According to a study conducted in 2018 by Kelton Global, 87% of workers responded that they would like to see more transparency within their companies. In the past few years, project transparency has become an often-heard buzzword. Though this is not a relatively new concept, it has definitely gained momentum, with an increasing number of employees expecting their companies and leaders to become more transparent, which in turn motivates them to perform better and feel more in sync with the company’s goals, values, and mission.
In this post, we will dive deep into the concept of project transparency, its importance, and how leaders, especially project managers, can improve transparency within their projects.
Table of Contents
Defining Project Transparency
The concept of project transparency is as simple as it sounds! Displaying transparency in a project means maintaining open and clear communication and visibility with the project team throughout the entire project lifecycle. Two of the most common reasons why several projects fail are a lack of proper communication and a lack of setting clear expectations. As a project manager, it is highly recommended that you keep your communication channels with the team as open as possible.
Project transparency enables the entire team to be aware of what is happening with the project and ensures that everybody is on the same page. Project transparency also involves documenting all the various decisions and communication and sharing them in a centralized location, so anyone on the team can easily access them. There are several reasons why project managers should focus on and prioritize transparency in their projects. Read on to find out more about these reasons.
Why Should Project Managers Focus on Transparency?
Here are the top five reasons why transparency should be at the top of the priority list for project managers.
1. Building Trust – By being transparent, project managers can successfully build trust among the team members. It enables everybody in the team to understand what the others are doing and also builds the trust that accurate information will be shared with the entire team. It also encourages the team to pitch in wherever required as they believe that the team’s overall success is as important as their individual success.
2. Clear Expectations – By ensuring project transparency, managers can clearly establish what is expected out of each team member, guide the team members in understanding their expectations, and provide them with clear project timelines so that they are aware of when to submit their work, etc.
3. Boosting Productivity – One of the major reasons why project transparency is absolutely crucial is because it helps in boosting the team’s productivity and efficiency. When each team member is aware of what the other team members are doing, the status of various deliverables, etc., it pushes them to give their best as well.
4. Keeping the Project on Track – A slight delay in the completion of even one task can completely delay the entire project, resulting in missing the determined deadline. By being transparent about the status, project managers and team members can quickly identify any bottlenecks and resolve them as soon as possible so that the project stays on track.
5. Promoting Collaboration – When you are open and transparent with the team members, it promotes effective collaboration and communication between them. This in turn helps in enhancing the group’s teamwork.
Ways to Improve Project Transparency
Below are some of the ways in which project managers can improve transparency in their projects.
- Before you go ahead with any project, you need to assess what is the transparency culture being followed currently, what their habits are, what changes you need to implement, etc. By assessing key details, you can improve the transparency level within the group.
- As a project manager, you need to keep the communication channels open and clearly explain to the team why it is important for everyone in the project team to be transparent. This will enable the team to stay aligned with the goals and work towards the timely completion of the project.
- One of the best ways to improve project transparency is to provide accurate contact information about all the team members involved in the project. This will enable them to contact each other easily. Also, project managers should encourage the team members to respond in a timely manner so that there is no delay caused.
- Change management is a key aspect that every project manager needs to understand and accept. In order to ensure that there is minimum disruption whenever a change is requested, managers should be transparent and clearly discuss the changes requested. They should also be open to questions and discussions as it will encourage the team to understand the reason behind the change and work towards accomplishing it.
- Apart from maintaining transparency among the team members, it is vital that project managers maintain transparency with the clients as well. Project managers should share regular status updates, explain the reason for the delay, if any, request feedback, etc. Clear and open communication with clients will also help in maintaining the required level of transparency with the team members.
- Project transparency is a two-way channel, which means that it is not only the project managers who need to be transparent but also the team members. If someone is not being transparent, project managers should openly ask them for updates and insights about the status of their tasks. This will enable the team also to be aware of what is happening with those particular tasks, provide feedback, brainstorm, etc.
When it comes to project transparency, there are a couple of focus areas related to the project, such as:
- Communication – One of the key areas where transparency is vital is project communication. The team can use different communication channels like emails, instant messaging, calls, etc., to keep the flow of communication smooth.
- Budget – Though project managers cannot share all the details of the project budget, it is possible to share the budget information in the form of time available. This means that informing the team about how much time they can allocate for the project can help them to plan their work accordingly. This in turn, can help project managers to stay within the allocated project budget.
Conclusion
Though ‘transparency’ is considered a buzzword, it is definitely here to stay! Project managers can definitely gain a lot of benefits by practicing and prioritizing project transparency. Of course, there are several information that cannot be shared, such as trade secrets, sensitive personal information, specific financial data, etc. However, by being transparent about things that can be shared, project managers can foster a healthy and successful team.
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