Speaker 1: The art of communication is an essential skill to be successful in project management. So how do you communicate effectively to your team? Well in this video I'm going to share with you just how to do that. And on a side note, just as important as effective communication, I have for you something really brand new. Six tips on how to ensure your projects are successful and I put it all together in a guide just for you and I'm going to share with you how you can get it at the end of this video. Hi, if you're new here, welcome. My name is Adriana and you have landed on a practical project management channel. In fact, the best practical project management channel on YouTube in my personal opinion. Love it if you would subscribe and help us grow this amazing community. Now on that note, let's get to those communication tips. Set clear expectations. Oh my goodness, part of communication as we all know even in our personal lives is when we're not clear with expectations and what happens. That's where a mess starts to happen. That's where things don't get done. So you really have to set clear expectation. That's part of a really good communication plan within a project. So what are some of those expectations? There's behavioral expectations of how you expect your team to interact with each other. There's expectations about your action plan and tasks. How are you going to meet? All of those things that bring you together as a team, you need to be very clear with what you expect from that. How are people going to deliver on their tasks? How are they going to inform you when things are done? What's really cool too is there's kickoff meetings that you can have to set this expectation out from day one. Now if you go to the search bar on YouTube, put in Adriana Gerdler, put in communication plan and kickoff meeting. I have lots more great tips for you for that as well. Share the project vision and goals. Yes, this is really important to be part of really good communication. People need to understand the why. Why are they doing this? Yes, I know they've gotten the marching orders, but I find when people are just given marching orders and they don't understand that bigger picture, the vision, how does this all tie in? I find that they're not as engaged or they don't understand the importance of their work. And so this is why really sharing the why. Why are we doing this project? How's it tied into the greater strategy of the organization? What is the vision that we're seeing and how does this project you're working on fitting in with it? And ultimately, what is the goal that you're delivering on? Become so critical that you share that with your team and remind them of it, particularly when things are really, really busy and it's easy to kind of lose track of what you're going to do. Reinforce the vision and the overall goal. Keep people in the loop. This becomes challenging and an interesting topic because we can sometimes get very lost when we're with our project teams and we're so into the project that we know all the nuances that we forget about keeping people in the loop for things that seem really basic and simple to us. But for someone who is maybe a stakeholder who's not part of our project teams and maybe not part of the daily workings, that they need to be kept in the loop. So keeping people in the loop becomes critical and there's different people you need to keep in the loop, which is why it's so important to understand that you just have to kind of step back, recognize that you know everything as a project manager. Your core team probably is really tight with everything going on as well. Just don't assume that everyone is on the same level as you are. In fact, I promise you they're not. So you have to keep them in the loop. So if there's an announcement for something or if you settled and you finished some testing and you got your results, don't just stop there. Make sure you share it. Tell the right people and put a little plan together around how you're going to keep people in the loop. It becomes really important for really good communication. Now if you're liking what you're hearing so far, please, I'd be so grateful if you would give this video a like and subscribe to the channel because it tells YouTube we're doing a really good job. Now let's move on to the next tip. What is it we have to do or what are one of the things that we have to look at when it comes to communication? Listening. Yes, listen to the team. It's really easy to think that communication is all about talking and giving out information, but it's listening as well. And as a project manager, that becomes really important that you listen to your team. They may be bringing stuff to you that is really critical that may change the direction of your project. They may also be bringing things to you from other stakeholders. So really listen to your team, listen to other people around you to ensure that you are all on the same page because it's about being kept in the loop, being on the same page, ensuring that everyone understands the nuances of what's happening in your project. In essence, really good communication. Have a purpose for all of your communication. How is your inbox right now? Is it huge? Just a ton of information in it? For a majority of people and organizations, the answer is probably yes. So you really have to be clear with your purpose of your communication. Don't just send something out for the sake of sending something out. Understand what the purpose is. Do you have the right people? Do you have a sequencing of when you're going to be sending that out? Is it like a newsletter that you're doing and you're inviting people to read what's happening? Whatever it may be, be very clear with your communication and the purpose behind it because I would love to say that every communication channel that you touch, and a lot of times, yes, we verbally, we talk to people, but a lot of them are newsletters. A lot of them are on SharePoint site. They may be announcements. You still have to drive people there and everyone's really busy. So be very careful and sure you have a purpose for everything. Really think through your stakeholders and it really is just going to enhance your communication and people will notice that you're not just sending things out for the sake of sending it out, but there's always something behind it, which means you may need to save up on information. Just don't piecemeal it out. You're going to have to play that one by ear depending on your organization and your project. Now that you have these tips on how to communicate effectively with your team and in projects, get this now in the link below this video. This is just going to ensure the basics you need to know so that you can have a successful project and it's for you free. Until the next video, see you later.