Alignment is important for projects and improvement efforts.
The communication plan I usually use for projects is the Green, Yellow, or Red indicators to show if we are progressing to plan or not. This has proven to not be enough. This became apparent when we had two stakeholders together in a room. We saw how they weren’t aligned in the project vision. We recovered from this, but I have learned a great lesson.
It is important to build into your communication plan a method to take an “alignment pulse” among stakeholders, sponsors, customers, ect. People’s minds can drift away from the original plan and goal of the project. Create visuals to ensure everybody sees the project as you do to generate the conversation. Hold difficult “stop the line” meetings when you see the alignment being out of sync.
We always hear about managing expectations, but you need to begin with alignment instead before you can do that!
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