#25 Including The Specialists As Part Of The Project

Symptom: Dependencies and bottle necks with key staff start to arise on a project, which can cause delays, burn down flat lining and impediments.

Probable Cause: An underlying cause might be that the staff are pretty busy with other things and their contribution is not really included as part of the project nor are they recognised as part of the team.

Suggested Resolution: These key staff could be IT admin, architects and support staff for example, who support the project teams with their expertise at various times during a project, but are not working on the project all of the time. In a lot of organizations these important people are usually performing their role across many projects or perform other duties in addition to their project contribution, and so tend to appear on a project from time to time when they are needed.

It can be easy to become reactionary and request these guys input as it is needed, but unless your project is the number one priority in the organization it can present a risk to the project if they are not available when the call goes out for their assistance. It would be much better to be proactive and be able to let these guys know that a spike is needed or that their input is required in the coming sprint or iteration.

A good way to prep them is to invite them along to the last half hour or so of the sprint planning meet to give them a heads up on what is being planned for the sprint and what kind of input the project team may need from them. This then allows them to provide some input on their availability and provide feedback on what is being proposed. Even if they are not needed in the coming sprint, it would be good to let these guys know so that they can arrange their schedule accordingly.

Including these key individuals at a regular planning meet signals that you value their input and that you want to work collaboratively with them to arrive at some plan of how to tackle the next sprint, which can have other positive spin offs such as building that team bond and including them in the decision making.

What you are looking for here is to include these key staff as being part of the project and include their input as being part of the team, even if they are only part time or just a "passer by" on a project.

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