Have you ever had a project you knew would be helpful, but could never get it noticed? I know I have. Here are some steps you can take to improve your chances that I wish I had learned sooner. To demonstrate this let’s follow a fictitious customer service manager, Scott. Whenever you see italics we will follow Scott with his project.
Make it About the Money
When trying to get your project off the ground there are two things you can focus on. You can choose a revenue generating or a cost saving idea. Sometimes this is dictated by the department you are in, but it doesn’t have to. For example marketing and sales generally affect revenue, while operations and legal generally affect cost. It is important to remember that a reduction in cost usually has a bigger impact than the equivalent increase in sales. How much is directly related to the company’s profit margin. This doesn’t mean that it is more important, only that it is different. For example, no amount of cost reduction will matter if you don’t have any sales.
In our example Scott’s project is to increase revenue by offering customers who want to cancel their subscriptions either free/discounted products, or free shipping. He plans to offer targeted promotions based on products on the pages the customer most visited. This means he needs a system that will take the site visit data and use an algorithm to determine which option to offer. He also wants customer service representatives to have access to this system for calls, chats, and emails.
Once you decide what direction you are going to go it is important to develop a well thought out and detailed plan. As part of this plan it is important to include any direct AND indirect costs in your calculation. Calculating costs may be difficult if you don’t have access to them. Asking someone who does may be all you need, but if that data is not available you can look at industry averages or similar costs in your geographic area. Be sure to document that information in your proposal.
Scott doesn’t know the true cost of all the things he needs to complete his calculations so he turns to looking at industry data for things like the below. (This is not an exhaustive list of all things Scott needs to make his case.)
- General mark up on products to discount and give away
- How long customers will continue with their subscription
- Cost of labor required for the project
- How long a project of this size should take
Scott uses all the data to create a complete proposal including the costs to get started and how long it would take to recuperate the investment.
Make Your Case
For better or worse you might be the reason you can’t get the project noticed. Unfortunately, because humans are involved there are biases you might have to overcome. Your project may not get a proper review because of your personality, gender, race, time in the company, title, or position. I am not saying this should be the case, but we can’t ignore that it can happen. As such your project isn’t always being evaluated on its merits alone. This means you need to make allies.
Before you officially present your project, talk to people in other departments and in your own team. It is important to discuss how your project may also help them. (If your project won’t affect them then talk about how it will help the company.)
Scott has only been in the company for less than a year and knows nothing about sales or IT systems. He is concerned that no one will take his project seriously. He needs allies.
In the breakroom he sees Han, a sales director, and casually talks to him about his project. While Han has concerns about devaluing the products he decides he likes the idea.
After Han leaves he notices Juanita, one of the fulfillment managers, at the other end of the room. He realizes that she had been listening to Han and his conversation. He then asks her what she thought of the proposal. As someone in operations she wasn’t too interested in a sales function and thought it sounded okay.
Scott could have walked away at this point, but decided to ask an additional question. “If we were to launch this project what could we do to make it easier on the fulfillment team?” Juanita thinks about this for a minute. While she still isn’t interested, she now realizes that she could get some improvements for her team with this project. She mentions that a problem they have been having is that promotional items are supposed to have different packaging, but the only way to know this currently are some notes on the order. It would be very helpful if there was a way to designate this. (If that were created for Scott’s project, maybe she can use it to make all other promotions better.) Now Juanita is invested.
In addition you must keep the project in the forefront. It isn’t just a one and done scenario. You have to have several discussions with the same people about the project. Especially getting feedback on how it could be improved. The more people you have excited about your project the more likely it will come to fruition.
Scott knows that just submitting a proposal will not be sufficient to get the project off the ground. He talks with Han and Juanita regularly about the proposal. He then learns that they have both been speaking highly of the project to others as well. The best part is that Han has gotten the attention of the CMO, who likes the idea and wants to implement it. The CMO asks you to come to their office to give details. Because Scott has already created a very detailed proposal with actual costs and projections the CMO is able to get the project to move forward.
Share the Results
Once you have successfully completed the project there is one more important thing to do. You should share the good news with those who supported you. Let them know the benefit it created, the things you learned from it, and most importantly thank them for hearing you out and supporting you. In this way you make it a team win instead of your win and they will be more willing to become an ally of your future projects as well.
With the project now implemented successfully, Scott looked to share with Juanita and Han the good news. He thanked them and expressed how integral they were in getting the project completed. Later that day Scott headed to the CMO’s office and thanked them for their help and support as well. He promised to provide data on how the project has impacted sales. More importantly Scott now has allies for his next big idea.