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Military reporting technique boosts project management

By Marilyn de Villiers
Johannesburg, 25 May 2017
Dirk le Roux, ICT executive at Mediclinic.
Dirk le Roux, ICT executive at Mediclinic.

A communication technique initially created by the US Navy as a method for conveying critical information in the high-risk nuclear submarine environment could significantly improve the outcomes of complex projects.

This is according to Dirk le Roux, ICT executive at Mediclinic, who - with decades of experience in the project management arena under his belt - acts as executive sponsor on several strategic projects that cut across country and cultural boundaries within his organisation.

Speaking at the recent Project Management South Africa's Gauteng PMO Forum, Le Roux emphasised the SBAR (situation, background, assessment, recommendation) technique could go a long way to enhancing executive sponsor engagement in projects and ultimately improve the overall outcome of the project.

The US Navy found the SBAR communication tool enabled all users, regardless of their level of command, to communicate via a common structure.

The SBAR technique has subsequently been widely adopted in the healthcare industry as it provides a reliable framework for practitioners to convey urgent and non-urgent information quickly and simply. It has been found to be particularly effective during hand-overs at shift changes in hospitals. Studies have shown that 80% of serious medical errors can be connected to miscommunication at this crucial time.

Executive sponsors

Guy Jelley, CEO of Project Portfolio Office (PPO) which sponsors the Gauteng PMO Forum, noted that regardless of the industry in which it was operating, project management faced the same challenges.

"An actively engaged executive sponsor is the top driver of projects meeting their original goals and business intent. However, there are still too few project sponsors that actually engage and understand the status of their projects. Only 62% of projects have executive sponsors and that is just not good enough," Jelley said.

"Executive sponsors have to be kept engaged and effective communications is a very important part of this as 19% of project failures are attributable to poor communications and 18% to lack of communications by senior management."

As an executive project sponsor, I have often questioned the usefulness of project status reports.

Guy Jelley, Project Portfolio Office

Le Roux told forum delegates that as an executive project sponsor, he relied on effective project status reporting to ensure he remained on top of project performance and progress which he had to report on to his board and executive.

However, his experience had shown project status reports that contained reams of data and facts without context or opinion were seldom useful.

"As an executive project sponsor, I have often questioned the usefulness of project status reports tabled at project steering committee meetings," he said.

"Engagement requires more than facts. Ticking boxes is not enough. Effective engagement requires the project manager to address the concerns of the executives, to explain what is happening with the project and to give an indication of his or her confidence or concern regarding the true status of the project," he explained.

Having used SBAR in his organisation for the past year, Le Roux said it had made a significant difference to project reporting. It provided a framework for effective communication as it had a logical structure and was message-oriented; it encouraged critical thinking and enabled the project manager to provide the full story about the project status. It had also been quick and simple to introduce.

"However, SBAR does not replace the project status report. It can be used to enhance it or as a project status summary but should not become just another template to be filled out," he concluded.

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