. And you have to, as a project manager, you have to push back when you're being asked or at least challenge yourself because for sure your team will challenge it. As one of the mistakes I made as an early stage project manager was to too quickly accept the sponsors change requests, even if they were funding the project. But your team were asking, well, why are we reworking what we'd just done two weeks ago?

John Byrne [00:28:41]:

Again, I don't think that really matters with the framework. That's a difference.

Dante Healy [00:28:45]:

That's structure and discipline though I think communication is ultimately where the project manager adds value, whether it's verbal discussions, getting buy in or even just reporting progress. Because if you're moving goalposts without the disciplines, without the buy in, without explaining why, then I think as you say, it doesn't matter whether it's agile or waterfall. You need to know what's going on and you need to be able to communicate so that not just you, but everyone else understands what's going on at the level they need to understand the project progress. But I guess that's, that's coming on to really, really where there are essential skills, whether you're. And probably just before this episode recorded, you mentioned whether you call it hybrid or not, it's just project management. And so I guess when we come to Essential skills for hybrid project managers. What, what do you find is important is making sure you understand what are the skill gaps to, to prevent success and you, you fill them. So from your perspective John, what do you see as essential skills for hybrid project managers?

John Byrne [00:30:01]:

And I'm about to go with being open minded and I know you will probably say and a lot of people probably say that's a mindset, not skill but actually I think it's a skill. I think it's something you can practice, it's something you can work on and something you can get better at. Being open minded and being able to recognize things that you know yes you are being trained as a waterfall project manager, you've got your prince too or your pmp. But to be open to well what are the, what are the scrum people there and what are the Agile bm And to be able to recognize and spot opportunities in that actually that piece there, I'm not mad about the other stuff but that piece there will work from my project that I'm about to start now in this area and to be able to recognize that I think that's, that's a big one and you know you're saying skills I'm kind of going to go then with mindsets almost curiosity I think is another one to, to be, to go with that openness change to try new things to be curious about well why are other people doing different things and how it's for them and to do it. I think they're skills rather than just mindsets because I do think you can practice them and I think you can get better if you don't do it now and if you have very close minded now and only do things one way, you know, if as I said unless it's very simple projects chances are you're going to run into problems and practicing that being open to new ideas and recognizing where they fit even if that means having to change your beloved whatever framework you've used up till now and then using the tools you know, learn how to use as many tools as possible. You may never use them again but if you know how to use them, if you've learned that skill of how to use project management tools or various ilks and types, if you know how to use them, you will have a better idea as to how to fit them into your project or if they don't fit in or all recently made on a knowledgeable way as opposed to just well I don't have to use that system so I'm not using it in my project, even though it could end up being the best system possible for your project.

Dante Healy [00:32:10]:

Yeah, I think for me one of the skills is really being able to cut through the noise. And a lot of the time I'm one of these people. Maybe I'm biased. For sure, I'm biased. The domain expertise helps. Now, you and I, we work on finance projects, but that's because we were qualified finance professionals in the past. And I found that having the domain expertise has helped to almost reduce what methodology you need because you can cut through the fluff and understand really what is the core essence of what we're trying to achieve for finance within our system implementations and what are their challenges. When you communicate, you can see project managers outside of their methodology or their approach.

Dante Healy [00:33:04]:

When you talk about the, when you talk about what are the specific issues that the teams are facing, their eyes can glaze over and then they'll take notes, but they won't be, they won't have the context. And even me having not done finance for a while, when things evolve, you need to go back after a meeting and talk to the person who mentioned a key action and understand, well, what is the action? So I guess experience helps a lot. And then coming to that example, you know, you have to be accepting what you know versus what you don't know. So it's not a skill, but it's more self awareness and the discipline to admit. Hang on a minute. There's an understanding gap. So knowing and following up on areas which are, I guess, risk, because it's not clear what's the problem. And then I guess within that, what makes a project hybrid and how you can make a project hybrid is your confidence in not just sticking to a framework, but being able to understand the core principles and then applying that based on, you know, why this should work and why it might not work in a given context within your project.

Dante Healy [00:34:24]:

I think that's the key is really. And that's not something you'll get from a textbook. It's only something you'll live through experience. What do you think, John?

John Byrne [00:34:35]:

Yeah, I definitely, I do think, I have often said it in the past. I, I think that somebody, you need to have functional knowledge. You know, when you're putting in a system, you need to know how people will use that system. I know there are a lot of people who are just project managers. They don't have a background in anything other than project management.

Dante Healy [00:34:52]:

They'll just have a schedule that was developed by the business. They'll, they'll, they'll ask them for all the inputs and when things go wrong they'll go back to the business and, and they'll ask them to say, well, what are the implications of these issues?

John Byrne [00:35:06]:

And that type of a project manager will probably struggle to adopt a real true hybrid approach because they need the structure of a framework of some sort. Even if it's an unstructured agile one, they still need to be, they just need to follow that because they don't have enough functional knowledge of the, you know, the area business to do so. That's a big one. Yeah, if you find, make sure you have a sound funct function, sound understanding of the function that you're delivering the project for even if you're not, you know, make sure you understand what you don't know at very least even if you don't learn it, at least know that you don't know it and have a subject matter expert ready to, to help you if you're going to go, we're in a hybrid approach that, that is very, you know, and I suppose though the technical skills from a hybrid point of view would be to the exact same technical skills as any of the other frameworks. You just need to broaden them a little bit. You know, you don't need to be qualified as a Prince 2 waterfall, you.

Dante Healy [00:36:15]:

Know, person, Prince 2 agile or even Prince 2 agile.

John Byrne [00:36:19]:

Yeah, Prince 2 agile and be a swarm master and be this and be that and be open to learning about them, you know, that you don't necessarily do the certification but there's plenty of stuff online and know what tools, from a technical point of view, know what tools they use because you know, there might be a tool like Kanban I suppose is the obvious one. It now gets used for many things beyond Kanban. You know, it's, it's a nice tool, it's a handy tool. But if you just said, oh no, I don't do agile technique, don't do Kanban, you would never use the board. And then even things like the standups and stuff like that from Scrum. They have a place even in waterfall if you do them right.

Dante Healy [00:37:01]:

Yeah, you can still do whiteboarding sessions whether you run a waterfall project. The only limitation is to what extent most digital products aren't co located teams. You've got distributed teams across Asia, North Americas as well as Europe, those different time zones.

John Byrne [00:37:22]:

Yeah, even then though, you know, learn the tools that they're using. You know, the, the whiteboarding, you know, there's a framework that would use whiteboarding. So what tools are they using? They have the same problem with everybody being threatened. So learn their tools and adapt them when they suit. Don't just. But that's the thing with hybrid. Don't try the force because you've learned how to do something. Don't throw the forest out into the current project you're doing.

John Byrne [00:37:45]:

It might not fit what fits and adapt it. And then I think the soft skills, especially the people management communication skills, that's probably the most important one because as I was saying earlier, hybrids means upfront. People know we're not sticking to one framework and it's the framework they know or they know they've heard of. We're going to be kind of mixing and matching and making sure you bring people with you there. Because especially if things go wrong, especially if those other issues that you brought up about, you know, changes and constantly changing plans plans and stuff like that, if that's happening as well, that's a problem for every framework. But if it's happening, we're in a hybrid framework, there is a risk that people will blame the hybrid framework for it as opposed to, at least when it's a waterfall thing and things keep changing, people know, okay, this is because the managements don't know what they want or, you know, we haven't gathered the requirements well, or whatever. But when you're doing a hybrid and that happens, it can happen that people just blame the hybrid thing. They don't look for the underlying problem.

John Byrne [00:38:46]:

They just think, oh, it's because it's hybrid. This is always going to be the problem. And no, that's not. Shouldn't be a problem with hybrid either. So make sure you make sure people know that hybrid is not the cause. There's going to be an underlying issue.

Dante Healy [00:38:58]:

Going to be something else. Either the, either the plan was unrealistic or the team, for whatever reason didn't deliver when they should have done. And again, a methodology doesn't really, doesn't really prevent dysfunctional team. But at the same time, if it's your process that's being attacked because you designed the hybrid plan and approach, don't be defensive about it. Be open to criticism because you could be wrong, you could have made a mistake. But again, be open about it. Here's why I implemented it. And based on the feedback, this is why the team believed this might not be the best approach.

John Byrne [00:39:40]:

Yeah, and that's it. And I get their soft skills. I suppose we have discussed it before. Soft skills are probably the most important skills and hardest management.

Dante Healy [00:39:47]:

But you don't get. There's no. I Mean, there's workshops, I've been on leadership workshops for soft skills where the trainers said they're not soft, they're not soft. And it is more about the interpersonal element, the team dynamics and ultimately being calm enough and approachable enough to get the inputs from other people and active listening, being able to read the room and sense what's going on, what's really going on underneath the surface.

John Byrne [00:40:17]:

Exactly. And putting your own ego aside that you know, you came up with this great idea, this nice hybrid solution that is your ip. It was your experience, it was your baby. You've done it all, you taught everything you come up with and then somebody points out a weakness to it or perhaps makes a suggestion that will make it stronger. Put your own ego aside and think, okay, they have just pointed out a weakness. Their suggestion is actually going to improve it. It's valid, it's valid. And take on, you have the cup on to realize, you know, you have a vendor.

John Byrne [00:40:49]:

Yeah, sorry. But now you have a better, a better system, a better framework, a better ip because you can now go and use that anywhere else it applies.

Dante Healy [00:40:58]:

Yeah, yeah, sorry, I was just going to jump in. Sorry to have tried to cut you off there. It was like, I've had that a few times recently. Depending on who you are working with one guy who keeps seeming to have this gotcha moment where they, where you feel like they're picking holes. Don't take it personally. They're just trying to add value in their own way. I guess it's more coming back to the skills you need is soft skills, being able to make judgment calls and as you say, thinking about, well, what are the real reporting requirements when you set up your hybrid plans? Because hybrid will ultimately be about the needs of the stakeholders and also the needs of the organization. When you're delivering success.

John Byrne [00:41:44]:

I think that is something that's important is whatever way you're communicating that needs. They might have a hybrid thing because when you switch true framework through a project, people will still want to see progress. So you need to make sure that you're consistent, not completely change the reports and say, oh, well now we've moved into, so we don't do those types of reports in this framework that we're using. It's not. You have to continue on with the same reports because that's what they'll expect. That's what your PMO will expect. Your Neon 19, whoever it is that wanted the project sponsors, they want to see the same reports that are consistent and show progress.

Dante Healy [00:42:22]:

And you need to Be alert to scope changes as well. If you find that your failure is because people are layering on additional requirements to the team, you need to be able to capture that and say, well, actually, for example, I have a developer who's working on this task, but they haven't been able to get to it because they've been working on something else which has been requested by someone else. And until yesterday I wasn't aware that they hadn't been working on my task when I thought they were. So having the visibility and the transparency, again, that doesn't come from a methodology, but it's more people communicating and being open and honest. And you know, sometimes you have to prompt that by saying, well, hang on a minute, I've got this task. You said you were going to deliver it last week. It's still open. What's going on, Guy? So I think it's coming back to the idea that whether you're doing agile, waterfall or hybrid, the traits are still the same.

Dante Healy [00:43:23]:

It still boils down to some structure, some flexibility, some people skills and a lot of communication experience.

John Byrne [00:43:32]:

Ultimately that's going to be it. But if you're starting off as a fresh project manager in your forced project, you may be sticking with one particular framework that you've got some qualifications in is the best way to do it and tweak it as you go. Experience where you get to figure out what works, what doesn't work. Adapt.

Dante Healy [00:43:50]:

I'm an advocate for training and definitely doing at least one or two certifications and keep your skills sharp because it gives you context. I found that after a training session, my project management skills sharpened. Even if it's just revising what you already know and what you've already experienced, it just reinforces that knowledge you already have internally. Do you think that ongoing training is essential? Because I don't think there is such a thing as a hybrid project management course. I could be right.

John Byrne [00:44:29]:

It is. But I mean the whole point of hybrids though is that you design yourself. So there's all the other course you know that you do actually, bit of this, bit of that, do some waterfall, whether it's Prince 2 Prince 2 agile, you know, refresh. Luckily they all tend to. Certainly I'm not so big, I don't have qualifications when it comes to agile stuff. But Prince 2PMP, they have continuous professional development, you know that you, you are required to do it. So they're good. I would expect the likes of you probably have a better idea than me with regards to actual qualifications.

John Byrne [00:45:02]:

I expect they have CPD Requirements as well the likes of Scrum Masters and things like that. If they don't, you still should be doing something keep up to date with and but what I would suggest is if you've, if you've got a certification, a training in one take broad strokes, you know, a waterfall or an agile, then try to at least you know, even if you're not doing certifications, which I don't think are necessary, I don't think you necessarily have to have lots of certifications. One will do you, one will get you the interview but to at least do some courses in the other type as well have the balance and then gives you that can start just giving you ideas as to what would work in certain contexts, what wouldn't work. But yeah, no, I'd be definitely for training and development pathways. As you said, there's no specific one for hybrid project managers but you don't need one for you know, do your waterfall, do your agile different blends of agile flavors and then pick the best bits out and pull them together. That's what will make you a good project manager. Yeah but it can be really good though especially when you're early in your career, have a, have a framework, do, do a certification, whatever certification that is because it does give you a good foundation then for knowing what's expected of you.

Dante Healy [00:46:24]:

Yeah, I think it's good to have the theory because that adds to your credibility. But please apply a level of pragmatism to your approach and actually thinking about it, the qualifications I've seen that probably would would fit into what is a library project management would be Prince to Agile because it's prints to waterfall plus Agile as well as disciplined agile. And again that promotes agile but in a context. So it's really about making sure that whatever you do, you have a thought process behind it and you're adapting it to your own specific context which is the circumstances of your project. So I guess that's it from me John. Anything else?

John Byrne [00:47:19]:

I think that's the main points I think wanted to cover.

Dante Healy [00:47:25]:

Brilliant. So thank you listeners. I hope you enjoyed this conversation on hybrid project management. Keep an eye out for future episodes on project management topics. As always, John, thank you so much for your time and look forward to the next discussion.

John Byrne [00:47:45]:

Thank you Dante.