PRAISE FOR MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Elizabeth has presented at several events for our Assistant com-

munity and written fantastic articles for our website. She is an expert
in project management and always provides clear guidance and
excellent strategies to those who need help managing multiple
projects. I highly recommend her book and encourage anyone who
has to manage projects to seek out her work.
Nicky Christmas, Founder and Editor of Practically Perfect PA

In this increasingly projectized world of portfolios, programs, mul-

tiple projects, tasks, contracts and virtual teams, in an ever more
complex and uncertain environment, the challenges and stressors
facing project professionals can be daunting. Elizabeth has taken on
these challenges with knowledgeable, practical and very readable
advice. She’s one of the most creative project management experts
that I know of. If you are working on two or more projects and want
to be more successful and reduce stress, this book is for you.
David L Pells, Editor, PM World Journal

This practical and well-written guide uses a simple framework to

help you manage your workload, combine project schedules and
engage stakeholders across multiple projects. It also helps you opti-
mize your personal productivity. Reading this book will increase the
quality of your work and save you time in the long run.
Susanne Madsen, executive coach and author of The Power of Project Leadership

Elizabeth Harrin has written an excellent guidebook for project

managers and others juggling multiple projects. Filled with practical
advice on managing it all, you will become a better project manager.
She lays out a framework that is easy to follow and will help you
get control of your workload. To get the most out of this book,
implement the action steps at the end of each chapter and check
out the appendices to find helpful checklists and templates. I highly
recommend this book.
Cornelius Fichtner, PMP, CSM, President of OSP International LLC, Founder of
The Project Management PrepCast and Host of The Project Management Podcast

We are living in a time of mass disruption, and Elizabeth counsels

us that so much can be solved with better planning and by being
better organized. When so much feels outside of our control, Elizabeth
brings us order by presenting various tools and techniques to help us
create our own ways of working across waterfall, hybrid and agile
approaches. Want to be a better project manager? Read this book, get
a hold of these practices, and put them into action.
Brantlee Underhill, Managing Director, North America, Project Management
Institute (PMI)

‘Employee engagement has a direct correlation to productivity’ and

the importance of engaging with people, especially when working
across multiple projects with varying deadlines and dependencies, has
been documented perfectly in this book. As a professional managing
multiple projects in my career this was a refreshing read, breaking
down the plan concept across five main areas. Elizabeth’s focus on
the importance of people, engagement and communication was a
pleasure to read, and a must for every project manager out there.
Nicola Graham, Managing Director, Simplify Change

Managing a project is tough – managing multiple projects can be

overwhelming. To succeed, you need the skills of a juggler, a mind
that can multi-process, and a spirit of adventure. A great reference
guide can only be a bonus and this is exactly what you have in
Elizabeth Harrin’s book Managing Multiple Projects – a perfect part-
ner to multiple project success.
Peter Taylor, author of The Lazy Project Manager

The reason lots of project people are down-trodden, overworked,

underpaid and undervalued is because they appear as a level of effort
line on the project plan. They’re there, but no one knows what they
really do – a non-value adding overhead. Elizabeth’s book helps you
become a benefits-driven portfolio. Rather than project managing
others or blindly delivering tasks, it shows you how to better under-
stand and manage yourself, but in a project and portfolio way. A
strategic and self-reflective way. Poacher turned gamekeeper. The
world needs smart citizens for the smart cities it needs to live in. This
book will help you and help others make the world the better place it
urgently needs to become.
Steve Wake, Chair, BSi MS/2, past APM Chair, Freeman of the Guild of Educators

In a world where everyone is increasingly expected to juggle multiple

tasks, priorities and projects, this book is an important and much-
needed resource. Combining useful insights from effective managers
with meaningful reflection, it offers a practical and tailorable coach-
ing manual designed to guide and support managers throughout their
multi-project careers.
Professor Darren Dalcher, Director, National Centre for Project Management,
Lancaster University Management School

Managing multiple projects is often neglected in project manage-

ment theory and texts. So, it’s about time we finally get a practical,
no-nonsense guide that helps us deliver all our projects with their
varying needs and stakeholders without burning out. Elizabeth
knows her stuff!
Anita Phagura, Founder, Fierce Project Management

Organizations around the world are all suddenly demanding one key
skill – the ability to manage multiple projects (MMP). The problem
is that few people actually have this skill. This book shows how to
rise to the challenge of MMP, make a fantastic contribution to your
organization and still have a life. If you are facing MMP overload,
this book should be No 1 on your infinite ‘to-do’ list. Read it now!
Stephen Carver, consultant, speaker and Senior Lecturer in Change and Crisis
Management at Cranfield University School of Management
In work, there’s no such thing as problems, merely the opportunity
for projects and productivity. Elizabeth Harrin has written a thought-
ful, detailed and useful guide to project management for smart people.
It’s packed with models, practical perspectives and some of the best
thinking on being productive with the bigger picture. Whether your
projects look like sushi, spaghetti or a side dish, this book will help
you make sense of them and get your world under control.
Graham Allcott, Founder of Think Productive and author of How to be a
Productivity Ninja
 Managing Multiple Projects
How project managers can balance priorities,
manage expectations and increase productivity

Elizabeth Harrin
 Publisher’s note
Every possible effort has been made to ensure that the information contained in this book
is accurate at the time of going to press, and the publishers and authors cannot accept
responsibility for any errors or omissions, however caused. No responsibility for loss or
damage occasioned to any person acting, or refraining from action, as a result of the
material in this publication can be accepted by the editor, the publisher, or the author.

First published in Great Britain and the United States in 2022 by Kogan Page Limited

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review,
as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be
reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in
writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms
and licences issued by the CLA. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms should be
sent to the publishers at the undermentioned addresses:

2nd Floor, 45 Gee Street 8 W 38th Street, Suite 902 4737/23 Ansari Road
London New York, NY 10018 Daryaganj
EC1V 3RS USA New Delhi 110002
United Kingdom India
www.koganpage.com

Kogan Page books are printed on paper from sustainable forests.

© Elizabeth Harrin, 2022

The right of Elizabeth Harrin to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in
accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Axelos® and PRINCE2® are registered trade marks of Axelos Limited. All rights reserved.

ISBNs
Hardback 978 1 3986 0552 7
Paperback 978 1 3986 0550 3
Ebook 978 1 3986 0551 0

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Harrin, Elizabeth, author.
Title: Managing multiple projects: how project managers can balance
priorities, manage expectations and increase productivity / Elizabeth
Harrin.
Description: 1st Edition. | New York, NY: Kogan Page Inc, [2022] |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022005014 (print) | LCCN 2022005015 (ebook) | ISBN
9781398605527 (hardback) | ISBN 9781398605503 (paperback) | ISBN
9781398605510 (ebook)
Subject: Project Management
Classification: LCC HD69.P75 H35937 2022 (print) | LCC HD69.P75 (ebook) |
DDC 658.4/04–dc23/eng/20220202
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022005014
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022005015

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Print production managed by Jellyfish
Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CR0 4YY
 CONTENTS

About the author xii

Foreword by Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez xiv
Preface xix
Acknowledgements xxii

Introduction 1
The managing multiple projects framework 4
How this book is organized 6
Reference 9

01 Quick start guide: fast answers to urgent questions 11

02 Why managing multiple projects is different 19

Understanding the multi-project environment 20
How projects fit into your job 21
Key skills for managing projects 25
Warning signs to look out for in multi-project
environments 27
Where to go from here 31
Key takeaways 31
Action steps 31
References 32
Further reading 32

03 Concept #1: Portfolio: understanding your workload 33

What is portfolio management? 34
Portfolio thinking 36
Tasks, projects and programmes 38
Create your personal portfolio 40
Prioritizing the work 44
viii CONTENTS

How many priority projects is too many? 52

Group the work 53
The portfolio as a communication tool 55
Key takeaways 56
Action steps 56
References 56
Further reading 58

04 Concept #2: Plan: combining project schedules 59

Before you start scheduling 60
Project dependencies 61
Consolidating your schedules 68
Rolling wave planning 77
Task-level planning 81
Resource allocation across multiple projects 85
Key takeaways 91
Action steps 91
References 92
Further reading 92

05 Concept #3: People: engaging stakeholders across multiple

projects 93
What is stakeholder engagement? 95
Working with project sponsors 97
Managing stakeholders across multiple projects 99
How to prioritize time with stakeholders 105
Setting stakeholder expectations 112
Streamlining project communications 117
Making the most of time with other people 131
Key takeaways 137
Action steps 137
References 138
Further reading 138
 CONTENTS ix

06 Concept #4: Productivity: managing your own time 139

Productivity saboteurs 140
Techniques to make the most of your time 150
Planning time to do your own work 154
Three techniques to improve focus 164
Beyond productivity box ticking 168
Key takeaways 170
Action steps 170
References 171
Further reading 172

07 Concept #5: Positioning: setting up the environment for

success 173
The time maximizer mindset 174
How to standardize your work 176
Multi-project risk management 178
Multi-project governance 181
Project documentation 184
How to create a productive home office environment 191
Creating reflection time 195
Key takeaways 196
Action steps 196
References 197
Further reading 198

Appendices 199
Appendix 1: Productivity checklists 201
Appendix 2: Simple weekly project report template for
multiple projects 203
Appendix 3: How to implement the framework 204
Appendix 4: Stop, start, continue 207
More books by Elizabeth Harrin 208

Index 211
 LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

FIGURES
Figure 0.1 The managing multiple projects framework 4
Figure 2.1 Top skills required for managing multiple projects 26
Figure 2.2 Major challenges of managing multiple projects 28
Figure 3.1 The Portfolio concept in the managing multiple projects
framework 34
Figure 3.2 Six principles of portfolio thinking 38
Figure 4.1 The Plan concept in the managing multiple projects
framework 60
Figure 4.2 Dependencies represented by lines on a project
timeline 62
Figure 4.3 Example of a dependency map 65
Figure 4.4 Rolling wave planning 80
Figure 5.1 The People concept in the managing multiple projects
framework 93
Figure 5.2 Example of a multi-project stakeholder mindmap 104
Figure 5.3 Per cent of project managers who discuss more than
one project in meetings with stakeholders 118
Figure 6.1 The Productivity concept in the managing multiple
projects framework 140
Figure 6.2 Productivity saboteurs 142
Figure 6.3 Task profiles 152
Figure 6.4 Focus on tasks that drive results 167
Figure 7.1 The Positioning concept in the managing multiple
projects framework 173
Figure 7.2 Per cent of project managers who have a multi-project
approach to risk management 180
 LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES xi

TABLES
Table 3.1 Template for a personal portfolio workload tracking
spreadsheet 41
Table 4.1 Source and target matrix for identifying project
dependencies 67
Table 4.2 Example of major project phases/events organized by
month 72
Table 5.1 Example saliency information to include in a
stakeholder directory 108
Table 5.2 Sample multi-project status report 122
Table 5.3 Example countdown plan 126

Appendix
Table 3.1 Framework concepts and action steps 205
 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Elizabeth Harrin, MA, FAPM, MBCS has been actively engaged in

projects since 2000. She works with individuals and organizations to
help them deliver projects with more confidence and less stress.
Elizabeth gained her experience of leading complex projects
through a career that spans financial services and healthcare, in the
UK and France. She has managed teams leading a range of large- and
small-scale projects from an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)
implementation to compliance initiatives and IT-enabled business
change. She has had to learn strategies to manage multiple projects
throughout her work, both in her corporate roles at AXA and Spire
Healthcare, and in her own business, Otobos Consultants Ltd, which
provides corporate project management materials and support for
individual project managers through training and mentoring.
She is the author of a number of other books about project manage-
ment: Shortcuts to Success: Project Management in the Real World
(BCS Books, 2013, which was a finalist in the Management Book of
the Year Awards 2014 and now in its second edition), the PMI best-
seller Collaboration Tools for Project Managers (PMI, 2016),
Communicating Change (Bookboon, 2017), Project Manager (BCS,
2018), Customer-Centric Project Management (Gower, 2012) and
Engaging Stakeholders on Projects: How to Harness People Power
(APM, 2020). She has contributed chapters to several books and is
widely published in magazines and websites on project management
topics. Elizabeth is also the award-winning blogger behind A Rebel’s
Guide to Project Management, which aims to help teams get work
done.
Elizabeth is a Fellow of the Association for Project Management
and a member of the Project Management Institute (PMI). She holds
degrees from the University of York and Roehampton University.
 ABOUT THE AUTHOR xiii

You can contact Elizabeth with feedback, questions or to find out

about the group mentoring programme, Project Management Rebels.
She also provides individual mentoring services.

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/elizabethharrin

Facebook community: www.facebook.com/groups/

projectmanagementcafe

Speaking: www.elizabeth-harrin.com

Web: www.projectmanagementrebels.com
 FOREWORD

Projects change the world. Projects make impossible dreams

possible.

The behavioural and social sciences endorse the idea that there are
a few ways of working and collaborating that are particularly
motivating and inspiring for people working on a project. These are
that a project should have ambitious goals, a higher purpose and a
clear deadline. You have probably noticed that what people tend to
remember most clearly from their entire careers is the projects they
work on – often the successful ones, but also the failed ones.
According to recent research, the number of individuals working
in project-based roles will increase from 66 million (in 2017) to
88 million (forecast 2027). And the value of economic activity world-
wide that is project orientated will grow from $12 trillion (in 2013)
to $20 trillion (forecast 2027).1 Those are millions of projects requir-
ing millions of project managers per year.
This is what I describe as the Project Economy, a term I conceived
in 2018 when working on my earlier book, The Project Revolution,
How to Succeed in a Project Driven World.
This silent disruption is impacting not only organizations but
also the very nature of work, and our entire professional lives. The
traditional one-company career path of previous generations is now
a distant memory. Today, people happily and fruitfully change jobs
and employers a number of times during their careers. I believe that
this trend will accelerate and that professional careers will become a
sequence of projects. Another notable trend related to this is the
growth in self-employment – according to Quartz at Work, an HR
consulting company, the number of Americans working for them-
selves could triple by 2020.2 They will be, effectively, managing a
portfolio of projects.
 FOREWORD xv

A global revolution
The more you look, the more projects you will see. On my desk,
I have a bushel of examples.
For example, in December 2016, the US Senate unanimously
approved the Program Management Improvement and Accountability
Act (PMIAA),3 which will enhance accountability and best practices
in project and programme management throughout the US federal
government. The PMIAA will reform federal programme management
policy in four important ways: creating a formal job series and career
path for programme and project managers in the federal government;
developing a standards-based programme and project management
policy across the federal government; recognizing the essential role
of executive sponsorship and engagement by designating a senior
executive in federal agencies to be responsible for programme and
project management policy; and strategy sharing knowledge of
successful approaches to programme and project management
through an interagency council on programme and project
management.
In the UK, on 6 January 2017, the Association for Project
Management was awarded a Royal Charter.4 The receipt of a Royal
Charter marks a significant achievement in the evolution of project
management and will have positive implications for those who
make, and seek to make, a career in this field. The Charter recognizes
the project management profession, rewards the association that
champions its cause and provides opportunities for those who
practise its disciplines.
The Richards Group is the largest independently owned ad agency
in the US, with billings of $1.28 billion, revenue of $170 million and
more than 650 employees. Stan Richards, its founder and CEO,
removed almost all of its management layers and job titles, leaving
only that of project manager.5
In another example, in 2016, Nike was looking to fill a vacancy
at its European headquarters. The job description was Corporate
Strategy & Development Manager for the European, Middle East
and Africa (EMEA) Region. Such a job would traditionally entail
xvi FOREWORD

strategic planning, market analysis and competitive intelligence

competencies. To my surprise, instead the job was described as
‘project management’. This meant that Nike was looking for some-
one who could implement transversal and strategic projects for its
strategy function. This was a clear shift of focus and culture: from
planning and day-to-day activities to implementation and projects.
And Nike is not alone – I have seen similar job descriptions for
strategy functions at UPS, Amazon and others.

In the project economy we are all project managers

For centuries, learning was achieved by memorizing hefty books
and mountains of written material. Today, the leading educational
systems, starting from early ages, apply the concept of teaching
projects. Applying theories and experimenting through projects has
proven to be a much better learning method, and soon it will become
the norm.
Not so long ago, professional careers were made in only one
organization. Throughout the 20th century, most people worked for
a single company. Today, we are likely to work for several companies,
and at some point we will most probably become self-employed,
working primarily on projects. This sort of career is best approached
as a set of projects in which we apply the lessons we have learned
from previous jobs, companies and industries while developing
ourselves for our next career move, often not known in advance.
The emergence of projects as the economic engine of our times is
silent but incredibly disruptive and powerful. And this massive
disruption is not only impacting the way organizations are managed.
Every aspect of our lives is becoming a set of projects also.
Juggling multiple projects has become one of our major challenges,
both as individuals as well as organizations, in our private and in our
professional lives. Elizabeth Harrin’s book on managing multiple
projects is a timely resource – full of practical tools and real examples
that will help you build the knowledge and skills to thrive in a project-
driven world.
 FOREWORD xvii

There are fewer ‘low-cost’ ways of working more inclusive, impact-

ful, motivating and inspiring than being part of a project with an
ambitious goal, a higher purpose, and a clear fixed deadline.

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez

ABOUT ANTONIO NIETO-RODRIGUEZ

World Champion in Project Management | Thinkers50 & Top 30
Global Gurus | PMI Fellow & Past Chair | Professor | HBR Author |
Founder Strategy Implementation Institute | Founder Projects & Co |
Director PMO | Marshall Goldsmith Executive Coach
Author of the Harvard Business Review Project Management
Handbook and four other books, Antonio is the creator of concepts
such as the Project Economy and the Project Manifesto. His research
and global impact in modern management have been recognized by
Thinkers50. Former Chairman of the Project Management Institute,
he is the founder of Projects & Co and co-founder of the Strategy
Implementation Institute. He is a member of Marshall Goldsmith
100 coaches. You can follow Antonio through his LinkedIn Newsletter
– Lead Projects Successfully – and website.

Notes
1 Project Management Job Growth and Talent Gap Report 2017–2027 (Project
Management Institute, 2017), accessed 1 October 2018, https://www.pmi.org/-/
media/pmi/documents/public/pdf/learning/job-growth-report.pdf?sc_lang_
temp=en (archived at https://perma.cc/X3H6-HSSD).
2 “The Number of Americans Working for Themselves could Triple by 2020”
(Quartz at Work), last modified 21 February 2018, https://work.qz.
com/1211533/the-number-of-americans-working-for-themselves-could-
triple-by-2020 (archived at https://perma.cc/2DQ3-4LJY).
3 “US Senate Unanimously Approves the Program Management Improvement and
Accountability Act” (Project Management Institute), last modified 1 December
2016, https://www.pmi.org/about/press-media/press-releases/senate-program-
management-act (archived at https://perma.cc/CJ7W-ECGX).
xviii FOREWORD

4 “APM Receives Its Royal Charter” (Association for Project Management), last
modified 6 January 2017, https://www.apm.org.uk/news/apm-receives-its-royal-
charter (archived at https://perma.cc/A42W-ST56).
5 “Stan Richards’s Unique Management Style” (Inc.), accessed 1 October 2018,
https://www.inc.com/magazine/201111/stan-richards-unique-management-
style.html (archived at https://perma.cc/6ND8-267M).
 PREFACE

In my corporate career, I went from managing one big project to

managing several small (but, according to my sponsors, equally
important) projects as a result of returning to work part-time after
maternity leave. I had to quickly learn skills to juggle competing
priorities and manage expectations from board level down. It required
a whole new way of thinking about my workload and engaging with
the people around me to keep everything moving forward – because
even after I had prioritized my work, I was still expected to show
some kind of progress on all my projects, even the ones at the bottom
of the list.
I know I’m not alone. My research for this book has shown
that more people manage multiple projects than single projects. Yet,
if you read project management books or attend a course, you’ll
learn about the end-to-end approaches for managing a single piece
of work. That’s good. We need that. But we also need a practical
approach for layering project upon project. That’s what I wanted to
do with this book. I wrote it for project managers, programme
managers, executive assistants, researchers, change managers, product
owners, account managers, team leaders, small business owners:
people who have to juggle so many different initiatives that sometimes
the workload feels overwhelming and you end up working evenings
and weekends just to stay afloat.
There is no magic wand to being able to manage multiple projects,
objectives and deadlines. First, you need solid project management
skills so you can do the job of a project manager with ease. In other
words, you understand the basics of project management and can
apply them efficiently. You don’t want to have to keep looking up
how to create a Gantt chart or wondering what process or form to
use for the next part of your work. Being comfortable with the basics
of managing a project is a pre-requisite. This book won’t teach you
xx PREFACE

how to do that. We will not cover the process for managing one
project, but there are many other great books that do. Instead, this
book will show you that repeating the ‘one project’ method over and
over for each project is inefficient. There is a better way, and you’re
about to learn it.
In 2020, I surveyed 220 project managers about the work they do
and how they feel about it. I was surprised by the results. Only 15 per
cent of people reported managing just one project. Everyone else in a
project delivery role is juggling the priorities, expectations and
responsibilities of more than one project simultaneously.
I suppose I should not have been that surprised. In 2019, I ran a
six-month training and mentoring programme for project managers
leading multiple projects that attracted 50 students from around the
world. In 2021, I launched an online Mastering Multiple Projects
course which had a first cohort of 81 students, and people continue
to join. This book has been formed from my interest in this topic over
the past few years, and is deepened by my understanding of the real-
life situations in which project managers find themselves.
Those situations are often hard. Project managers – in my experi-
ence – tend to be people passionate about doing a good job, and they
hold themselves to high standards. Combine that with an increased
workload and it’s a helter-skelter ride to self-doubt and burnout.
That is perhaps part of the issue around why about 35 per cent of
experienced project managers from my research say that they are
considering leaving project management: the burden is too much.
That alone has a massive implication for the future of project success.
PMI reports that by 2027 the demand for project-orientated jobs is
due to grow by 33 per cent (22 million jobs – see https://www.pmi.
org/learning/careers/job-growth (archived at https://perma.cc/3Z2V-
3EX2)). If the profession is losing experienced project managers
because of what the job has become, then what does that mean for
the projects planned for the future?
I feel it’s crucially important that we equip today’s and tomorrow’s
project managers (and people doing the role with a different title)
with a realistic expectation of what it means to do the job – and the
skills to manage multiple projects at the same time.
 PREFACE xxi

This book can’t fix all the reasons people might choose to leave a
project management job. What it can do is share with you my proven
techniques, blending formal project management practices with time
management and productivity tools in a framework to help you get
out of overwhelm and fall back in love with managing projects. I
hope this book begins a conversation about what the workload of a
project manager is really like, and how, as a profession, we can shape
the tools and processes we use to serve us better.

Elizabeth, West Sussex, 2021

Supporting resources for this book can be found at

koganpage.com/managing-multiple-projects and
elizabeth-harrin.com/mmp.
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I’d like to thank Penny Pullan for helping me take the first steps with
making this book into a reality, and for inspiring me to turn Chapter 1
into a quick start guide for this book.
I would also like to thank Isabelle Cheng, Amy Minshall, Adam
Cox, Ryan Norman and the rest of the team at Kogan Page for seeing
the potential in this book. Gillian Hutchison did a great job of help-
ing me pull it all together and Ian B created the fantastic graphics.
Many people have kindly shared their unique insights into the
world of work as they see it, and helped me stretch my understanding
of the challenges faced in a diverse society. Special thanks are due to
Anita Phagura, who listened without judgement, Hannah Bullard
and Rebecca Alley, and Brian King for his input on neurodiversity
(and Matthew Fox for putting us in touch).
I’m grateful to all of those who completed my survey about what
it’s like to manage multiple projects. Many of their stories are included
throughout this book including Kelly, Omar, Juan Manuel, Robert V,
Kirsten, David, Lisa, Dana, Leah, Erac, Dorte, Megan, Rachel,
Stephene, Steph, Abigail, Else, Jen, Una, Amanda, Ana, Chet, Kelly,
Akola, Alyssa, Sheri and Kimberly. Others contributed anonymously
and I’m indebted to so many for sharing their experiences. Thank
you!
My thanks also go to my past and present students and mentees,
especially those in my virtual mentoring group, Project Management
Rebels, who have taught me so much about the challenges of manag-
ing projects and continue to reinforce my belief that static textbook
approaches rarely solve our problems in the real world.
I also want to acknowledge the limitations of my knowledge of the
experience of neurodiverse project managers and team members, and
the experience of people of colour and those with disabilities work-
ing in a project environment. I’m aware that my privilege shapes my
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS xxiii

interactions with stakeholders and decision-makers, as well as how I

choose to spend my time. I’ve tried to include diverse voices, and to
reflect the community of students and mentees I have worked with
over the years.
My family continues to support me in creating time to work on
book projects; picking up my share of the load while my head is
somewhere in research or writing. Thanks are always due to Jon,
Jack and Oliver, and my parents.
THIS PAGE IS INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK
 Introduction

Your manager might not say it, but more projects are coming your
way. It might not be written in your role profile, but your boss expects
you to juggle several things at once.
Project management is changing: as more and more work is done
in a project-led way, teams are using tried-and-tested tools for smaller
initiatives as well as those multi-million organizational transform­
ation projects. And those smaller projects often can’t justify the need
for a full-time team.
Today, many people’s work environment includes more knowledge
work. There are more change initiatives to contribute to and get
done. You’re expected to have the skills to cope with a greater work-
load. Efficiency, project management tools and streamlined processes
help teams deliver more with less time, and to manage the mental
overhead of keeping many strands of work on the go at the same
time.
At least, that’s the expectation. However, most people have never
been taught how to juggle multiple projects. Books (including the
ones I have written) and training courses focus on the skills required
to run one project, not how to combine and consolidate, merging
plans and meetings, to deal with more than one at a time. So we
muddle through, often inefficiently, using what we have been taught
and hoping for the best.
The trouble with that approach is that when the systems for multi-
project management aren’t in place, you can feel overwhelmed with
it all. And it’s not as easy as simply overlaying the project process
several times because that adds time and bulk to your work without
2 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

necessarily adding anything of value. Managing multiple projects

with competing deadlines can take it out of you. Here’s the truth:
without the skills to manage multiple projects, you’ll crash and burn.
It is no surprise that workload is the top cause of burnout (Moss,
2021). I’ve seen burnout happen to colleagues, and I’ve been on the
verge of it myself (fortunately I managed to change my situation
before it became crippling).
When I first started getting more and more projects added to my
workload, I faced two choices: do the extra work and work more
hours, or don’t do it and take the career implications of being seen
to not deliver. Neither of those are great choices, to be honest. Instead,
I decided to rethink the way I handled my workload. I got good at
the fundamental skills of being able to manage a multi-project environ­
ment by working on the following:
●
Managing my own time: becoming personally good at time
management and working efficiently.
●
Managing work requests from others: I doubled-down on
stakeholder engagement and building good relationships so I could
push back politely but effectively when I needed to.
●
Managing communication: I made sure everyone knew what was
expected of them, what was going on and when deadlines were
coming up so teams avoided rework, duplication of effort and I
wasn’t bothered with requests for status updates outside of the
established communication schedules.
●
Managing schedules: I became a power user for my software tools,
so I could rely on them, and invested time in detailed planning to
work out when stuff needed to happen so nothing fell through the
cracks.
●
Managing my environment: I systemized and checklist-ized as
much as I could to have standard operating procedures for
streamlining the work, thus reducing the amount of information I
needed to actively hold in my brain.

You can do the same. When you are leading several initiatives simul-
taneously, you need to apply the skills you already have in different
 INTRODUCTION 3

ways to maximize your time. Having the skills, tricks, processes,

experience, knowledge – whatever you want to call it, and it’s a blend
of all of those – to keep multiple projects happening, moving forward,
being seen to deliver AND get home on time… that’s the secret to
being able to meet your manager’s expectations and avoid the burnout.
Protecting your mental and physical health (and that of your team)
should be one of your key priorities. It was something I didn’t realize
until much further along in my project management career. I figured
I would always be able to do it all, but actually I couldn’t. For me, it
was balancing work with being the kind of parent I wanted to be.
Whether you want time to go to the gym on a work day, or have time
to spend with your family, or time to unwind with the TV and a glass
of wine at the end of the day (instead of doing emails until 11pm and
then rolling exhausted into bed), you need to make that happen
because no one else will actively manage it for you.
Juggling multiple projects is a challenge and a skill. And when you
get it right it’s rewarding. You get to meet more people, deliver more
value and have variety in the day to keep your job interesting. But it
does come with the risk of overwhelm, which is why going home on
time should definitely be on your ‘must do’ list. I know: it’s not always
possible as a project manager to make it out of the office on time
every day. In fact, the more senior I got in my corporate job, the more
likely it was that there was some kind of issue to handle that couldn’t
wait until the next day. However, you should get to leave on time at
least some of the time. The more you can manage your own diary,
prioritize your workload and make progress during the normal work-
ing day, the easier it is to manage your time to at least get away from
your desk at a reasonable time, some of the days.
This book will help you achieve that. You’ve picked up this book
because you’re prepared to learn something new about managing
your workload, and you’re in the right place. Managing Multiple
Projects is a book to help you develop the skills and knowledge for
juggling multiple projects, dealing with conflicting priorities and
managing expectations… and still leave the office on time. It aims to
improve the chances of project success by giving you the tools you
need to get everything done without burning out.
4 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Whether you work in an informal project management role, on a

couple of large projects or multiple smaller projects, you face the
challenge of keeping all the information straight in your head and
meeting the requirements of multiple bosses. This book will help you
address those challenges and give you tips and techniques to stream-
line what’s filling up your To Do list. You won’t need to get permission
for a whole new way of working either: these are changes you can
make for yourself to win back more time in your day.
Managing Multiple Projects takes you on a step-by-step journey
to critically review your workload and make changes in how you
work to be more efficient. You’ll learn a framework based on five
concepts to help tame the chaos of multiple projects, leading to
(hopefully) more confidence that you are making the right kind of
progress.

The managing multiple projects framework

FIGURE 0.1 The managing multiple projects framework

Figure 0.1 shows the managing multiple projects framework. It’s

not truly linear because not much in project management is. Most
methods for getting work done require review and reflection so the
 INTRODUCTION 5

‘step-by-step to a specific end goal’ is rarely the perfect answer to the

complexities of the modern work environment. There are too many
complications and diversions that get in the way!
Instead, think of the framework as the five concepts that will help
you feel more in control of your workload. It does help to have an
understanding of your personal work portfolio before you try to plan
your activities for the next few months, but if you want to dive into
personal productivity first, for example, skip ahead to Chapter 6. The
pieces of the framework are:

Portfolio: This is where you gain a consolidated understanding of

your current workload in a way that helps you see patterns and
groupings across all the things you are doing. You will be equipped
to talk about your workload in a different way – using portfolio
management principles – and get tools to prioritize what you have
to do.
Plan: This is where you combine your project schedules to give
you a holistic, big picture overview plan of all your responsibilities.
You will learn to look at task scheduling in different ways to help
you make better decisions about where to spend your time and to
avoid wasting effort on planning work that will have changed by
the time you get to it. This overview will inform whether you can
take on additional work and when, by improving visibility of what
you are already committed to in the coming weeks and months.
People: This part of the framework teaches you how to engage and
work with the most influential stakeholders – the people who are
interested in and impacted by your projects, and those who have to
contribute to the work. You will learn how to keep track of all the
people you work with and how to prioritize your time with them.
Just as project schedules overlap, so too do people’s interests. When
you understand how your stakeholders interact with your various
projects, you can use their time more efficiently too.
Productivity: The best processes in the world won’t help if you feel
personally disorganized and struggling with productivity. While
productivity looks and feels different to different people, there are
some common elements that many people find challenging. In this
6 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

part of the framework, you will learn tips and tricks for managing
your own work and creating focus time in your week to dedicate
to the tasks that are a priority for you.
Positioning: Finally (although it doesn’t have to come last in
your learning), you will find it easier to be successful if your wider
environment is set up for success. Many people managing projects
are not the top leaders in their organizations and can’t influence
strategy, what tools are in use, or how many projects the business
promises to clients. This section is about looking for things you can
influence that will make your life easier and support your colleagues
at the same time, such as by creating processes and checklists to make
work repeatable and standardized. That takes away some of the
mental overload of having to think of what to do all the time so you
can use your brainpower for more value-added tasks instead.
The framework is designed to be scalable whether you are manag-
ing two projects or 22 (hopefully you aren’t managing 222). You can
take the pieces of it that feel the most important to you and use those,
or adopt the whole thing as an extension to the way you work today.
As you go through the book, make choices about how you can imple-
ment these tips, tools and tactics. If you go all in, use Appendix 3 as
your implementation roadmap.
A book about project management is always a book about work-
ing with others and understanding the nuances of organizational
culture. All workplaces are different, so while this book gives you a
framework and techniques for managing multiple projects, feel free
to adapt the ideas to make them fit better to where you work and
how you work. Take what works, adapt what doesn’t fit your work-
ing preferences and ignore what you know would be a disaster in
your workplace – although perhaps test it out in a small way first,
just to be sure!

How this book is organized

This book is organized into seven chapters. Chapter 1 is your quick
start guide. Here you’ll find fast answers to urgent questions. If you’re
 INTRODUCTION 7

struggling with something right now, flip to this section, find your
problem and then be guided to the part of the book that will help you
the most.
Chapter 2 discusses the realities of managing multiple projects.
You’ll learn why it isn’t easy and what warning signs to look for.
You’ll discover a new way of thinking about your workload: do you
have sushi, spaghetti or side dish projects?
Chapter 3 covers the first concept in the framework for busting the
overwhelm and managing all your projects, which is the Portfolio. It
gives you the tools to create your personal work portfolio. You’ll get
a better understanding of your workload and be able to prioritize
efficiently – both your project work and everything else that fits
around the edges of that.
Chapter 4 talks about how to combine project schedules to give
you visibility of your upcoming deadlines across all your projects.
Multi-project scheduling is a skill you will need to develop to make
sure no work falls through the cracks. This chapter covers the second
concept in the framework, Plan, and shows you how to manage
dependencies and create fully integrated or high-level plans, as well
as co-ordinating the work of the people allocated to do the tasks.
The third concept in the framework is People. Chapter 5 is your
guide to engaging stakeholders across multiple projects. It covers the
interpersonal skills required to manage incoming requests for work
and to engage outwards as well: up, across and down the organiza-
tion so that everyone knows what’s happening on all your projects in
a timely way. You’ll learn how to prioritize between stakeholders,
avoid communications fatigue in stakeholders, and to set and manage
expectations effectively. This chapter also covers how to consolidate
meetings and reports to save you time.
Chapter 6 is all about managing your own time, because the fourth
concept in the framework is Productivity. We’ll take a practical look
at how to make the most of your working hours, ensuring you can
make progress on all your projects. This chapter discusses three
productivity saboteurs: things that stop you being productive and
what you can do about them. It will also equip you to have a struc-
tured conversation with your manager if you really do have more
8 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

work than any human could realistically be expected to do with the

time available, because no productivity approach in the world can
help you if that’s the case.
Finally, Chapter 7 looks at the last concept in the framework,
which is Positioning. You’ll learn how to set yourself and your environ-
ment up for success. That section of the book talks about ways to
tweak your processes and influence those in use in your team so that
they are more standardized, repeatable and easier to follow. It also
covers governance in a multi-project environment and the minimal
amount of documentation you can (normally) get away with to save
you time.
You will find action steps and key takeaways at the end of most
chapters. Think of these as your homework assignments: it’s a good
first step to read a book, but you won’t actually see any improvement
in how you manage multiple projects unless you take some action to
do things differently. You don’t have to do the action steps during
your first read. Go through the book to familiarize yourself with the
framework, the ideas and concepts, and then read it again with a
view to taking action towards creating your own multi-project
management system. As we’ve seen, there are five concepts within the
framework: Portfolio, Plan, People, Productivity and Positioning.
You can work through them one at a time, perhaps taking a concept
per week (or month) to implement in your own work.
I recommend you block out some time in your calendar now to
reflect on your current working practices, use the templates and
review the material. Take as much time as you need to have conver­
sations with relevant colleagues and to get any support you need
from your team and organization to put the ideas in this book into
practice.
Finally, you will find Appendices at the end of the book to help you
take action. Appendix 1 has checklists that cover regular tasks that
project managers do on a daily, monthly, weekly and annual basis.
Use them as a prompt to ensure all of your projects are making
progress and getting the attention they deserve, because it is easy
to overlook the basics when work gets busy. They should act as a
 INTRODUCTION 9

starting point for your own work checklists: as you’ll see as you go
through the book, the more activities you can put into templates
and lists, the less information you have to hold in your head which
alleviates some of the burden of juggling lots of projects. Appendix 2
gives you a simple weekly report template for sharing status updates
on multiple projects at the same time. Appendix 3 is a guide to imple-
ment the framework and put into practice what you have learned
from this book. To help reflect on your experiences and action-taking,
Appendix 4 is a Stop, Start, Continue exercise that you can use alone
or with your team.

Reference
Moss, J (2021) The Burnout Epidemic: The rise of chronic stress and how we can
fix it, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston
THIS PAGE IS INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK
 01

Quick start guide:

fast answers to urgent questions

Have you picked up this book wanting to solve a particular problem?

This section will help! Let’s get you unstuck with some fast answers
to common questions. Find your challenge below for a quick answer
and then flick to the relevant section of the book to take it further.

I’ve been asked to do another project and I don’t know how to tell my
manager I’m already drowning.
Your manager probably doesn’t have the full picture about what
you are doing. Turn to Chapter 3 and start putting together your
personal portfolio so you can both see what’s currently on your To
Do list. Look at how many hours you are spending on each item per
week and estimate what the latest project will take.
Next, arrange to meet your manager and ask the question, ‘I’m
already working at full capacity on the projects on this list. What do
you want me to slow down or stop so I can focus on this? Can you
help me with the prioritization of my workload so I’m working on
the initiatives that are the most value, as we’re now at the point where
there is too much for me to deliver everything within the timescales
we’ve already discussed?’
Hopefully that will prompt an open discussion about prioritizing
the work. If slowing down or stopping certain activities is not an
option, move to talking about who else could pick up some of the
tasks. Shifting work around within the team is also a solution to one
12 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

person being overloaded (as long as the person being delegated to

has the time available).

What should I do first? I have so much on my To Do list and I don’t

know how to prioritize what’s important.
First, breathe! A long list of projects always feels overwhelming.
The goal is to understand what you are prioritizing and then prioritize
the work. Chapter 3 has four options for prioritizing your work.
Read those and have a go at using one (or more) of them to put your
workload into an order that feels manageable.
Part of the challenge of managing multiple projects is that priorities
often change. Set some time aside each week to review whether your
list still represents what is actually a priority. Prioritization is not a
one-and-done thing, so having that mindset will help you moving
forward.

I’m spending too much time in the details and I don’t really know
where my work is going.
Turn to Chapter 4 which will help you take a big picture look at
your work to spot patterns and groupings. Thinking differently about
‘all the things’ will help you see how tasks and projects fit together
towards larger goals which should alleviate some of the concern that
you don’t know what your work is leading up to.

I’m spending so much time entering tasks into software and design-
ing schedules for my work that I don’t have enough time to actually
do the tasks themselves. What should I be doing differently?
Let’s go back to basics: why are you doing so much planning?
What’s the problem you are trying to solve with that? What are you
trying to find out? The answer will help you determine what the best
next steps will be. For example, if the goal is to identify pinch points
for resources, that’s a different challenge from trying to create time-
line information for a status report, or to support a conversation you
have scheduled with your manager about how busy you are.
It’s OK to do a quick scribbled schedule on your notepad, or a
summary view of the next six months in a spreadsheet, especially if it
is not something you have to come back to or update.
 QUICK START GUIDE: FAST ANSWERS TO URGENT QUESTIONS 13

If planning in detail is the problem, then turn to the section in

Chapter 4 on rolling wave planning and see if that technique will give
you enough detail to keep the work moving forward without being
bogged down in tasks for the future.

I’ve just realized my calendar for next month is awful. I have loads of
important deliverables due and I’m going to be exhausted. How can
I stop this happening again?
When you manage each project independently, you can’t easily see
what the bigger picture impact will be on you or other people in your
team. Chapter 4 will help you set up systems to consolidate your
schedules and spot where your busy times will be so you can plan
accordingly. Organizing child and elder care, meal planning and
trying to get ahead on non-work tasks (like buying and writing all the
birthday cards for the month in advance and leaving them by the
door to post on the right days) can help. If you can, in the future try
to organize work so there aren’t too many big events in your projects
happening at the same moment.

It feels like something is always falling through the cracks and I don’t
know how to stay on top of everything.
That’s the reason I wrote this book! Too much of my corporate
career was feeling like I was holding things together by a thread. And
many of the project managers I mentor or chat to on social media
say the same. Turn to Chapter 6 which will help you take a critical
look at how you work. It has tips for personal time management and
strategies for organizing your tasks to stay on top of everything.
Chapter 6 covers the Productivity concept of the framework that
this book will help you implement to get on top of your work and be
more efficient. Using those strategies, you will (hopefully) start feel-
ing like you are on top of things because you will have full visibility
of your work and techniques to streamline what you do. That’s not
to say you will end up with hours of extra time for sunbathing and
cocktails on a Friday afternoon, but the goal is to give you practical
solutions for taking back control.
14 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

I don’t have enough time to talk to all my stakeholders.

That’s normal! If you’ve got many projects on the go, the number
of stakeholders you have increases. You’ll be working with people
across many teams and they will all have different expectations of
you and the work you are doing.
While it would be lovely to think we could treat all stakeholders
with equal attention and dedicate adequate time to each and every
one, there aren’t enough hours in the day. Instead, like with projects,
we have to prioritize our engagements with people. Chapter 5 will
give you the tools to do this, so you can invest more time with the
stakeholders who have the biggest influence on your work.
Stakeholder influence and interest changes over time, so your
‘priority’ stakeholders may well shift as you go through the project.
Make sure you are regularly reviewing who is getting the most of
your attention so you can be confident it’s going to the right people.

I’m in meetings all the time. I want to cut the number of meetings I’m
having.
You are in full control of how many meetings you organize. If you
are the meeting organizer, rethink what meetings you are in and
whether they really need to be a meeting or not. For example, change
weekly team meetings to fortnightly, if that would still give you the
same (or a good enough) outcome. Change the duration of meetings
to be 10 to 15 minutes less than what you currently have scheduled.
Check out Chapter 5 for information on combining meetings so you
don’t need to have so many.
If you are being invited to meetings all the time, reconsider whether
you actually need to be there. Could you delegate your attendance to
someone else? Could you attend only for a portion of the meeting
where points relevant to you will be discussed? Ask the organizer: ‘I’ll
join the meeting for that agenda point. When do you need me to dial
in/join?’ Set the expectation that you will not be there for the whole
thing.
There will always be meetings where you have to coach the team
through to a decision or conclusion, and those are the ones you don’t
want to miss. However, the more you have confidence in your
 QUICK START GUIDE: FAST ANSWERS TO URGENT QUESTIONS 15

colleagues, the easier it is to let them have meetings without you. If

you are only sitting in to make sure the meeting happens, or because
they have asked you to organize it, then show up for the first ten
minutes to set the scene and give them some direction, and then leave.
If necessary, join again towards the end to listen to the team feed
back the output and actions.
You will know if it’s a meeting that is going to be useful and rele-
vant or one that will suck the life out of you and deliver nothing of
value. If it’s the latter, take a big breath and hit decline on the invite.
Perhaps add a note along these lines:

●
‘I’m unable to attend, but I can send you a written update the day
before to share with the group.’
●
‘Based on the agenda, I don’t think you need me this early/late
in the discussion. Can you copy me in on the minutes instead?
Thanks!’
●
‘I didn’t see an agenda for this meeting so I’m not sure if I can add
any value to the topics being discussed. Is there anything specific
you need from me at this time?’
●
‘I see you already have Person A attending, so I think our area is
adequately covered and as I have a clash at that time I’ll let them
fill me in afterwards.’
●
‘Thanks for including me, but I don’t think I’m the right person.
Would you like me to check if Person B can attend instead?’

How do I manage my projects when my resources keep getting pulled

on to other work? I don’t have line management authority over the
people, so I feel like I’m having to ask my colleagues for favours just
to get business critical projects done.
Projects that are a priority for you are not always a priority for
other people, especially if those colleagues have day jobs that are
involved in handling company operations, like serving customers or,
as we used to say in IT, ‘keeping the lights on’. Day jobs take priority
over project work, which is often treated as discretionary.
16 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

However, if your project is truly business critical, you need support

from senior managers to make sure the team leaders of your resources
understand that. A lot of project management is negotiating and
influencing, so use those skills to have conversations with your
manager and their managers, as well as project sponsors. Ideally, you
would want ring-fenced, dedicated time from those resources so they
can complete their project tasks. Look at the section on planning
time with other people in Chapter 5 for ideas on how to build success-
ful working relationships with these stakeholders – so you can be
more influential when you need to be.
If that isn’t possible, and you are still not receiving the support you
require, work out what the impact of the delay will be. For example,
it’s not really about implementing a new process by the planned date.
It’s really about improving staff satisfaction in time for the annual
survey, or getting the time-saving benefits of ten minutes per day per
team member, which equates to efficiency savings the organization
isn’t getting for every week of delay.
Ultimately, it’s easier to secure resources for your projects if every-
one has the same idea about what is a company priority, so everyone’s
work objectives and targets are aligned behind common goals.

I’m constantly switching between projects. How do you manage all

the multi-tasking?
I don’t! Most of the time I time-block my day so I have fewer
things to deal with at any one time. You can do the same. For exam-
ple, where it is within your power to do so, only book meetings for
certain days of the week. If someone asks you when you are available
to meet, don’t reply, ‘Whenever’. Tell them the days that you accept
meetings: ‘Any Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday works for me.’
Block out other periods of time for report writing, responding to
emails, project work or something else. Remember that you don’t
have to answer every email within 30 seconds or pick up every call.
If you know it’s not urgent, let phone calls go to voicemail and call
them back when you’ve finished your task. In most situations, people
will have no issue with waiting an hour to talk to you.
 QUICK START GUIDE: FAST ANSWERS TO URGENT QUESTIONS 17

Chapter 6 has more ideas for keeping focused on work: it’s all
about being intentional with how you spend your time while know-
ing that some curveball is likely to come and change your plans at the
last minute.

I feel like I’m the only one having to juggle multiple projects and I’d
like to hear about other people in the same situation.
You are definitely not alone! You’ll find examples, anecdotes and
stories of how other people deal with the challenges of managing
multiple projects throughout the book. Perhaps some of their strate-
gies and tips will help you think differently about your own workload.

Reading isn’t enough for me. I want to be able to turn the strategies
into action as I know I need to do things differently.
This book will give you five concepts within a framework for
managing multiple projects. You’ll find action steps at the end of each
chapter. Work through those and you’ll be on your way to using your
new knowledge in a practical way. There is also a complete list of
action steps in the form of an implementation plan in Appendix 3.
Why not team up with a colleague to implement one part of the
framework per month?

I don’t think a particular tool, tip or technique will work for me (or
someone on my team). What should I do?
You know your working style better than I ever could, and you
also know your professional environment. There are no hard and fast
rules in this book. Feel free to take what works and ignore what you
know will not be successful in your environment. Tailor the ideas to
fit ways of working that you feel comfortable with. Having said that,
it might be worth giving the idea a go before you skip over it. How
could you adapt it that would make it suitable for you?

I don’t know what I want to know… but I want to learn as much as

I can!
You’re in the right place! Once you’ve read this book, take a look
at the further reading and references as they will help you stretch
18 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

your knowledge further. Remember, however, that learning is not the

same as doing: while I’ve always found reading to be a valuable
source of information and inspiration, you have to do something
differently to get different results, so block out some time to work on
the action steps and to consider how you can implement what you
learn.
 02

Why managing multiple projects

is different

Around a third of the gross domestic product (GDP) in the average

Western economy is a result of project activity (Schoper et al, 2018)
so it is unsurprising that organizations do so many projects. They are
the way strategy gets delivered, and in what the Project Management
Institute (PMI) calls the ‘project economy’ (Anderson, 2019), it’s
likely that organizations will continue to deliver work through the
structure of projects.
However, because there are so many projects, we all often have
to contribute (or lead) several at a time. That makes multi-project
management an expectation in many roles, so let’s unpack that for a
moment.
If you are managing multiple projects, it means you have more
than one project on the go at the same time. You will have different
project teams (even if the people on them are the same people). You
might have different sponsors or customers, all with their own expect­
ations of what is possible, and probably the belief that their project is
the most important. Each project has its own timeline and you have
to manage your time to keep them all moving forward to hit the
planned deadlines and milestones. This workload is different from
the workload of someone managing a single project, or carrying out
their day job. There are more moving parts and normally more people
involved.
20 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

In this chapter, you’ll learn about what a multi-project environ-

ment is like, the different ways projects fit into your workload, and
the warning signs to watch for that show you need to adapt the way
you work before the risk of burnout becomes real.

Understanding the multi-project environment

Managing multiple projects is different from having responsibility
for just leading one project. That’s not to say that leading a single
project is easy: the larger the project, the more complex and strategic­
ally important it tends to be, and that comes with its own stressors.
A multi-project environment features the following:

●
A large number of unrelated stakeholders who need to be engaged
in various, sometimes isolated, sometimes connected activities.
●
More project sponsors to please.
●
More expectations to meet.
●
Project teams made up of part-time resources who also have a day
job to do that takes priority over their project work.
●
More resource conflicts to resolve, often with subject matter
experts booked to work on multiple projects who then struggle to
see their whole work commitments and aren’t able to complete
their tasks in the timeframe they expected.
●
Constant pressure from deadlines instead of the comfortable ebb
and flow of busy and not-so-busy points on a single project: every
month one of your projects is beginning, completing or hitting a
major milestone.

A workload that includes multiple projects also requires a slightly

different take on the core skills that are used to manage a single
project. It’s not a totally new skillset, but it’s a smarter, more complex
way of addressing the work and the complexities of balancing many
people, processes and products.
 WHY MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS IS DIFFERENT 21

I started in project management working for an insurance firm as part of a

team leading on the upgrade of a website. This project went smoothly
with everyone knowing what they were supposed to do and hitting their
deadlines. Later in my career, I progressed to working on a larger project
to deliver a new IT system to 35 locations. While the size, scope and length
of this project was greater than what I’d done before, similarities remained
that helped me understand and manage the individual tasks.
However, at the next stage in my career, I was no longer leading groups
of related projects and sometimes my stakeholders were totally different
groups. I was team leader for a group of project managers, and I picked up
some operational tasks, such as liaising with suppliers for ongoing contracts,
that were nothing to do with my projects. When my sponsor informed me
of another project coming my way it felt like the mental load of juggling
so many things was going to be too much – even though I could make
time for the physical workload.

During the experience I described above, my work was no longer a

personal portfolio of connected and contextually relevant work –
you will learn more about this in Chapter 3. Every day was a balance
between doing something to advance my own To Do list and also
supporting my team and colleagues with their work. What should I
be focused on? How do I choose what to do first? How can I use
what I already know to make this easier?
Those are some of the challenges of delivering multiple projects,
and you’ll learn more about the tools, tips and strategies for manag-
ing those challenges as you go through the book.

How projects fit into your job

Whether you have the job title of project manager or not, you could
have a workload made up predominantly of projects. Perhaps the
bulk of your time is spent in an operational role, with the expectation
that you will manage projects around the edges of that.
22 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Your project workload is likely to fit into one of three categories,

depending on how it integrates into the rest of what you do. Let’s
look at those categories now.

Sushi
Just like a plate of perfect pieces of sushi, each of your projects are
unrelated and stand well on their own. Project work is the main
portion of your job and you have a number of initiatives on the go
at any one time, varying in length of time, size and complexity. The
projects are for various customers or sponsors and you have to work
with a wide range of stakeholders, often influencing across different
departments to secure the input and support you need.
Examples:
●
Executive assistant leading various projects for many directors.
●
Project manager in a small business supporting all the change
projects the company wants to do.

Spaghetti
Like a tangle of spaghetti in a bowl, your workload is made up of
several related projects. You do a wide variety of project work but
it’s broadly all thematically grouped and often the project teams are
made up of the same people time after time. Your projects might
affect a number of teams, but they all fall under the leadership of one
director or under one team structure.
Examples:
●
Project manager running a range of projects for one customer/
sponsor.
●
Project manager setting up the same software or process for many
customers.
 WHY MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS IS DIFFERENT 23

Side dish
Projects are the ‘side dish’ to your day job. You have an operational
role where projects are not your main focus, but you are still expected
to manage small, short projects (and sometimes larger ones) around
your other responsibilities. The content and customers for these
projects can vary.
Examples:
●
Team leader running a customer services department who also has
to implement process improvements.
●
Lawyer with a case load who also has to lead an internal change
project to move the department to digital records.

As a senior project management leader in a clinical team, all my projects

fell under the umbrella of things that were to do with clinical operations,
for example, projects that affected doctors, nurses, healthcare IT and so
on. One of the things I did when I was in that role was also supporting
hospital audits. Audits were an ongoing responsibility for the department
and they were managed as small projects in their own right. My workload
was a mix of strategic initiatives for executive sponsors and smaller
projects: all related by the common themes of shared stakeholders and
clinical work.

You may find that your project workload changes from time to time
depending on what your organization requires of you. For example,
a finance manager may find themselves spending more and more time
on improvement projects during the majority of the year, and then be
fully focused on year-end accounting when it’s time to do the books
for the past 12 months. A project manager with a spaghetti workload
may be required to move to the sushi model when their manager
changes suddenly and departmental priorities shift. Normally, project
managers with spaghetti or sushi workloads also have business-as-
usual or non-project tasks to do as well, and there’s a list of common
‘extras’ in Chapter 3.
24 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

If you’ve only recently been given a couple of projects to manage,

you might be feeling OK about your workload at the moment, what-
ever it looks like. The default approach most people use is to replicate
the same methods as you use to run a single project. Just repeat
exactly what you are doing for your first project, using the same
approach, tools and techniques.
However, it won’t be long before you start to feel that you don’t
have time to do everything to the level of quality you expect of your-
self. You recognize that things aren’t going as well as they could, and
you feel it should be easier to work efficiently with a multi-project
workload. That’s the moment to check for the warning signs that tell
you it’s time to start doing things differently.

I had eight ongoing projects at one time. Some were third party software
implementations and some were internal development. Some projects
and teams were larger and required more time and effort (over a year
duration) and some were small teams that were short term (three to
four months) and less than five team members. The hardest part was
keeping notes and communication with all the project team members –
many overlapped on the projects.
One of the internal development projects included a large group
of users. Testing was difficult and the team was over-critical at times,
which slowed progress. Two projects were third party software that
also included many of the same team members. I visited every project
task list every day, made myself reminders on my calendar and tried
to get communication/project updates out to the team quickly after
meetings. I learned that there is no such thing as over-communicating,
especially related to tasks due and planning for the next meeting. Next
time I would try to organize tasks by team member across all projects
to reduce the number of reminders/emails sent and to make it easier to
check them off and track in PM software.

Kelly, PMP, PMI-ACP, senior project manager, USA

 WHY MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS IS DIFFERENT 25

Key skills for managing projects

There are lots of reasons why projects don’t always go to plan. In a
study of more than 28 publications, researchers found 44 different
‘failure factors’ that influenced project outcomes for the worse
(Rezvani and Khosravi, 2020). The top seven from that list – the
things that come up time and time again in case studies and research
papers – are:

1 Poor planning or unclear initial requirements;

2 Changing project requirements;
3 Poor communication and stakeholder relationships;
4 Lack of effective leadership;
5 Instability of the project team;
6 Poor risk management;
7 Poor project control.

If we flip those causes of failure into what it takes to be successful at

leading projects, we get the following skills:

1 Planning;
2 Requirements management;
3 Communication and stakeholder engagement;
4 Leadership;
5 Team management;
6 Risk management;
7 Project control and governance.

Every project management professional has their own take on what

the most important skills are for leading successful projects, but that’s
a pretty good list. However, when we adapt the list for what it looks
like in a multi-project environment, we can see that the skills are the
same but with a slightly different twist:

1 Planning (with an understanding of competing priorities between

projects);
26 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

2 Requirements management (across projects that may be

interconnected);
3 Communication and stakeholder engagement (with more people);
4 Leadership (in multiple leadership roles at a time on different
initiatives);
5 Team management (with team members who might contribute to
more than one team or project);
6 Risk management (where risks may aggregate across multiple
projects to have a more significant impact);
7 Project control and governance (the time for which is squeezed in
a multi-project environment because there are just so many other
things to do).

Perhaps unsurprisingly, in a survey for this book (Harrin, 2021)

planning and stakeholder engagement came out as the top skills
required for people managing multiple projects, closely followed
by team management (there’s more on the resource management
challenge in Chapter 4), as shown in Figure 2.1. In fact, survey
respondents recognized over 60 different skills, from attention to
detail to vendor management.

FIGURE 2.1 Top skills required for managing multiple projects

Planning

Communication and
stakeholder engagement

Team management

Governance

Leadership

Risk management

0% 20% 45% 60% 75% 90%

 WHY MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS IS DIFFERENT 27

Warning signs to look out for in multi-project environments

If your working environment has some of the features discussed
earlier in this chapter, then you are probably already spending at least
some of your time feeling overwhelmed. Here are three warning signs
that mean it is time to consider new ways of working to manage your
multi-project assignments.

1 Your manager keeps giving you more work

You do regular reporting, and maybe even timesheets. You believe
your manager knows what you are doing every day and how much
work you have, so they are only giving you what they feel you should
be able to do.
If your manager keeps giving you more work without discussion,
that’s a warning sign because often your manager hasn’t got the
capacity to track what you are doing day-to-day. They probably only
have a very high-level overview of what you are working on. I guar-
antee they aren’t studying your timesheet in detail every week and
committing to memory the tasks that you have been working on.

On one project, my sponsor asked me to take on a time-consuming admin

task that (in my opinion) could have been done by one of the executive
assistants or a temp. I couldn’t get that done and my own workload, and I
spoke – rather emotionally – to my manager about it. She explained that
the project sponsor wouldn’t know what else I was working on, so wouldn’t
have considered the possibility that I might not be able to get it done.
Our project team was made up of senior managers. Despite speaking to
my sponsor every day, the reality was I was expected to be able to manage
my time and have grown-up conversations about workload if I needed to.
Instead of doing that, I was burning out trying to please everyone.

Project sponsors are senior leaders who also have high workloads,
often in a complex environment with many pressures that you may
not be aware of. However much they try to understand what’s going
on, they can’t know everything, especially if they are only responsible
28 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

for part of your workload. In a multi-project environment where you

are working for several leaders, the only one who knows exactly
what your workload includes is you.
You’re not alone if you feel like the amount of work coming from
your manager is unsustainable. In a survey for this book, 44 per cent
of project professionals reported that their manager giving them
more work was a challenge, as you can see in Figure 2.2.

FIGURE 2.2 Major challenges of managing multiple projects

70%

60%

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

0%
Work is not Having to work Manager asks Work is
completed to longer hours for more work missed
a suitable quality

The first step in dealing with a situation where you keep being given
more work is to fully map out what your current workload is. Chapter 3
will help you do that. Share this information with your manager and
work together to assess the priorities.
Weekly, transparent, reporting on fast-moving projects also helps,
and it should include the effort you are making as the project manager.
For too long I reported on what the team was doing without includ-
ing my tasks. Find ways to tell people what you are doing to raise the
visibility of how you are spending your time.
 WHY MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS IS DIFFERENT 29

2 You are working longer hours

When you get given more projects to run, sometimes it feels like the
only way to get the work done is to spend more time at work. This is
a warning sign because that’s the start of the fast route to burnout.
Nearly half of project managers (46 per cent) reported that they are
working longer and longer hours as time goes by.
Project work has peaks and troughs of effort. However much you
aim for a steady cadence to your work, there are issues that need to
be resolved, last-minute changes and client requests: that’s part of the
role. There are also times when you will work longer hours to support
your team. I remember staying late one evening just to be around
while my IT colleagues were doing something critical for our project.
I wasn’t needed, but I felt like I wanted to be there for solidarity, and
to show I recognized their efforts at working into the evening.
I also choose to get into the office and be the first one on my floor
of the building from time to time, because I enjoy the peace and being
able to ease myself into the day before the pace picks up. This means
travelling at a time when I can get a seat on the train with no prob-
lems, and I am grateful for that too. While that works for me, watch
out for feeling like you have to start early, finish late or fire up your
laptop when you get home. That’s a sign that you should be critically
looking at your workload to make sure you have used all your strat-
egies for structuring, combining, streamlining and batching your
work to speed up how long it takes to do things.
In other words, if it takes ten hours a week to manage one project,
it doesn’t necessarily take 20 hours a week to manage two. Working
efficiently between several projects is the best way to get the work
done and get home on time. Throughout this book you will find tips
and processes for how to do this. Use the right strategies to structure
your work and manage your time, so you can take advantage of the
dynamics and interactions between projects and processes.

I routinely work on all the small projects (under $5 million value) in

the office. There are many of them and it is easy to hand them over to
me because I take them and run with it. Many of them are similar in
scope and it can be hard to keep track of what project is specifically
30 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

doing what. Ultimately, the projects get done (and done well in my
opinion) but it can be frustrating and stressful balancing scopes and
schedules when they are all small but require a similar effort as the
larger projects that a person may be tasked with only one or two of.
Higher management doesn’t necessarily see it that way which makes it
frustrating. In the future, I would like to be able to say ‘No’ when asked
to add one more ‘small’ project onto my plate.

Anonymous project manager

3 Work is slipping through the cracks

When you have a lot on the go at once, you need solid systems to
make sure nothing is overlooked. Having said that, it’s possible that
even with the best systems in the world, something falls through the
cracks from time to time. Ideally, that should be an unusual occur-
rence, rather than something that happens on a regular basis. As
Figure 2.2. shows, about a third of project managers (34 per cent)
report that work is slipping through the cracks and that’s a challenge
for them as a professional who is leading multiple projects.
If you feel like you are dropping balls more times than would like,
consider how much your environment is setting you up for success.
Are your systems really working for you? Are you taking a reactive
approach to work, perhaps only working on something when some-
one asks for an update? That can result in a knee-jerk reaction like
firing off some emails just to say that you’re making progress. If you
find yourself doing work in response to the last person who asked
you for something, and being more reactive than feels comfortable,
then consider that as a warning sign that you need to get on top of
your tasks.
The good news is that you are in the right place: this book is going
to help. Chapter 7 has tips for standardizing processes and creating
checklists to help you manage your work in efficient ways.
 WHY MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS IS DIFFERENT 31

Where to go from here

If you have recognized your workload and some of the challenges
you face in these pages, then you may have come to the realization
that it is worth trying different approaches for managing your
projects because there could be better ways of using your existing
skills and making your environment work for you. It honestly doesn’t
have to be so hard.
Keep an open mind as you move through the book and consider
trying some of the activities, tools and techniques to see how much
of an impact they could have on your efficiency levels – and the enjoy-
ment you get from your work.

KEY TAKEAWAYS
●
A multi-project environment naturally includes more moving parts:
people, processes and products.
●
Managing multiple projects requires a slightly different take on the core
skills needed to deliver successful projects.
●
Projects can form part or all of your workload.
●
Watch out for warning signs that signal your current workload
management techniques are becoming inefficient due to the volume of
projects you are leading.

ACTION STEPS

Your action steps from this chapter are to:

●
Identify what category your workload fits into. Do you have a sushi,
spaghetti or side dish project workload? Or perhaps a blend of a
categories?
●
Reflect on your current position. Do you spot any of the warning signs?
If you are a team leader, can you spot the warning signs in anyone in
your team?
32 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

References
Anderson, C (2019) Welcome to the project economy, LinkedIn, 26 September.
Available from: www.linkedin.com/pulse/welcome-project-economy-cindy-
anderson-cae/ (archived at https://perma.cc/M6FM-HTQU)
Harrin, E (2021) Managing multiple projects: The research, 29 October. Available
from https://rebelsguidetopm.com/managing-multiple-projects-the-research
(archived at https://perma.cc/73XE-MV4Z)
Rezvani, A and Khosravi, P (2020) Critical success and failure factors in large-scale
complex projects, in Phillips, M (2020) The Practitioner’s Handbook of Project
Performance: Agile, waterfall and beyond, Routledge, Abingdon
Schoper, Y, Wald, A, Ingason, H T and Fridgeirsson, T V (2018) Projectification in
Western economies: A comparative study of Germany, Norway and Iceland,
International Journal of Project Management, 36 (1), 74–82 (January)

Further reading
Williams, T C (2017) Filling Execution Gaps: How executives and project
managers turn corporate strategy into successful projects, Walter de Gruyter,
Boston
 03

Concept #1: Portfolio:

understanding your workload

The majority of project managers run between two and five projects
at any one time (Harrin, 2021a). However, 15 per cent of project
managers reported running over ten projects simultaneously. On top
of a project workload, most employees have other tasks to do that do
not fall within the boundaries of a project or an actual day job beyond
managing projects. That’s a lot of activities to fill your time.
The number of projects you are asked to lead depends on a wide
variety of factors. Research by Kuprenas et al (2000) shows that
prior experience is the factor that most influences the workload for a
project manager. From that, we can conclude that if you have shown
yourself to be a safe pair of hands running multiple projects in the
past, you will likely be asked to take on a multi-project workload in
the future. Complexity is another factor that influences workload:
the same research also shows that project managers tend to get fewer
highly complex projects. That means you may have a couple of high
cost, high complexity projects or a larger number of low cost, low
complexity projects. What is it for you?
The first concept covered by the framework for managing multiple
projects is to create a personal portfolio, as shown in Figure 3.1. This
is a summary statement of your work in list form that documents
everything you are currently responsible for. The portfolio is impor-
tant because before you can structure and streamline your work, you
34 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

need to know exactly what that work looks like. The action of
creating a personal portfolio serves three purposes:

1 It gives you the full picture of what is on your To Do list.

2 It provides clarity about what is expected of you.
3 It creates the information you need to communicate about your
workload with other people.

FIGURE 3.1 The Portfolio concept in the managing multiple projects framework

This chapter gives you the tools to understand and prioritize your
workload, which is the foundation for being able to effectively prior-
itize time and make smarter decisions about how to consolidate some
of your project management activity. You’ll learn what portfolio
management is and how you can use the principles of portfolio think-
ing to run your To Do list like a portfolio manager.

What is portfolio management?

The seventh edition of the APM Body of Knowledge (2019) defines a
portfolio as ‘a collection of projects and/or programmes used to
structure and manage investments at an organizational or functional
level to optimize strategy benefits or operational efficiency’. In other
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 35

words, a portfolio is a way to group, structure and oversee the

project-related work being undertaken across the organization or
functional area, so that the highest value, most beneficial work takes
priority. For example, an IT portfolio would list all the projects,
programmes and larger pieces of operational work that the IT depart-
ment is working on at any given moment in time. It could also include
information about projects that are going through the approval
process or waiting to start, along with any pieces of work that are
currently on hold. The portfolio is the whole picture of the work for
the team, usually as it relates to delivering change.
In practice, portfolios can take many forms. A portfolio can be:

●
A collection of related work, for example work to do with a
particular department.
●
A collection of unrelated projects where it is helpful to manage
them together, for example the portfolio for a whole organization,
where projects happening in different departments do not
necessarily relate to each other, but management wants visibility
of all the work that is happening across the organization.

The benefit of thinking about work in this cohesive, combined way

is that you can use the big picture to make better decisions. Portfolio
management is that decision-making effort: it describes the work
involved in managing a portfolio, including the choices that get made
about the projects. It’s a common concept within the world of strat-
egy execution and project delivery because it allows for comparisons
and rankings between projects based on different factors like priority,
risk, cost, the effort involved and the amount of time the work will
take (Durbin and Doerscher, 2010). You also have to make choices
about how to invest your time and effort, so portfolio management
lends itself well to thinking about your own workload too.
According to Reiss and Rayner (2013) the term ‘portfolio manage-
ment’ has two interpretations:
●
A management layer: the people responsible for the selection and
delivery of any changes, projects or programmes within the
organization.
36 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
A process: the decision steps and workflow for choosing what gets
done in what order.

As an individual managing a number of projects, the management

layer aspect of portfolio management is simply you, and perhaps
your direct manager or the people who assign you work. You may
have a greater or lesser influence over the work you are asked to do.
A small business owner will have a larger influence over the selection
of projects to do because those choices are within their personal
control. An employee will have less of a say about what they work on
because those decisions are typically made by the hierarchical levels
of management above them.
The process aspect is where you will have greater control: ulti-
mately, you can decide how to spend your time each day and how
you organize your work to combine activities to give you the best
results.

Portfolio thinking
Managing a portfolio requires a specific way of thinking: a joined
up, holistic way of looking at everything with a view to creating
balance, assessing priorities and making choices. At an organizational
level, portfolio thinking is shaped and constrained by what the Praxis
Framework (undated) defines as the seven components of portfolio
management:

1 Establishing an infrastructure to support projects and programmes.

2 Defining management procedures and processes to be used
consistently across projects and programmes.
3 Optimizing the allocation of available resources by managing
supply and demand.
4 Maintaining a portfolio that balances strategic objectives in
changing conditions.
5 Improving the delivery of projects and programmes through a
co-ordinated view of risk, resources, dependencies and schedules.
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 37

6 Co-ordinating the need for change with the capacity of the

organization to absorb change.
7 Reducing costs by removing overlapping and poorly performing
projects and programmes.

These elements reflect how an organization would want to structure

its governance processes to ensure the right projects get done at the
right time, with the right resources to deliver the right outcomes and
benefits.
However, you can use portfolio thinking at an individual level
too. By reframing these organizational responsibilities to make them
applicable to your personal workload, you can structure your work-
load to look at it in a portfolio way, which will help you feel more in
control: many of my students and mentees feel more confident once
they can ‘get their hands around the work’ and brain dump all the
projects and tasks that are taking up space in their heads. Portfolio
thinking helps you see the connections between projects and activi-
ties that may make more sense if they are managed together.
The six principles of portfolio thinking at an individual workload
level are shown in Figure 3.2 and are as follows:

1 Understand the big picture: all the tasks, projects and programmes
in the portfolio.
2 Prioritize the work.
3 Group tasks and projects into buckets to make them easier to
manage, monitor and control.
4 Plan and carry out all the work, and monitor progress against your
plan.
5 Communicate project status and providing recommendations
for actions to your manager, project sponsors and other key
stakeholders.
6 Look for opportunities to continuously improve by learning as
you go.
38 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

FIGURE 3.2 Six principles of portfolio thinking

The first principle requires you to have a full understanding of

what makes up your workload today. That big picture view will give
you the contents of your personal portfolio and the foundation for
creating efficient working practices. We will come back to the other
principles as we go through the book.

Tasks, projects and programmes

Regardless of whether you have a sushi, spaghetti or side dish
workload (see Chapter 2), it will be made up of tasks, projects and
(sometimes) programmes.
A task is a piece of work assigned by someone to you or to some-
one else, often by a certain date. They are one-off, small(ish) activities
that do not require the structure of a project management approach
to manage them. In other words, you don’t have to spend much time
breaking down the work into smaller sections, planning it all out and
following a governance process to make sure it’s done the right way.
Normally, you can do a task by yourself. Examples include:
●
Preparing a slide deck;
●
Booking a meeting venue;
●
Emailing a proposal to a client.
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 39

Robert Wysocki (2019) came up with my favourite definition of a

project: a ‘sequence of unique, complex and connected activities that
have one goal or purpose and that must be completed by a specific
time, within budget, and according to specification’.
Projects are made up of lots of different tasks. The decision about
whether a group of tasks is a project often comes down to whether
you would benefit from using a structured approach to control and
manage the work so that it gets done at the right time, by the right
people, in the most efficient way. That structured approach is project
management. Adopting project management practices, tools and
techniques is the most effective way to ensure the work is carried out
efficiently and to the correct standard.
You can only do the smallest projects by yourself. Normally,
projects need input from other subject matter experts and team
members, even if they only contribute on a part-time basis. Examples
include:

●
Launching a new product;
●
Upgrading an IT application;
●
Making improvements to a process based on customer feedback;
●
Constructing a structure, like a house or a road.

A programme is ‘a group of related projects that often use a similar

group of resources and will together achieve an overall common
objective or set of related objectives’ (Harrin, 2018). In practice, a
programme will often include tasks that don’t neatly fit into a project
and the goal is to deliver an outcome or benefit that relates to the
organization’s strategic objectives. It’s often a transformative initia-
tive. Programme teams are made up of a range of specialists, project
managers and other stakeholders. Examples include:

●
Digitizing the back office functions in a business;
●
Transforming organizational culture;
●
Moving to environmentally sustainable ways of working across
the organization.
40 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Create your personal portfolio

It’s time to take the first steps in applying portfolio thinking to
your workload. Using the principle of understanding the big picture,
you are going to create a detailed list of what you are working on.
The easiest way to do this is in a spreadsheet, but if you feel more
comfortable recording the information in another format, such as
mindmapping or another tool, then do so. Your goal is to document
everything that currently forms part of your workload. List out the
projects.
For each project, include the following information:
●
Unique reference: to make it easier to talk about your list later;
●
Project name: a short, descriptive title for the work;
●
Status: in progress, not started, on hold. Don’t include work that
is complete;
●
Priority: high, medium or low. If you have not been told the
priority, ask someone or use your judgement and knowledge or
organizational objectives to work it out (there are tools for
prioritization covered later in this chapter);
●
Sponsor or customer name;
●
Department, client or group that the project is for;
●
Objectives: one or two key points about the purpose of the project
or what it is for;
●
Forecasted completion date: your estimate of when the project will
be finished or the date by which you have been asked to have the
project complete;
●
Deliverables: two or three of the major things this project will
create;
●
Dependencies: if you are already aware of dependencies between
projects, note them here (there is more on dependencies in Chapter 4);
●
Estimated hours per week: record how long you think you are or
will be spending on this project in hours.

The result will be something like Table 3.1.

TABLE 3.1 Template for a personal portfolio workload tracking spreadsheet

My workload

Expected Hours
completion per week
Project ID Name Status Priority Sponsor Group Objectives date Deliverables Dependencies (approx)

5
1001 Project X In progress Medium [name] IT Point 1 [date] Deliverable 1 Project Y
Point 2 Deliverable 2
Point 3
1002 Project Y Not started High [name] Engineering Point 1 [date] Deliverable 1 None 15
Point 2 Deliverable 2
Deliverable 3
42 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Delegates on my training courses often find estimating hours per

week is the hardest part of this process, especially if your organiza-
tion does not mandate timesheets and you have nothing much to
go on beyond your best guess. Your best guess is fine. Projects are
typically busier at the beginning as you get things set up, before they
fall into a comfortable rhythm, and then they require more project
management effort again towards the end as the team prepares to
handover the deliverables and close out the work. Your per-week
hourly estimate doesn’t have to be perfect or reflect those ebbs and
flows in your workload. It’s simply a guide for sizing to give you
an idea about whether the project is taking up a lot of your time or
not very much at all. It can also help you later with prioritizing your
time and can indicate to your manager (if you share the information
with them) just how busy you really are. If you really struggle with
estimating hours, use T-shirt sizing instead: is it an extra small, small,
medium, large, extra large or extra extra large piece of work? This is
a way to measure project size relative to the other things on the list.
Too many XXL projects running at the same time will be challenging
to manage, but it may be OK to have one alongside a handful of
small and medium-sized pieces of work.
The spreadsheet needs to work for you, so if it helps to break
down a project into large pieces and consider it in chunks, then do so.
However, it is not a project schedule, so it’s not necessary to include
every task on there.

It makes sense to align your priority categorization with that of your

organization. If the company standard is to assign priority on a different
basis to high, medium or low, then use that as the way to allocate a
priority to each of the items of your personal portfolio.

Non-project work
Even if you have the job title and role responsibilities of a project
manager, it’s unlikely that you spend 100 per cent of your time on
project work. Everyone has other tasks to do that should also to be
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 43

accounted for in your available time. After you have listed the projects
in your workload tracking spreadsheet, add any additional non-
project tasks that are taking up a regular amount of time.
Common tasks for people leading projects that are not actually
project-related include:

●
Organizing team meetings, team building or social events;
●
Mentoring others or buddying new starters;
●
Facilitating meetings or workshops for colleagues;
●
Attending one-to-one meetings or performance reviews with your
manager;
●
Line management and recruitment for direct reports if you have
them;
●
Updating or creating templates, other process-related documen­
tation and policies;
●
Being responsible for organizational learning, for example
organizing training for the team, hosting lunch-and-learn sessions
or facilitating knowledge sharing in some way or your own
professional development;
●
Providing input to team or departmental strategy, working groups
or committees.

You might find these tasks on sticky notes, in your task management
app, as open items in your inbox or written in a notebook. Add them
to your list, or perhaps group them into an entry for ‘other’ with a
portion of your time allocated against them. When your portfolio list
is complete, the spreadsheet is useful to help you spot whether there
are any overlaps or conflicts between your projects, and as the start-
ing point for seeing your workload as a personal portfolio.

I filled out the spreadsheet for the major projects I was working on to
help me prioritize. It was good to see the four or five big projects that I
was running, and then the time I allocated to them per week.

Omar Warrack, supply chain project manager, UK

44 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Prioritizing the work

The second principle of personal portfolio management is to prior-
itize the work. But everything is a priority, right? While you might
hear that from colleagues or managers, it can’t be true – and even if
it was, it’s unrealistic to expect project managers to work on every-
thing all at the same time. That’s not how work works. Having said
that, if you only worked on the project that is your top priority, you
would never make any progress on projects that appear lower down
the list. There is a balancing act in ensuring your priority projects get
more of your time but the lower priority projects still get some atten-
tion – because no doubt your boss expects those to be moved on at
least a little instead of ignored each month.
When work is identified in your portfolio spreadsheet, the next
step is to prioritize it. Knowing the priority of your projects, and the
priority of tasks within your projects, lets you make informed deci-
sions about where to spend your time. Ideally, your project sponsors
or your manager will help you to identify the priority work on your
list. However, if they are unable (or unwilling) to do so, it is up to you
to establish the relative priority of what you are working on so that
you can effectively manage your own time.
There are a lot of different ways to do that. In a survey for this
book (Harrin, 2021b), 30 per cent of project managers reported using
more than one way to prioritize, so it is OK to use different tech-
niques in different situations. Popular methods for prioritizing work
include:
●
The Eisenhower matrix (42 per cent reported using this);
●
MoSCoW (20 per cent reported using this);
●
ICE (18 per cent reported using this).

If you are wondering what those techniques are, they are explained
in more detail below. However, it is interesting to note that 14 per
cent of respondents relied on their professional judgement in an
informal way, either by making their own priority-based To Do lists
or by using upcoming deadlines from their project schedules. The 3
per cent of project managers who said they had no way to prioritize
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 45

were probably doing something similar to get through the day. Some
of the verbatim comments about how people prioritize included:
●
It’s often ‘gut feeling’ or management determination based on
project constraints.
●
Projects are aligned to company business objectives so identifying
which objective is top priority for the business at this time and
working from there.
●
Whoever yells the loudest? (It’s horrible and embarrassing to
admit, I know!)
●
Common sense and project dates.
●
I have a regular scheduled meeting with the Managing Director to
set priorities.
●
Nothing structured. Mostly I use my timelines to determine key
activities to prioritize. However, anything my manager asks for
gets done first.
●
When is their go live? And are they on track or how far off?
●
Literally, it is whatever is on fire today.

Do you prioritize whatever is on fire? While sometimes you might

have to, let’s look at four ways to take a more structured approach to
prioritizing work: MoSCoW, the Eisenhower matrix, ICE scoring
and COST.

Putting projects into a priority order helps you think about how much time
and effort to spend on each one, but in practice you will be spending time
on all your projects. While you wait for a decision on a high priority
project, you can be moving a lower priority piece of work forward. Use the
gaps in higher priority projects to work to focus on other tasks.

MoSCoW
MoSCoW is a prioritization technique usually used for project
requirements. Initially developed by Dai Clegg (Clegg and Barker,
46 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

1994), it was later adopted by the Dynamic Systems Development

Method, an agile project delivery framework managed by the DSDM
Consortium (now the Agile Business Consortium).
MoSCoW stands for:

●
Must have;
●
Should have;
●
Could have;
●
Won’t have this time.

The additional letter o’s don’t stand for anything but they make the
technique easier to say.
Typically, project teams use MoSCoW to prioritize work within a
project and create a set of requirements. It’s a way of defining project
scope and setting expectations about what is most important and
what’s going to get delivered.
A slightly adapted version of MoSCoW can be used to prioritize
work across your personal portfolio. In this multi-project version,
MoSCoW stands for:

●
Must do;
●
Should do;
●
Could do;
●
Won’t do at the moment.

The must do tasks are the projects and activities that are essential.
If you don’t do them, you might as well hand in your resignation.
Perhaps they are codified in your job description, or they represent
strategically important work for your department.
The should do projects are important, but they are not critical. If
you don’t take responsibility for completing that work, someone else
is going to have to, or the organization will need to find a painful
workaround to fill the gap.
The could do projects are initiatives that you will complete if you
have the time. It will be considered a shame if they don’t get done, but
the pain level of not completing them is not as high as a ‘should do’
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 47

project. These might be good projects to delegate to a colleague with

less experience than you, if the work is straightforward.
The won’t do tasks are items in the portfolio that you will not
work on at the moment. You make the decision to put those to one
side, in order to free up time for more important work. You may
come back and work on them later, but, for now, you don’t need
to do them – and neither does anyone else. The organization will not
suffer for having to wait for them to be complete. These tasks can
wait.

Priority is relative, so a project’s priority will change based on what else is

on your To Do list. The exercise of prioritization reflects the position at the
time you rank your projects. A project that is low priority, not considered
strategic or in your won’t do list may become more important in a couple
of months. Make time to reflect regularly on your prioritization decisions
so you can move projects around as necessary and ensure you don’t
overlook something that is becoming more and more important.

Eisenhower matrix
The Eisenhower matrix (also known as the Eisenhower box, the
Eisenhower decision principle or the urgent/important matrix) is
named after Dwight D. Eisenhower, 34th President of the United
States. It’s not known if he used this prioritization method himself,
but he referenced the basic concept which developed into the matrix
in an address at the Second Assembly of the World Council of
Churches in 1954.
In the speech, he quoted a former college president as saying, ‘I
have two kinds of problems, the urgent and the important. The urgent
are not important, and the important are never urgent’ (Eisenhower,
1954). From that basic idea that a task or project can have urgency
or importance (or both – unlike his quote), the Eisenhower matrix
was born.
The matrix is a two-by-two grid where one axis represents the
urgency of the work and the other represents the importance of the
48 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

work. Consider each of the four quadrants in relation to your projects

and establish where they best fit. The four options are:
●
High urgency, high importance. For example, tasks like:
{ Dealing with a crisis or issue;
{ Upcoming deadlines.
●
Low urgency, high importance. For example, tasks like:
{ Relationship-building activities;
{ Developing strategy and forward-looking plans;
{ Projects that contribute to strategy but don’t have any delivery
dates or milestones in the near future;
{ Identifying new opportunities;
{ Team or personal and professional development activities.
●
High urgency, low importance. For example, tasks like:
{ Responding to incoming messages where the expectation is
that you will reply quickly;
{ Dealing with a full inbox;
{ Talking to a colleague who has shown up at your desk;
{ Being asked to attend meetings at short notice.
●
Low urgency, low importance. For example, tasks like:
{ Projects that are not due to start for several months;
{ Time-wasting activities such as social media where this is not
part of your job or being interrupted.

I was approached in the office by a senior manager who asked me to

attend a meeting that was happening at that moment. I had not been
invited before this moment, did not know what the meeting was about or
how I was expected to contribute, and, of course, I had nothing prepared.
In their opinion, the meeting was important; for me, it was less important
as it was an interruption to my day. However, it was urgent as it needed to
happen straight away.
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 49

The Eisenhower matrix can be used for prioritizing the work in

your personal portfolio, although it is more commonly used for
individual tasks instead of projects. When using it to prioritize
projects, consider the timeline for the work. Projects with high
proximity – the closer the expected completion date – have higher
urgency. The more strategically-aligned or essential the work is
considered by your manager, the higher up it should appear on the
importance axis and the more of your attention it should command.
When using the matrix to prioritize tasks, be extremely critical
about where you put each activity. Work that might feel important
because it takes up a lot of time may not be getting you closer to
your goals. For example, a study by Carleton University (Duxbury
and Lanctot, 2017) found that people spent one-third of their time
reading and answering emails, but 30 per cent of the time those
emails are neither urgent nor important. In an eight-hour working
day, that’s about 48 minutes spent on emails that don’t really
matter.

ICE scoring
ICE stands for impact, confidence and ease. ICE scoring is a concept
developed and made popular by Sean Ellis (2015), founder of
GrowthHackers. Originally for internal use to help prioritize
business growth experiments and tests, it can be used as a decision-
making tool to prioritize almost anything.
Score each project on your portfolio spreadsheet out of ten for the
following characteristics:
●
Impact: If this project completes successfully, what will be the
impact on the organization, corporate objectives, the department,
your career and so on?
●
Confidence: How certain are you that this project can be completed
successfully with the knowledge, data and experience that you
have?
●
Ease: How easy do you think it will be to do this project with the
time and resources that you have?
50 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

The ICE score is the average of the three individual scores and gives
each of your projects a rating from one to ten.
As an example, let’s say you’ve been asked to lead a project to
organize an event to celebrate 20 years of your company being in
business. You know the project will have a high impact for your
community and you are confident that you can host the event success-
fully, as the organization has done similar events several times before,
even though it’s your first time as project manager. You’re juggling
several other projects so it won’t necessarily be easy to fit the work in
but you give it scores of seven for impact, nine for confidence and six
for ease. The ICE score for this project is seven. That information
helps you prioritize the project among your other work.

COST
Finally, let me share an approach I use personally. The COST model
is a simple way of prioritizing projects by the value they offer the
company. COST stands for compliance, operations, strategic and
tactical. Projects are categorized into those four groups and then they
can be worked on in that order.
Compliance projects are initiatives that ensure the organization
meets regulatory and compliance requirements. If these projects were
not done, the organization would have to cease operations. Examples
include:

●
Changing processes to meet new regulatory requirements.
●
Carrying out the work required to meet an external audit or
industry assessment.
●
Updating and configuring software and hardware to meet new
legal standards for data protection.

If you have any projects in your portfolio that fit into the compliance
category, they should be your top priority.
Operations projects are those designed to keep the company
operational and meeting its requirements to customers. Think of
these projects as the ones that ‘keep the lights on’. If these projects
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 51

were not done, the organization would cease to be viable longer term.
Customers would leave and products and services would not be
maintained. Examples include:
●
Technical software and hardware upgrades to ensure the IT estate
is fit for purpose and remains within service contracts.
●
Process improvements to address issues with customer support.
●
Procuring a fleet of vehicles to replace old vehicles that are end-of-
life.

Operations projects are your next priority because, without them,

the organization’s viability is at risk.
Strategic projects help the organization turn its strategic plan into
reality. Projects are how organizations deliver strategy and get the
business closer to its goals. If these projects were not done, the
company would fail to deliver on its strategic plan. Examples include:
●
Launching a new product or service;
●
Improvements that relate to cost savings;
●
Initiatives with the aim of improving customer or employee
satisfaction.

While strategic projects might sound like they are top priority, they
actually rank third in this model. This group of projects is normally
work to do with making change and improvements. Note that
compliance projects and operations projects would also be mentioned
on a company’s strategic plan. Staying in business and meeting regu-
latory requirements would be a key part of any organizational
strategy, although they might not routinely make the Town Hall
briefings or ‘top projects for the year’ presentations. However, we
split out those compliance and operations projects and use the stra­
tegic category for work that is of strategic importance but does not
qualify as compliance or operations.
Tactical projects are everything else, typically discretionary
improvements that would be nice to have but that don’t take priority
over the other categories. These projects have been recognized as
good ideas but don’t have to be implemented right now. If the projects
52 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

are not done, there’s no substantive impact. However, today’s tactical

project can become tomorrow’s strategic project, as business needs
change over time, so it is always worth revisiting your prioritization
on a regular basis to check your categorization remains correct.
Examples include:

●
Acting on comments from the employee suggestions scheme;
●
User-suggested software enhancements that don’t affect
functionality;
●
Process improvements.

These are the lowest level of priority for you and – if you have projects
that fit into any of the other categories – should be timetabled to take
up the least of your time.
In summary, you are aiming to prioritize the work that makes the
most impact and offers the most value balanced against the time,
budget and effort it will take to achieve it. It’s not an exact science.
You can choose any of the techniques above, something else entirely,
or a blend of methods. Most managers will be open to listening to
why you have prioritized the projects the way you have, as long
as you can explain your thinking. The important part is putting in
the time to reflect on what each project involves so you can include
priority in your personal portfolio.

How many priority projects is too many?

There is no specific number of priority projects that you should have;
no number beyond which your workload becomes unmanageable.
In their book, Not Today, Erica and Mike Schultz (2021) suggest that
you forget about thinking in absolute numbers and instead consider
the following factors for each project on your list:

●
How much time will it take?
●
How big a change is it?
●
How uncertain is the outcome?
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 53

●
How much emotional energy will it require?
●
What resources will it take?

It might be manageable to take on another priority project if it’s only

going to last a few days. A large organizational change project that
requires making many people redundant will impact your emotional
energy as well as take up a lot of change management time. Projects
with a high degree of uncertainty typically need more attention than
those with a tried-and-tested plan.
Review your answers: trust your intuition if you look at the list
and feel what you see is too many ‘top’ priorities. If that is the case,
start the conversation with your manager about how to deprioritize
some of your work in order to focus on what truly is the most
important work.

Group the work

The third principle of personal portfolio management is grouping
the work. If you can group the work into buckets, it becomes less
overwhelming and you benefit from efficiencies of managing things
together. We’ll look at techniques for managing activities together
later in the book. For now, focus on looking for connections between
the things on your portfolio list. Here are some ways that you can group.

●
By stakeholder: Do you have common resources or subject matter
experts who are working with you on multiple projects? Perhaps
you have multiple projects for the same sponsor, department,
customer or client.
●
By theme or content: Do your projects have common deliverables
or subject matter? For example, group all the projects that you’re
doing that involve construction, or the projects that involve web
design.
●
By location: Do your projects serve a particular geographic
location? Can you split them by country or region?
54 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
By lifecycle stage: Do you have multiple projects going through a
common project process in the lifecycle? You could group all your
projects that are in the initiation phase, for example, so that you
can work on common activities for them all.
●
By project management approach: Do you have projects using
different approaches? Maybe you’ve got some that are using a
waterfall or predictive methodology, and others where you’re
working in a more iterative way following agile methods.
●
By amount of active management required: Do you have some
projects where you have to be very hands-on and a lot of active
management is required? And others where you can be more
hands-off as the team knows what is expected of them? Cluster
your projects by the amount of management effort you need to
spend on them.
●
By deadline: Do you have projects that share a common end date?
It could be advantageous to group them together. For example,
look at all the projects due to complete in the next quarter.
●
By software: Do you run projects using a range of different
software tools? This can happen when clients ask you to use their
tools and, as the project manager, you end up having project data
split across a number of applications. There are time-savings to be
had by going in and updating everything in one system at the same
time.

If none of these feels like natural groupings for your work, look for
any other connections between projects so that you can make your
buckets. Give each bucket a descriptive name like ‘IT Projects’, ‘Client
X’s Projects’ or ‘Due by year-end’ so you know what the group repre-
sents. These names are for your personal use to help you refer to
them later, so don’t worry about them too much.
The number of buckets you end up with will depend on the original
number of projects on your list. The more buckets you have, the
harder it will be to see any tangible improvements from managing
your workload as a portfolio. Three to five buckets would be a
reasonable result; if you end up with more it could be worth looking
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 55

over your list again to see what other similarities you can find to
further consolidate the list. It doesn’t matter how many individual
projects fall into each bucket: some might have many, another may
have just one project.
It’s not a problem if you end up with fewer than three buckets. You
may be able to manage your entire portfolio in a way that con-
solidates everything. However, as you start to use the combined
approaches to managing your work, you may find you do need to
split out certain aspects. Stay flexible and be prepared to make
changes until you find a set of buckets that works well for you.

I have worked in multiple project management for more than ten

years now. The hard thing is to keep the motivation. Not all projects
are interesting, not all projects are passionating... To keep up, I need
to find one new challenge, one new passion and new people to meet.
Otherwise, it becomes simply boring. If we do not want to feel trapped
like a rat in a cage running in a wheel, we need to look beyond the
projects, and human interactions are the best solution to provide that
shot of adrenaline.
Juan Manuel, EU projects officer, La Réunion

The portfolio as a communication tool

At this point, you will have a spreadsheet that contains a complete
list of all your projects and additional repetitive tasks, all prioritized
and organized into buckets. If you do nothing else after reading this
book, this activity alone will help you gain clarity about what is
expected of you and whether that is reasonable.
Your personal portfolio is a good communication tool to start a
dialogue with your manager. Use it as part of a conversation about
your current workload. Ask them if they agree with your prioritization.
Bring out the list when you are asked to take on another project and
have a discussion about what drops further down your list to make
space for the new work.
56 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

KEY TAKEAWAYS
●
A portfolio is a collection of projects or programmes.
●
Portfolio thinking helps you identify connections between tasks and
projects, taking a big picture view.
●
Understanding your workload provides the foundation of your personal
portfolio: the contents of which represents everything on your To Do
list.
●
Prioritization techniques like COST, MoSCoW, the Eisenhower matrix
and ICE scoring enable you to identify the work that will make the most
impact and offer the most value.
●
Group your projects into logical buckets to maximize efficiencies in
how they are managed.

ACTION STEPS

Your action step from this chapter is to create your personal portfolio.
Here’s how to do it.
●
Create a workload spreadsheet (or equivalent) covering all the projects
and major recurring tasks that you are working on.
●
Prioritize the work on the list.
●
Look for connections between projects and group similar work into
logical buckets.

References
Agile Business Consortium (undated), Chapter 10: MoSCoW Prioritization.
Available from www.agilebusiness.org/page/ProjectFramework_10_
MoSCoWPrioritisation (archived at https://perma.cc/3MDV-LRCH)
 CONCEPT #1: PORTFOLIO 57

Association for Project Management (2019) APM Body of Knowledge, 7th edn,
APM, Princes Risborough
Clegg, D and Barker, R (1994) CASE Method Fast-Track: A RAD approach,
Addison-Wesley, Boston
Covey, S (2018) The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Free Press, New York
Durbin, P and Doerscher, T (2010) Taming Change with Portfolio Management:
Unify your organization, sharpen your strategy, and create measurable value,
Greenleaf Book Group, Austin, Texas
Duxbury, L and Lanctot, A (2017) Carleton study finds people spending a third of
job time on email. Available from newsroom.carleton.ca/archives/2017/04/20/
carleton-study-finds-people-spending-third-job-time-email/ (archived at
https://perma.cc/4SW8-A83X)
Eisenhower, D D (1954) Address at the Second Assembly of the World Council of
Churches, Evanston, Illinois. August 19, 1954. Available from www.presidency.
ucsb.edu/documents/address-the-second-assembly-the-world-council-churches-
evanston-illinois (archived at https://perma.cc/5F5C-VZXL)
Ellis, S (2015) The Growth Team: How to build a high performance growth team.
Available from www.slideshare.net/startupfest/startupfest-2015-sean-ellis-
growthhackerscom-how-to-stage (archived at https://perma.cc/M6FY-MPXA)
Harrin, E (2018) Project Manager, BCS Learning & Development, Swindon
Harrin, E (2021a) The 2021 project management report, 22 March. Available from
https://rebelsguidetopm.com/project-management-statistics/ (archived at
https://perma.cc/DA3W-PKAP)
Harrin, E (2021b) Managing multiple projects: The research, 29 October. Available
from https://rebelsguidetopm.com/project-management-statistics/ (archived at
https://perma.cc/XG4F-XUKT)
Kuprenas, J A, Jung, C-L, Fakhouri, A S and Jreij, W G (2000) Project manager
workload – assessment of values and influences, Project Management Journal,
31 (4), 44–51 (December)
Praxis Framework (undated) Project, Programme and Portfolio Management.
Available from www.praxisframework.org/en/knowledge/project-programme-
and-portfolio-management (archived at https://perma.cc/D7EQ-4VJ5)
Reiss, G and Rayner, P (2013) Portfolio and Programme Management Demystified:
Managing multiple projects successfully, Routledge, Abingdon
Schultz, E and Schultz, M (2021) Not Today: The 9 habits of extreme productivity,
BenBella Books, Dallas
Wysocki, R K (2019) Effective Project Management: Traditional, agile, extreme,
hybrid, 8th edn, Wiley, Indianapolis
58 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Further reading
Association for Project Management (2019) Portfolio Management: A practical
guide, APM, Princes Risborough
Kendall, G I and Rollins, C (2003) Advanced Project Portfolio Management and
the PMO: Multiplying ROI at warp speed, J Ross, Boca Raton
PMI (2017) The Standard for Portfolio Management, 4th edn, PMI, Newtown
Square
 04

Concept #2: Plan:

Combining project schedules

Your personal portfolio and project prioritization will only get you
so far. You’ve probably discovered from doing that exercise that
you’ve got numerous pieces of work with overlapping timetables.
Project scheduling involves creating a timetable for each project but,
when you have a lot of projects, there’s a risk that you miss seeing the
big picture.
Resist the temptation to dive in and start clearing some of those
timeline tasks from your To Do list. Before you get going on execut-
ing your plans, you need to take a moment to think strategically and
understand the bigger picture. ‘If you’re too busy and frenzied to
think’, writes Dorie Clark (2021) in her book, The Long Game, ‘then
it’s almost impossible to break out of a short-term mindset.’
The short-term mindset is what will keep you reacting to what is
on your calendar for next week instead of looking forward. To do
that, you need to create a more strategic vision for your work in the
coming months: a consolidated, big picture view at a relatively high
level that encompasses all your projects and allied work.
If that sounds like a challenge, then you are not alone. Rich
Horwath, from the Strategic Thinking Institute, surveyed over 500
managers in 25 companies and concluded that the top strategy
challenge is time: 96 per cent of people don’t have enough time (or
choose not to spend the time) on strategic thinking (Horwath, 2012).
60 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

The second concept in the managing multiple projects framework,

as Figure 4.1 reminds us, is combining project schedules. In this
chapter, we take a strategic approach to multi-project scheduling.
You do need to find what Clark calls ‘white space’ to dedicate some
time to completing this level of planning. But it will be worth it.

FIGURE 4.1 The Plan concept in the managing multiple projects framework

When you create a consolidated schedule for your projects, you can
more easily predict when your busy times are going to be and where
project timelines could clash. It can also show you where projects are
dependent on each other and how to best make use of skilled people
who are working on more than one of your projects, so they aren’t
overloaded. In other words, a consolidated timeline for your port­
folio improves your ability to monitor and control the work.

Before you start scheduling

The fourth principle of personal portfolio management (as we saw
in Chapter 3) is planning and carrying out the work, and monitoring
progress against that plan, so schedules are required. The pre-
requisite for combining project schedules is that each project needs
to have a schedule in the first place. You can’t combine what doesn’t
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 61

exist! Go through your portfolio and check that every project has,
as a minimum, a high-level timeline. It doesn’t have to be detailed
but you will need an idea of the key dates and milestones, as well
as an idea of what resources (people and things) you need.
If you don’t have enough information yet to be able to plan out
the full timeline for any project, look at the section on rolling wave
planning later in this chapter.

Project dependencies
The next step in creating a multi-project schedule is to look at the
dependencies between your projects.

What is a dependency?
A dependency is a relationship that links the order in which tasks are
carried out. Dependencies are how tasks are linked together or relate
to each other.
On a single project schedule, you’ve probably seen this kind
of thing on a Gantt chart before: the black lines show the flow of
the work and the dependencies between the tasks, as shown in
Figure 4.2. If you’re familiar with Gantt charts, this will not be new
to you.
Even if you don’t use Gantt charts for scheduling your work, there
are other ways of visually linking tasks. It might be typing the number
of the successor or predecessor task into a list. It might be linking
tasks on a Kanban board, or even using sticky notes for tasks and
drawing lines between them to map out the flow of work in a project.
It might be giving tasks the same reference number. However you
record them, these dependencies are baked into the project schedule,
and it’s often pretty easy to manage them as project management
software tools have the features required to link tasks in a variety of
ways.
In a multi-project environment, the effort moves beyond linking
activities in a single project to linking the relationships between
FIGURE 4.2 Dependencies represented by lines on a project timeline

SEP OCT NOV DEC JAN FEB MAR

Design/Concept Sean

Planning Morgan

Implementation Nimesh

Testing Katie

Marketing Sam

KICK-OFF HOLIDAY SEASON LAUNCH

 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 63

projects. Projects may relate to each other in different ways, for

example:

●
Resource dependency: projects share human or other resources
and this puts a constraint on when work can be done. For example,
one subject matter expert needs to contribute to two projects but
cannot be in two places at once, so their availability dictates the
project timelines.
●
Knowledge dependency: one project relies on the knowledge
created by another. For example, one project trials a new technology
which will then be used to build the deliverables for a second
project.
●
Task dependency: activities within projects are linked in some way.
For example, a task on one project has to be completed before a
task on another project can be started.
●
Deliverable dependency: the output created by one project will be
used as an input to another project. For example, a rebranding
project creates new brand guidelines which are then used as an
input to another project that has the objective of refreshing the
company website.

Bilgin et al (2017) identify further relationships that exist within a

portfolio of construction projects including financial dependencies,
such as financial difficulties with a client affecting more than one pro-
ject being completed for that client, and the fact that winning a new
project may be dependent on successfully completing an existing project.
Perhaps you can identify similar dependencies in your personal port-
folio, even if you do not work in a construction environment.
You may be the project manager for each of the projects that relate,
or your project may be providing knowledge, staff, tasks or deliver­
ables to the work of another project manager. Either way, it’s worth
having a full understanding of inter-project dependencies as they can
affect your ability to deliver the work successfully. Many enterprise
project management tools will help you do that, for example by
creating network diagrams that show interrelated projects. If you
don’t have software that will make it easy to show those relationships,
64 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

below we look at two low-tech ways to give you enough information

to adequately manage interactions between projects without having
to be a pro planner or use new tools.

How to identify inter-project dependencies

If your portfolio is thematically linked, or you are working on a
programme, you may have easy-to-spot dependencies between
projects. For example, one project has to begin or finish before some-
thing can happen on another project. Perhaps a client has to approve
something before another project can move forward. Sequence your
projects by looking at how they relate to each other.
Once those easy connections have been identified, think about
what else could affect the success of those projects. That could
involve work happening on projects outside of your control. One of
the largest areas for dependency management is people. It’s common
to have subject matter experts working on multiple projects so your
project teams may include the same people. Look for where people
are a dependency, because their availability will influence when work
can be done.
Dependencies of any kind can affect the sequencing of the work.
Knowing how your projects interrelate (within your own portfolio of
work and with other project managers’ work) will help you make
smart choices about what to tackle first, and how to best make sure
everyone is available to do the right tasks at the right time. When you
dig into what your projects are delivering and how they are going to
deliver those outputs, you may not find any dependency linkages
between your projects, and that’s fine. Knowing there are no depend-
encies is still useful information – and remember that as your projects
evolve, that situation could change. New dependencies can crop up at
any time.
Figure 4.3 shows an example of interproject dependencies recorded
in a dependency map. Here, the planning phase of Project 1 is going
to provide information or deliverables that will then be used to initi-
ate Project 2. Next, something happens in the execution phase of
Project 1 that has to be finished before Project 3 can be closed. Not
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 65

FIGURE 4.3 Example of a dependency map

all projects will interlink in ways similar to this, but the majority of
project managers in a multi-project environment do have to manage
inter-project dependencies.
In a survey for this book (Harrin, 2021), 59 per cent of project
managers reported leading work that was dependent on other projects
they were running. Nearly 70 per cent of respondents said their pro-
jects had dependencies on other people’s projects. It is also common
to have to juggle both types of dependencies: 43 per cent of pro-
fessionals said they handled a personal portfolio that required
them to both manage dependencies between projects they were
leading and those that others were leading. Only 16 per cent of people
reported only running projects that had no dependencies on any
other projects.
If your projects have dependencies on other work, a map like the
one in Figure 4.3 gives you clarity about how projects depend on
each other. That helps you see the bigger picture and make better
decisions about how all of your work can be prioritized effectively
and structured effectively. It can also prompt you to start conversations
with people who rely on the outputs of your projects, or people on
whom you are reliant in order to complete your work. Keep those
66 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

communication channels open to maximize everyone’s chances of

getting what they need to finish their projects successfully.
Once you have identified the dependencies that affect the sequenc-
ing of your projects, it’s important to document them in a way that
allows the team to understand them and monitor them carefully. As
with all things on projects, a situation can change. You may well find
that what feels like an unimportant dependency now becomes critical
later, or something shifts around and what wasn’t a dependency now
becomes something that you need to be aware of.

Documenting dependencies in a source and target matrix

There is no hard and fast rule for mapping project dependencies, and
you can approach this task any way you like. You might have already
started to record dependencies on the portfolio workload spreadsheet.
One option is to put the links into a consolidated project schedule,
showing the dependencies between projects on a Gantt chart.
However, dependency mapping between projects on a task-level
view can soon get complicated. Another (simpler) option is to create
a separate source and target matrix that shows how project activities
relate to other projects, an example of which is shown in Table 4.1.
The source and target matrix shows the project that is the source of
the requirement or activity and the project that is the target recipient
of that work. The matrix is a useful communication tool for explain-
ing how projects relate to each other and why you’ve scheduled the
work in a particular order.

I used a dependency matrix for a group of several related projects.

I inherently knew of the dependencies, but the value for me was having
a way to document exactly how those projects were tied to each other.
Reviewing the matrix with my team was also valuable because they
could give input on ways to manage the dependencies, propose ideas
about how they could actually help, and ensure overall project success.

Robert Valle, senior project manager, USA

TABLE 4.1 Source and target matrix for identifying project dependencies

Project task dependencies

Target

Source Project 1 Project 2 Project 3 Project 4 Project 5

Project 1 Documentation on tech Copy of Policy X once it is

solution written

Project 2 Expert resource being

borrowed for Phase 2

Project 3 Notification of time Input to Phase 2 strategy

changes are taking place

Project 4 Copies of training Comms on the training so

materials they can reuse it

Project 5 Milestone 5 needs to be

on time
68 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Keep dependencies up to date

The project environment is fluid, and that’s even more the case in a
multi-project environment. A project change, risk or issue can affect
the dependencies on your source and target matrix, or it may create
new dependencies. If you get a request for a change, use the matrix to
identify if it would possibly impact other projects in your portfolio.

Consolidating your schedules

Project managers tend to live or die by their schedules. They shape
decisions, priorities and stakeholder engagements. We feel good when
the schedules give us confidence. We feel nervous when they change a
lot. We feel out of control when the schedule is clearly fictional with
no chance of ever being delivered. It’s no surprise that scheduling can
be such an emotional activity. According to Teresa Amabile and
Stephen Kramer in their book, The Progress Principle (2011), there
are three things that shape the positive feelings you have about work
time: making meaningful progress, events that directly help project
work and moments of positive interpersonal activity. Scheduling is all
about making progress towards a meaningful goal so it’s no wonder
dates and deadlines play such an important part in whether work
feels in or out of control.
Multi-project scheduling adds another layer to hitting deadlines.
Instead of moving towards one meaningful goal, you are moving
towards several at the same time. You’ve got several independent
project schedules, whether they are detailed Gantt charts, task lists
with dates, or timelines in some other format. Individually, they may
all look manageable. But you aren’t working on them individually.
You have a multi-project portfolio to review and that means you
need a big picture view of task deliverable dates so you can better
organize your calendar.
Consolidating your schedules means you can predict when you
will be busy. Look for overlapping periods of intense activity or
where deliverables are due on several projects at the same time. These
are days, weeks or months when your time will be stretched and it’s
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 69

helpful to know that before you find yourself in the middle of a work-
load crisis. There are two ways to bring your schedules together:
●
The ladder view
●
The hot air balloon view.

The ladder view: a detailed schedule

Think of standing at the top of a ladder. You can see the ground quite
clearly. You’ve got a full view of what’s going on, and your view is
made all the better from being up a little bit higher than you were at
ground level. That’s what we’re aiming for with a detailed combined
schedule. The ladder view schedule is useful for identifying:

●
What needs to be done when across multiple projects from one
plan.
●
Potential resource conflicts where people are allocated to multiple
projects at the same time.
●
Busy points in the coming months so you can plan accordingly.
●
Where activities can be merged to benefit the team, for example
combining governance meetings (there is more on governance in
Chapter 7).

The ladder view is also a useful tool for communicating about your
projects and provides a visual overview of what’s going on for you,
your project sponsor and your team. Create the ladder view by taking
all your project timelines and consolidating them into one document.
If you use a Gantt chart, that means creating one ‘master’ Gantt chart
that combines all your schedules.
Whatever tool you create it in, if you intend to use this schedule as
your daily To Do list or work management tool, it’s going to have to
include everything: your own tasks as well as the tasks for the team.
If you have a lot of projects and a lot of tasks in each project, that is
going to shape up into a monster of a plan. As schedules change, you
will have a lot of updates to do.
70 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

However, a slightly easier way to create a master schedule is to be

selective about what makes it in. Only include the major phases of
work, milestones and any tasks that span two reporting periods (as a
rule of thumb, that makes a task long enough and significant enough
to make it onto your consolidated schedule). You will have to main-
tain the detail in a separate schedule, alongside your ladder view
plan. This should give you enough information to benefit from the
economies of managing multiple projects together, but without the
overwhelm of thousands of lines on your schedule.
The ladder view approach is suitable for portfolios where the vast
majority of your work is related, there are a lot of dependencies
between tasks and you use common resources. A detailed, consoli-
dated schedule is also a useful communication tool with your team
or project sponsor if all the work is relevant to them. Regardless of
how thematically grouped your work is, if you feel putting all your
project schedules in one document would be a better management
approach and help you feel in control, then that is equally a good
reason to do it.

I work with multiple stakeholders and multiple projects all the time.
Over the past year the number of projects has grown tremendously
and initially I hit a brick wall after I got above ten projects. Microsoft
Planner within Teams and Microsoft To Do were the game-changers
for me. It helped clear my mind with a morning brain dump into the
To Do. Then I would develop My Today tasks. When I got through My
Today tasks, I focused in on longer range tasks, follow ups or weekly
managerial requirements.
Erac Priester, USA

The hot air balloon view: a high-level schedule

Now think of being up in a hot air balloon. You are higher than
standing on a ladder so you can’t see the ground quite so clearly. You
can pick out the big features in the landscape: rivers, hills, roads,
towns and clusters of industrial buildings. This is the view we’re
aiming for with a high-level schedule.
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 71

The hot air balloon schedule is useful for quickly identifying

periods where multiple projects have deliverables or milestones due
at the same time so you can plan accordingly. It is a roadmap for
what’s coming up and it gives you a big picture view with relatively
little effort. Create this view of your work by looking at the schedules
for each of your projects and picking out the milestones or major
phases. Create a side-by-side list for all your projects using that
information, like the example in Table 4.2. A table or spreadsheet
works well for this: list the projects down the side, put months or
quarters across the top (or even weeks, if your projects are short-
term), and write in the major milestones where the columns and rows
intersect for each project.
The benefit to this approach is that it is far less time-consuming
than creating a detailed combined schedule. It highlights the busy
times and gives you that hot air balloon view of your upcoming dead-
lines. For example, in Table 4.2, the project manager will be very
busy in February, with Project 1 going through testing, having to
start the planning for Project 2 while facilitating requirements elicita-
tion for Project 3 and closing down Project 4 at the same time.
This way of looking at your work is an overview; you still need to
maintain an individual schedule for each project so that you have
somewhere to track progress at a detailed level. It is also only a snap-
shot of a single moment in time, as project schedules change. However,
as a way to identify what’s coming up so you can be prepared, the hot
air balloon view is very helpful. It is also a great communications tool
if you are trying to explain why you can’t take on any more work or
why perhaps you need to recruit extra people in your team in a way
that a detailed task by task activity listing might be overwhelming for
the person looking at that information.
This approach is best for projects that don’t feel they would suit
a fully combined, detailed master schedule. When your projects
are unrelated, or your workload doesn’t group into a single bucket,
then the hot air balloon view shows you the big picture in a relatively
low-effort way.
TABLE 4.2 Example of major project phases/events organized by month

Months

Projects Jan Feb March April May June

Project 1 Test Test Training Go live at pilot Go live at pilot Pilot continues
location 1 location 2
Project 2 Business case Planning Planning Design Design Design
Project 3 BAU Requirements Focus groups Proposal Project begins
meeting
Project 4 Go live Handover to Lessons learned
operations meeting
Non-project work Performance Half year
reviews reviews
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 73

Include additional tasks

Whether you go for the hot air balloon view or the ladder view, it is
worth including any additional tasks from your portfolio spreadsheet
that feel significant. Create a section or column in your plan for those
additional tasks so they don’t get lost. These are non-project respon-
sibilities, but you don’t want to lose sight of them so it is worth
highlighting them because they can create busy times for you as well.
There is no hard and fast rule for whether the ladder view or the
hot air balloon view is going to be best for you, but you probably
have an instant feeling for which one would give you the best visi­
bility and control. You can use one approach for certain projects and
the other for the rest of your portfolio: mix and match as you see fit
to give you the best visibility for the work that is to come.

Review your combined schedule

Once you have finished combining the project schedules together,
take a look at what that has given you. Make sure that the inter­
project dependencies you identified have been incorporated into the
flow of the work, so you plan to work on the right things in the right
order.
Ideally, you would prioritize your time on the most important
project, and the schedule would reflect that. However, if you only
worked on the priority projects, other projects wouldn’t make any
progress. If you can negotiate a pause on some of those lower priority
items, then go for it! That will free up some time to speed ahead
on priority work. However, for most people the reality is having to
demonstrate progress in all projects, and keeping all stakeholders
happy that their projects are moving forward, regardless of what
priority they are in the big picture.
A good way to do that is to timebox your work based on the
priority of the projects, so you’re spending some time on each project
every week or month, making sure that all your projects move
forward even if just by a little bit. The impact of this on your schedule
is that the lower priority projects have their timelines extended. You
74 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

can make this adjustment on your combined schedule if it is within

your authority to do so.
Prioritize between your projects first, using the information in
your portfolio spreadsheet (and the source and target matrix if appro-
priate). Decide how much time to dedicate to each project per month.
Allocate time in your calendar and on the schedule for each project
based on the priority level.

Creating timeboxes to enable all projects to move forward is a technique

that also works on a day-to-day basis. Look at your calendar for the week
and make sure you are allocating more time to the top priority work but
still leaving some time for other projects. When I made this change to my
calendar planning, I allocated Monday and Tuesday for one project, one
day for another project, a morning on another project, an afternoon on
another project and a whole day on Friday for other things.
Yes, you’ll get interrupted and there will be meetings booked at times
that don’t fit your plan. But if you start the week with the intention that
you will work on each of your projects, then that helps you mentally
approach time with the right prioritization in mind. The idea is that all of
your projects move forward, but the priority projects get more of your
focus time. Timeboxing is my favourite method for managing time across
multiple projects.

Next, adjust the schedule for any known planned holidays or absences
for you and the team. Some workplaces close over the end of year
period, for example, and you could also have individuals with upcom-
ing planned medical leave, parental leave and so on. Look at where
those absences fall on the schedule and what impact they have.
Regardless of whether you chose a ladder view or a balloon view
to visualize the entirety of your portfolio, one of the benefits of
consolidating your project schedules is being able to see when your
busy times are going to be.
Your combined schedule can be a useful communication tool
for talking to your manager about your workload. It’s a visual way
of highlighting the impact of managing multiple projects and the
expectations of project sponsors. If your combined schedule looks a
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 75

little scary, use it to open the door to a conversation about changing

some of the delivery dates for lower priority projects to allow you
and the rest of the team the time to do the work to the best of your
ability.

Sharing your combined schedule

Now you have a combined schedule, how can you use it for better
communication? This is an important consideration if you have
information in the schedule that is not relevant for everyone to see.
The combined schedule is a personal document designed to help you
more easily see how work fits together and when different activities
are happening across your workload (there’s more on planning for
busy times below). You will want to share it with your manager and
possibly your project sponsors.
However, there are groups of people for whom it would not be
appropriate to see this information, for example external suppliers
or clients who are not involved in all the projects represented on the
schedule. If you need to communicate timelines and activities with
them, it is better to create a separate version that only contains the
information they need to see. They may still appreciate a consoli-
dated version for all the projects they are working on with you,
but they don’t need to see any information relating to projects where
they are not a part. Use individual action logs for each project (see
‘Task-level planning’ below) for detailed communication with exter-
nal stakeholders, again, filtered as necessary by what is appropriate
to share with them.
Tailoring the information shared with stakeholders also has the
benefit of making it easier for them to understand. They won’t be
distracted by erroneous information as you are providing them with
what they need to do their job.

Planning for busy times

Combining your timelines gives you advance warning of when intense
periods of work will fall. So, what can you do with that information?
The first consideration is whether those dates are in your control.
76 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

You may uncover data that show it could be advantageous or

challenging to have the work scheduled at that time. For example, if
you are implementing new software tools for the marketing team, it
could be useful to have two projects launching together so you can
consolidate the training and communication. Or you may be able to
get the team leader to agree that would result in change overload for
the users. Perhaps you could push out one project so that the team
has a chance to get used to using one tool before having to learn the
next, thus minimizing the impact of change fatigue.
Think about what you can influence to make the projects easier for
you and other stakeholders. The reality for many people will be that
they will not be able to influence project timelines as much as they
would like, as deadlines may have been promised to external stake-
holders or be driven by calendar dates such as year-end or sharing
results with the stock market.
If you cannot change the dates to minimize the amount of work
happening at any one time, at least the schedule will highlight the
busy times, and unfortunately those peaks in workload have to be
managed around. Look for and be aware of when you or the team is
likely to be busy – and therefore under stress. Being conscious of
those calendar clashes will help you take action to minimize the
impact. For example:
●
Try to do as much as possible in advance, down to creating empty
documents ready to be filled in or having pre-meeting conversations
with key stakeholders.
●
Decline meetings or reschedule them to avoid the busy period.
●
Minimize your other work commitments like professional develop­
ment activities during that time.
●
Recruit extra help to see you through the busy period.
●
Block out time in your calendar so you can focus on your projects
during that time.
●
Make your colleagues aware so they can plan too.
●
Plan your personal time to be as low stress as possible, for example
organizing a meal plan and getting the support you need for caring
responsibilities if possible.
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 77

●
Plan something fun for the team to do after you’ve all got through
a busy time.

Remember, if you change dates on your combined schedule as a result

of identifying busy times or staff absence, make sure those changes
flow through to any individual project plans.

I think the hardest part [of managing multiple projects] was to manage
important milestones that were planned to happen at the same time and
required full attention over a period of time. That would give very long
work hours and it was not always possible to plan my way out of it.
I learned that a maximum of two projects at a time was optimal to
make sure I delivered the quality I wanted. Now that I am working in
agile, this has changed, so we still have many activities in parallel that
would previously have been defined as different projects, but now it’s
all in the same backlog and I can prioritize. This is really great because
it helps avoid those conflicts between parallel running projects with
different priorities.
Dorte Frejwald, product owner, pharma industry

Rolling wave planning

Rolling wave planning, also known as progressive elaboration, is a
technique to use when it’s difficult (or pointless) to plan too far ahead.
The APM Planning, Monitoring and Control Specific Interest Group
Planning, Scheduling, Monitoring and Control Guide (2015) defines
rolling wave planning as ‘the planning density that is achieved at
different moments in time. Primarily more detailed planning in the
immediate future and less detailed planning towards the end of the
project.’
Rolling wave planning gives you the ability to plan in smaller,
incremental, steps. Smaller steps are easier to track and manage, and
they take less time to schedule because you are only planning in detail
for work that is on the short-term horizon.
The schedule is made up of waves: each wave has tasks planned
at an appropriate level of detail, or density. Use high density,
detailed planning for the tasks on the short-term horizon. This could
represent the next month or 90 days or any other time period that
78 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

makes sense for the overall duration of the project. This represents a
full, in-depth schedule of the work that needs to happen during that
period.
The next wave – the medium-term horizon – is made up of tasks
planned at medium density: the tasks will have a longer duration and
be less granular but they still represent the effort involved.
Finally, the long-term horizon is represented in one or more waves
where tasks represent large clusters of work or phases. The tasks are
not granular but act more as place markers for activities that are yet
to be fully thought though and scheduled.
As the team undergoes the work, the project manager can
constantly review the schedule and add more detail to the next waves
as this is known. Consequently, you end up with a plan that is
frequently revisited, refined and elaborated in a timely way.

Benefits of rolling wave planning

On many projects, you won’t know exactly what the work is going
to look like later on. Some projects have evolving scope or high levels
of complexity, where you don’t really know what’s going to be
required as you move through the work.
The exact project tasks required might depend on the outcome of
the design phase or may change once you’ve carried out customer
focus groups, for example. Maybe you have agreed to roll out a new
service to certain customers, and the intention is to deploy it to every-
one if it’s a success. Your sponsor expects to see the timeline for the
whole effort, but the exact deployment timetable is going to depend
on the order you extend the service to customers, and you don’t know
that yet.
If you cannot predict what’s coming with any degree of certainty,
there’s not a lot of point in creating a detailed project schedule. You
will only have to change it again later and you may have inadvert-
ently set expectations with stakeholders that you then need to revisit.
Rolling wave planning reduces the amount of planning upfront.
Managers like that because it means they feel the team can get started
on delivery work and they start seeing progress more quickly.
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 79

I used rolling wave planning on a project to implement organizational

changes to comply with new legislation, the full details of which had not
yet been released by the regulator. Guidance notes and details were
coming out week by week. That shaped the prioritization of project work
and changed how we wanted to respond. The schedule evolved iteratively
over time as new information was known.

Rolling wave planning is not the lazy way to get around the effort of
scheduling. It’s a calculated move to show progress with creating a
realistic and reasonable schedule, which makes it a good technique to
use when you have multiple projects, because you are often under
pressure to get going with delivery right now.

How to create a rolling wave plan

A rolling wave plan starts with knowing the major milestones or
governance points. These become your wave points: the boundaries
of each wave of planning. These could be anchored by project phases,
major deliverables, key governance review points or simply that you
have chosen to plan in three-month increments.
Next, create a project schedule for the first wave, in conjunction
with the team. Look at the tasks that need to be completed in that
timeframe and plan them out in detail. Then review the next wave.
As you won’t have all the information for bottom-up, detailed plan-
ning, think about the work you have to complete from the top down.
Include larger, longer tasks that represent groups of activity.
If there is a task that runs into the next wave, for example an
activity which crosses the wave point, then plan that to the level of
detail relevant to where the task starts. There is no point in cutting
the task halfway through or changing the dates of your governance
boundaries to fit. Plan flexibly: don’t stop scheduling tasks halfway
through their duration just because they happen to cross a milestone.
Finally, include the long-range tasks. These are tasks towards the
later parts and end of your project that can be scheduled at a low
80 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

density. Include buckets of activity, phases and generic tasks that

serve to represent what will be planned in detail once you get nearer.
The end result is a plan with different levels of task density
scheduled in waves. An example of what the chart will look like is
shown in Figure 4.4. Don’t forget that as time moves on you will
need to revise those swathes of medium- and low-density activity
with more granular planning. It’s good practice to book out time
to spend elaborating the next iteration of the plan as you get closer
to the relevant timeframe because people’s calendars get booked up.
As you will need input from the project team, you can book planning
meetings or workshops now to use for creating the next iteration
of the schedule. The planning work for a project using progressive
elaboration never stops.

FIGURE 4.4 Rolling wave planning

HIGH-DENSITY MEDIUM-DENSITY
LOW-DENSITY TASK SCHEDULING
TASK SCHEDULING TASK SCHEDULING

TODAY WAVE POINT WAVE POINT WAVE POINT

As you create a rolling wave plan, engage stakeholders in what you

are doing and explain what the plan represents. In particular, make
sure they are aware that, as you have not yet planned in detail, it is
difficult (if not impossible) to guarantee an end date for the project.
Stakeholders need to be aware that as you schedule in greater detail,
tasks may push any anticipated project closure date forward or
backward. If the delivery date is fixed, that may mean they have
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 81

to make decisions about what scope can be realistically achieved

in the time.
In a multi-project environment, priorities change quickly. Rolling
wave planning for your project cuts out the effort of detailed plan-
ning where it’s difficult to do so. If priorities then change, you haven’t
spent a lot of time creating a detailed schedule for a project that is
no longer top priority. In addition, the team can plan quite far ahead
because the schedule has less detail in the low-density waves, and
that can help you review the impact of projects on each other. You
can use the medium- and low-density tasks to inform your overall
consolidated schedule and to look for overlaps and dependencies
between projects.
Use rolling wave planning where it makes sense to do so. It can feel
like a time-saving technique but it is not a real shortcut, because you
do still have to do the planning; it is simply happening at a different
point.

Task-level planning
The big picture plan and a consolidated view of what’s happening
when are helpful tools, but you still also have to juggle all the
individual tasks. There are four tactics that help particularly well for
multi-project planning and scheduling at a task level: identifying
immovable tasks; identifying tasks with wiggle room; using a stand-
ard weekly report; and using an action log.

Identify immovable tasks

Look across your schedules for tasks that cannot move. The dates
might be fixed because they have been promised to a customer, or
they are on the critical path of your project, or for another reason.
Status update meetings where you have to show deliverables to a
client, approval dates and sign off dates are typically events that don’t
move. Meeting-driven dates like fixed governance meetings, project
boards, quarterly review boards, committees and so on are also
normally planned far in advance and unlikely to move.
82 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

You will most likely have items to prepare in advance of these

fixed points, for example a demo, meeting papers, presentations or
reports. Prioritize meeting the requirements for those immovable
tasks. If you’re having difficulty knowing what tasks to prioritize on
a daily basis, the activities that cannot move are going to be where to
focus your effort.

I work in a small e-commerce website development agency. I manage

multiple projects but in my current view, each client is a ‘project’ with
multiple tasks and projects going on. I help manage four large clients
and three additional ‘occasional’ clients. Our entire team is remote. For
me to get everything done and work not to fall into the cracks, it takes
a good project management tool which provides notices on past due
projects; a notebook for to-do lists, ideas etc. (thankfully also built into
the tool); agendas for internal and client calls which I add to throughout
the week. It requires almost daily planning/scheduling as new requests
come in daily and range in size and priority. This is probably one of the
biggest challenges.
I am comfortable working with the stakeholders and thankfully most
do not require more than a bi-weekly call to discuss ongoing and new
projects. However, some clients have access to a Slack channel which
they use to pop in, ask questions and discuss new work. So this means
while there’s not an abundance of business calls there is a LOT of
communication. Some clients prefer email, which is my least favourite
form of communication for receiving new requests. And still yet some
clients have access to their own client board to assign tasks on ClickUp.
Abundance of communication styles with multiple clients. Everyone is
different and it would be ideal but impossible to consolidate that.

Megan, project manager, USA

Identify tasks with wiggle room

The opposite of tasks that have fixed dates is tasks that have
wiggle room: there is some flexibility in their scheduling. Identifying
the tasks with the most slack helps you deal with emergencies and
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 83

last-minute problems on other projects because you can use that

flexibility to your advantage.
Let’s say you have a task on your list of things to work on this
week, and you know the dates allow for some room for manoeuvre.
You want to get it done, but it doesn’t absolutely have to be done for
a couple more weeks. An issue pops up, either on this project or a
different project. Because you know there is wiggle room in your
schedule for this task, you can push it out to next week and deal
instead with whatever crisis is pulling your attention. You don’t get
stressed about having to reschedule what you planned to do because
you know it isn’t going to negatively affect your overall ability to
complete the work on time.
Eventually, a task with wiggle room becomes a task with a fixed
date: it needs to be done at some point, and if you keep delaying it
and delaying it, ultimately you are going to arrive at the deadline.
However, until that happens, you have some flexibility. Identify
where the flexibility exists so you can use it to your advantage if you
need it.

Use a standard weekly report

Research into the behaviours of over 2,300 people by Erica and Mike
Schultz of the RAIN Group (Schultz and Schultz, 2021) shows that
44 per cent of extremely productive people track progress weekly,
compared to 13 per cent of everyone else. If you want to feel more
productive, a weekly report is a good tactic.
A simple standard weekly report summarizes what was achieved
this week and what will be achieved next week. It is useful for task-
level planning because it’s a way of holding yourself accountable for
the major project activities that you planned to achieve this week.
Anything that did not get achieved this week is carried forward to
next week’s report.
I open up last week’s report on a Monday to identify what I said
would be the priority tasks for the coming week. Those activities
become my focus for the week, so that when I report on a Friday
what I’ve achieved, I can say that these tasks are completed. The
84 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

report goes to my manager and major project stakeholders on a

Friday afternoon, in the form of a colour-coded email – in my experi-
ence, opening an attachment is too much work for some people, so
the report text appears in the body of the email itself. Tasks that are
complete are coloured green, tasks that are delayed but not by much
are coloured orange, and tasks that weren’t started at all or couldn’t
start are coloured red.
The RAG colour coding scheme is commonly used by project
professionals and you may be familiar with it already. RAG stands
for Red, Amber, Green, the colours of traffic lights. Organizations set
the threshold for what each colour means. For example, Red could
mean that a task will not hit the published completion date and/or is
more than 30 per cent overspent. If your organization does not have
definitions for the colours, it’s OK to use your own professional
judgement. Typically, Red means management attention is required
as a task is stuck and the project team can’t unblock it alone, Amber
means the task has gone awry but the team has a plan to address the
situation, and Green means the work is on track. Some organizations
also use Blue to mean ‘completed’, making the acronym BRAG.
Save time on Friday by having the report open on your computer
for most of the week. As you complete something, update the report.
As new tasks appear that need to be added to the priority list for
next week, write them on. Copy and paste this week’s report to create
the foundations of next week’s. There is a status report template to
use as a starting point in Chapter 5 and an alternative version in
Appendix 2.

Managing multiple projects is difficult, as soon as you feel like one

project is on track and understood, something else goes off the rails on
another project. I like to manage my own tasks from one consolidated
list, and add in prompts to check in with key team members when I
delegate something to them, to ensure everything stays on track. Writing
things down and not relying on memory are key. As are structured
reports and reporting periods.

Rachel, project manager, New Zealand

 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 85

Use an action log

The final tactic for task-level planning is to use an action log.
An action log is a simple way to record the tasks that drop out of
your meetings, emails, calls and conversations. These are To Do list
activities that would not necessarily need to go on your integrated
schedule or even your individual project schedules.
You can have a multi-project action log, if you want to keep every-
thing on one project log, or you can create an action log per project
if you find it easier to manage that way, and if your team members
stay the same across several projects.
Action logs can be created in any software, although it’s a bonus
to be able to easily update and share the records, and filter by task
owner or project. For that reason, I use a spreadsheet, but modern
task management apps and project management software would also
work. Think about how you want to maintain the list as you set it up.
I prefer to have the option to share the log with the team, and for that
reason, I have a log per project as my teams do not always overlap. I
prefer to have responsibility for updating the log myself, although
you could delegate responsibility for updating tasks to the individual
task owners.
Another benefit of having a single place for your To Do list tasks is
that when you meet with someone, you can filter the action log(s) on
their name to see what work is outstanding for them. Then use your
meeting time to get updates on all their outstanding tasks. Use the
downtime before and after a meeting to catch them for updates: the
meeting doesn’t necessarily need to be about your project. If you are
both attending, there will hopefully be a moment for you to ask about
project work.

Resource allocation across multiple projects

Resource management is planning, getting and using the resources
that you need to do your project efficiently. Often, organizations
use ‘resources’ as an unfriendly shorthand for ‘people’. The term can
86 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

also mean equipment, services, software, hardware, supplies, raw

materials and anything else you need in order to make the project go
forward efficiently.
When you manage multiple projects, the biggest resource chal-
lenge is normally people. You might have to order supplies or book
equipment, but that is easier to manage than people’s time. In order
to make sure you are using individuals’ time in the most effective
and efficient way, you first need to know who is going to be working
on the project with you. These people form part of your project team
and are normally subject matter experts or others who can contribute
to the work.
Typically, these people will work on your project on a part-time
basis. They might be working on several of your projects, or support-
ing another project manager with their work. Maybe they have ‘day
job’ responsibilities in an operational capacity.

In our small architecture office the project managers are often battling
for the same resources. Even though we plan monthly there would
always be shifting needs last minute. We decided to have a weekly
project management meeting prior to our weekly staff meeting where
we would debate any shifting or new priorities and skillsets of resources
to make sure everything could be accommodated, no one was over or
underutilized, and everyone was hitting their minimum billable hours.

Gillian Hutchison, Portugal

How to secure resources for your projects

People are busy and have other things to do besides work on your
projects. That’s why it is important to give team leaders and individu-
als enough notice for the work required. Get commitment for their
time as early as you can so they know the work is coming up for them
and they can plan for it.
Use your consolidated schedule to plan forward, identifying what
support or skills you might need in four or five months’ time if you
don’t currently have resources booked. If you have secured time
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 87

from an individual, look across all your projects to see how you
can best use it, especially if there are lulls in the upcoming work.
They could use their project hours to train a colleague, develop new
skills so they can support other areas of the project or get ahead on
future tasks.
Capacity planning software allows you to see resource assign-
ments across multiple projects and teams. However, many
organizations don’t have tools that provide this level of data, or a
culture that enables forecasting and planning at a granular level. You
may find yourself having to plan people’s time commitments with
just a spreadsheet and using detective work to talk to team leaders
about who is available to work on what at what time. This can be
time-consuming in itself.
In some situations – for example where your organization does not
yet have a mature approach to managing projects – the onus falls to
you to ensure you secure support for your work. There are some
things you can do to make it easier to make sure that your team
members have enough time to dedicate to the work that you need
them to do. That starts with understanding who influences decisions
around how individuals spend their time – the gatekeepers.

Build relationships with gatekeepers

Build relationships with gatekeepers – the people who manage the
priorities and time for subject matter experts and resources who
work on your projects. These gatekeepers could be team leaders or
department heads. They are typically the line manager of the person
whose time you want for your project.
Ideally, you will have built a relationship before you need to ask
for someone from their team to support your project. Your internal
network is an important source of support for your project. Work by
Ron Burt (2000) shaped subsequent thinking about network diver-
sity and shows that ‘better connected people enjoy higher returns’.
Building an internal network is beyond the scope of this book, but
there are some suggestions for building relationships with colleagues
88 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

later in the book, and there are plenty of good guides to developing
professional networking skills. Try to dedicate some time regularly
to improving and deepening your professional relationships with
colleagues by making time for them, sharing useful information with
them, and being interested in what they are doing.
When you need to ask for support from their team members, start
by explaining the role that individual would play on the project so
that the gatekeeper understands what that person is being asked
to do. If you can, show how the project work links to the strategic
objectives of the organization or department. This helps demonstrate
the value in the work and elevates the ask from simply a task to a
contribution to the organization.
It’s really important to keep communication channels open with
the line managers of your project team members. Make time for
regular check-ins with team leaders. This is one of the primary ways
that you will find out about upcoming absence, planned holiday and
other times when the individual will be unavailable for project work,
if the person themselves doesn’t let you know.
Certain project team members and stakeholders are senior enough
in the organization that you don’t need to talk to their manager about
their availability and what else they are working on. Talk to them
directly. These are the kind of things that you can ask:

●
How much time do you/your team/individual have for my project?
●
What is your top priority if it’s not my project?
●
And how can my project and I support you in doing that?

This question is not an offer to take on more work for their top
priority project. It’s a way to uncover how you can manage your
project work in a way that doesn’t interfere with their priority goals.
For example, you may be able to work around their other commit-
ments by only scheduling meetings with them on a Tuesday.

●
When do you/they have upcoming leave?
●
When will you/they be really busy?
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 89

As we’ve seen, getting visibility of absences is helpful for your project

planning. Knowing their busy times is useful too. For example, if
you’re working with the finance department, there will be particular
times in the financial year when they are very busy. Try and find out
what those are for the people in the project team.
●
What roadblocks do you see?
●
What’s coming up that I don’t know about that you think might
be a problem?

There could be activities or events happening in the future that you’re

not aware of. Ask open-ended questions to uncover things that might
create problems or opportunities for your project schedules.

Keep everything under review

Whatever you hear from line managers or the resources themselves,
assume that things will change in the near future. The information
you get today is only good for today – who knows what their prior­
ities will be in three months. It’s important to monitor progress
against your plan (the fourth personal portfolio management
principle) and to do that you need accurate, updated information
about what people are doing and how much time they continue to
have to work on your projects. Keep talking and reviewing, having
the same conversation about availability and upcoming work as a
way of reminding people about their commitments and also to
reassure yourself that they really will be available when you need
them. Make changes to the schedule based on that information to
ensure it reflects reality.
Resource management across multiple projects is one of the
hardest things to manage. Here are some ‘voices from the trenches’
from project managers who have experience of trying to secure
resources, drawn from a survey for this book:
●
Two ICT projects with expectations to utilize same resources.
Funding request for additional resources declined. [It was]
challenging to meet all delivery requirements – Kirsten
90 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
Biggest challenge was always making stakeholders realize that
shared resources among projects without dependencies (not
obvious in any one project’s plan) are meaningful and require
sound cross-functional prioritization – David
●
My biggest struggle is that I have multiple projects that often
rely on the same resources and stakeholders. Stakeholders want
to be seen as ‘getting things done’ but don’t understand the impact
on the downline. Project team resources are overextended with
both day-to-day operational work and project work. I have seen
and experienced this in all four organizations where I have been
a project manager. I know I can manage four to eight projects
well but not if we keep tapping into the same pool of resources –
Lisa
●
We have a matrixed team of resources (developers, business
analysts, data analysts, quality analysts etc.) that work on our
projects and a key success for all of our teams is to turn all project
sprints on the same sprint dates (even if one project is just starting
and another is finishing, they’ll all run three-week sprints with
same start and end dates), which allows us to plan resources across
projects and have more certainty in the work we can get done with
less interruptions and risks – Dana
●
I currently have nine active projects of different sizes and the other
project manager in my department also has nine, all pulling from
the same resource pool and all affecting the same end users. [It] is
a nightmare. Throttling the project pipeline and making people
wait for the start date of their projects takes strong leadership and
people get grumpy but it is vital with shared resources to ensure
success – Leah

A lot of the challenges come from the organization around you not
being able or willing to understand the logistics and requirements of
running multiple projects in parallel. There’s no magic bullet for that,
but keep communicating and using your documentation and data to
demonstrate the impact of resource conflicts on your work.
 CONCEPT #2: PLAN 91

KEY TAKEAWAYS
●
Consolidate and combine project schedules to provide the big picture
view across all your projects.
●
Identify dependencies between projects to help you schedule and
prioritize the work in the right order using a source and target matrix.
●
The combined schedule provides better visibility and allows you to
identify busy times. It allows you to visualize your commitments and
those of your team and make adjustments to ensure neither you nor
your colleagues are overloaded.
●
Consider rolling wave planning as a way to develop a schedule where
you cannot accurately predict the work into the future.
●
Identify immovable tasks and tasks with flexible schedules, use weekly
reporting and an action log to help with task-level planning.
●
Build good relationships with people who supply resources for your
project and individual subject matter experts so you can help them
commit time to your project.

ACTION STEPS

Your action step from this chapter is to create a consolidated project

schedule. Here’s how to do it.
●
Make sure each of your individual projects has a schedule or timeline.
●
Map the dependencies between your projects.
●
Choose either the ladder or hot air balloon view to make your
consolidated schedule (or decide to try both and see which you prefer).
●
Combine your schedules into one overarching timeline.
●
Review that schedule to look for resource conflicts and busy times and
take appropriate action.
●
Start an action log for task-level planning.
92 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

References
Amabile, T and Kramer, S (2011) The Progress Principle, Harvard Business Review
Press, Boston
APM Planning, Monitoring and Control Specific Interest Group (2015) Planning,
Scheduling, Monitoring and Control: The practical project management of time,
cost and risk, APM, Princes Risborough
Bilgin, G, Eken, G, Ozyurt, B, Dikmen, I, Birgonul, M T and Ozorhon, B (2017)
Handling project dependencies in portfolio management, Procedia Computer
Science, 121, 356–63
Burt, R S (2000) The network structure of social capital, Research in
Organizational Behaviour, 22, 345–423
Clark, D (2021) The Long Game: How to be a long-term thinker in a short-term
world, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston
Harrin, E (2021) Managing multiple projects: the research, 29 October. Available
from https://rebelsguidetopm.com/managing-multiple-projects-the-research
(archived at https://perma.cc/73XE-MV4Z)
Horwath, R (2012) The Strategic Thinking Manifesto. Available from
www.strategyskills.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/The-Strategic-Thinking-
Manifesto.pdf (archived at https://perma.cc/WN9L-NMRR)
Schultz, E and Schultz, M (2021) Not Today: The 9 habits of extreme productivity,
BenBella Books, Dallas

Further reading
Lock, D (2019) Project Management, 10th edn, Routledge, Abingdon
Muzio, E (2018) Iterate: Run a fast, flexible, focused management team, An Inc.
Original, New York
 05

Concept #3: People:

engaging stakeholders across
multiple projects

All projects are done by people, whether you work as part of a large
team or are managing and doing the project work by yourself. As
well as the people delivering the project, there are other individuals
and groups who are affected by the work. Together, these people have
the power to influence and shape your projects, and they are the
focus of the third concept in the framework, as show in Figure 5.1.

FIGURE 5.1 The People concept in the managing multiple projects framework
94 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

According to a survey by Gallup (2020) employee engagement has

a direct correlation to productivity, the delivery of quality outputs,
well-being and profitability – all things we want from projects
and the people who work on them. However, only 20 per cent
of employees are engaged at work (Gallup, 2021). The activities you
do to shift someone from being not engaged with your project to
engaged can have a huge impact on the perception of project success
and the outcomes achieved.
Experienced project managers understand this already.
Communication and stakeholder engagement ranks as the second
most important skillset for managing multiple projects – second only
to planning (Harrin, 2021). However, it isn’t easy to engage others.
While you might be deeply involved in the project, other people have
their own jobs and priorities. While you might have a full under-
standing of the details of your project, they might not remember
why the project is even happening. You may be leading five projects;
they may be contributing to several of yours, plus a few being led by
someone else, while at the same time being affected by the changes
delivered by a couple of others – and of course they have their day
jobs too.
The changes, outputs, deliverables and outcomes that your projects
are making happen are only part of their world. We need to meet
people where they are: as embroiled in multiple aspects of the
organization, and contributing and being affected by many of the
initiatives that are happening at the same time.
Engaging with people on multiple projects means putting them
at the heart of what you are trying to do and understanding what
the world looks like from their perspective. Trust me, it looks messy,
complicated and busy. Good engagement can make people breathe a
sigh of relief as you guide them through what needs to happen.
This chapter is your guide to helping others engage on the projects.
You will get new tools for understanding who matters on your
projects, which is the starting point for working out how to prioritize
your time with the right people. You’ll understand the interpersonal
skills required to engage with stakeholders across your projects.
You’ll learn how to set expectations effectively and how to
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 95

streamline how you interact with others to reduce communications

fatigue.

What is stakeholder engagement?

APM (2019) defines stakeholders as ‘influential, interested individu-
als and groups who are affected by projects, programmes or
portfolios’. They are the people you work with to deliver the project,
whether they have a substantive role to play or are only called upon
to do one or two tasks.
In an ideal world, everyone would be fully behind the project and
give you their full attention and commitment at all times, regardless
of the size of their contribution. However, there are many demands
on your colleagues’ time, and you aren’t the only customer for your
suppliers. Stakeholder engagement is the activity that keeps people
connected to your projects.
Stakeholders feel involved, heard and valued when they are treated
like partners in project delivery instead of simply ‘resources’ to be
booked via a software tool to complete assigned tasks. ‘Engagement’
is what you do to create those feelings: it is mainly talking, listening,
discussion, relationship building, knowledge sharing and targeted
interactions designed to increase the likelihood that individuals will
participate in the project in the way you want them too.
The purpose of investing time in engagement activities is to increase
the chances that people will behave in ways that are conducive to
project delivery. In other words, engagement serves to reduce conflict,
increase understanding and encourage people to do what you need
them to do. In turn, that saves you time chasing up actions and
cajoling people who don’t work for you into doing their project tasks.
Engagement is twofold: it happens through building positive inter-
est in the work and minimizing negative interest (Harrin, 2020). You
are encouraging supportive behaviour and creating an environment
where people want to join with you in delivering the projects. At the
same time, you are smoothing over resistance to change and influenc-
ing those individuals who don’t see the point in what you are doing.
96 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

There are two things that stakeholders should be engaged in to

build positive interest and minimize negative interest:
●
The process of managing the projects: how you are doing the work
and how you intend to work with them.
●
The outcomes of the projects: what you are delivering.

Often stakeholders haven’t had as much project experience as you

have, especially if you are formally in the role of project manager or
spend a lot of your day job working on projects. They need support
to be able to operate in a project environment and use the processes
you have chosen to get the work done. For example, in a mature
project management environment, you will be carrying out risk
management, change management, multi-project scheduling, retro-
spectives or lessons learned and many other things. Stakeholders
might not have taken part in any of those formal processes before.
They may never have had the need to join a planning workshop or
brainstorm a list of requirements and will need support of some kind
in order to be able to participate effectively.
In addition to being able to join in with the process, they also need
to understand the project’s outcomes and what is being created or
delivered as a result. That can be broken down further as a sub-set
of the project’s goals will be their tasks and what role they play on
the project, however big or small. Engagement activities help create
clarity about their involvement and give them the information and
environment required to do their work.
Within those two elements of process and outcomes, being able to
engage others starts with understanding what action or behaviour
you want to see from them. What do you want the result of the
engagement to be? Perhaps it’s sharing information with their team,
making a decision or taking an action. Once you have clarified your
objective, you can then turn your efforts to thinking about how you
are going to get that intended result. Engaging others in the work is
a core responsibility for anyone managing projects so it is probably
something you have some experience doing already. In this book, we
will focus on how to switch up the ways you work with others when
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 97

you are juggling more than one project, so you can win back time in
your day.

Working with project sponsors

An individual project might have many stakeholders, but the most
important and influential one is normally the project sponsor. This is
the person who benefits the most from what the project is delivering
or who holds the resources you need to get the work done. Sponsors
can be:
●
Your direct manager, for example where you are delivering a
project for the benefit of your team.
●
A senior manager in another department, for example where your
project management skills are being used to deliver work that
benefits another team or teams.
●
A senior manager in the customer organization, for example where
your organization is completing work for a client. In this case, you
probably have an internal sponsor as well, leading the work on
your side.
●
Someone else: sponsors can come in lots of different forms!

As someone leading many projects, you will have many project

sponsors. Some will be hands-on individuals who take up a lot of
your time; others will be happy to let you get on with the work as
long as you report progress regularly. According to executives
surveyed for the HBR Project Management Handbook (Nieto-
Rodriguez, 2021), executives spend 32 per cent of their time on
projects and the implementation of transformation and change
initiatives. That’s not very much; it is only around a day and half a
week, split between all the projects the person is sponsoring. They
may be sponsoring more than one of your projects, or projects for
other project managers.
Given that they are busy people with lots of demands on their time
(just like you), it’s important to think about how best to work with
98 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

them. If you consider it appropriate, talk to your sponsor about the

principle of management by exception. This is a principle of the
PRINCE2® project management method that sets agreed boundaries
and tolerances for the work. As long as the work is progressing within
those boundaries, there is no need for the sponsor to get involved.
They will still receive information and formal reporting at the rele-
vant governance points, but you aren’t bothering them with small
details or copying them in to every email. As soon as the project is
expected to go outside of the tolerances set, the project manager
alerts the sponsor.

WHAT IS PRINCE2 ®?

PRINCE2® is a process-based project management method. It stands for

Projects IN a Controlled Environment (Version 2). It is a structured and
experience-based method, created from the lived experience of thousands
of project managers and successful projects and currently overseen by
Axelos®, a provider of global best practice. PRINCE2® is a customizable
way of managing and controlling project work. It’s tailorable and suitable
for projects of all sizes, large and small as it is underpinned by principles,
themes and processes that are universally applicable.

Tolerances can be set for a number of aspects of the project, at levels

that feel comfortable to both the project manager and sponsor. For
example:
●
Time: the project delivery date can move ± two weeks;
●
Cost: the project budget can change ± 10%;
●
Quality: the search feature must return results within 0.5 seconds
with a tolerance of ± 0.1 second;
●
Scope: as long as the mandatory requirements are included, the
project team can introduce other requirements as long as time and
cost boundaries are respected.

Having these conversations and setting tolerances is very liberating.

As long as the project is going to plan and you are confident you are
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 99

within tolerance, you can get on with the work without needing to
constantly provide updates.
As you can imagine, this approach only works when the project
sponsor trusts the project manager, and the project manager is
empowered to get things done. If you work in an environment where
that is possible and reasonable, you can cut some of the overhead of
managing up because you only need to get the sponsor involved when
things deviate from your agreed plan.
Beyond your relationships with project sponsors, you will also
have to work with many other people on your projects. Let’s look
next at how to make those relationships work effectively.

Managing stakeholders across multiple projects

There are nearly always multiple stakeholders to manage, even on
one project. However, the more projects you manage, the more people
you have to involve and the greater the number of stakeholders you
interact with on a regular basis. That presents some logistical chal-
lenges of keeping everyone up-to-date and prioritizing interactions
with the people who have the most influence over the end result or
project goals. There are two tools that will help you stay on top of the
relationships you have with these colleagues: the stakeholder direc-
tory and the multi-project stakeholder map.

Working with different stakeholders/groups is like walking on eggshells

while juggling all the balls and singing the alphabet backwards. Check
in, don’t assume. Communicate the same messages five times and in
different ways to get your message across.

Stephene, project manager, Australia

Create a stakeholder directory

Managing multiple projects normally means you are juggling a lot of
contacts. You need a way of managing information about them
because it can be a lot to hold in your head. A stakeholder directory
100 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

is a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system for project

people. It can be a spreadsheet, A–Z tabbed notebook or you can use
contact management software features in the tools you already have.
Use it to record helpful information about your stakeholders.
The basic data points to include are:
●
Name;
●
Job title;
●
Location and time zone if different to yours;
●
Telephone number(s);
●
Email address;
●
Preferred method of communication, for example collaboration
tool, via phone or something else;
●
What project(s) they are involved in;
●
Role on the project(s).

Additional data to include could cover:

●
Their past roles in the organization or where they used to work;
●
Specialist skills;
●
Contact details for their executive assistant if they have one;
●
Places they studied or certifications they hold;
●
Some personal details, for example hobbies, pets or family members
if they have shared this information with you.

So much of building relationships with people is about informal

conversations and taking an interest in their work and their life. If
they mentioned that they have school-age children, for example, you
might bring that up in conversation around the time of the school
holidays: ‘Are you taking time away from work for the school holi-
days?’ If you find you have something in common, for example you
both have cats, you can share a story of what your cat did at the
weekend and ask after their pet. These informal chats make use of
your interpersonal skills to help build trust and present you as person-
able, friendly and approachable. You don’t need to be best friends
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 101

with your work colleagues, but being interested in others will help to
position you as someone they can go to with questions – or informa-
tion they think you will find useful. Those small nuggets of information
shared in informal chats could help you lead the project more effect­
ively and over time create a concrete network within your organization.
Remember, if you are storing personal data about colleagues,
suppliers and other stakeholders, make sure you do so in a secure
way, in line with your organization’s policies about information
protection. Check with the organization’s information security team
so you comply with current regulation, policy and best practice, and
hold yourself personally accountable for how that information is
used.
It sounds calculated and manufactured to write out how to engin­
eer interactions in this way with the goal of building relationships
with people at work. If you have a great memory for this kind of
detail, then you can rely on that. If you are working with many stake-
holders in many different settings, then notes can help. They prompt
your recall about your last conversations and allow you to create
moments for small talk.
Small talk – those quick questions and normally superficial inter-
actions that help pass the time – is actually crucial to building trusted
relationships. It’s even more important in virtual teams, where it is
hard to find a replacement for water-cooler or coffee machine chat.
Instead of bumping into someone in the corridor, you have to orchest­
rate moments for the exchange of pleasantries. For example:
●
Send them a link to something you’ve read that they might enjoy.
●
Send something through the post, like a thank you card or
handwritten note appreciating their efforts on the project.
●
Use time in project team meetings for informal catch-ups and
check-ins instead of cramming every moment with project business.
●
Seek their opinion on something.

Informal chat gives other people the opportunity to ask you quest­
ions as well and you are building ongoing relationships, without it
feeling like you are hassling them for status updates.
102 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

In a diverse workplace, you may find that your working styles do not align
to those of your colleagues. Consider how you can make adjustments to
accommodate the needs of stakeholders. For example, turning on
captioning for videos shown in meetings, providing presentation materials
in advance, choosing an accessible venue, requesting attendees do not
wear strong scents, allowing people to stand and move around the room if
that is more comfortable for them and so on.

Create a multi-project stakeholder map

Once you’ve got a directory of people you work with, it’s time to see
how those relationships overlap in your project ecosystem. Creating
a multi-project stakeholder map will highlight where individuals or
groups have a role in more than one of your projects. To do that, list
all the people you work with and group them by project. You can
create this as a mindmap or a list in a document or spreadsheet,
whichever works best for you. Link people to the projects they are
interested in.

The most difficult situations to deal with are always related to the
people on the project; difficult personalities, stakeholders that bring
corporate politics into the mix, team members that are very protective
of the information that the project needs to move forward. I’ve learned
over the years to really work to identify the key contacts for each
project and OVER communicate with the teams. So many issues/
challenges I’ve run into with projects I’ve managed have been because
of mismatched expectations, missing communications, not including the
right people at the beginning of the project, and identifying stakeholders
that have sway in the project, too late.
Steph Holmes

Next, look for sources of conflict or opportunity, especially where

stakeholders have influence over several projects. Sources of conflict
include:
●
Time: where one stakeholder is pivotal to so many projects, they
will not have time to serve each effectively.
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 103

●
Expectations: where stakeholders have different views about what
one or more projects will deliver, for example where a stakeholder
on one project is pushing for a deliverable that will negatively
impact a stakeholder on another project.
●
Resources: where you don’t have enough stakeholders to fulfil the
resource requirements of one or more projects, perhaps because a
team manager has assumed someone can meet the needs of multiple
projects and now you’ve done the planning you can see that isn’t
going to be feasible.
●
Leadership: where one project or group of related projects has
more than one person in a leadership or sponsorship role.

If you identify potential points of conflict, take steps to have conver-

sations with the relevant stakeholders. Explain what you’ve noticed
and suggest ways to address that. You may need to bring several
stakeholders together – even if they technically operate on different
projects – in order to facilitate an outcome that everyone is satisfied
with. In particular, setting realistic expectations is important to ensure
everyone has clarity and can agree about what is to come.
You can uncover sources of conflict through active listening,
interviews, conversations, observation and using what you know
about office politics and the culture of your working environment.
You may not have all the information at the time you start thinking
about stakeholders in this way, so be prepared to revisit and revise
your notes as you learn more about how individuals and projects
interrelate.
It is worth acting on potential conflict even before it becomes a
‘real’ problem. Heading off problems saves time later and creates a
more pleasant working environment for everyone. It’s easier to
discuss issues before they have happened as people are less emotion-
ally invested in the outcome before it is personally affecting them or
their team. Sources of opportunity include:

●
Resources: creating pools of subject matter experts who could
advise and support across projects.
104 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
Communication: merging communications to stakeholders who
share common interests across several projects (there is more on
this later in the chapter).
●
Task consolidation: team members performing the same task on
several projects could find it advantageous to consolidate their work.

Act on these potential opportunities too. Talk to the individuals you

have identified about how work could be combined or streamlined as
a result of their involvement in several of the projects you are leading.

FIGURE 5.2 Example of a multi-project stakeholder mindmap

Figure 5.2 shows an example of a multi-project stakeholder mind-

map for one project manager, using team member initials. You can
see that there are several people involved in multiple projects either
because of their subject matter expertise or because they are in a leader-
ship position. Key contacts are marked with squares. The connec-
tions help you visualize an individual stakeholder’s project ecosystem.
That context provides insightful information into how you can
engage with them. It shows you:

●
What they are involved with
{ Use this information to discuss their project priorities with
them: which one is most important to them?
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 105

{ Does that align with the importance given by other

stakeholders to the work?
●
What they will talk about when you meet them
{ Use this information to plan for your conversations
{ What else might they be interested in?

The multi-project stakeholder map is simple to create and a powerful

tool for understanding exactly who you need to work with on a day-
to-day basis.

How to prioritize time with stakeholders

Between your project sponsors and other key contacts, your stake-
holder directory is probably looking quite busy. How can you find
time to plan to engage all these people and then carry out those
engagement activities? It might feel like you won’t have time to do
anything else.
In an ideal world, we would have all the time necessary to build
deep, trusted working relationships with people across all our
projects. In the real world, there simply aren’t enough hours in the
day to do that. That’s why you should prioritize stakeholders so you
can invest your limited time on the relationships that matter most.
Stakeholder saliency is a model created by Mitchell et al (1997)
with the goal of providing a framework for explaining ‘to whom and
to what managers actually pay attention’. They define salience as ‘the
degree to which managers give priority to competing stakeholder
claims’, which makes it a great tool to use for managing multiple
groups of stakeholders.
The theory of stakeholder salience shows who really counts on the
project. And when you know that, you can better prioritize your
time. The model combines the attributes of legitimacy, urgency and
power to establish stakeholders’ relative importance and influence.
Legitimacy is a measure of how valid their views are; how much
of a right a stakeholder has to make requests of the project. For
example, they could have a contractual right to make demands of
106 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

the project, or a legitimate business interest – perhaps they are going

to use the software you are building.
Power is a measure of how much influence they have over the
actions and outcomes of the project. That influence can come from a
variety of sources such as:

●
Hierarchical status in the organization or project team, for example
being the project sponsor or chief executive.
●
Prestige or soft power, for example being a respected and trusted
subject matter expert in a relevant domain.
●
Ownership of resources, for example being the budget holder or
line manager for the people doing the work.

Urgency refers to how much attention they demand and how

quickly they expect their requests to be dealt with. Typically, the more
important someone considers themselves to be, the more unaccept­
able it is to them to face any delay in response. Their request could be
genuinely time-sensitive, but it is equally possible that it is not.
The three attributes combined give you useful information about
how someone may interact with the projects. It shows how they
could wield their influence. Someone who appears on your stake-
holder map as part of several projects could hold more influence than
someone who appears only once, but that’s not always the case. The
purpose of using the saliency model is to uncover more about how
stakeholders will engage with you and where to spend your limited
time. The more attributes a project stakeholder has, the more it is
worth prioritizing your time with them.

How to use the saliency model

Add information about saliency to your stakeholder directory. Table
5.1 shows one way to do this. For each person’s involvement with
each project, note your assessment of the attributes. Remember that
some stakeholders may appear in more than one project, but with
different levels of influence on each. Consider:
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 107

●
Do they hold a position of power over the project?
●
Do they have a legitimate claim over the work of the project?
●
Is there something that is making their requests very urgent at the
moment?
There are eight combinations of power, legitimacy and urgency that
create eight categories of stakeholder. Mitchell et al define these
groups as follows.
Definitive stakeholders: These stakeholders tick all the boxes. They
hold power in the project setting, they have a legitimate claim over
the work being done and they can use urgency to shape what gets
acted on. They might not wield their influence in all ways at all times,
but they could if they wanted to. An example would be your project
sponsor.
Dominant stakeholders: These stakeholders have the attributes
of power and legitimacy. They are probably recognized by your
organization in some way, such as holding a position of hierarchical
power or sitting on a committee or board. These are the kinds of
stakeholders who expect (and receive) formal reports and briefings.
An example would be your project governance board.
Dangerous stakeholders: You may not have stakeholders who fit
into this category, demonstrating the attributes of power and urgency
but with no legitimate claim over the project. As they don’t have a
legitimate claim to the work being done, they may use their power to
influence in destructive ways as they try to ‘muscle in’ on the project.
An example would be someone using coercive power to try to influ-
ence outcomes, for example threatening to have you removed from
the project if you do not take a particular action.
Dependent stakeholders: These stakeholders have the attributes of
legitimacy and urgency but do not have any real power on the project.
An example would be local residents in the town where your team is
building a new facility on the edge of a nature reserve. They are
unable to directly affect the outcomes but they have a legitimate
interest in how the land is used and their involvement will be time-
sensitive. They depend on the actions of others – stakeholders with
power – to effect change.
TABLE 5.1 Example saliency information to include in a stakeholder directory

Name Role Project Power Legitimacy Urgency Category Potential action

Person A Tech team lead Project 1 Y Y Y Definitive Engage fully

Person B Marketing rep Project 1 Y Y N Dominant Engage fully in anticipation of urgency
Person C Customer rep Project 1 Y N Y Dangerous No legitimate authority on the project but
could use their power in inappropriate ways
– engage, plan to mitigate impact of their
actions
Person D Sponsor Project 2 N Y Y Dependent May need to align with a stakeholder with
power to affect change – engage, plan to
respond to their actions
Person E Team lead Project 1 Y N N Dormant Watching brief
Person F Governance Project 2 N Y N Discretionary Watching brief
expert
Person E Sponsor Project 1 N N Y Demanding Watching brief
Person A Tech team lead Project 2 N N N Not a stakeholder Not necessary to engage at this time
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 109

Dormant stakeholders: These stakeholders have power but they

aren’t using it as they don’t have any particular reason to engage with
the project at this time.
Discretionary stakeholders: This group represents people with a
legitimate interest in the work but no power or influence to shape the
direction of the work. These stakeholders are often on the receiving
end of corporate philanthropy, so if one of your projects decom­
missions old staff laptops and reformats them so they can be donated
to and used by local schools, the schools become discretionary
stakeholders.
Demanding stakeholders: These stakeholders have concerns they
consider to be urgent, but no power and no true legitimate claim to
participate in the project. Mitchell et al describe them as ‘mosquitoes
buzzing in the ears of managers’ and give the example of a single
protestor holding a placard outside an organization.
Non-stakeholders: Finally, your analysis may identify people who
are not stakeholders at this time because they have none of the attrib-
utes in the saliency model. However, think carefully before putting
people in this group, especially if they have sought you out and
are acting as if they are stakeholders. Do you really have the full
picture? Why do they think they should be involved in the work in
some capacity? An ignored stakeholder can quickly become a time-
consuming problem for a project so be cautious about dismissing
individuals or groups as irrelevant to the work.
As someone managing multiple projects, you need to be smart
about where to spend your time. The more attributes someone has,
the more likely it is that they need to be on your radar for stakeholder
engagement. However, stakeholders don’t stay in fixed categories.
Their influence over the project (and each other) changes with time.
For example, a dominant stakeholder can become definitive when
they want to get something done. That adds a degree of urgency due
to their expected deadline and they gain the urgency attribute as a
result. Power, authority, urgency, legitimacy and influence can be lost
or gained, slowly over time or in an instant. Stay tuned in to how
stakeholders are shifting on your projects.
110 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

My colleague resigned and I was left his complex projects. As a junior

project manager, I was used to managing the small projects with not
as much engagement required. Taking on more complex projects has
made me realise more stakeholder engagement is required to update
on progress, planning before a change window is arranged and making
sure everyone is on the same page. Communication for me has been
key. Taking 10 to 15 minutes before jumping into my day to analyse
what needs to be done on a project has worked for me, to organize my
thoughts and day ahead. Every day I am learning something new and
I am mindful to keep my lessons learned in my toolbox for when I
need it.
Jenny Harrison, telecommunications project manager, South Africa

The saliency model, and the analysis created for your projects, will
give you a picture of which stakeholders are most influential on any
given project. Once you have the list, look over your analysis to spot
overlaps between projects. Review the list and pick out the stake-
holders who need most of your attention at this time (remember:
stakeholders can move between categories so your analysis is only
relevant at this moment). The attention that stakeholders command
depends on both how relevant they are to the project, as identified by
your analysis, and how much time you have to work with them.
Assuming you have the time, the actions for engaging stakeholders
for each of the categories where they demonstrate more than one
attribute are:
●
Definitive: fully engage this group;
●
Dominant: fully engage this group: they are likely to have requests
with deadlines at some point so it’s important to stay connected to
their expectations;
●
Dangerous: engage with a view to mitigating the impact of their
potential actions (hopefully, you don’t have too many of these);
●
Dependent: engage with a view to understanding their perspective.
If they receive power, through virtue of influencing a powerful
stakeholder or moving into a position of power themselves, you
will need a plan to respond to their concerns.
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 111

Anyone who falls outside these categories should stay on your radar,
but with a watching brief: there’s no need to take specific, targeted
action at this time. Include them in communications and meetings
where relevant but focus your energy on the people who matter more
to project success at this time.

If saliency theory doesn’t work for you, think of other ways you can
identify priority stakeholders across all your projects. The interest and
influence matrix is a popular tool used on single projects and is a simpler
approach for stakeholder analysis, plus you may already be familiar with
that (if not, it’s covered in another of my books, Engaging Stakeholders on
Projects, 2020). However, the tool or approach used to do this doesn’t
matter: your goal is to review the community of stakeholders you work
with regularly to identify the relationships that matter most. That’s where
you need to spend your limited time.

Create a drop-everything list

As we’ve seen, not all stakeholders command equal attention,
especially when your attention is necessarily limited by working with
a large network of contacts across multiple projects. That’s why it is
important to think about whom you allow to pull your focus.
A ‘drop everything list’ is a list of the key stakeholders for
whom you will drop everything to take their call. It’s the people who
really matter to you and your work. If you are stressed or stretched
for time, these are the people who take priority. Anyone else can
wait.
Your list is made up of key work contacts like executive stake­
holders and the project sponsors of your biggest or most important
projects as well as people from your family life, for example childcare
providers or the carer for an elderly relative. You could mark the
contacts on your phone with an abbreviation or special ring tone, or
flag them in your email system or collaboration tools as VIPs where
that’s possible. But you don’t need to write the list down or call out
those contacts in any way – the thought process of considering those
112 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

contacts and having them in your head is enough. If your list is more
people than you can comfortably hold in your head, you probably
need to re-think who your priority contacts really are.

Setting stakeholder expectations

It takes time to deal with miscommunication and people who don’t
complete their tasks. You don’t have a lot of time when you have a
personal portfolio of projects to look after, so it helps to set expecta-
tions effectively. When everyone has realistic expectations of what
they have to do or what they can expect, you save time later because
you shouldn’t have to follow up or repeat yourself so often.
Being seen as someone who helps others understand their role and
responsibilities and provides clarity on the tasks ahead can also help
you position yourself as someone who is easy to work with. Being
perceived as someone stakeholders know, like and trust is another
factor for building solid working relationships which in turn contri­
bute to people making the time to do the work that’s expected of
them for your project.
There are three different types of expectations to manage:

●
Expectations of someone doing project work;
●
Expectations of someone receiving project work;
●
Your own expectations.

Setting expectations for someone doing project work

Unless it’s just you working on the project, you will have to ask
people to do tasks. The clearer you can make your task, the easier it
is for them to understand what you need them to do. People don’t
have the time or the inclination to work it out themselves because
everyone has competing priorities. If it is easy to work with you, your
work goes to the top of their list: another reason why honing those
interpersonal skills is important. Typically, you’ll want to explain:
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 113

●
What the task is;
●
Why it is important;
●
When it needs to be done by;
●
Any quality standards, processes or protocols they need to follow
or abide by;
●
Anything else that is important for them to know.

Before you start the conversation, check over your stakeholder map
and see if they are likely to be involved in any of your other projects.
If they are, use your discussion to talk about all the upcoming tasks
you need their help with.
Good communication skills help you craft a message that makes it
easy for the recipient to understand what you want from them.
Making a really clear ask starts with knowing what it is that we want
the person to do (in this case, get on the phone). The task needs to be
relevant to them and make it clear that you think it is their job to do
the task.
Here’s a formula for asking someone to get involved in your
project.
●
This project will + short description of what the project is going to
do, for example change a process, make a product, update a system,
add new features, onboard a new client.
●
It’s an opportunity to + benefit statement, for example sell more,
save time, increase customer satisfaction, decrease complaints and
so on.
●
Your expertise will + explain what you need them to do, for
example help us craft really good user requirements, smooth the
way with the regulator, be important to secure the backing of a big
client, enable us to build the best solution or similar.
●
I understand from + name of someone important to them or
influential that this is your area.
●
Who would be the right person from your team to work with us
on this?
114 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

I tend to ask the ‘who would be the right person from your team?’
question even if I know the person is the only individual on the team
with the right skills or doesn’t have any direct reports. It is a less
direct way of asking them to commit to the project, and people tend
to accept that the only correct person to support the project is them,
which results in them volunteering their services.
If you are asking someone for a smaller, one-off piece of work that
doesn’t require them to join a project team, change how you phrase
the ask to be relevant in that situation. For example:

I’m working on a project that will make it easier for customers to

find and agree to our terms and conditions. We’re trying to reduce the
number of customer complaints and free up the service team to do
other work, like supporting that project your boss kicked off last
month. We could really do with the support of someone in the legal
team to review the updated document, which will be ready by the end
of the month. Would you be the right person to take that on, if I could
get it to you in the first few days of next month?

You are clearly setting out what you need (the document reviewed)
and when you would prefer the work to happen (from the first few
days of next month). From there, you can negotiate whether they are
the right person and how long they need to complete the task. Once
you’ve gained agreement, put that in writing to them or log it some-
where on your shared task management software so they have a
record of what they’ve committed to (or been committed to by their
manager).
You might also want to set some expectations about how you are
going to work together. For example, how are you going to communi­
cate with each other? What channels are you going to use? How are
you going to get in touch with people, if it’s an emergency? What are
the expectations for a response?
Time is the biggest challenge for setting expectations with a
colleague regarding project work. Typically, you are working with
subject matter experts who have the skills and knowledge to know
what to do. They just don’t have the time to get to your work given
their other priorities. You can address this upfront if you think it
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 115

might be an issue for your project. Explain that you know they have
other commitments. Ask how they see your project fitting into their
overall workload and what priority it has.

Remember, someone has to work on the low priority projects. While it

would be great to believe all our work is top priority, ultimately, it probably
isn’t. For example, I ran a requirements workshop in a hospital when one
of the key stakeholders – a senior nurse – was called away to see a patient.
Treating patients was more important than attending a meeting about an
IT project (of course), even though for me, getting that meeting done was
top priority because without agreement on the requirements we couldn’t
move the project on.
Anyone who has an operational job is more likely to prioritize that work
because it keeps the organization running. There’s no point doing a change
project that launches in six months if your business has collapsed in the
meantime as no one is answering the phones. Be realistic about what
priority your projects really have when viewed through the eyes of others.

Setting expectations for someone receiving project work

Your project sponsors and key stakeholders also have expectations
that need to be managed. They are normally interested in things like:
●
How long will the work take?
●
When can I have it/use it/see it?
●
What am I getting for my money?
●
How much has been spent already?
●
Is it the quality I expected?
●
Does it meet my needs and requirements?

The best way to manage expectations is to be open and honest about

what can be realistically achieved with the time and budget available.
You will likely be challenged about that and asked to deliver more
for less. Present options: everything is possible with the right amount
of time, budget and resources. The balance of how much to invest for
the desired outcome is ultimately their choice.
116 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Have an explicit conversation about when they can expect things

to be delivered, and tell them about the other projects you are work-
ing on. They need to know that you are not 100 per cent dedicated to
this piece of work, and neither is the team. If they want to lobby your
other project sponsors behind the scenes to get their work moved up
the priority list, then they can, but for now it sits within your work
portfolio and you will work on it for the amount of scheduled time
available.
When problems occur, as they most likely will, explain the impact
of those on the dates and budget that have already been agreed. Your
project portfolio and any resource planning information will be help-
ful tools to show what is achievable with the commitments the team
already has.
Try to uncover the way your stakeholders prefer to receive infor-
mation. Someone who needs all the facts will respond better to a
detailed data-driven analysis that leads to a logical conclusion.
Someone who is a big picture thinker might need a diagram that
explains options. If you are presenting to a project board, you’ll need
to create a briefing that supports a number of preferences.
Cautious optimism in these discussions is OK; promising the moon
on a stick because you feel backed into a corner is not. Ask for more
time to assess the impact or promise to give them estimates by the
end of the day (or a time period that feels realistic to you) if you feel
under pressure to commit to something on the spot. Then take the
time to reflect and discuss with the experts on the team so you can
present something realistic.

Setting your own expectations

Finally, think about how realistic your own expectations are. You are
juggling several pieces of work, plus potentially a day job as well.
That’s a lot already. You probably have a maximum of five or six
hours of productive work in you, per day. A good rule of thumb is to
‘book’ yourself to work at 80 per cent capacity. In other words, leave
a 20 per cent buffer in the week so you have time to deal with emer-
gencies, attend team meetings, take lunch breaks and address those
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 117

ad hoc things that you can’t avoid. That could look like keeping one
day a week clear of meetings, or ring-fencing some time each day.
You don’t have to physically block the time in your calendar at all:
use the 80 per cent capacity rule as a mental reminder not to max out
your week. There’s more on personal time management in Chapter 6.

Streamlining project communications

As we’ve seen, a lot of stakeholder engagement is communication. It’s
the fifth principle of personal portfolio management: communicating
project status and providing recommendations for actions to your
manager, project sponsors and other key stakeholders. Communication
goes wider than simply providing status updates and proposals for
action because a lot of modern knowledge work is communication.
Think of all the emails and instant messages you get in a day. Think
of all the staff briefings and phone calls. It is not surprising that stake-
holders suffer from communication fatigue. There is just so much, it’s
hard to pay attention to it all.
Streamlining project communications means looking at where you
can combine messages and meetings. There are two benefits to this:
●
It makes communications easier to deliver because there is less for
you to do.
●
It helps stakeholders avoid communication fatigue.

Trust me, they will thank you!

Below, we’ll look at five ways you can streamline project communi­
cations to make them faster, easier and more relevant to the people
who matter. The five ways to do this are:
●
Combining meetings;
●
Streamlining reporting;
●
Creating countdown plans;
●
Creating communications calendars;
●
Recording decisions.
118 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Combining project meetings

Projects involve a lot of meetings. For example, project managers
attend Project Management Office or departmental meetings that
involve giving updates on and talking about several projects. There
is also the opportunity to talk about multiple projects in stake-
holder and team meetings, even though my research for this book
shows that the default position for 28 per cent of project managers
is to keep a meeting focused on one particular project, as shown in
Figure 5.3.

FIGURE 5.3 Per cent of project managers responding to the question: Do you have
meetings with stakeholders where more than one project is discussed?
50
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
Yes regularly Yes sometimes No

Consider how you can combine project updates from several projects
into one meeting. Instead of having multiple conversations with the
same stakeholder throughout the week, can you combine everything
you want to talk to them about across all of your projects, and just
have one session? Book a time with them, create an agenda that
covers all the projects they’re involved with, and be prepared for any
conversations that may come up as a result.
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 119

Once, I worked with a sponsor who was sponsoring two of my projects.

I arranged a meeting to discuss one of the projects and prepared in detail
to cover that. The agenda was focused purely on that one project which
was the topic for discussion. However, he kept asking about the other
project too. I had not prepared to provide status updates and data related
to the other project, but I did my best. As I stumbled through the briefing,
explaining what I could remember, I learned a hard lesson: just because
we compartmentalize projects, doesn’t mean that stakeholders do the
same. For him, the meeting was just an opportunity to meet ‘his’ project
manager and catch up on all the work he was interested in.

The agenda can list out the projects in order of priority, with sub-
topics for the key things that need to be covered in the meeting. In my
experience, executives who are sponsoring or tangentially involved
with several projects have a lot on, and sometimes benefit from a
quick recap of what the project is and the current status before you
get into the specifics, especially if they are not part of the core team.
However, something I have found when dealing with very busy
stakeholders, especially senior stakeholders, is that they don’t have a
lot of time. Be prepared to jump to the essentials in the meeting.
Make sure that you know what it is that you want to get out of your
time with that individual. If your time is cut, dive straight into that
part of the conversation, whether it’s making decisions or getting
them to take action or asking them to approve something. Those
action-orientated outcomes are more valuable than providing a
generic progress update because they can read that for themselves in
a written report. Use their time wisely because you won’t get very
much of it.
Another option to consider is running multi-project lessons learned
meetings and multi-project closure meetings where it is appropriate
to do so. A multi-project lessons learned meeting works where the
goals and stakeholder groups of several projects overlap. If there isn’t
enough overlap to justify having one single meeting, invite attendees
for the part of the meeting that is relevant to them. Alternatively,
120 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

consider running a couple of lessons learned sessions on the same

day, so attendees who have contributed to more than one project are
able to curate their thoughts for one concerted piece of effort instead
of it being spread out over several weeks.
If you have several projects that are closing at similar times, it
could be beneficial to run a single meeting where approval is given to
close each project. As you look over your calendar and your high-
level milestone plan, consider what other meetings it might be possible
to combine. There’s more on multi-project governance in Chapter 7.

Right now I’m in the middle of three smaller projects all due within
the next month while trying to maintain and keep pushing forward
on the major project that is my main job. Luckily there is a lot of
crossover with the same stakeholders on multiple projects which makes
communication easier – we can catch up on multiple items in the
same conversation. One challenge is that I’m so busy running between
meetings I’m having a hard time putting my notes down and planning
for the next steps, rather than just dashing to the next deadline. I
am making an effort to trust my team as much as possible through
delegation and leaning out on decision-making until I really need to be
involved.
Abigail Appleton, USA

Streamlining project reporting

As Graham Allcott and Hayley Watts say in their book, How to Fix
Meetings (2021), a culture of good reporting leads to fewer meetings.
The more you proactively keep people informed, the fewer meetings
stakeholders will need from you.
If you are leading multiple small projects for the same sponsor or
manager, then you can combine reporting to make it even easier.
Typically, project managers report weekly or monthly, sharing the
current status, progress, risks, issues, outstanding decisions, budget
situation and anything else that speaks to project performance. Some
teams may have a daily standup meeting to take the pulse of the
project(s).
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 121

Regular written reports can be combined, as can be seen in Table

5.2. Agree core performance items to report against and list these in
the first column. Put the project names across the top. If your report
recipients will be able to see the report in colour, change the cell
background colour to the appropriate Red/Amber/Green status to
reflect the summary project status. There’s more on RAG colour
coding in Chapter 4, but, as a recap, Green would mean the project
is progressing to plan, Amber (Yellow) would show it is at risk, and
Red shows it needs management attention. This is a very visual way
of helping your readers identify the projects they need to pay most
attention to.

Reporting on many projects

The more projects you have, the harder it is to prepare consolidated
reports that appear meaningful and are still easy to interpret. There’s
little value in presenting a single slide on each of 20 projects and then
expecting the audience to understand which of those projects they
should be paying the most attention to. The larger your portfolio of
open items, the more work you have to do to highlight where manage-
ment attention is required.
One way to do this is to first flag projects that have a Red status
and need input or decisions from your manager, project sponsor or
governance group. Focus on the initiatives that they need to be aware
of for their work, because they can positively influence the outcome
or remove roadblocks.
Another way to streamline reporting of large amounts of projects
is to go back to the portfolio workload spreadsheet you created in
Chapter 3 and review the buckets of work. Then report against these
buckets, not at individual project level. For example, highlight the
key milestones across a bucket of work and report against those to
show aggregated progress. Another option would be to identify the
organizational benefits that will be achieved across a bucket, flag the
contribution of each project and report on how close you are to
achieving those benefits.
TABLE 5.2 Sample multi-project status report

Project Name Web design project Product launch project Office relocation project

Summary Progressing to plan; client satisfied with Product focus groups were carried out The move is running two months behind
the wireframes delivered last month and this month and feedback was good. The and we will not be able to hit original
is supporting the next phase of work continues to plan but is Amber deadlines
development because we have yet to secure premises
for manufacture
Milestones due 1 July: Development complete None Health & safety visit – delayed
this month 27 July: Changes into production Decision on artwork – delayed

Milestones due 15 August: Demo with client 20 August: Secure premises – we have We need to replan the project to establish
next month 28 August: Budget approval for next several venues in mind but need to work realistic timeframes for the outstanding
phase quickly to arrange a lease on a suitable work
property to ensure we meet schedule
dates
Top risks & issues Risk of slippage due to sickness – see Need to secure a location – see above No solution has been found for the
below recycling bins issue – with Facilities team
Client contact is on holiday for three to resolve
weeks during August – may impact Building is still not available for us to
decision timetable move into
Project Name Web design project Product launch project Office relocation project

Budget Total budget (this phase): £75k Budget depends on premises being Total budget: £550k
Spend to date: £60k secured – final costings will be put in the Spend to date: £325k
Estimate to complete: £73k Board Paper due to be discussed on the
10th

Resourcing The lead web developer is out of the None We didn’t factor in a resource’s paternity
business on sickness absence and this leave to the schedule, so the office
may impact our ability to deliver unless comms is now being managed by the
we can source alternative resource project manager instead of the comms
lead, until he returns
Decisions required Upcoming decision required by client Premises selection None
about scope of next phase
124 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

While project-level reporting may be expected, there is often more

organizational value in understanding the impact or contribution of
a group of initiatives that deliver results towards a common goal.
If you have the time, prepare consolidated reports as well as any
individual reports that are mandated by the management team, and
see how they respond to seeing the bigger picture.

Creating countdown plans

A countdown plan is a step-by-step guide to what needs to be done
by someone (or a team) in order to be ready for the launch or go live
for a project. Not all projects are going to need a countdown plan,
but they are a useful resource if your project involves:
●
Process change;
●
Internal policy change;
●
Changes to working practices or expectations of staff;
●
Data migration, for example where historical information needs to
be transferred into a new software product;
●
User training.

In all these cases, team leaders or individuals need to take responsi-

bility for their part in being ready for the incoming changes, and the
countdown plan helps with that. The countdown plan can be a simple
spreadsheet with columns for:
●
Tasks;
●
Owner;
●
Due date;
●
Status;
●
Notes.

The list of data points to include is similar to the project schedules

and timelines created as part of managing the project. The difference
is that a countdown plan is a very simple checklist or To Do list
for people who are not used to looking at things ‘the project
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 125

management way’. They would benefit from a simple list that focuses
purely on what they have to do.
Each team or department affected will take your countdown plan
template and use it as a working guide as the go live date for the
project moves closer. You will create it for them, but they will take
responsibility for updating it. It includes activities they will do and
also what will be done for them. Examples of tasks that could be
included are:

●
Book a meeting room for the project kick-off meeting for that
department.
●
Nominate a change champion or local lead for this project.
●
Provide a list of PC reference numbers/logins that need access to
the new software.
●
Agree dates for training.
●
Put up posters in staff area.
●
Cascade training materials to the whole team, keeping a list of
who attends.
●
Organize delivery of resources and keep them on site until the
project team arrives to install them.

There is an example in Table 5.3.

Creating a countdown plan for each department affected by your
project is a change management activity; if you have a change
manager assigned to the project, then they can take this on. However,
I’ve never had a dedicated business change manager on any of my
smaller projects, because if your organization has people in that role
they are normally tied up supporting large-scale organizational
change. As the project manager of many smaller projects, you are
likely to need to do this yourself.
It is an additional task when you are already feeling busy and over-
whelmed but the payoff is immense. The easier you can make it for
someone else to do their parts of the project, and the more you can
help them prioritize their project tasks, the less you have to support
them in the future.
TABLE 5.3 Example countdown plan

Countdown Plan for HR Department Go Live

# Task Owner Due Date Status Find more information Notes

1 Book meeting room for project [name] [date] Complete Team manager + HR manager to
kickoff meeting attend, plus others identified by
team manager
2 Nominate change champion [name] [date] In progress Need to confirm asap
3 Provide list of PCs to IT including [name] [date] To do
user IDs
4 Agree dates for training [name] [date] To do
5 Book meeting rooms for training [name] [date] To do
6 Deliver briefing to all team [name] [date] To do Use the slides on the central drive
(link)
7 Read training manual [name] [date] To do Project manager will send you the Call me if you don’t have it by
manual month end
 Countdown Plan for HR Department Go Live

One week to go

8 Check all the user logins work [name] [date] To do

9 Share the briefing with the team [name] [date] To do Link to be provided Still being approved by legal
10 Review planned staff absence [name] [date] To do Organize extra staff to be on site
if needed
11 Go/no go decision [name] [date] To do Call details to be provided

Go live!

12 Be on site between 8am–8pm [name] [date] To do Project team will be with you
13 Put up balloons and banners [name] [date] On hold Budget to be confirmed
14 Catered lunch to be provided by [name] [date] To do Please provide dietary needs
project team
15 Put out desk drops on each desk [name] [date] To do
before 9am
16 Dial in for CEO’s message at 4pm [name] [date] To do Meeting details to be provided
128 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

You’ll still want to check in and make sure they are on track and
doing what the countdown plan says, but you can use that document
as your main communication, which limits the amount of additional
communication materials you’ll need to provide for them.
They will feel more engaged with the project, they will understand
the process and they will hopefully stop feeling overwhelmed them-
selves with the changes coming their way. They will be able to
proactively engage with the project and take ownership of the things
that fall to them. It’s also a good way of holding people accountable
and making sure they are on track with dates. It minimizes the
number of distractions involved in engaging with the project by
breaking down their work into really small steps.
It may feel like this document is basically spoon-feeding profes-
sionals what they should already know how to do, but everyone is
busy. It’s easier for you to use a template to create a countdown plan
for them instead of them trying to work it out themselves. Once they
understand what they have to do, the goal is for you to be a little bit
more hands-off because you have already set them up for success.

Creating a communication calendar

If your project affects a number of teams, you will need to let them
know what’s going on. Often, you can do that by briefing team
leaders and having them cascade information to their teams. That
saves you time, but risks the message not being transmitted exactly as
you would like.
Where there are several projects affecting the same group of teams,
it makes sense to consolidate information so team leaders have an
easier job of sharing what their colleagues need to know. That’s where
a consolidated communications plan comes into play. A consolidated
approach is a way to minimize stakeholder overwhelm, by combin-
ing communications where it makes sense to do so. Look for the
points where it makes sense to run communications together to make
it easier for everyone.
The first step in creating a consolidated communications calendar
is to check that you have a communications schedule for each project.
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 129

What is being shared with whom, and when is it being shared? Your
communication points for individual projects may include:

●
Staff presentations;
●
Newsletter articles;
●
Updates on the intranet or via collaboration tools;
●
Written briefings;
●
Formal reports.

Make a list of key dates and planned communications for each

project. A table works well for this: list the next six months down the
side and the project names across the top. Then plot what comms are
being created and shared for each project in each month.
The goal is to get a sense of what’s being sent to whom and when,
so you can try to minimize duplication and avoid overlaps. It can also
help you see where your stakeholders might be busy. For example, if
one group is having training on a new business process for Project 1
during May, it might be too much for them to also learn about a
new software tool you are launching for Project 2 at the same time.
Or it might align perfectly, and you can combine the training to
cover both.
Look at when you’re sending out information to the same group
of people. Can you put that into one consolidated project newsletter,
perhaps coming from the Project Management Office if you have
one? Could you create a form that asks for two sets of inputs instead
of just one, to meet the requirements for data collection for two of
your projects? Have a think about where you could use and combine
your information. Could you include updates on a couple of projects
in a staff briefing instead of using the time for just one? It won’t be
possible to combine or consolidate every aspect of your communica-
tion but do it where you can.

One important aspect of project communications is making decisions.

As a project team, you’ll make a lot of decisions about what to do and
how to do it. When you have multiple projects on the go, you need a
130 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

way of recording decisions to remove the burden of remembering

them all.
I learned to keep a decision log. When you are designing buildings,
you make decisions or the client makes decisions, on the scope, timing
or on the budget. I find it is important to keep track of which decisions
are taken, why and by whom so that later on you can refer to that. I
have a list of decisions with dates and the project phase as an almost
chronological record of when things were decided. That’s something
I learned the hard way to do.
Els, architect, Belgium

A decision log is a simple record of:

●
What decision was made, written as a statement;
●
Who made the decision;
●
The date the decision was taken;
●
A link to where there is more information, such as meeting minutes
or a recommendation paper.

The value of the decision log is only clear when someone asks why a
decision was taken… and you can’t remember! Look it up and explain
why that choice was made. If necessary, the decision can be over-
turned or changed if new information becomes available or the
project takes a different direction. However, that should be done with
consideration for the rationale used in the past, and in a controlled
way.
These five ways of working – combining meetings and reporting,
creating countdown plans and communication calendars, and record-
ing decisions – will help you streamline project communications and
make it easier to engage with stakeholders across multiple projects at
the same time.
You won’t need or want to use all the tools and techniques
discussed in this chapter on every project. People are as dynamic as
the situations they find themselves in, so test out approaches for
engagement and see what works for your particular project, your
office culture, your environment and the stakeholders themselves.
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 131

It might work to combine project status meetings for one sponsor,

but another wants you to stick to separate meetings for each project.
Or they might change their mind a few months later and ask you to
combine your updates into one conversation.
Keep monitoring what is working and giving you and your project
team the best results. Do more of what works, but be aware that as
your project moves forward, so too do your relationships. If you
notice engagement is flagging, try switching up what you do as that
might give the team a boost.

Making the most of time with other people

A large part of engaging people is getting the time to speak to them,
and that is not always easy. Therefore, when you do get in front of
them, you want to make the most of the time you have together. As
everyone is different, the methods you use to meet up and work with
colleagues will be different. Some people will want face-to-face time
if they can have it. Others will be happy with a quick status update
via text message. Different situations will demand different types and
lengths of interaction. Being productive when you work with stake-
holders is going to look different for each engagement, so let’s
consider some ways to get the most out of whatever time you have
with stakeholders.

If you have attention issues, staying tuned in the entire time is exhausting
so you want the freedom to zoom out from time to time to save your
attention for what matters.
Agendas help, especially if they have time next to each of the agenda
items. Not that it will be religiously kept to but to have some kind of
idea when each item will be discussed, where it’s possible.
People that are neurodiverse also tend to be socially clumsy so if you
have multiple people trying to give feedback they might not know how
to break into the conversation. The project manager can help by making
it clear what the protocol is for getting your contribution in and how
you make it be known that you have something to add.
132 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

There’s a rhythm to a conversation and if you have difficulty with

time, you have difficulty with timing. It might be difficult to spot the
pauses. Then by the time you figure out what you want to say, the pause
is gone.

Brian R King, neurodiversity productivity coach, USA

Book shorter meetings

All your stakeholders are busy. One thing you can do to make the
most of their time is to cut the duration of meetings. Many calendar
software tools have a default length of time for a meeting. The one I
use defaults each meeting to one hour, and most people use the default
setting. You don’t have to. Change the default duration of meetings
to 45 minutes. You can still get through an hour’s worth of meeting
conversation and agenda topics in 45 minutes because you will be
more targeted, focused and waste less time.
If your stakeholders don’t buy into the idea of shorter meetings,
book the meeting for an hour and then finish it 15 minutes early. If
15 minutes is too much of a stretch, aim to cut ten minutes off the
end of the meeting. That gives you some time to catch your breath
between meetings or complete a couple of the small tasks that
dropped out of your last conversations.
Alternatively, start your meetings at ten past the hour. People will
soon get used to it! Try a few different varieties of meeting times and
see what works best for you.

Some people are not interested in coming to meetings, or are too busy
to come to meetings, but you still need their input. Reach out to them
in different formats. In my experience, text-based conversation has been
an effective way of working with technical teams. If they are always
chatting away in their messaging tool, maybe that’s the channel to meet
them on. The right communication approach will save you (and them)
some time.

Jen Mckay, HR coordinator, USA

 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 133

Schedule at 80 per cent availability

Project management software allows team members to assign them-
selves or other people to particular activities. That is resource
scheduling: making sure people are available to do the work at the
required time and that no one is overloaded or sitting around with
nothing to do.
It is tempting to think that everyone on the team, yourself included,
has a full work day to commit to project tasks. Let’s say that a soft-
ware engineer allocates one day a week to one of your projects. They
work 9am to 5pm so that’s a full seven hours of work, because they
are entitled to take an hour’s lunch break. However, they are unlikely
to do seven hours of productive work in that time. It is more realistic
to set expectations of working time at 80 per cent of available time
because of interruptions, bathroom breaks, needing to do errands,
fixing the printer because paper is jammed… and everything else that
means you are not pumping out productive work for a straight seven
hours.
The 80 per cent rule is not a strict expectation. Consider it a guide-
line that helps you get to a more realistic portioning of time. When
you use the 80 per cent rule, you are building in natural contingency
time and hopefully have more chance of hitting your project dead-
lines while not burning out your team.

Use a two-week look ahead

A two-week look ahead is a regular planning conversation with the
team where you discuss what is going to happen in the next fortnight
and what might make those things harder to achieve. It’s a quick
meeting where you ask questions like:
●
Do we all know what the priorities are for the next fortnight?
●
What do we need to be doing now to be ready for these activities
in a fortnight?
●
What might stop us from hitting the deadlines due in a fortnight?
134 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
What hasn’t been finished yet that needs to be carried forward into
the next fortnight, and how does that affect our planned work?
●
Is anyone out of the office in the next fortnight or unable to work
on this particular project during that time?
●
Do we need to adjust our schedule to make sure people are
available, given what we know now?
●
What other projects have we got on that might affect our work in
the next fortnight?
●
What have we learned recently that could shape or influence our
work going forward?

Use the time with the team to review how things are going and to
make sure that realistic expectations are set for the upcoming two-
week period.

Find out when people are available

If your organization uses a shared calendar system, use that to your
advantage. You can check the busy/available times for your colleagues,
and sometimes even see where they are going to be, depending on the
privacy level and settings they have chosen for their account. Put a
note in your calendar to remind you to make calls when you can see
your stakeholders look like they might be free.
People who travel for work might be available to take calls while
they are waiting for trains or flights, as long as the conversation does
not require them to disclose confidential information which they
would not be comfortable talking about in a public place. When I
travelled internationally for work, I would make a lot of calls from
the airport as there wasn’t much else productive I could do. Talk to
their executive assistant and find out when would be a good time to
call. Be strategic about when you get in touch with your colleagues
and you are more likely to reach them when they are able to respond
in a timely manner.
 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 135

Watch when people send their emails. I was working with an international
team, and a colleague would send emails that arrived with me at 1am
or 2am in the morning, my time. Another colleague based in Mumbai
would send emails that arrived around 4am. I watched the times that
they would send emails so I would know when I would be most likely
to get hold of them or to get a fast response. I could work out when
they were available, typically working and looking through their list of
To Dos, and then I could schedule my messages to send then.

Dr Una Olmstead, USA

Paying attention to people’s schedules also works the other way:

note when people tend to gravitate to you for help. Is there a time
in the day or week when you seem to get interrupted more often?
When are your phone and collaboration tools constantly pinging
with incoming calls or messages? Pre-empt those times by keeping
your diary light or doing work where you can be easily interrupted.
Alternatively, walk around the office or check in with your colleagues
with a quick chat message to find out if they have anything for you
before you settle in for a period of focused work.
When people are available is part of the equation, but how to
reach them is also important. Phone calls and emails are options, and
most stakeholders will have many other ways to reach them, like
collaboration tools, or text or voice messages on various platforms.
Ask your colleagues how they would prefer you to get in touch with
them. What’s the channel they are most connected to, the one they
gravitate to and use the most? That’s the best way to get in touch.
While you are having the conversation, point out what works best
for you too, in case they need to get hold of you urgently.

I worked out that 8.30am is the best time to drop in somebody’s inbox,
because that makes your message the first thing they see in the morning.
Or if they’ve been on holiday, I time the message to arrive for 10am.
At that point they’ve probably got through their urgent stuff and are
ready, sitting with a second cup of tea ready to get back into work.

Amanda Howard, project manager, higher education sector, UK

136 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Make the time to build relationships

The single biggest thing you can do to make the most of time with
other people is to have a trusted professional relationship with them.
When you have that, you can dive straight into the heart of any
conversation. You can provide a different level of background infor-
mation because they will already have confidence that you are
presenting everything they need to know.
Investing time in building those relationships will pay off many
times over. Put people at the centre of your projects, not the tasks,
activities or goals. Make your workplace inclusive. Use strategies that
allow everyone to contribute. That will help you communicate and
collaborate effectively, as well as encouraging feelings of belonging in
the team. It also supports resilience in the team: people are more
likely to be patient and work with you to address challenges if they
trust you are doing the best job you can with the information and
resources you have.
Relationship building goes faster when you meet people face-to-
face. Budget – if you can – for remote teams to meet up at the
beginning of a new piece of work. That will help everyone get to
know each other and show that you are willing to invest time and
effort in developing those relationships for the good for the project.
Where it is impossible to meet in person, think about how you can
foster a sense of team and stay connected to each other despite the
distance.

For the last six years, I have managed multiple projects at a time. It is
hard to keep up if you don’t have a good platform to track progress
and a good schedule system to manage meetings and deadlines. I believe
that the key to succeed in managing multiple projects is learning how
to build a good team in a culture of trust where you can delegate
important tasks and trust that the work is getting done. Early in all my
projects, I make sure that we are building the right foundation for the
project by meeting with the sponsor, stakeholders and teams and listen
to why the project is important, clearly defining their roles and working
together on setting clear expectations.

Ana Lozoya, IT PMO manager, Canada

 CONCEPT #3: PEOPLE 137

KEY TAKEAWAYS
●
Stakeholder engagement is the activity that keeps people connected to
your projects. The more people feel connected to your project, the less
chasing up you should (hopefully) have to do, saving you time.
●
Project sponsors are the most influential of all your stakeholders.
●
The stakeholder directory and stakeholder map are your tools for
understanding who is involved in which projects, so no one gets
forgotten.
●
You have limited time, so prioritize working with and engaging the
most appropriate stakeholders in the most time-efficient ways to get
the best results for the project.
●
Setting expectations helps you manage the work and helps others
know what they have to do.
●
Streamlining project communications through consolidated reporting,
meetings and other communications helps to avoid stakeholder overload
and helps people deal with all the changes an organization is going
through – not just the one project you’re talking about at the moment.

ACTION STEPS

Your action steps from this chapter are:

●
Identify all your stakeholders and create a stakeholder register and
stakeholder map.
●
Review the power, legitimacy and expectation of urgency of your
stakeholders across all of your projects, and use a table to identify
stakeholder saliency and to help you prioritize where you spend your
time.
●
Check everyone knows what is expected of them for each project and
that they are only scheduled to work at 80 per cent of their available
hours.
●
Review your upcoming meetings and see what can be combined and
which ones can be done in less time: change your default meeting time
to at least ten minutes less than what it is now.
138 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
Look at your individual communications plans and see where it makes
sense to consolidate and merge the information that is being shared
with your stakeholders.

References
Association for Project Management (2019) APM Body of Knowledge, 7th edn,
APM, Princes Risborough
Allcott, G and Watts, H (2021) How to Fix Meetings, Icon Books, London
Gallup, Inc (2020) The Relationship Between Engagement at Work and
Organizational Outcomes, 2020 Q12® Meta-Analysis: 10th edn. Available from
www.gallup.com/workplace/321725/gallup-q12-meta-analysis-report.aspx
(archived at https://perma.cc/9PAN-8Q4A)
Gallup, Inc (2021) State of the Global Workplace 2021 Report. Available from
www.gallup.com/workplace/349484/state-of-the-global-workplace.aspx
(archived at https://perma.cc/CBT8-XQHA)
Harrin, E (2020) Engaging Stakeholders on Projects: How to harness people
power, APM, Princes Risborough
Harrin, E (2021) Managing multiple projects: the research, 29 October. Available
from https://rebelsguidetopm.com/managing-multiple-projects-the-research/
(archived at https://perma.cc/73XE-MV4Z)
Mitchell, R K, Agle, B R and Wood, D J (1997) Toward a theory of stakeholder
identification and salience: Defining the principle of who and what really
counts, The Academy of Management Review, 22 (4), 853–86
Nieto-Rodriguez, A (2021) Harvard Business Review Project Management
Handbook: How to launch, lead and sponsor successful projects, Harvard
Business Review Press, Boston

Further reading
Pullan, P (2016) Virtual Leadership, Kogan Page, London
Smith, T and Kirby, A (2021) Neurodiversity at Work: Drive innovation,
performance and productivity with a neurodiverse workforce, Kogan Page,
London
 06

Concept #4: Productivity:

managing your own time

Managing multiple projects is a lot like juggling: you have a lot

of balls in the air and it’s important each of them stays moving.
You could easily spend all your time working on one project, to the
detriment of others. However, the reality for most people with a
multi-project workload is that you have to make progress (and be
seen to be making progress) across all your projects, because that is
what your customers expect.
It’s often said that you can’t manage time. Time passes whether
you want it to or not. We can only make the best of the time we have
by making sure we are working on the right things and dedicating
our focus to the activities that matter most. That’s harder than it
sounds. In a study for their book, Not Today, Erica and Mike Schultz
(2021) found that 47 per cent of respondents spend a significant
amount of work time on non-value added tasks or timewasting
activities.
It is also hard to stay focused with the constant distractions at
work. In a survey by Udemy (2018), 50 per cent of people reported
being significantly less productive as a result of distractions, with
74 per cent of millennials and Gen Z respondents describing them­
selves as distracted at work. The impacts are significant: lack of
motivation, stress, frustration and decreased staff retention, and –
according to research carried out by Mark et al (2008) – compensating
for interruptions by working faster.
140 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

If you have several projects on the go at once you will end up

switching between them during the week, and often during a single
day, as you focus on what is currently important. Being productive in
such an environment is the fourth concept in the managing multiple
projects framework, as shown in Figure 6.1. A key skill is being able
to make the most of your working hours so you keep everything
moving forward – without leaving you feeling overwhelmed or burnt
out. Having a toolbox full of productivity and time management
strategies will help you maximize your time.
This chapter is your toolbox. You’ll learn about the productivity
saboteurs that stop you making progress and how to overcome them.
You’ll discover new tips to boost your productivity and techniques to
help keep you focused on the most important tasks.

FIGURE 6.1 The Productivity concept in the managing multiple projects framework

Productivity saboteurs
Research for this book (Harrin, 2021) shows that over a third of
project managers find procrastination their largest productivity
saboteur when it comes to managing multiple projects, as shown in
Figure 6.2. Productivity can be affected by many things. There are
plenty of things at work that make it hard for you to progress your
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 141

projects – the skill is in being able to identify and tackle them so you
can keep moving forward. Let’s look at the top productivity sabo-
teurs identified in Figure 6.2: procrastination, disorganization and
poor planning, and how you can effectively address each of these.

Procrastination
Procrastination can be characterized by general dithering about,
putting off tasks and choosing to work on other things because they
are easier or shorter, and not making progress. Humans seem to be
wired to find easy ways to do things, and sometimes doing a
completely different task is easier than the big, difficult thing you’ve
got at the top of your To Do list. As one survey respondent wrote,
their biggest productivity saboteur is ‘Prioritizing items and doing the
easy things first.’

Procrastination tends to be the evil of productivity. Whether this is a

big or small task/project, we tend to leave the bigger ones which causes
the procrastination within us. Why? Because we feel it takes a lot longer.
So we focus on the small ones. If you calculated the time it took to do
the smaller tasks this would almost equate to the same time it would
take the bigger projects. So why not flip this on its head and use
procrastination to your advantage? Procrastinate on the small tasks
which don’t really matter and work on the bigger tasks. Bigger projects
may require quality and we aim for perfection. But focus on ‘Version
One Is Better Than Version None’ and progress to high quality. The
surprising thing is the smaller tasks you have left aside may no longer
need doing, because they have been covered in the bigger projects.
So use procrastination to your advantage and flip it over to the smaller
projects/tasks. Use procrastination to increase your productivity, and
you be in control rather than letting it control you.

Chet Hirani, performance coach, UK

FIGURE 6.2 Productivity saboteurs identified by project managers
40%

35%

30%

25%

20%

15%

10%

5%

0%
Proc Diso Poo Com Res Inte
rast rgan r pla mun rrup
inat izat nning ication
ourc
es tion
s
ion ion
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 143

If it feels like procrastinating is a challenge you share, here are some

tips for managing procrastination. First, get clear on the vision and
the goals for your projects. Write them down and stick them up near
your desk. Being able to visually see where you are going and what
your targets are can help you stay on track.
Make the most of your calendar. Plan your time so you have blocks
of hours available to work on certain things. Use colour coding to
help keep you on track. There’s more about personal time manage-
ment and time blocking later in this chapter, so keep reading for tips
for how to use your calendar effectively.
Make sure you get enough sleep. It’s really hard to do anything
if you don’t have enough sleep. You’ll fall into the habit of doing
the easy work because you don’t have the cognitive capacity to deal
with anything that takes strategic thinking or a bit of brainpower.
Eating is just as important. You’ll know how your body reacts with-
out food: skipping lunch is rarely a good idea, especially if it makes
you cranky.
Interruptions and distractions were only the major productivity
saboteur for 2 per cent of project managers in my research for this
book, but we all suffer from them. Identify what interrupts or dis-
tracts you the most and how you could better respond to those. For
example:

●
Social media: unless it’s part of your job, put time aside to check
and participate on social media.
●
Phone calls: screen your calls. Record an out of office message and
if you don’t recognize the number, let it go to voicemail and attend
to it later.
●
Email: set an out of office message and take an afternoon off being
constantly in your inbox, or dedicate time slots during the day to
reading and responding to messages.

Break your big tasks into smaller ones. Procrastination often happens
when people find it difficult to make progress on something because
it feels too big. If you can break the work down into smaller activi-
ties, you might find it easier to make some progress.
144 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Finally, focus on the consequences of not doing something. There

might not be any consequences, in which case, you have to ask your-
self, why am I spending time on this? However, there are probably
going to be substantive consequences for you and for your project if
the work doesn’t get done. If you’re aware of those, that could give
you a little bit of pressure for making sure that you make time to do
your tasks.

ONE, TWO, DONE

Get into the habit of ‘one, two, done’: this means touch something one
time, and if it’s a task you can complete in under two minutes, it gets
done straight away. For example, a quick response to an email, booking a
meeting, filing a document, leaving a voicemail (only if you can guarantee
they won’t pick up, as that would push it over two minutes).
David Allen popularized the two-minute rule in his book Getting Things
Done (2002). The key is to only apply the rule if you are already doing
something related to the task. For example, you’re in your inbox, sorting
out a lot of emails and one needs a quick response. That’s an OK situation
to apply ‘one, two, done’. If you are working through your inbox sorting
emails and suddenly remember you need to take mail to the post box (or
post room) then pause before you get up from your desk. While the mail
drop task might only take two minutes, it would pull you away from what
you are currently doing so it’s not a good use of your time. Allen calls the
time you spend working out what to do with each activity ‘processing
time’ and this is when it makes most sense to apply the two-minute rule.
Where it takes longer to schedule the task than to do it now, doing it now
is your best choice. Note down any unrelated tasks so you don’t forget
them and come back to them later.

Disorganization
As we saw in Figure 6.2, over one in five project managers report
their biggest productivity saboteur is being disorganized. Given that
being organized is pretty much a key skill for someone managing
projects, that might come as a surprise. However, when things are
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 145

busy at work, corners are cut – often with good intentions. Later, that
causes problems because the task wasn’t completed in exactly the
right way.

While I was creating a new project management webinar, I saved files to a

variety of places. Slides went in the ‘Speaking’ folder, handouts for
delegates went in my ‘Products to Download’ folder, promotional
information went somewhere else, and I saved the video recording on to a
hard drive.
Needless to say, when I wanted to re-run the webinar, it took a while to
find all the different components. A disorganized filing system (even
though it felt like it made sense at the time) slowed me down.

Being disorganized leads to not being able to find important infor­

mation in a timely fashion. It can contribute to missing deadlines,
because you didn’t remember, or didn’t know, they were coming. It
can result in turning up late for meetings, not working on the right
things, or duplicating tasks that someone else has already completed.
I’m sure we have all worked with people who are the epitome of
disorganization. Whether that is you or whether that is somebody in
your team, there are some things that you can do to help and resolve
disorganization as one of your productivity saboteurs.
First, consider your calendar as your friend. Create alerts and noti-
fications to act as reminders. For example, Outlook defaults to
reminding you of meetings 15 minutes in advance, but you can set
yourself a reminder for two or three days in advance. Use that, for
example, as a prompt to send out a meeting agenda.
Next, try to create a structured environment in which to work.
You don’t have to do that all in one go. Start small, and build in
structure as and when you have time or are picking up a task to do.
For example:

●
The next time you need the contact details of a key supplier, create
a contacts list in a tool of your choice and put them in there. Add
the contact details for other stakeholders or vendors in time.
146 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
The next time you need to file an email, quickly review where it’s
going to end up. Is the folder name clear? Will you be able to find
it again? And do you need to keep it at all? A better answer might
be to save any attachments and delete the original email. Decide on
your approach for email filing and stick to it going forward. Don’t
worry about re-filing everything from the past – just use your new
personal rules going forward.
●
Choose one method for taking notes and stick to it, whether that’s
a notebook, an app, dictation which you transcribe, or something
else.

In my experience, a lot of the feelings of overwhelm and disorganiza-

tion stem from technology. Modern collaboration tools are designed
to be intuitive and need little training, and unfortunately that has
meant that employees are often left to their own devices to work out
how to effectively use the tools they are given. While you can pick up
the basics with very little learning curve, there are often helpful
shortcuts and best practices available – if only you knew about them.
Block out ten minutes every couple of weeks to review the help
files available from your project management software tool provider.
Most products have both video and text-based user guides so you can
learn how to use the software more effectively. If time is a premium
(and when is it not?), play the training videos on 1.5 speed. Being
able to confidently use your software tools can make the difference
between feeling like data is lost forever and being able to quickly save
and retrieve important information, and stay more organized.

FILING FOR FINDING

Filing for finding means storing information in a way that makes it easy to
find in the future. Think about how your document filing system is set up.
Simple changes, like numbering folders or creating naming conventions
for documents, will make it easier to retrieve files in the future. For
example:
●
Number folders if you want them to appear in a certain order. Naming
folders 01 – January, 02 – February and so on will ensure they appear
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 147

in the right order. Do the same with 01 – Project initiation, 02 –

Planning and other topics if you have folders for project stages.
●
Use the year-month-date format for dates in file names to enable files
to be sorted by name and appear in chronological order, for example
‘Project Board Minutes 20220606’ for the notes of a meeting from
6 June 2022.
●
Pay attention to file names from scanned files, photographs or
attachments. These often default to random characters, dates, ‘Doc1’
and so on. Change names to match your naming convention.

Poor planning
Figure 6.2 shows that poor planning is the productivity saboteur that
20 per cent of project managers find the biggest challenge. It results
in having to do rework, and causing confusion because you’re not
exactly sure where to start, so you might start on something that’s
not the right task for now. Poor planning can really affect how much
progress you’re making.

Verbatim survey responses for the impact and causes of poor planning:
●
Rework or wasted work due to competing project priorities
●
Things often take longer than expected
●
Too many competing priorities
●
Prioritization of which issues to focus on and which to leave to the
teams to solve
●
Other people’s lack of planning and procrastination becoming someone
else’s emergency
●
Lack of clearly defined and approved requirements from the business
areas
●
Lack of clear strategy or vision from senior management
●
Lack of clarity on project requirements which leads to rework
●
Lack of clarity from project sponsor, frequent scope evolution
148 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
Bad memory – too many balls juggling in the air and I drop a ball and
then forget I ever had it.

Unsurprisingly, the fix for poor planning is to plan. One of the

common barriers to creating a plan is the knowledge that it will
change. What’s the point in investing time in planning if your work-
load and calendar will look different next week?
It is worth planning – at least at a level of detail that won’t make
you deflate like a popped balloon when someone changes their mind
about an activity. You know your environment and your stakehold-
ers: if you know that you won’t be able to bring more stability to the
setting, then instead focus on how to adapt quickly and make nimble
changes to your plan as the situation evolves. Take a look at the
section on rolling wave planning in Chapter 4 for some guidance on
how to document a project when you aren’t sure of exactly what is
going to be worked on at any given time, but stakeholders still want
to see that you have ‘a plan’.
Ideally, you would be able to influence your environment to bring
a bit more stability to the work. This might take a few difficult
conversations with internal customers or senior leaders to highlight
the challenges of trying to get things done when everything changes.
Another approach is to work with your team, if you have one, to
create a plan that you can all buy into. Often plans fail because the
right people were not involved in creating them. You’ve probably
been in a situation where someone tells you what needs to happen by
when: it’s not a good feeling because it removes your agency. This
impact on motivation and commitment may be the difference between
hitting a date and not hitting it, so if you can encourage others to tell
you when their pieces of the project will be completed, that’s a start-
ing point for your scheduling. If project team members offer you
dates that do not fit with overall expectations, or they refuse to
commit to dates at all, that’s a different challenge!
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 149

TIPS FOR WHEN PEOPLE WON’ T COMMIT TO DATES

One of the biggest challenges for people managing projects is getting

their colleagues to commit to delivery dates for their portions of the work
– and then ensuring those dates are achieved. If you find people will not
commit to dates the issues could be:
●
They don’t know how to estimate: help them break down the task into
smaller chunks and work out how long it will take.
●
They don’t know how to deal with the uncertainty: ask them what the
major risks to their work would be and what would stop them
achieving those dates. Then factor that into the estimate. For example,
talk about best case/worst case scenarios and put the worst case dates
on your schedule (while hoping they meet the best case dates).
●
They don’t understand that their work has an impact on anything else:
show them the overall plan and explain the consequences to the
project overall if their tasks are not completed on time.
●
Their manager is not prioritizing the project tasks and letting them
have time to work on them: explain the value, relevance and
importance of the project so they can share that with their manager
and, if necessary, escalate to their manager or your project sponsor.

Agree a process for dealing with changes to that plan, as next week it
might look totally different. The process should be a way for the
team to assess and incorporate new requests and changes. That allows
you to adapt and iterate as you go – but it needs to be a process
followed by everyone. Make sure stakeholders know how to suggest
changes and guide them through the approval process so they can be
incorporated into the plan in a structured way, where everyone knows
their impact.
Consider how you are working together as a team. Is your approach
keeping everyone on the same page? You can do that through regular
conversations, one to one check-ins, team meetings, and any other
communications that you push out to people. Communication can
really help by making sure that everybody knows what the priorities
are for the upcoming week based on what your plan says.
150 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Overcoming the saboteurs

A lot of issues with productivity are actually issues with mindset.
Your working style can be changed if you want it to change. Give
yourself permission to be more organized – sometimes disorganiza-
tion is a learned habit. If you can get out of the habit and try to set
yourself up with systems, then you can perhaps be more efficient with
how you make things work.
Everyone works and thinks in different ways. Try different
approaches, test and iterate, and ditch what doesn’t work for you. I
take notes in a notebook, but that might be inefficient for you. You
will find something that works, so get creative and use your tech to
the best advantage to make systems work for you.

Techniques to make the most of your time

Work time is split between the time you spend with other people
in meetings or working together, which is covered in Chapter 5, and
the time you spend doing your own work independently of others.
Making the most of both those types of time will help you feel more
productive and on top of your workload.
One way to filter tasks coming in is to use what Canfield et al
(2000) call the 4-D solution: dump (which I call delete in this digital
world), delegate, defer, do. In other words, you have four choices for
every task that comes across your desk:
●
Delete: no one needs to do this task. Make the decision that it is
not going to get done.
●
Delegate: the task needs to be done, but not necessarily by you.
Delegate it to the person best placed to complete it. If you don’t
know who could do it, but know that you don’t want to or don’t
have time to do it, ask who else is available to pick the work up.
You may need to make a note to follow up (which is a task for
your personal To Do list).
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 151

●
Defer: the task needs to be done by you. It’s not something you can
do right now, so schedule it or make a note that it needs to be done
at some point.
●
Do: the task needs to be done by you. If it’s appropriate to do it
now, do so. If it can’t be done now, put it on your To Do list, noting
its relative priority, even if that means something else has to drop
off.

Time is precious. We can only make the most of what we have.

Practise making quick decisions as you look through your list of
incoming requests.

People with time blindness don’t feel time passing so they have difficulty
estimating how long things are going to take. When you hear about
people who put off things to the last minute and burn the midnight oil,
these are usually people who think, ‘I’ve got enough time’. For them
the future is always far away until it feels like it’s right here because
their sense of time is either ‘now’ or ‘not now’, there isn’t a sense of
progression. We have a funny relationship with the clock. We have half
an hour to do something and our body doesn’t know what half an hour
feels like.
I always have a clock in front of me on the upper right-hand corner
of the computer screen. I use Google calendar so it has the scrolling
bar on the calendar to show me where I am in the day. The Time Timer,
which was built for kids in the classroom, shows time as a big red pie
and as time lessens, the red goes away. By showing time as a decreasing
amount of red that computes with the brain to register that time is
dwindling. So having concrete measures can really help. In some cases,
you have to set yourself multiple alarms, sometimes every 15 minutes.
A lot of people who are working well in teams could have flown under
the radar and don’t necessarily know why they do things differently so
they might not have insight into time blindness.

Brian R. King, neurodiversity productivity coach, USA

152 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

TIS: Task, Interest, Skill

Once tasks have made it on to your To Do list, another way of maxi-
mizing your available time is to use what I call Task/Interest/Skill
(TIS) to come up with the best way to approach each activity.
Ask yourself:

●
What is the task?
●
What is your level of interest in the task?
●
How skilled are you at doing the task?

This information helps you establish your profile for each task and
how you might best make the most of your time tackling it. There are
four task profiles as shown in Figure 6.3.

FIGURE 6.3 Task profiles

Occupant: For these tasks you have low interest and low skill. The
tasks occupy you, but you aren’t particularly keen to do them or
particularly good at them. Spending too much time on tasks that fall
into this category will suck your motivation. When you aren’t inter-
ested in your work and don’t know how to get started, you are at risk
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 153

of procrastinating. Manage these tasks by limiting how many of them

you have to do. If the work is crucial to your role, increase your skill
level with some training so you can get through them faster.
Alternatively, consider delegating the work to somebody who does
enjoy that kind of task.
Expert: For these tasks you have low interest and high skill. You
are capable of doing the work to a good standard, but it doesn’t
inspire you. You’re considered a safe pair of hands for this work.
People know you can do the tasks, but you may find your role boring
if too much of your time is spent here. Consider training someone
else to do the task: share your knowledge with someone who would
love to know how to do it. If a lot of your work falls into this cate-
gory, it might be time to talk to your manager about a career change
or promotion. Resentment may set in if you don’t enjoy the tasks that
you are being asked to do on a regular basis.
Enthusiast: For these tasks you have high interest and low skill.
You enjoy the work but you don’t have any special talent at doing it
(yet). Tasks in this category can eat up far more time than you origin­
ally allowed because once you start them, you begin to research and
learn to fill your knowledge gaps. The learning part is fun, so the time
passes quickly. Manage these tasks by giving yourself a set window in
which to work on them so you can get stuck into improving your
skills but limit your ability to get carried away. It’s not a good use of
your time to get sucked into a new topic when you are pushed for
time, so ring fence your time, delegate the work to someone who can
do it more quickly than you, or plan to come back to it later when
your priority work is done. If time isn’t an issue, feel free to spend lots
of it on these activities! If you love the work and are learning new
skills, one day you’ll become a pro.
Pro: For these tasks you have high skill and high interest. You love
the work and you are good at it. This is where the state of Flow sets
in. This state, described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his 2002 book
called Flow, is where you are absorbed in your work, fully immersed
in what you are doing and enjoying it – and you look at the clock and
154 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

three hours have passed without you realizing, during which you’ve
achieved a lot. Achieving a Flow state is a great way to maximize
what you can do with your time. Extremely productive people are
2.6 times more likely to work in a state of flow, and 3.8 times more
likely to concentrate for longer periods than other people (Schultz
and Schultz, 2021).
Try to spend as much time as possible doing pro-level tasks. It’s an
efficient use of your time because you are skilled at the activities.
You’ll be doing your best work and enjoying it at the same time. It
would be great if your whole working day was full of tasks that
found you in a state of Flow and let you act as a pro for hours at a
time. However, your workload is going to include other activities that
you aren’t so good at or care so much about. As someone in charge
of multiple projects, there are going to be tasks that need to get done
regardless of how much you aren’t interested in doing them. Ideally,
you’d be able to build a project team to fill your gaps: surround your-
self with people who are good at what you are not good at, so together
you have an amazing pro profile to tackle the project. In real life you
won’t always have the ability to recruit or even select people for your
team. Look at the Task/Interest/Skill combination for each activity
and make a decision about how to approach the work based on your
task profile, so you can spend your time as wisely as possible.

Planning time to do your own work

You’ve carefully curated what you say yes to and considered your
levels of interest and skill for each activity so you can use broad strat-
egies make the most of your time. Beyond that, it is helpful to have a
toolbox of quick tips and tactics for finding time in your calendar to
get your own tasks done. If you’re in a lot of meetings, or if you feel
that your calendar is out of control, then hopefully some of these tips
will help you.
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 155

Transfer key dates to your calendar

Transfer key project dates and times to your calendar. Add your team
members’ holidays and other out of office time as well so you are
reminded about their availability. It’s also nice to record their birth-
days where they are willing to share that information with you, so
you can celebrate as a team.
Add a reminder to alert you a couple of days before an important
date. Block time in your diary to prepare for those key events; for
example, sending out the agenda for a project board meeting, prepar-
ing your expenses or a budget report to submit for a project, or
completing monthly reporting for your project management office.
Those blocks of time can move if something else comes up, but the
fact that they are in there at all will help you preserve the time
required to do the work. If you are worried about how it looks to
others to have time blocked out on your calendar for personal work
and meeting prep, then call it something else. Allcott and Watts
suggest you label the time as ‘Project Magenta’ in their book, How to
Fix Meetings (2021). Your colleagues won’t know what that is, but
because it sounds important they won’t book their meetings over it
either.

Make sure your work calendar is synced with your personal calendar. You
have one life, so use one diary system to manage it all and you won’t book
a project meeting at the same time as the school concert.

Plan transition time

Transition time is the gap between one activity and the next. If your
diary is full of back-to-back meetings, you don’t have any transition
time. That can be a huge source of stress. Be realistic about the
amount of time you need to physically or mentally move between
meetings. For example, make sure the meetings you are in control of
156 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

are not scheduled back-to-back. You can schedule your meetings for
45 minutes, and that gives you a 15-minute window if you have
another meeting starting at the top of the next hour. Use that time to
mentally prepare or take a bathroom break, for example.

One of my biggest stressors in the office was back-to-back meetings.

I would spend time the day before or early in the morning making sure
I had all the papers ready for the meetings, and a printed-out calendar of
where I was supposed to be when. I’d make empty documents for meeting
minutes so I could save time getting the notes out from each conversation.
And then I had children.
I constantly managed their transitions between activities, like giving
countdowns: ‘We can play for ten – five – three – one more minute and
then we are going home.’ But my own transitions went more like: It’s
5.25pm and I have to leave the office in five minutes. I can totally fit in writing
another email before I go.
When I realized, I started winding down from work 30 minutes before I
needed to walk out the door. Now I check my To Do list and make sure the
big things are done (and finish those straggler tasks like sending that
half-written email I started at 8am). I mark the most important things for
tomorrow so I know what to focus on. I do end-of-day things like change
my out-of-office message, take my cups back to the kitchen, a last-minute
check-in with my team. It’s a calmer end to the day.

Book weekly reviews with yourself

Book a 15-minute review with yourself every week. It can happen at
any time in the week, but make it a regular slot. Use the time to
review your calendar for what’s coming up. Look through your
project portfolio list and remind yourself of what is outstanding – not
for the project team but for you personally.
It is very easy to fall behind on projects when you are managing
multiple things (and very difficult to catch up again), so a quick scan
through your list of projects will help refresh your memory on what’s
a priority and what you could do to keep each project moving
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 157

forward. Reflect on which projects are getting most of your time and
adjust that for the coming week if necessary.

Track your time

Time-tracking software is worth using if you have access to it and are
in an organization that has a culture of time management and time
tracking. If you don’t have access to that, just keep a note of what
you are doing for a couple of weeks and you’ll soon get a feel for
which projects are taking up most of your time. Look back through
your calendar to see how many meetings you had about each differ-
ent project.
Your time tracking does not have to be accurate, or even some-
thing you do every week. The goal is simply to be aware, and conscious
of which projects are sucking up all of your time. Conversely, the
time-tracking information should help you identify which projects
are not moving on, because you’re not in a position to give them the
time that they need.
If you identify projects that are not making progress due to how
you are spending your time, look at your priorities and see what can
be moved around to make more time for the lagging project. That
might involve talking to your manager or project sponsor about how
realistic it is to continue moving ahead with everything right now.
Use your project portfolio list to help frame your workload.

Know your high-energy times

It is unrealistic to feel you can keep the same pace of work through-
out a full day. Think about when you feel most energized. Perhaps
it’s the morning, when you are coming to your work fresh from a
brilliant night’s sleep. Perhaps it’s the evening, as you’re a night owl.
Try to schedule your difficult, most thought-inducing work at the
times when you have most energy. At its most simple, that means not
scheduling strategic meetings for just after lunch when many people
have a bit of a post-lunch slump.
158 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Your personal energy levels and enthusiasm for work change

throughout the week, month and year. Women may find their energy
levels and ability to concentrate fluctuate with the hormone changes
that come from the menstrual cycle.
It is not possible to perfectly plan your time around your prefer-
ences and moods – managers are unlikely to be receptive to the idea
that you only do creative work on certain days, for example. However,
where it is within your control to make choices about when to do
work, use that to your advantage.

If working during your high-energy times doesn’t resonate with you, try
‘eating the frog’ instead. The term comes from Brian Tracy’s popular book,
Eat That Frog! (2017) and refers to the saying that if the first thing you do
each morning is to eat a live frog, the day only gets better from there.
Tracy says that your ‘frog’ is the biggest, most important task that will give
you the most positive impact today, and also happens to be the one you
are most likely to procrastinate on. Do your hardest task in the morning
and you can go about the rest of the day with a sense of accomplishment.

Deal with the guilt

Let’s say you want to spend a couple of hours drafting out the plans
for two projects and considering how they integrate so you can
manage them together. You have blocked time in your diary for that,
and perhaps even booked a meeting room to work in so you aren’t
physically at your desk where you could be easily interrupted. If your
office culture is one where everyone seems to want everything done
instantly, you may feel nervous about being ‘away’, even for two
hours. This is something I hear frequently from the people I mentor:
they don’t want to be perceived as unavailable in case something
important comes up.
It is time to set boundaries. Be realistic: what is it that could
possibly happen within a two-hour window that would need your
immediate attention? Perhaps a critical component failure, some kind
of system outage or breakage, or a high-profile customer complaint
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 159

or news story that needs a timely response – there could be situations

where you need to be reached. That’s OK. You have a ‘drop every-
thing list’ (see Chapter 5) to help streamline incoming enquiries. Tell
your colleagues what you are doing and that you’d prefer not to be
disturbed unless it’s urgent.
More often than not, you’ll be able to spend a couple of hours on
focused work and no one will even realise you didn’t check your
messages during that time. Try it!

A study from Columbia Business School (Bellezza et al, 2017) showed that
high social status is conferred on people who are seen to be busy. They are
perceived as competent and ambitious. Be deeply honest with yourself: do
you think there is a sliver of a chance that some of your busyness is
caused by wanting to be seen to be busy? Do people in your organization
value busyness? The study also found that people wearing a bluetooth
headset were perceived as competent, ambitious and of high social status.
Perhaps investing in a headset to wear (even if you never took calls on it)
would balance the need to be seen as constantly busy.

Let people know where you are

Set expectations with your colleagues by making the most of out of
office messages and system alerts. This is especially important if you
are going to be out of the office for any length of time. In The Burnout
Epidemic, Jennifer Moss (2021) recommends adding a one-day
buffer to your out of office message: tell people you are back at work
the day after you actually come back. Your immediate team will
know that you are back, but colleagues in your extended network
might hold off chasing you for another day. That should buy you
some time to catch up at your own pace.
Change the presence setting in your collaboration tools to ‘away’.
Put a message on your voicemail and email saying that you are
unavailable at the moment, or not able to read emails until after
lunch, or whatever. When people know you are working on some-
thing, they are more likely to try to contact you once and then leave
160 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

you alone as they know their message has reached you and you will
get to it when you can. If you are concerned about being unavailable,
use the message to let people know how they can reach you in an
emergency.
Another thing to try is having open door times. If your team is
constantly interrupting, allocate some time where they know it’s OK
to do that. During the open-door time, they can come to you with
anything and you will stop and work with them on whatever prob-
lem, question or challenge they are bringing to you. If they need you
at another time, they know to wait until your next open-door slot, or
scheduled meeting. This won’t work in every situation but for some
organizations it might be a way of managing constant interruptions
if you feel that your team is constantly leaning on you.

Avoid decision fatigue

Project work involves a lot of decisions. By the end of the day, your
brain can feel overwhelmed with the effort of having to make choices
– and not just those related to your work. On average, people make
226 decisions just related to food per day (Jarrett, 2007), so imagine
how many work-related decisions and other decisions your brain is
processing every day. Knowing that decision fatigue is a possibility
gives you the power to influence your environment and the way you
approach your work to try to avoid it, or at least to minimize the
impact. Template everything you can. Never start a document from
scratch if you can help it. Someone else in the team probably has a
similar document they’ve made in the past, or the Project Management
Office might have a template you can use. Once you’ve written a
document, like a project charter, always call up your last project
charter and use that as the basis from which to write your new project
charter.
Using templates can help you get to tasks more quickly because
there’s a lower barrier to getting started. Feeling disorganized can
stem from having ‘leftover’ tasks that should have been done but
haven’t yet. Meeting minutes are a good example. Try to send out
minutes, using a standard template to speed up writing them, within
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 161

24 hours of the meeting taking place. Your memory of the discussion

will be fresher, so overall the task will take less time than if you left it
to next week. The quicker you can share the output from the meeting,
the quicker the task is off your To Do list.
As well as project documents, you can create template responses
for things you are asked a lot, or for emails you send regularly. Then
simply copy and paste the text into your response, or create a macro
or shortcut to do it for you.
Checklists are a kind of template for a repeatable process. Whether
you have a Standard Operating Procedure, protocol, work instruc-
tions or a simple tick box list, guidance on what to do when takes
away some of the mental load required to do the tasks and minimizes
the need for you to make decisions. Checklists should also result in
fewer mistakes and less rework. If you can systemize more of what
you do, you can get through more things. There are some example
checklists for project managers in Appendix 1.
If you want to take this idea even further, take a leaf out of the
books of leaders like Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs and Barack
Obama, and curate your wardrobe in a minimalist way to reduce the
decision about what to wear every day (Saul, 2016).

Avoid gold plating

Gold plating is a project management term that means adding
in more features or doing additional work even though it is not
necessary. The customer hasn’t asked for additional work, and you
may have reached a point of diminishing returns: there’s no value in
adding extra.
Project managers tend to be conscientious, detail-orientated people
who want to do a good job, and that’s a positive. But that tendency
to want to deliver excellent results can sometimes tip over into a
desire to make something the best it can possibly be, even if no one
else cares at that point. You probably won’t get an acknowledgement
of your additional work that is commensurate with the additional
effort you put in, and the task will take longer and potentially cost
more. When you have multiple projects to juggle, it’s important to
162 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

recognize when work is good enough. When it’s good enough, ship it!
Consider it finished and move on.

Use fake deadlines

One thing that works for me is setting myself a fake deadline which
is something you can try too. I say to myself: I’ll complete this busi-
ness case review by midday. And I will get it done.
That frees me up mentally to complete the work within a reason-
able time period to give it my full attention for that time, and then it’s
done. Give yourself a time limit and you may find you can achieve
more because you are focused within that window.

Learn to use your tech

According to research by the European Commission (2020) only 61
per cent of the EU population have basic software skills, and only 33
per cent have above basic digital skills. Given how much project
management work relies on using software and being able to compe-
tently navigate the digital world, not knowing how to use your tech
can be a major productivity saboteur.

Even if you are a digital native, your colleagues and suppliers may not be.
On one of my projects, we factored basic computer skills training into the
change management plan for those who needed it, to increase the level of
digital literacy in the user population before we launched a new software
product that would change the way people did their tasks.

Technology will help you be more productive, but only if you can use
it efficiently. Here are some suggestions for making the most of the
digital tools you have.
●
Get the fastest internet service you can, especially if you work from
home. So much of what we do relies on the internet so don’t waste
precious time waiting for screens to load – plus, it’s really
frustrating!
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 163

●
Improve your touch typing: the faster you can type, the faster you
can get things done. If you don’t touch type, learn! Failing that, get
voice recognition software and dictate instead.
●
Speed up your mouse: change your computer settings to increase
your mouse speed, increasing it to double the original setting.
●
Learn keyboard shortcuts: it’s faster to use keyboard shortcuts
than navigate menus, switch tabs or execute commands with a
mouse. Print out a list of keyboard shortcuts for your most
commonly used applications and practise using them.
●
Turn off notifications: this is a common piece of time management
advice, but have you actually done it? Mute notifications for your
collaboration tools and emails to minimize digital interruptions.
●
Use text macros or a text expander: set up your devices or apps so
that when you type a certain short phrase, it is automatically
replaced with the full text. This can save you time typing out
standard text you use regularly, such as the company’s name
address, project details or even your name.
●
Use images and audio: learn how to take and annotate screenshots
and make short videos to better communicate with your team.
Leave voice messages via apps instead of defaulting to text chat
where you have that option.
●
Use a password keeper: resetting your password every week
because you can’t remember it is a real time waster. Use a password
keeper service to keep your passwords secure, as long as the tool is
sanctioned by your corporate IT department.

Quick questions for prioritization decisions

Sometimes you need to make a quick decision on whether something
is worth doing right now, or whether the smarter choice would be to
put it off until later. Here are some quick questions to ask yourself in
the moment to help you prioritize.
●
Does it get you closer to a project deliverable? If so, perhaps that’s
worth making time for.
164 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
Has someone important asked you for it? It’s not always worth
listening to the HiPPO (Highest Paid Person’s Opinion – see
https://exp-platform.com/hippo/ (archived at https://perma.cc/
SRQ3-FNZ9) for an explanation of how the term HiPPO came
about) but sometimes you can’t avoid prioritizing work from
senior managers.
●
Is it to do with somebody else’s lack of planning? Is someone else
struggling because they have created a crisis by not acting on
something early enough? What would happen if you let them fail?
Consider the consequences of saying no to this task right now and
what would happen if you didn’t step up to help them out.
Sometimes the right thing to do would be to let them sort out their
own mess. If you do choose to do the work, or have to do the
work, think about how you could avoid that happening again.

I was asked to write a report on something I didn’t know much about the
day before it was due to be submitted for an internal committee meeting.
I wasn’t able to say no as the person who asked was far more senior than
me. I felt frustrated because I’m sure they had known the report was due.
The committee met quarterly and creating the report was an action out of
the last meeting. In other words, I could have had three months to write
the report instead of eight hours. To avoid this happening again, I put the
dates of future meetings on my calendar with a note to ask for a copy of
the minutes. Then I could have a proactive conversation with that leader
and get early warning of any tasks coming my way, so I could better
manage my time.

Three techniques to improve focus

When you do get dedicated working time for moving your projects
forward, it’s good to have a couple of strategies to make the most of
that time. There are three techniques to try described here: Sticky
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 165

three; Time blocking; and Focus on the 20 per cent. If you have used
them in the past, reflect on what made you stop using them. How
could you adapt a technique to make it better suit your working
style? If you haven’t tried a technique, give it a go. You won’t need to
use all these techniques every day for everything. But having them in
your toolbox means you can reach for them when the time is right.

Sticky three
The simplest technique is what I call the ‘sticky three’.
At the end of the day, write your top three tasks for tomorrow on
a sticky note and leave it somewhere you will see it in the morning.
For example, stick it on your computer monitor, laptop or keyboard.
The tasks on the sticky note should represent what you’d be happy to
get done if you only had the time and energy to achieve three things.
Those activities should form the backbone of your day.
When you arrive at work the next day, you are instantly reminded
of the top three tasks that are your priority for the next eight hours.
It’s a really simple way of getting quickly focused and zooming into
work mode, so you can make a start on the things that are going to
add the most value to your day.
If you want to take it further, consider which of the tasks would be
the priority if you could only find the time to complete one. How
would you slim down your To Do list to really focus on prioritizing
the project or task that is the most important today?

Time blocking
Time blocking, also known as batching, is where you group similar
tasks together to avoid task switching. For example, spend time
responding to emails: it doesn’t matter what project they relate to,
but you only work on emails for a fixed time.
Task switching is the term to describe moving between tasks. For
example, you spend ten minutes on the phone, then switch to updat-
ing your plan, then make another call, then spend ten minutes
166 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

responding to emails, and so on. This is ineffective: many studies

have replicated the results of Rogers and Monsell’s research in 1995,
which showed that people were slower switching between tasks than
carrying out the same task on repeat.
Activities that can be batched include:
●
Filing and document management;
●
Dealing with emails;
●
Returning or making phone calls;
●
Project reporting;
●
Team one-to-one meetings (I used to schedule all my one-to-one
meetings on a single day each month);
●
People management tasks, for example noting holiday requests
and scheduled absence on project schedules, contributing to staff
appraisals by providing feedback to line managers;
●
Creating similar types of assets, like project newsletters or
presentations;
●
Showing gratitude and celebrating success, such as making the
time to thank people for their contributions on each project.

Using blocks of time for the same kind of activity reduces the mental
load of task switching and allows you to both get more done and feel
less overwhelmed with the work.

Try to arrange as many meetings as you can on the same day with the goal
of having at least one day a week without any meetings at all.

Focus on the 20 per cent

Vilfredo Pareto was a 19th-century Italian economist who
demonstrated that 80 per cent of the land in Italy at the time was
owned by 20 per cent of the population. This 80/20 rule has become
a popular management maxim: the Pareto principle says that 80 per
cent of your results come from 20 per cent of the inputs. In other
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 167

words, there are probably only a few tasks you are doing that drive
the majority of your project outcomes.
Prioritize your time by spending more effort on the 20 per cent of
activities that get you the bulk of your results. Here’s a quick exercise
to help you identify what those are.

1 On one side of a piece of paper, write down the tasks you do

regularly across your projects.
2 On the other side, write down some recent wins, successes or
outcomes you are proud of.
3 Draw lines to link the tasks to the successes. Which tasks con-
tributed the most to your achievements? Those are the activities
that are making the most difference to you: your 20 per cent. Make
sure you spend enough time on those tasks as they are influencing
your outcomes disproportionately to other activities.

FIGURE 6.4 Focus on tasks that drive results

You will end up with something that looks like Figure 6.4. It should
be relatively easy to identify the tasks that are having the most impact
on your results. As results, successes, achievements and so on are
what project managers tend to be judged on, it’s useful to know what
drives those outcomes. Do more of that because you know it works.
However, bear in mind that sometimes ‘what works’ changes over
time and as you involve other stakeholders in the work, so this is an
168 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

exercise worth revisiting a couple of times a year to check you are

still focusing on activities that really make a difference.
Improving your level of focus during the time you have to do your
work will help you feel more on top of multiple projects. Hopefully,
you will find yourself completing work faster but that shouldn’t
equate to taking more on. You were probably putting in extra hours
anyway. The goal of this book is to give you the tools to get your
projects done and leave the office on time so if you can structure your
workload and achieve greater levels of productivity, think carefully
about what you do with those extra hours.

Beyond productivity box ticking

You’ve read this far through the chapter and have a good idea about
how to make the most of your time to maximize your productivity at
work. The tools and techniques in this book work effectively for
people who have a reasonable workload. If you implement them, you
should find yourself with a more structured workload and the ability
to keep your projects moving forward in a lower-stress way than
before.
But what if you implement everything and still find there is too
much to do? No time management techniques in the world will help
you leave the office on time if you routinely have more to do than any
human could naturally cope with. Talk to your manager about your
workload – while the conversation might be awkward, it is your only
choice. Be prepared with details about what you have done to improve
your personal productivity and manage your projects effectively so
you can evidence the changes you made and how they have not been
enough. Don’t struggle on because that leads to burnout. You are not
a resource; you are a human who deserves a supportive work environ­
ment. If you don’t feel that you can achieve that in this role, it could
be time to look for somewhere else to work. Before you start scour-
ing the internet for new jobs, read Chapter 7 and see if influencing
your environment would help your situation.
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 169

It might also help to reframe what it means to be productive. A

different way to look at productivity is not to focus on how many
tasks you tick off in a day but on your results and your impact. Use
what Elizabeth Grace Saunders, in her 2021 HBR essay, calls a
‘values-driven schedule’ to identify your personal priorities and be
intentional with your time. She talks about curating your calendar to
fit your priorities, whether those priorities are work engagements,
exercise, family commitments or something else. In 50 years will it
matter if you stay late tonight at work or say no to that meeting?
Or would you prefer to look back on a lifetime of health, family rela-
tionships and a fulfilling personal life? What does productivity really
mean to you?
In today’s digital and project economy, productivity can be hard to
define and measure objectively, especially for creative and knowledge
workers. Measures of output that served the economy so well in the
industrial revolution are less relevant to the workplace today, as the
boundaries between ‘work’ and ‘life’ become more blurred for many
people.
Research is now considering more holistic ways of capturing how
knowledge workers are doing at work, by blending classic approaches
to productivity with measures of well-being. Guillou et al (2020) use
the term Time Well Spent to describe a rounded approach to evalu­
ating time at work. They allowed research participants to define
what Time Well Spent meant to them over a working week and
then analysed the results. They concluded that Time Well Spent is a
blend of:
●
What you work on: the researchers found that study participants
valued making progress, following their plans and delivering a
quality output.
●
How you work: meeting deadlines, being focused and being
efficient were self-identified measures of Time Well Spent.
●
How you feel: the researchers found that a sense of satisfaction
and achievement, as well as being involved in meaningful work and
having fun contributed to personal definitions of Time Well Spent.
170 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

●
How you take care of yourself: participants identified that Time
Well Spent included paying attention to physical health (like eating
well at lunch time), creating social bonds and looking after mental
health and taking breaks.

If you get to the end of the day and haven’t made as much progress
on your projects as you would like, try to think holistically about
how well your time was spent. There is as much value in training a
new colleague or supporting a friend through a difficult time as there
is in crossing something off your To Do list.

KEY TAKEAWAYS
●
Be aware of the top three productivity saboteurs that affect your ability
to move your work forward efficiently: procrastination, disorganization
and poor planning.
●
Personal time management is a blend of managing the flow of tasks
coming in and responding to tasks in the most appropriate way.
Constantly question whether the work has to be done or whether
someone else is better placed to do it instead of you.
●
Try out plenty of time management tactics so you have a grab bag of
solutions available to use. Pick a few favourites and get into the habit
of using them.

ACTION STEPS

Your action steps from this chapter are:

●
If you suffer from any of the productivity saboteurs, block out 30 minutes
in your calendar to brainstorm ways to approach your work differently.
●
Review your task list and use the TIS task profiles to see the shape of
your work. Which profile do you use most of the time? Is that the best
use of your time? If not, what could you do to shift tasks around?
●
Choose a few of the time management tactics and techniques in this
chapter that are new to you and try them out.
 CONCEPT #4: PRODUCTIVITY 171

●
Productivity means more than what tasks got crossed off today.
Consider what Time Well Spent means to you and how you judge and
value your own time.

References
Allcott, G and Watts, H (2021) How to Fix Meetings, Icon Books, London
Allen, D (2002) Getting Things Done: The art of stress-free productivity,
Penguin, Harmondsworth
Bellezza, S, Paharia, N and Keinan, A (2017) Conspicuous consumption of time:
When busyness and lack of leisure time become a status symbol, Journal of
Consumer Research, 44 (1), 118–38 (June)
Canfield, J, Hansen M V and Hewitt, L (2000) The Power of Focus,
Health Communications Inc, Deerfield Beach
Csikszentmihalyi, M (2002) Flow: The psychology of happiness, Random House,
London
European Commission (2020) Digital economy and society index 2020: Human
capital. Available from digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/desi-human-
capital (archived at https://perma.cc/Y2EQ-J9TR)
Guillou, H, Chow, K, Fritz, T and McGrenere, J (2020) Is your time well spent?
Reflecting on knowledge work more holistically, CHI 2020 Paper,
April 25–30, 2020, Honolulu. Available from www.merlin.uzh.ch/
contributionDocument/download/12862 (archived at https://perma.cc/YD7A-
YJXN)
Harrin, E (2021) Managing multiple projects: the research, 29 October. Available
from https://rebelsguidetopm.com/managing-multiple-projects-the-research/
(archived at https://perma.cc/73XE-MV4Z)
Jarrett, C (2007) Mindless eating: The food decisions we don’t realize we’re
making. Available from https://digest.bps.org.uk/2007/01/22/mindless-eating-
the-food-decisions-we-dont-realise-were-making/
Mark, G, Gudith, D and Klocke, U (2008) The Cost of Interrupted Work: More
speed and stress, Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems –
Proceedings, 107–110. Available from doi.org/10.1145/1357054.1357072
(archived at https://perma.cc/437E-UVE3)
Moss, J (2021) The Burnout Epidemic: The rise of chronic stress and how we can
fix it, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston
Rogers, R D and Monsell, S (1995) Costs of a predictable switch between simple
cognitive tasks, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 124 (2), 207–31
172 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Saul, H (2016) Why Mark Zuckerberg wears the same clothes to work every day.
Available from www.independent.co.uk/news/people/why-mark-zuckerberg-
wears-same-clothes-work-everyday-a6834161.html (archived at https://perma.cc/
4NUG-L2CU)
Saunders, E G (2021) ‘Does your schedule reflect your values?’ In Getting It All
Done, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston
Schultz, E and Schultz, M (2021) Not Today: The 9 habits of extreme productivity,
BenBella Books, Dallas
Tracy, B (2017) Eat That Frog! 3rd edn, Berrett-Koehler Publishers Inc, Oakland
Udemy (2018) 2018 Workplace Distraction Report. Available from research.
udemy.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Workplace-Distraction-Report-2018-
2021-Rebrand-v3-gs.pdf (archived at https://perma.cc/Y7HV-ZSJN)

Further reading
Adachi, K (2020) The Lazy Genius Way, WaterBrook, Colorado Springs
Cox, C (2021) The Deadline Effect, Avid Reader Press, New York
Thomas, M (2021) From To-Do to Done, Sourcebooks, Naperville
 07

Concept #5: Positioning: setting up

the environment for success

The final concept in the framework is positioning yourself and your

environment for success, as shown in Figure 7.1. This means critically
evaluating the processes and working practices you and your team
have adopted by default and establishing if these could be tweaked to
give you back some time. That goes for project documentation too:
by the end of this chapter you will be equipped to decide what files
you really need to create in order to lead, manage and control the
work.

FIGURE 7.1 The Positioning concept in the managing multiple projects framework
174 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Your physical environment also shapes how you approach your

work. In a 2020 study by iQ Offices, 73 per cent of respondents said
they estimated they could save up to two hours a day if they worked
in an office that was designed to minimize distraction. The impact of
the physical environment was rated a greater productivity challenge
than things like getting too much email. Offices that are too noisy,
that don’t offer private spaces and have poor natural light were all
cited as reasons that negatively impact productivity.
While you can’t always influence your office environment, you can
control your home working set up. Microsoft’s Work Trend Index
(2021) reports an interesting challenge: 73 per cent of employees
want the option for homeworking but 67 per cent report wanting
more face-to-face time with their teams. That points to the trend for
hybrid working; splitting time between the office and home. This
chapter provides some tips for ensuring you have a home working
set-up that supports your ability to work successfully.
Also in this chapter, you will learn how to develop a time maxi-
mizer mindset to free up more time for your future self. You’ll get
a step-by-step approach for standardizing things you do regularly
to minimize decision fatigue and leave your cognitive capacity for
activities that really do need thinking power. You will uncover how
to combine risk management and governance processes, so they are
more powerful and less time consuming.

The time maximizer mindset

There is a lot in your project environment that you cannot control,
but you can adopt a time maximizer mindset. This is where you focus
on what you can do today to make things better, faster or easier
tomorrow. For example:
●
Creating a process so you can repeat the work easily next time
(more on that in the next section).
●
Training a colleague so they can pick up the work from you.
●
Creating a template.
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 175

●
Setting up an automation, workflow or macro to do the work for
you.
●
Learning formulas or shortcuts to speed up how you do the work.
●
Renaming files to make them easier to find in the future before
saving them.
●
Consolidating action logs or To Do lists into one master list or
tool.
●
Transferring sticky notes into a task management app.
●
Booking a set of meetings in one go instead of individually.
●
Reflecting on what works and what doesn’t work so you can take
active steps to do more of what works in the future.

The time maximizer mindset is about making sure the work you are
doing today is setting you up for future success – or at least not
undermining your success by making things harder for your future
self. It requires an investment of time today with the knowledge that
will pay off in the future, and that’s what is hard: carving out the time
in the short term to create an environment for longer term productiv-
ity and success. The more you consciously reflect on whether you are
maximizing your time for the long term, the easier you will find it.

The five-email rule

In Beyond Collaboration Overload, Rob Cross (2021) talks about
‘channel inefficiency’: the misuse of meetings, email, text messages
and so on. Failing to use those channels in the best way contributes
to a culture of poor collaboration, which is an inefficient use of time.
One time maximizer to make better use of your communication
channels is the five-email rule.
This rule transformed the way I dealt with my inbox. When an
email chain gets to five messages, it needs to stop being an email. If it
isn’t resolved within five messages, the subject must be so compli-
cated, or there are so many additional points that need to be
considered, that the team needs to move it to another collaboration
channel, such as having a call or meeting about it. We started shifting
176 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

to having those meetings at the point that we hit five emails, because
it was clear that there were too many voices to be heard or too much
information to be discussed effectively on a long email trail.
Changes in behaviour, like the five-email rule, can be introduced as
new norms for your team. It takes time to position your environment
for success, but soon you will be spotting opportunities to maximize
your time – and that of other people – in many places.

How to standardize your work

Another common time maximizer that it is worth considering in
more detail is standardizing processes you do often to reduce the
mental overhead of having to think about the steps each time.
Decision fatigue, as we saw in Chapter 6, is when you have made
so many decisions that you feel washed out at the idea of having to
make any more choices. I noticed this explicitly after a long, difficult
day at work when my husband asked me what I would like for dinner:
I could not will myself to have an opinion. Decision fatigue is a type
of mental exhaustion. When the choices relate to dinner, the conse-
quences are not important, but when they relate to purchasing
decisions, communication or training needs or risk mitigation activi-
ties, then they could affect how successful your project becomes.
When your brain is full of all the things to do on your projects, it
feels like the amount of processing power available for how those
things will get done is reduced. Standardizing the way things are done
helps to limit the number of decisions required and stops you making
poor choices. Many activities within project management are repeti-
tive and lend themselves to a standardized process, checklist or work
instructions that enable the team to work in a consistent and repeat-
able basis. If your Project Management Office already provides
standard processes for these, then use your corporate guidance.
However, if you are in an organization or role where standard
approaches are not documented you will have to create your own
process documents or checklists. The following four steps will show
you how.
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 177

Step 1: Decide on the topic

First, decide what activity is the focus of your process. Find some-
thing you do that is repetitive (you don’t have to do it every week)
and that requires you to remember multiple steps or items. For
example:
●
Reviewing and managing risks and issues;
●
Handling incoming change requests and deciding whether to take
them forward or not;
●
Preparing for a meeting and following up afterwards;
●
Gathering data for monthly reports and then writing up the reports;
●
The things you need to do prior to, during and after staff annual
reviews for your team.

Step 2: Break the activity into tasks

Break down the activity into component tasks that represent each
part of what needs to be done. If it is important that the steps are
done in a particular order, you are creating a process. If it doesn’t
matter in which order the tasks are done, a checklist format will
work well.

Step 3: Document the standardized approach

Choose how to document or format your list. There are apps for
process creation, or you could create a simple spreadsheet, with space
to tick off a task as complete, and print it out to use each time.
Consider your working style and what would be the easiest for you
to use.

Step 4: Test it!

Now you have created a process document or checklist, you should
test it. That ensures you have remembered all the important points
for this particular activity. The next time you need to complete this
178 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

activity, pull out your process document or checklist and use it to

work through all the tasks. You may want to add more steps or
change the order. Your checklist can always be a work in progress –
add things to it as you learn from the experience of using it.
It will probably feel basic and a little bit pointless to document
things at this level, especially if you are not a junior member of the
team. You may have been managing risks, issues and changes, organ-
izing meetings and managing reporting for years. You can hold these
processes in your head… can’t you?
Yes, you can. But there is a lot of other stuff in there too. Having
it written down takes away the thinking overhead when you are
stressed and juggling a lot of work. And if you’re managing multiple
projects, you’re probably stressed and juggling a lot of work
frequently. Standardizing your processes means you are not starting
from scratch every time. It alleviates some of the mental burden of
having to use your active brainpower to think about these things,
leaving you more capacity to focus on activities where you really do
have to use your critical thinking faculties.

Standardization is important. If working with a group of project

managers that share project team resources, it is helpful if there is
standard communication from all project managers, rather than one
project manager sending reports and updates that are different in style
and content from another project manager.

Kelly, PMP, PMI-ACP, senior project manager, USA

The goal with standardizing processes is to make your work easier to

repeat and simpler to manage. The more streamlined the approach,
the more you will benefit from reducing the mental overhead of
having to do things from scratch each time, even if it is an activity
you are familiar with and do regularly.

Multi-project risk management

Another thing you can do to influence the environment for success is
look at how you’re managing project risk. Project risk management
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 179

is the process of reflecting on what potential problems your project

could hit and what you could do about them to make the impact or
likelihood of occurrence less. Project teams regularly review their
work to identify new risks and check that management actions for
existing risks are on track.
However, there is another level to consider when you manage
multiple projects: how all the open risks across all your projects
combine to change the overall risk profile. Projects interrelate and
often the big picture across all your projects looks quite different to
the position on each individual project. A research study of 177
projects (Teller et al, 2014) concluded that the risk management
process and the integration of risk information at portfolio level
increases the positive effect on portfolio success. In other words,
researchers have proven that it is worth consolidating risks across
your projects because doing so increases the chance that all the
projects will be more successful.
For example, let’s say you identify a risk that a resource might not
be available during August due to holidays. That might be a small
risk for one project, one that’s easily managed by shifting the work
around in the team so your absent colleague catches up when they
are back. But if that individual has tasks to complete on five of your
projects, suddenly it’s looking a lot less likely that they will be able to
easily catch up on their return. Perhaps you need a different solution,
like training someone else how to do the tasks so they can cover
during holiday time.
Over 80 per cent of project managers do not consolidate risks
across multiple projects to see if the combined effect of a risk is
greater than individual effect, as you can see in Figure 7.2. That
figure, drawn from a survey for this book (Harrin, 2021), is not
surprising: project risk management is not currently taught in that
way. Creating a consolidated risk profile is something typically done
by the project management office to show the overall risk exposure
for a portfolio across a department or division.
As a multi-project manager, you already take a portfolio view for
managing your workload, and risk can be done in the same way.
Carry out your risk management and planning activities twice: once
180 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

FIGURE 7.2 Per cent of project managers who have a multi-project approach to risk
management

for the individual project and once at your personal portfolio level so
you can see whether the impact of any risk changes when it is viewed
in light of the risks from other projects. Look for connections or
overlaps between the risks and see if that changes how you want to
respond to them. Here are some common risks that become more
impactful the more projects they apply to:
●
Poor planning, new changes and unplanned work on one project
may affect others.
●
Poor project governance on one project may affect others.
●
Changing priorities may affect other projects.
●
Delays accessing shared resources, equipment or materials may
affect other projects.
●
Unavailable decision-makers may delay activity on more than one
project.
●
Projects may have dependencies to or from high-risk projects.

It’s also worth considering adding risks that reflect the size of the
project manager workload and the risk that too many projects are
using the same resources, if these apply to your situation.
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 181

I manage strategic operational projects within the business and there

are also departments that do very small projects, but in high volume.
There are various tools in use across the business from simple products
to power reporting tools. Some of them are intuitive; others have a good
view at project level but don’t provide a portfolio overview. I switch
platforms from day-to-day depending on the project I’m contributing
to at the time.
I would recommend looking for some sort of consultancy, if you
have the budget, to get a company to configure a platform for you.
They will go through a briefing process to understand what you are
trying to do and what information you need. Many companies can
take your existing solutions and help you use them more efficiently,
tweaking what you have to make it do what you need.

Omar Warrack, supply chain project manager, UK

Multi-project governance
The role of governance on projects is to provide an ethical frame-
work for decision-making and a set of standard good practices for
managing the work. It ensures there is a system of checks and balances
to make sure the right work is being done within appropriate, trans-
parent, boundaries relevant to the methodologies in use.
Governance is unfortunately often seen as an overhead for organi-
zations and project managers alike, but it is the collective conscious
of the project, providing the direction and clarity of purpose for the
team. Governance processes are often set up to support individual
projects, for example project boards and steering groups convene to
discuss a particular project or programme.
Therefore, it is worth looking at the governance processes for
managing multiple projects to see if there are ways you can influence
your environment to work better for you. Two key areas to consider
are governance meetings and reports.
182 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Governance meetings
Project boards or steering groups are made up of the key decision-
making stakeholders that represent the customer, the supplier and
anyone else who has a senior position and influence over the project.
The smaller this group, the easier it is: chairing a steering group of 15
senior executives, each with their own opinion to share, is a tricky
job! Typically, this meeting is chaired by the project sponsor, although
the project manager normally does a lot of the preparation and talk-
ing in the meeting, guiding the group through the agenda and
presenting any items that need action or decisions from this audience.
People managing multiple projects may have a small set of attend-
ees at the project board meetings, or perhaps only meet with a project
sponsor. As projects tend to be smaller (although not always), there
are fewer stakeholders involved in the meetings.
Look at your workload overview and personal portfolio, and
remind yourself of the groupings you created. The projects that fall
into groups could be reviewed by the governance functions at the
same time. For example, where you have three projects that fall under
the same sponsor, hold a joint project board meeting where you
discuss all three. That saves everyone present time and allows inter-
dependencies between projects to be discussed more easily.

Reporting
Write joint reports where the projects have clear commonalities, or
dependencies, and try to consolidate as much as you can into one
document. This works if you have common metrics for tracking
progress and performance, and can create a template that shows the
information for every project.
Roadmaps are a good way to visually represent the progress of a
selection of projects, for example all the projects you are working on
for one department. Many software and graphic tools allow you to
create a multi-project view of timelines or status, or you can draw a
roadmap on your whiteboard or on flip chart paper during a work-
shop, then stick it up in the office where the team can see it. A
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 183

roadmap showing multiple projects can help the team understand the
priority and progress of projects in relation to each other.
Keep multi-project reports as simple as possible. There is a simple
weekly project report template in Appendix 2, which is suitable for
emailing to stakeholders; or take a look at the monthly table format
template in Chapter 5. Stakeholders can always ask for more infor-
mation and you can update your template for next time.

Agree governance parameters before you start

While you can merge governance meetings and project reporting, you
do want to take stakeholder expectations into account. They may feel
it is appropriate to have some projects taken together and discussed
in one session, but others should not – for whatever reason – be
covered in the same forum.
Talk to your project sponsor and agree the parameters for govern-
ance as soon as you can. Ask whether consolidating this project into
other meetings or reports would be an approach they could support.
Perhaps they are open to trying it and seeing how it works. Stay flex-
ible and encourage your stakeholder community to consolidate and
think holistically about the project portfolio, just like you do –
although they may still expect certain meetings or reports to be
focused on a single initiative. Stay flexible and update templates or
meeting agendas as the project progresses. It’s common, for example,
to reduce the number of project board meetings if a project is going
well and the project leadership team have confidence in the work. On
one large project we moved from monthly project board meetings at
the beginning to bi-monthly and then quarterly meetings as the
project stabilized during the delivery phases.

My first experience with [managing multiple projects] was in a new

job that did not have a well-defined project management structure.
Business ownership of the projects was at bare minimum, so I had
to do the heavy work of coaching all project stakeholders on the
different roles they needed to own to successfully run the projects.
I had extensive support from the leadership team, after several
184 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

sessions of how projects should be structured for success. Eventually,

after setting up a sort of framework, we were able to de-prioritize some
projects and focused more keenly on those that were deemed must haves/
Urgent and Important. From this experience I learnt that when you are
able to demonstrate value to people, they are more likely to join and
support you in the journey. A clear goal and vision articulately defined
and objectives drawn out is a good way to keep the team moving.

Akola, project/programme manager, Germany

Project documentation
Project documents are the files you create to manage, control and
deliver the project. The documents you use are likely to reflect
whether you are using an iterative, hybrid or predictive methodology.
There are lots of documents mentioned in the body of literature
for project management knowledge and best practice. It seems like
there are logs and files for everything. If you are building a massive
Olympic park, or a military battleship, then there are higher stand-
ards for documentation, but for most projects done in office-based
environments by small, medium and even large-ish firms, your time
will be best spent on getting the basics right and avoiding creating
documentation that does not add value to the way you want to
manage the work. When you have to duplicate paperwork for each
project you lead, you don’t have time to create endless files that most
stakeholders won’t read. Instead, focus on the nine essential docu-
ments and adapt that list to suit your environment. They are:

1 Business case;
2 Charter;
3 Project management plan;
4 Schedule;
5 RAID log;
6 Status reports;
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 185

7 Budget tracker;
8 Lessons learned log;
9 Closure document.

1 Business case
At the concept or idea phase of a project, someone comes up with a
bright idea. That is written down into a formal project proposal or
business case. It’s written to explain why the project should happen
and it summarizes the problem the project is going to solve. It could
be as simple as an email sent to the product owner outlining a sugges-
tion for a new feature. It could be a fully costed business plan for the
launch of a new product. Assuming the business case or proposal is
taken forward, it is the driver that kicks off the whole project.
The business case is normally written by someone other than the
project manager, usually the person who ultimately becomes the
project sponsor. However, on small projects or those where you work
closely with a department lead, it’s possible you will get involved in
the creation of the proposal in your capacity as project manager. In
fact, I’d argue that it is preferable. It’s certainly easier leading a project
where you fully understand the background and context for why it
was kicked off in the first place.
Whatever your business case or proposal looks like, there should
be something that explains why this project is a good idea. Once the
decision-makers have approved it, the idea can be formally ratified as
a project.

2 Project charter
Before the project begins, the team should create the charter. It varies
in format depending on the project approach you are using. The Agile
Alliance recommends a single-page charter for agile projects. I prefer
to use a fully rounded version that internally we call a Project
Initiation Document. You might also hear the document referred to
as a Project Brief.
186 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Whatever you call it, the point of this document is to include every-
thing you need to know about where the project is starting from, at
least at high level.
Charters normally include a selection of these elements:
●
Project objectives;
●
High-level statement of scope;
●
Key success criteria and critical success factors;
●
High-level assumptions, constraints and risks known at this time;
●
High-level project timeline;
●
High-level budget;
●
Expectations for resource requirements.

Often, much of this information can be extracted from the business

case or proposal and expanded as necessary to provide greater detail
for the project team.

In my role, I often work on multiple projects across various stakeholders

and teams. The most challenging hurdle to overcome is the lack of and
miscommunication that occurs. One thing I’m trying to work on is
creating more documentation for all projects (project briefs, complete
timeline, the scope of work, etc.) to ensure stakeholders are on the same
page. I’ve learned that communication is the most critical component of
all projects within my organization and that it’s easier to document the
project along the way rather than have to reconnect with stakeholders
down the road. I know that to do my best work when managing projects,
I need all stakeholders to be on the same page and have a clear, accurate
understanding of the project outcomes.

Alyssa Towns, business operations specialist, USA

3 Project management plan

The project management plan in predictive methodologies has tradit­
ionally been a substantive document. It sets out how the project work
will be done. At a high level, that’s a statement of what approach
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 187

will be used, for example the particular agile framework the team
will adopt, or how work will be phased with a predictive approach.
A project management plan covers the expectations, method and
approach for:

●
Managing requirements and scope;
●
Managing the schedule;
●
Managing the budget and costs;
●
Managing risks;
●
Managing changes;
●
Managing quality;
●
Managing human resources and engaging stakeholders;
●
Managing communications;
●
Managing procurement and configuration if applicable.

These topics can be covered in individual documents or a consoli-

dated document that covers all the topics, and this list is not exclusive.
You might need a release plan that explains how releases will be
managed, or a test plan outlining the team’s approach to testing.
Create what you need.
Organizations with a project management office tend to have
structured approaches for doing these things anyway. There is prob-
ably a corporate or department risk management process that you
can use for your project. It’s not practical for every project manager
to approach supplier management and procurement in a different
way so there are probably internal processes for that too. Therefore,
quite a few aspects of the project management plan might be covered
by ‘normal’ ways of working within your organization.
Don’t reinvent the wheel. There is little value in creating a docu-
ment that repeats processes that exist elsewhere. You can simply
mention in the charter that you will follow applicable internal
processes as relevant. Perhaps your project needs agreement on how
to secure resources, so it is appropriate to write down a plan for how
that will happen, but you don’t need a detailed plan for the other
188 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

sections. Tailor and adapt so that you get the right level of document­
ation for your project.

4 Project schedule
The project schedule sets out all the tasks, who is going to do them
and when they are going to be done. It also tracks dependencies
between tasks. Schedules can be created in a number of formats from
a Gantt chart to a sprint plan, a timeline on a slide or a countdown
plan in a table. Use whatever format works for you and your team,
and meets the expectations of your stakeholders. Chapter 4 covers
multi-project scheduling in detail.

5 Project RAID log

RAID stands for:
●
Risks;
●
Actions (and/or Assumptions);
●
Issues;
●
Dependencies (and/or Decisions).

I use the term ‘RAID log’ to cover all the different logs relating to the
project. That includes all the elements in the list above, plus changes.
RAAIDDC doesn’t have the same ring to it!
The log could be a spreadsheet, software tool or something else
that fits the team’s working preferences. The objective is to have
records of the daily activities and decisions to support project govern-
ance and make sure everyone is on the same page. In a multi-project
environment, you can have one log for each project or a consolidated
system, depending on what works best for you and how you have
grouped your projects into buckets.

6. Project status reports

Project status reports are another critical document. You are busy
doing the work, so you need to tell people what work is going on.
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 189

They also help you track what’s going on and provide information to
decision-makers. They are the formal written record of progress.
There are lots of tools you can use to create real-time reports for
individual projects. If your organization has mature software that
can cope with displaying information at a programme or portfolio
level, try to arrange your work so that you can take advantage of
done-for-you dashboards. Macros, integrations, databases and using
an API (Application Programming Interface) to connect different
tools are other tech-enabled ways to create real-time reports.
Unfortunately, without software and a bit of investment, it’s very
difficult to create real-time reports and dashboards. The alternative is
manually filling in a template on a regular basis: the trick is to make
the template as simple as possible to complete, preferably using fields
you can copy and paste from your project management software or
records.

7 Project budget tracker

Your project budget is a different sort of document – it includes less
text, and a lot more numbers. Many small projects that are largely
focused on business change and process improvement will not have
formal budgets at all, as the investment is usually in people’s time.
Alternatively, there may be a budget but it is wrapped up within a
departmental budget which is managed by someone else and you
need to work with them to purchase anything required.
If you are managing the finances for your projects, you probably
want to keep the numbers separate. This is one occasion where there
is limited benefit to combining data sets. Most managers will want
granular reporting for money so budgets can be apportioned to the
right client or cost code. Check with your sponsor before rolling up
and consolidating budget information for your projects.

8 Lessons learned log

Reflection is an important part of the project management process.
Throughout the project, ask yourself what is working and what is
190 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

less successful. Ask your project team for their views too – there is a
simple Stop, Start, Continue reflection exercise in Appendix 4. You
may also be part of more formal reflection exercises like retrospec-
tives or regular lessons learned discussions, either as the chair or a
participant.
Lessons learned documents might not actually be documents. You
could store your lessons learned in a database or wiki, or some other
searchable format. Ideally, all the lessons should be made available to
others in your organization so they are able to benefit from your
learnings where appropriate. That helps mitigate the risk that infor-
mation becomes ‘lessons captured’ instead of lessons truly learned
and acted on.

9 Project closure document

Finally, when the project comes to an end you can produce a formal
project closure document. In a formal environment, this document
summarizes:
●
What the project delivered;
●
How the project performed against time, cost, quality and scope
measures, i.e. were you late, over-budget or struggling to get a
quality result?
●
Any outstanding risks, issues and actions at the point of closure;
●
The location of project files;
●
Anything else the person receiving the handover needs to know.

In an informal environment, project closure could be achieved

by sending an email or through the final set of minutes from team
meetings.
Of all the documents, this is the most important one to get formally
signed off and approved in some way. Without the project sponsor
agreeing to the project being closed, the project is not closed. That
means it stays on your personal portfolio and you’ll be doing ad hoc
work and support until they are happy that the work is delivered.
That’s a situation to avoid! You are busy enough with your portfolio
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 191

and the goal should always be to close down projects smoothly,

providing a handover to colleagues as necessary so you can move on
to other things while leaving behind tidy archives of what happened
in case people need to refer to the project history in the future.
The most important thing to remember about the documents
mentioned above is that this section is only a guide to what project
documents make the most difference when you are short of time and
energy. Tailor the files you need so that you can best manage your
project. Removing the admin time spent creating documents that
don’t add value means you can free up more time to lead your team.
Overall, it’s more important that the team members work together to
deliver the project than they spend time creating paperwork that no
one will ever read again.

Working in the manufacturing industry, I have always managed multiple

projects at the same time. The major difficulty seems to be getting a
milestone completed before moving on to the next (new and shiny)
project. It’s easy to move on to something else, but not so easy to close
out a project. Typically, this results from an outside force such as a
component delay or a customer changing their mind with a design.
The team then loses motivation to come back to it because they’ve
already moved on to something that has a better chance of success, at
least in the moment. Having consistent progress checks helps to keep
the team on task, especially the act of reaching out to determine what
each person specifically needs to take the next step. It’s very difficult to
manage schedules this way, so it feels like we’re ‘winging it’ often.

Sheri, senior project manager, USA

How to create a productive home office environment

Setting up your environment for success goes beyond having effective
processes and ways of managing your work. It also stretches into
making sure the physical environment where you work is a pleasant
place to be, optimized for productivity.
192 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

The pandemic that began in 2020 and the shifts in the work
environment that it created meant nearly 50 per cent of people did
some work from home (ONS, 2020). Many organizations chose to
maintain homeworking options for their teams, even after it was
possible to return to the office environment. While there are many
benefits to homeworking, not least avoiding the costs and stresses of
the commute, there are also distractions at home that you don’t have
in the office. It’s important to create a homeworking space that lends
itself to your working style and what you want to accomplish while
you are working from home. Small changes to your environment can
give you a productivity boost and help you feel more in control of the
work you have to do. Here are some considerations for achieving
that.

Background noise
What kind of environment works for you? I prefer quiet when I’m
working, but I live with people who prefer having music playing in
the background. I have a dedicated workspace away from the house
so I can have peace. You might find noise cancelling headphones or
earplugs provide the same effect, or you might choose to have your
music player close by so you can control the ambient noise easily.

Location
Where are you working? Some people feel more productive when
they are connected to nature, and it’s certainly possible to move your
laptop onto a table in the garden or to an outside space if you prefer
that. Many people feel more creative outside their normal work
location – that’s the reason we scheduled brainstorming workshops
and training sessions in external meeting rooms.

Desk space
Do you prefer a standing desk? Or do you prefer sitting? There might
be a way that you can configure your home office space to give you
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 193

the choice to do both. Sometimes that can really help with lifting
your energy and making you feel more productive. And it’s also better
healthwise to be moving around.
Whatever you choose, make sure your set-up is ergonomic and
designed with your safety and comfort in mind. Choose a keyboard
that is comfortable to use and follow the relevant health and safety
guidance for display screen equipment usage.

Ambiance
Once you’ve found a space to work and got your desk set up, consider
some of the other things that shape how you feel about your work
zone. For example, bring some plants into your space. They increase
oxygen levels, they look nice and they give you a sense of bringing in
the outside: all proven productivity boosters.
Make sure the temperature is conducive to work. I find it very
difficult to work when I am cold, and wear fingerless gloves in the
winter. An air conditioning unit makes it possible to work comfort-
ably when it’s scorching hot. Control the temperature of your space
so it doesn’t distract you.
Make sure you’ve got enough light. This is really important if you
are doing a lot of video calls, because it’s easier to express yourself
and to show your body language when your colleagues can see you.
Make sure you have light preferably behind your camera so that the
light comes on to your face during video calls.

Routine
Do you like to have a routine? Or do you prefer to be able to work
flexibly? Some people prefer to have a very solid routine; others
prefer to work flexitime around their other responsibilities, then
make up the hours working early mornings or late evenings. As long
as your manager and team are OK with your working schedule and
routine, go with whatever works best for you.
Think about how you can use your routine and your time in the
day to spend your energy when you have the most of it.
194 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Distractions
Consider how you will manage distractions within your space. For
example, can you hear the doorbell? If so, will you stop work to get
up to open the door for deliveries? If you have children at home, ask
them to make a sign for your work space for you to hang up when
you cannot be disturbed. My office door has a lock so I can shut
myself in during important calls. A physical ribbon or a rope across
the door can also serve as a reminder to others at home that you are
not in a position to be disturbed.
Make sure you have everything that you need in order to be able
to work effectively, so you’re not constantly having to get up and
search the house for resources. You should have all your chargers in
place so that you can use those. If you use things like external hard
drives, make sure that you’ve got those and the relevant cables avail-
able as well. Buy duplicates if you can so that your kit doesn’t have
to ever leave the office space.
Having said that, you also need to build in breaks. In an office
environment there are plenty of moments for screen breaks: walking
to a meeting room, talking to a colleague; working at home, not so
much. Never feel guilty about taking a break in your homeworking
day. Take a walk, call a colleague or friend, or simply sit and have
coffee outside or near an open window for a little bit of fresh air.
Breaks can reset your brain and help you come back to work feeling
more energized to get on with what needs to be done.
Working from home doesn’t make you inherently more or less
productive. You still need to be realistic about the amount of work
you can get done in a day, so keep your To Do list manageable and
limit the number of meetings you accept.

Influencing your office environment

If the considerations above help you at home, think about how you
could make similar changes at work in the office. Could you agree
guidelines on using headphones or earbuds for music as a team, along
with how to interrupt or get the attention of someone wearing head-
phones? Is your desk set up as ergonomically as possible with
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 195

adequate light for video calls? Do you have a way to regulate the
temperature? What home comforts could transition to the office to
make it a more comfortable work environment?
Start a conversation with your colleagues about what they enjoy
about their home working environment and what they enjoy about
the office and how to blend the best bits of both. In one office I
worked in, a staff engagement survey highlighted the fact our team
needed another coat stand, especially in winter. It was such a small
(and cheap) fix for the management team and yet had a demonstrable
impact on people’s ability to transition smoothly into work in the
morning. Changes don’t have to be big to be meaningful.

Creating reflection time

Projects are dynamic environments. When you are dealing with the
complexities of interrelated and overlapping strands of work, things
change regularly. What used to work perhaps now doesn’t have the
same impact. Stakeholder expectations have changed, or maybe new
stakeholders have joined the team and bring with them different
working styles and communication preferences. That’s why reflection
time is important. It’s a moment to take stock of what is working
right now and how you can maximize and capitalize on the activities
that are contributing to getting things done, helping achieve the
results and making your life easier.
Looking for opportunities to continuously improve by learning as
you go is the sixth and final personal portfolio management principle
(for a recap, flip back to Chapter 3). It asks you to find time to
consider what you have learned and what you are going to do differ-
ently as a result of that knowledge. Finding the time to reflect can be
difficult when your project workload is heavy, but there are ways to
build reflection time into each month. There are probably retrospec-
tives or lessons learned conversations already scheduled: these are a
rich source of learning and opportunity. Have a working lunch with
a colleague in a similar role to you and chat about what you’ve done
this month that was successful. Share ideas about how to approach
196 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

the situations that didn’t go quite so well. If you prefer to reflect

alone, put 30 minutes in your calendar for first or last thing in the
week, grab your favourite hot drink and work through the Stop,
start, continue exercise in Appendix 4.

KEY TAKEAWAYS
●
Your ability to make the most of your time and feel in control of your
work is influenced by your environment.
●
Cultivate a time maximizer mindset where you focus on what changes
can be made that will set you up for success in the future.
●
Standardize as much as you can to minimize decision fatigue and make
it easier to work in a way that is repeatably good. Checklists, work
instructions and processes can help.
●
Consolidate project risks at portfolio level to assess whether the risk
profile of your work changes when all projects are considered together.
●
Combine governance frameworks across all your projects where it
makes sense to do so.
●
Create the right project documentation for your project so you have
what is necessary for management and control without creating extra
bureaucracy.

ACTION STEPS

It takes time to make changes to your environment, so pick something

you want to improve on and make a plan to implement that. When that is
done, choose something else. A slow and steady approach helps you avoid
what Dorie Clark, in her 2021 book, The Long Game, calls strategic
whiplash: a situation where you never see any results because you
constantly change direction without giving your changes enough time to
take effect.
Your action steps for this chapter are:
●
Find one thing that you could take action on today (or in the next
couple of days) to make it easier to manage your projects tomorrow.
 CONCEPT #5: POSITIONING 197

●
Introduce your team to the five-email rule and agree to try it.
●
Identify where you have processes that could be documented. Pick one
and turn it into a set of work instructions, a process document or
checklist. Could you share the process with colleagues?
●
Review the risk logs for each project together to create a consolidated
view of risk across your personal portfolio. See whether the combined
impact increases or decreases the risk.
●
Consider how to consolidate the performance reporting and
governance for your projects, if and where you can, and then put that
into practice.
●
Look at your home working environment if you have one and consider
what you could improve to make it feel more like a workspace that is
conducive to productivity.

References
Agile Alliance (undated) Project Chartering. Available from www.agilealliance.org/
glossary/project-chartering/ (archived at https://perma.cc/QT7S-KA8U)
Clark, D (2021) The Long Game: How to be a long-term thinker in a short-term
world, Harvard Business Review Press, Boston
Cross, R (2021) Beyond Collaboration Overload, Harvard Business Review Press,
Boston
Harrin, E (2021) Managing multiple projects: the research, 29 October. Available
from https://rebelsguidetopm.com/managing-multiple-projects-the-research/
(archived at https://perma.cc/73XE-MV4Z)
iQ Offices (2020) 57 percent of Canadians are distracted, lose up to 2 hours of
productivity each workday. Available from www.globenewswire.com/en/
news-release/2020/02/10/1982254/0/en/iQ-Offices-survey-57-percent-of-
Canadians-are-distracted-lose-up-to-2-hours-of-productivity-each-workday.html
(archived at https://perma.cc/X4AB-L2R4)
Microsoft (2021) Work Trend Index Annual Report: The next great disruption is
hybrid work: are we ready? Available from www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/
work-trend-index/hybrid-work (archived at https://perma.cc/ZSZ4-SCPG)
ONS (2020) Coronavirus and homeworking in the UK: April 2020. Available from
www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/
employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/coronavirusandhomeworkingintheuk/
april2020 (archived at https://perma.cc/P5JW-J9FG) [Accessed 21 August 21]
198 MANAGING MULTIPLE PROJECTS

Teller, J, Kock, A and Gemünden, H G (2014) Risk management in project

portfolios is more than managing project risks: A contingency perspective on
risk management, Project Management Journal, 45 (4), 67–80

Further reading
Vaden, R (2015) Procrastinate on Purpose: 5 permissions to multiply your time,
Perigee, New York
 Appendices
Final words

I want to end with this story from Kimberly, because the image of
working in a fast-food environment but having customers who expect
a sit-down service resonates so well with me, and I’m sure you will
recognize it too.

I work in a fast-food PM environment that expects sit-down service:

I carry 12 clients and 32 projects across those clients. I’m one of nine,
and I’m a programme manager. So I have mine, and then I have dotted
authority to all the others for process and audits. I wish I had one single
way of tracking what needs to be done, by when, and by whom. I have
about 32 different ways because no one wants to be the same. It’s hard.
I have time set every day to work my lists, I alternate starting from the
top alphabetically with starting from the bottom, but always attend
to the loudest first. I have learned to give myself five minutes before
each meeting to review my bullet items and reacquaint myself with the
stakeholders and deliverables so that it seems, to them, that they and
their projects are my only focus.

Kimberly Ray, programme manager, US

Kimberly’s story speaks to the reality of juggling multiple projects,

the compromises we make and the hacks we use to try to make every-
one feel as if their work is worthy of our full attention.
I hope this book has given you some tools and tips to manage the
things you can manage. The goal was to provide you with practical
ways to adapt your working style to help you feel like your time is
well spent – and perhaps to make it more likely that you provide your
colleagues with that sit-down service we all strive for.
The unfortunate reality is that the way many organizations manage
work is broken. In my experience, too many leaders at all levels in the
200 APPENDICES

organization are unable or unwilling to say no to more work. There

are personal and professional ramifications to having difficult conver-
sations about workload and juggling multiple projects: What if they
think I’m simply not good/fast/efficient enough at doing my job?
What if I truly am not good enough?
It’s hard to assess whether it is us or the job that is the issue.
However, often the only part we can usefully influence is the way we
approach the work. You can do the best you personally can in order
to keep all the balls in the air but, at the end of the day, if your
organization is not equipping you for success, that working culture
can drain your motivation and eat away at your belief that your work
is fulfilling.
Sadly, I find myself suggesting too often to talented, experienced
project professionals that the time has come for them to move on
from their current business and take their skills somewhere that is
better set up to support productive working practices before they hit
burnout. Once we have optimized their working practices and
empowered them to have difficult conversations about processes,
workload management, expectations and resourcing, there is often
nowhere else to go except out.
The good news is that you are now equipped to have those difficult
conversations. You can talk about how you have combined, stream-
lined and optimized your work so you can get more done in the time
you have to serve your stakeholders more effectively. You’ve got tools
to share and you can spread the word about what it takes to keep all
your work moving forward. You’re a grassroots campaigner for port-
folio management: you do it at a personal level, and you can fly the
flag for the organization taking it seriously as a broader, department,
division or enterprise approach for getting work done. Ultimately,
managing multiple projects shouldn’t mean working more hours:
instead, the onus is on us to come up with strategies to deliver what
we need to and still leave the office on time.
The world of project management is expanding. More and
more work is delivered as projects, and there is no sign that will
change any time soon. You’ve got the skills to succeed in what
 APPENDICES 201

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez in the Foreword calls the project economy

and, if you choose, you can influence your organization for good.
But you don’t have to do that right now. You’re a busy leader;
expect to take some time to reflect on what you’ve learned and imple-
ment the changes you choose. You’re already doing enough, and I
appreciate you carving out the time in your schedule to get to the end
of the book.
Now breathe. And pop the kettle on. You’ve got this!

Appendix 1: Productivity checklists

These checklists are a starting point for thinking about daily, weekly,
monthly and annual activities as a project manager. Use them as a
prompt to ensure all of your projects are making progress and getting
the attention they deserve, because it is easy to overlook the basics
when work gets busy.

Daily things to do
●
Review your To Do list;
●
Check in with project team members who have tasks with
upcoming deadlines or work that is stuck;
●
Deal with urgent issues;
●
Update the project schedule with changes;
●
Update project action list with any progress;
●
Deal with urgent emails, voicemails and messages;
●
Review work for tomorrow and get ready for anything that needs
preparing.

Weekly things to do
●
Update the project schedule, reviewing actual progress against
anticipated progress and take action accordingly.
202 APPENDICES

●
Review and act on project risks and changes.
●
Check in with the team and have a status meeting if required.
●
Check in with the project sponsor, product owner or senior
customer as well as other key stakeholders and suppliers.
●
Prepare and circulate a weekly report if appropriate.
●
Review what’s coming up next week and plan accordingly.
●
Say thank you to the team.
●
Plan for and prepare for upcoming project communications.

Monthly things to do
●
Capture, review and act on lessons learned.
●
Review milestones and key targets for next month and check they
are on track to be achieved.
●
Prepare and circulate monthly reporting.
●
Review and update the project budget.
●
Review resource allocation and make sure people are available for
work due next month.
●
Update project management documentation.
●
Hold a governance review via a steering group, project board,
client meeting or similar.
●
Do some career development activity.
●
Scan the horizon for potential issues and act accordingly.
●
Review the business case and original proposal and ensure it is still
viable.

Annual things to do
●
Complete any year-end financial tasks such as accruals, budget
carry overs and settling outstanding invoices.
●
Input to or carry out staff performance reviews and schedule your
own review with your manager.
 APPENDICES 203

●
Input to the strategic plan, prioritization and resourcing
requirements for next year if required.
●
Organize a project celebration if you haven’t had one recently.
●
Check you’ve taken your annual leave and plan what to do if you
still have time to take.
●
Send greetings cards to vendors, colleagues and other stakeholders
to mark the holidays.

Appendix 2:
Simple weekly project report template for multiple projects
The format below can be used to report progress on multiple projects
within one document. You can use Red/Amber/Green colour coding
to highlight text (where the recipient will receive the information in
colour) to further draw attention to activities that are on track, at
risk or falling behind. The template is designed to be used on a weekly
basis but can easily be adapted to report once a month.

Subject: Weekly report for [project names/my projects/Marketing

projects etc.]: [date]

Please find below the weekly report for the following projects for
[date]:

●
Project name 1;
●
Project name 2;
●
Project name 3.

Tasks due for completion this week:

Project name 1:

●
Task 1 – outstanding;
●
Task 2 – completed;
●
Task 3 – meeting to discuss postponed until next week.
204 APPENDICES

Project name 2:
●
Task 1 – outstanding;
●
Task 2 – completed;
●
Task 3 – meeting to discuss postponed until next week.

Tasks for next week:

Project name 1:
●
Priority task for next week 1;
●
Priority task for next week 2 (Elizabeth);
●
Priority task for next week 3 (meeting happening Tuesday).

Project name 2:
●
Priority task for next week 1;
●
Priority task for next week 2 (Elizabeth);
●
Priority task for next week 3 (meeting happening Tuesday).

Other things of interest:

●
Some news that doesn’t fit into the categories above;
●
An issue or new risk that everyone needs to know about;
●
Some celebration of a good thing that happened;
●
Upcoming holiday/vacation time/notice of future meeting dates.

Appendix 3: How to implement the framework

Reading this book is only the first step on your journey to becoming
better at managing multiple projects. Next, you have to implement
what you have learned. Below is a summary of the action steps in this
book, plus some additional tasks that will help you implement the
framework.
Remember, if you haven’t been doing the action steps as you have
been reading the book, that’s OK. During your first read, you went
through the book to familiarize yourself with the framework, the
 APPENDICES 205

ideas and concepts. The checklist below will help you read it again
with a view to taking action towards creating your own multi-project
management system.
As a recap, there are five concepts within the framework: Portfolio,
Plan, People, Productivity and Positioning. You can work through
them one at a time, perhaps taking a concept per week (or month)
to implement in your own work. If you know you will find
implementing your new skills tricky, perhaps enlist the help of an
accountability partner to work with you? You can review processes
and talk together about the best ways to use the framework efficiently
in your workplace.

APPENDIX TABLE 3.1 Framework concepts and action steps

Framework
concept Action step ✓

Pre-work Identify what category your workload fits into. Do you have a sushi,
spaghetti or side dish project workload? Or perhaps a blend of a
categories?
Reflect on your current position. Do you spot any of the warning
signs outlined in Chapter 2? If you are a team leader, can you spot
the warning signs in anyone in your team?
Portfolio Create a workload spreadsheet (or equivalent) covering all the
projects and major recurring tasks that you are working on.
Prioritize the work on your workload spreadsheet.
Look for connections between projects and group similar work into
logical buckets.
Plan Make sure each of your individual projects has a schedule or
timeline.
Map the dependencies between your projects.
Choose either the ladder or hot air balloon view to make your
consolidated schedule (or decide to have a go at both and see
which you prefer).
Combine your schedules into one overarching timeline.
Review that schedule to look for resource conflicts and busy times
and take appropriate action.
Start an action log for task-level planning.
206 APPENDICES

TABLE APPENDIX 3.1 continued

Framework
concept Action step ✓

People Identify all your stakeholders and create a stakeholder register and
stakeholder map.
Review the power, legitimacy and expectation of urgency of your
stakeholders across all of your projects, and use a table to identify
stakeholder saliency and to help you prioritize where you spend
your time.
Check everyone knows what is expected of them for each project
and that they are only scheduled to work at 80% of their available
hours.
Review your upcoming meetings and see what can be combined
and which ones can be done in less time: change your default
meeting time to at least ten minutes less than what it is now.
Look at your individual communications plans and see where it
makes sense to consolidate and merge the information that is being
shared with your stakeholders.
Productivity If you suffer from any of the productivity saboteurs, block out 30
minutes in your calendar to brainstorm ways to approach your work
differently.
Review your task list and use the TIS task profiles to see the shape
of your work. Which profile do you use most of the time? Is that the
best use of your time? If not, what could you do to shift tasks
around?
Choose a few of the time management tactics and techniques from
Chapter 6 that are new to you and try them out.
Productivity means more than what tasks got crossed off today.
Consider what Time Well Spent means to you and how you judge
and value your own time.
Positioning Find one thing that you could take action on today (or in the next
couple of days) to make it easier to manage your projects tomorrow.

Introduce your team to the five-email rule and agree to try it.
Identify where you have processes that could be documented. Pick
one and turn it into a set of work instructions, a process document
or checklist.
Review the risk logs for each project together to create a
consolidated view of risk across your personal portfolio. See
whether the combined impact increases or decreases the risk.
 APPENDICES 207

TABLE APPENDIX 3.1 continued

Framework
concept Action step ✓

Consider how to consolidate the performance reporting and

governance for your projects, if and where you can, and then put
that into practice.
Look at your home work environment if you have one and consider
what you could improve to make it feel more like a workspace that
is conducive to productivity.
Finally Reflect on what you have achieved and how it makes you feel about
your workload. How can you share your successes with others at
work?

Appendix 4: Stop, start, continue

What’s working for you right now? What’s not? Take a moment to
reflect on how the past month has gone and how next month can
build on this (or be different).

Date: _____________________

STOP: What are you going to stop doing?

______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________

START: What are you going to start doing?

______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________

CONTINUE: What are you going to continue doing?

______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
208 APPENDICES

More books by Elizabeth Harrin

Engaging Stakeholders on Projects: How to harness people power
(APM, 2020)
Whether you work at a project, programme or portfolio level, you’ll
have stakeholders involved in your activities. This book addresses the
challenges you face when dealing with project-drive change in organ-
izations. It provides an in-depth examination of the topic covered in
the APM Body of Knowledge (7th edition), providing projects profes-
sionals with detailed tips, tools and practical steps to help improve
ways of working. It will show you how harnessing the power of
people is key to improving project success.
This book addresses central questions such as:
●
What does engagement look like?
●
What tools have I got available?
●
How do I best reach, engage and work with stakeholders?
●
How do I minimize conflict and resistance to change and move
toward resolution?
Managing stakeholders is a critical skill required by all managers and
finally there is a book to help you to do just that. As with every good
book you’ll want to read it front to back to begin with, however, there
is so much practical content here that you’ll be jumping around it in
no time! It’s suitable for every project professional regardless of sector,
country or area of expertise. Even with 20 years of experience myself,
I still was able to take plenty of things away!
Colin D Ellis, author and founder of the Culture Makers community

Collaboration Tools for Project Managers (PMI, 2016)

Today’s project leaders face the challenge of managing projects effec-
tively using tested and reliable methods, while also trying out the new
methods preferred by some global and tech-savvy team members and
stakeholders. Information travels faster than ever before. Project
teams are called upon to produce relevant and up-to-date project
information, increase productivity and deliver results through top-
notch communications.
 APPENDICES 209

Social media and online communications tools have rapidly

changed our world outside the workplace. These platforms and other
tools, like wikis and big data repositories, offer exciting possibilities
to improve project team collaboration and stakeholder communica-
tion in the workplace as well. Since project managers rely on
communication and effective team management skills, they need to
keep up with the fast pace of change, technology trends and the latest
business drivers that help move organisations forward.
This book builds on Elizabeth’s 2010 book, Social Media for
Project Managers and is fully updated. It provides the latest informa-
tion, success stories and an easy-to-follow guide to implementing
online collaboration tools successfully.
It’s time for project teams to explore how online collaboration
tools can help them to communicate faster, work virtually with
people across the globe and get better business results.

As project managers, we can no longer just manage our project details;

schedule, budget, quality, scope. Yes, they do need to be managed,
but it is becoming much more than that. One must, as Elizabeth says,
‘Create collaborative environments where people can do their best
work…’. That environment will not only make the project manager
more effective, but will make the project more successful, something
we all strive for. In her book, Collaboration Tools for Project
Managers, Elizabeth does just that: help the project manager use all
the collaborative tools available. She defines the tools, provides the
reasoning behind their effectiveness, and how to use them for their
maximum value. Elizabeth also provides a roadmap to a myriad of
resources as well as inviting the reader into the conversation. This book
is a must read for all project managers who want to be more effective,
and I believe that is what we all want.

David Shirley, PMP, author, educator and

Cleland Project Management Literature Award Winner
210 APPENDICES

Shortcuts to Success: Project Management in The Real World (BCS,

2013)
Anything from an office move to the Olympic Games can be termed
a project but it takes time to gain the experience required to be confi-
dent on the job. Not any more: this book contains the wisdom of
project managers totalling over 250 years of professional project
management experience in a highly accessible format. This practical
and entertaining book will help project managers get up to speed
quickly with good practice, avoid pitfalls and deliver business value.

Packed with hard-won insights on how to make projects work in

today’s pressurised business environment. Apply what it suggests and
you’re likely to save your company a fortune and yourself heaps of
frustration!

Dr Penny Pullan, PMP, director, Making Projects Work Ltd

Customer-Centric Project Management (Routledge, 2012). Co-

authored with Phil Peplow
There has been a sea-change in the focus of organizations away from
a traditional product or service centricity towards customer-centricity
– and projects are just as much a part of that change. Projects must
deliver value and the authors demonstrate convincingly that stake-
holders are the ones who get to decide what ‘value’ actually means.
This short guide explains the importance of customer-centricity to
project performance and demonstrates the tools and processes to
guide customer-centric thinking in your project teams. The book
provides a straightforward implementation guide to delivering
engagement, even on difficult projects.

[This approach] allowed us to achieve fantastic results in terms of

customer satisfaction. It enabled us to channel our energies into
precisely what our customers were looking for – a consistently excellent
service.

Neil Harrison, CEO, Travelex

 INDEX

Note: Page numbers in italic indicate figures or tables

action log 75, 81, 85 project reporting, streamlining 120–21

Agile alliance 185–86 relationships building 136
Allcott, Graham 120, 155 reporting on many projects 121–24
Amabile, Teresa 68 resource scheduling 133
API (Application Programming Interface) shorter meetings, fixing 132
189 two-week look, using 133–34
APM Body of Knowledge 34–35, 208 communication skills 113
APM Planning, Monitoring and Control compliance projects 50, 51
Specific Interest Group 77 conflict 102–03
Association for Project Management (APM) COST (compliance, operations, strategic
34, 77, 95 and tactical) 50–52
Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly 153
batching. See time blocking Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
big tasks, breaking 143, 149 99–100
budget report (project) 189
Burnout Epidemic, The (Moss) 159 dashboards 189
Burt, R S 87–88 decision fatigue 160–61, 176
deliverable dependency 63
calendar delivery dates, committing to 149
for avoiding procrastination 143 dependency 61, 62, 65, 67
communication calendar, creation of definition 61–2
128–30 documenting 66–67
for effective organizing 145 inter-project dependencies, identification
time blocking 155 of 64–66
capacity planning software 87 types 63
Carleton University 49 up to date, keeping 68
‘channel inefficiency’ 175 dependency management 64
checklists 161 detailed schedule. See ladder view
creation process 176–78 digital tools, suggestions for effective usage
Clark, Dorie 59, 60 162–63
Clegg, Dai 45 disorganization 144–47
collaboration tool(s) 146, 159 software tools, ensuring 146
combined schedule 71, 74–75, 91 structured environment creation
communication 117–38, 118, 122–23, 145–46
126–27, 149 distractions 143
colleagues availability, checking of documents 187
134–35 budget report 189
communication calendar, creation of individual/consolidated document 187
128–30 project closure document 190–91
countdown plans, creating 124–28 Project Initiation Document/Project Brief
decision log 130–31 185–86
key takeaways and action steps 137–38 project status report 188–89
miscommunication 112 RAID log 188
project communication, organizing 117 on reflection 189–90
project meetings, combining 118–20 ‘drop everything list’ 111–12
212 INDEX

Dynamic Systems Development Method Grace Saunders, Elizabeth 169

(DSDM) 46 GrowthHackers 49

Eat That Frog! (Tracy) 158 HBR Project Management Handbook

80/20 rule 166–68, 167 (Nieto-Rodriguez) 97
Eisenhower matrix 44, 47–49 high-level schedule. See hot air balloon view
Eisenhower, Dwight D. 47 HiPPO 164
Ellis, Sean 49 home office environment, creating 191–95
emails 49, 135, 143 Horwath, Rich 59
five-email rule 175–76 hot air balloon view 70–71, 72
engagement How to Fix Meetings (Allcott and Watts)
employee engagement 94 120, 155
stakeholder engagement 25, 68, 94,
95–97, 117 immovable tasks 81–82
enthusiast 153 impact, confidence and ease (ICE) 49–50
environment influences ICE scoring 49–50
ambiance 193 individuals 86, 87, 95, 97, 109, 124
background noise 192 influence matrix 111
desk space 192–93 informal chats 101
distractions 194 interpersonal skills 94, 100, 112
governance 181–84 interruptions 143
governance meetings 182 digital Interruptions 163
home office environment, creating iQ Offices 174
productive 191–95 IT portfolio 35
location 192
office environment, influencing 194–95 Kanban board 61
project risk management 178–81 knowledge dependency 63
reporting 182–83 Kramer, Stephen 68
routine 193
Erica 139 ladder view 69–70
European Commission 162 leadership 22, 25, 26, 183
legitimacy 105–06, 107
‘failure factors’ 25 Long Game, The (Clark) 59
fake deadlines 162 long-term horizon 78
filing for finding 146–47
Flow (Csikszentmihalyi) 153 Macros 189
focus improving techniques 164–68 managers
focus on 20% 166–68, 167 budget report 189
sticky three 165 on high energy times 158
time blocking 165–66 well vision on gold plating 161
4-D solution 150–51 master schedule 70, 71
medium-term horizon 78
Gallup 94 meeting minutes 160–61
Gantt chart 61, 66, 69, 188 Microsoft 174
gatekeepers 87 millennials 139
GDP (gross domestic product) 19 mindmapping 40
Gen Z 139 miscommunication 112
goals 143 Mitchell, R K 105, 107
standardizing process 178 MoSCoW 45–47
time tracking 157 multi-project lessons 119
gold plating 161–62 multi-project management 4, 19–31, 39, 86
governance 26, 181–84 framework 4, 60
governance meetings 182 gatekeepers, relationships building with
reporting 182–83 87–89
 INDEX 213

key takeaways and action steps 31 personal portfolio 40–43, 195

multi-project environment 2, 68 phone calls 143
multi-project stakeholder map, planning. See multi-project scheduling
forming 102–05, 104 Planning, Scheduling, Monitoring and
priority changes in 81 Control Guide 77
resource allocation 85–90 PMI. See Project Management Institute
resources, securing 86–87 (PMI)
stakeholder directory, creation of poor planning
99–102 impacts and causes of 147–48
stakeholders, managing 99–105 worth planning 148–49
struggles and challenges of 28–30, 28, portfolio 5, 33–56, 156, 157
89–90 as a communication tool 55
understanding and managing 20–21 components of 36–37
warning signs 27–30 COST model 50–52
see also multi-project risk management; definition of 34–5, 34
multi-project scheduling; Eisenhower matrix 44, 47–49
workload grouping the work 53–55
multi-project risk management 178–81 ICE scoring 49–50
governance 181–84 key takeaways and action steps 56
multi-project scheduling 7, 25, 59–91, 96 MoSCoW 45–47
action log, using 75, 81, 85 non-project work 42–43
additional tasks, including 73 personal portfolio 40–43
busy times, planning 75–77 portfolio thinking, principles of 36–38,
combined schedule, analyzing 73–75 38
combined schedule, sharing 75 prioritizing the work 44–52
hot air balloon view 70–71 priority projects limits 52–53
immovable tasks, identifying 81–82 risk information, integration of 179–80
key takeaways and action steps 91 tasks, projects and programmes 38–39
ladder view 69–70 workload tracking spreadsheet 41
plan concept framework 60 portfolio management 34–36
project dependencies 61–68 portfolio manager 34
rolling wave planning 77–81, 80 positioning. See environment influences
schedule planning 60–61 power 105, 106
schedules, consolidating 68–77 Praxis Framework 36
standard weekly report, using 83–84 PRINCE2® project management 98
task-level planning 81–85 prioritization
tasks with wiggle room, identifying decisions 163–64
82–83 prioritizing items/tasks 12, 141, 143
see also dependency; poor planning sticky tasks 165
see also multi-project scheduling
non-work tasks 13 pro 153–54
Not Today (Erica and Schultz) 52, 139 procrastination 141–44
productivity 5–6, 94. See productivity
occupant 152–53 saboteurs; time management (for
office environment 192, 194–95 self)
‘one, two, done’ habit 144 productivity saboteurs 140–50, 142
open-door time/open-door slot 160 disorganization 144–47
operations projects 50–51 overcoming saboteurs 150
poor planning 147–49
Pareto, Vilfredo: 80/20 rule 166–68, 167 procrastination 141–44
people 86, 93, 93 from technology 162
definition of 95–97 programme 39
stakeholder engagement 25, 68, 94, Progress Principle, The (Amabile and
95–97, 117 Kramer) 68
214 INDEX

project boards/steering groups 181, 182 risk management 26, 96, 178–81
project closure document 190–91 roadmaps (governance tool) 182–83
project communication. See communication
project control 26 scheduling 60, 68, 188. See multi-project
project documentation 184–91 scheduling
business case 185 combined schedule 71, 74–75, 91
lessons learned log 189–90 master schedule 70, 71
project budget tracker 189 Schultz, Mike 139
project charter 185–86 short-term horizon 77
project closure document 190–91 small talk 101
project management plan 186–88 social media 48, 143
project schedule 188 software 86
project status report 188–89 digital tools suggestions 162–63
RAID log 188 help files 146
‘project economy’ 19 as report creation tools 189
project ecosystem 102, 104 time-tracking software 157
Project Initiation Document/Project stakeholder analysis 111
Brief 185–86 stakeholder directory 99–102
Project Management Institute (PMI) 19 stakeholder engagement 25, 68, 94, 95–97,
Project Management Office 118, 129, 160, 117
176, 179, stakeholder salience theory 105–11
project management software 61, 85 stakeholders 20, 108, 148
project management. See multi-project acceptance governance parameters 183
management categories of 107–09
project managers 22, 98–99 drop-everything list, creating 111–12
common tasks for 43 prioritize time with 105–12
on governance 182–83 project boards, presence in 182–83
on project management planning 187 stakeholder expectations, setting
risk handling 179–80 112–17
project portfolio. See portfolio standardizing work 176–78
project requirements 25 sticky three tasks 165
project risk management 178–81 strategic projects 51
project schedule 188. See multi-project Strategic Thinking Institute 59
scheduling structured approach 39, 45, 187
project sponsors 27–28, 97–99, 182, 183,
185, 190 tactical project 51–52
project teams 19, 22, 179 tasks 38
projects activity to tasks 177
categories 22–23 driven majority 167–68
definition of 39 filter tasks 150–51
different approaches for managing 31 ‘leftover’ tasks 160
key skills for managing 25–26, 26 stick tasks 165
project management efforts 42 task profile 152, 152–54
task switching 165–66
RAAIDDC 188 task dependency 63
RAID log 188 task management software 114
reflection team leaders 86, 87, 124
as lessons learned log 189–90 team management 25, 26
reflection time creation 195–96 templates 160–1
reports: project status report 188–89 time blocking 155, 165–66
resource dependency 63 time management 168
resource management 85–86, 89 calendar usage tips 143
resources 85–86 distraction factors, considering 139
 INDEX 215

meeting minutes 160–61 time-tracking 157

not doing something, awareness of 144 TIS (task, interest, skill) 152–54
open door times 159 To Do list 4, 44, 125–26, 150
own work time, techniques of 150–54 tolerances 98–99
prioritizing items 141 transition time 155–56
reflection time 195–96
time blocking 155, 165–66 Udemy 139
Time Well Spent 169–70 urgency 105, 106
time-tracking 157
transition time 155–56 ‘values-driven schedule’ 169
videos time, managing 146 Verbatim 147–48
see also time management (for self) vision 143
time management (for self) 154–64
available times setting 159–60 Watts, Hayley 120, 155
decision fatigue, avoiding 160–61 weekly report 83–84
fake deadlines, using 162 wiggle room 82–83
4-D solution 150–51 women high energy levels 158
gold plating, avoiding 161–62 work from home environment 192–95
guilt, dealing with 158–59 work time (own). See time management
high-energy times, knowing 157–58 (for self)
plan transition time 155–56 Work Trend Index 174
presence setting 159–60 workload 20, 76
prioritization decisions, quick changes in 23–24
questioning on 163–64 portfolio thinking application to 40–41
tech usage learning 162–63 project workload, categories of 21–23
time-tracking 157 recognization of 31
transfer key dates to calendar 155 workload tracking spreadsheet 41
weekly reviews booking 156–57 World Council of Churches 47
time maximizer mindset 174–76 worth planning 148–49
five-email rule 175–76 Wysocki, Robert 39
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