Do you feel pressure to do more and more? I do. I’m pretty sure I’m not alone.
But sometimes, that “more and more” creates pressure on the team and the people who interact with that team. When anyone has a capacity reduction, everyone feels even more pressure.
But pressure is not particularly useful. Exhorting people to “go faster” or “do more” does not help people increase their capacity. Instead, managers—or any facilitative leader—needs to recognize when capacity changes. That’s when they can replan and decide how to proceed.
Recognize When Capacity Changes
I’ve experienced a serious change in my capacity over the past several months. My appendix cancer diagnosis led to 10 rounds of chemo. I’m delighted to say I am done with chemo and headed to the Big Surgery next month. My capacity will diminish even more during my surgery and recovery. While I’m not looking forward to even more capacity reduction, I am looking forward to regaining my health.
Most teams do not have such a dramatic decrease in capacity. Instead, a team member gets the flu, or a parent has to deal with a child’s cold, or the building suffers a power outage. Whatever the source, the entire team’s capacity changes.
Managers—and any facilitative leaders, such as project managers—need to recognize when capacity changes. Once leaders realize what’s occuring, they have many choices. Trying to force more throughput does not work. (See Flow Metrics and Why They Matter to Teams and Managers.) Instead, it’s time to replan and purposefully reduce all the WIP and plans.
It’s time to look at “how little” instead of “how much.”
Reduced Capacity Requires Less Work, Not More Pressure
When teams have less capacity (and I mean all teams, not just feature teams), it’s time to focus on much less work. Here are some guidelines I use for reducing the work:
- What is the single most important work item we can do? (For managers, this is the next decision. For teams, this is often an item that offers value in the sense of reducing risk, learning, or customer value.)
- How can we collaborate to finish that single work item? That collaboration will allow us to decrease our cycle time and increase throughput.
- How will we decide on the next most important item? This means both the speed of the decision and how we will make the decision.
I’m disappointed in my capacity reduction. If you or your team also suffers from reduced capacity, I suspect you are also disappointed. But instead of trying to do “more,” purposefully focus on less. Less for the team, the product, and the project portfolio.
Pressure to do more never works. Replanning and focusing on the single most important item at a time does work. That’s how we manage with reduced capacity.
Read More:
- I introduced the idea of “how little” in Manage It! Your Guide to Modern, Pragmatic Project Management.
- I expanded the idea of focus and managing all the WIP in Manage Your Project Portfolio: Increase Your Capacity and Finish More Projects.
- See the Modern Management Made Easy books for how to think about this as a leader, someone who leads teams, and someone/a team that leads an organization.