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Core Team

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About this lesson

Most large projects are managed by a cross-functional core team. Core team members have a dual responsibility; they are responsible for the project achieving its goals and they are responsible to ensure that the project complies with their function’s standards and best practices.

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Core Team

When to use

Projects that require many individuals from different departments or organizations should use the Core Team approach. The Core Team should be established as soon as the project is approved. The Core team stays in place until project completion. The Core Team is sometimes referred to as the Project Management Team.

Instructions

Based upon the high-level project plan, an assessment is made of which functions or organizations will play a significant role in doing the work of the project.
Each of the functions or organizations assigns an individual to be the Core Team member for the project.
The Core Team member works with functional managers and SMEs to create a plan for the function’s participation in the project.
Core Team members meet together and create an integrated project plan.
As the project progresses, Core Team members manage day-to-day project activities within the function or area they represent.
Core Team members ensure their respective functional or organizational leaders are informed about project decisions or risk issues prior to stage gate or management review meetings.
Core Team members work together to resolve issues and problems on the project.

Hints & tips

Core Team members must lead in two directions. They must lead into their function or organization to manage the project tasks conducted by individuals in their function. They need to ensure the work is done in a way that meets the project goals and needs. They must also lead into the project Core Team to represent their function’s perspective. They must identify and resolve risks within the project relates to their functional areas. The need to ensure that all project work is done in a manner consistent with their functional standards.
Core Team members must be good negotiators and good at resolving conflict. Many Core Team meetings are spent resolving issues between functions.
Core Team members should stay with the project through project closeout. Their performance appraisal should include both project performance and functional performance attributes.
Core Team is not needed when there are only 2 or 3 team members or all the work is in one department.

00:04 Hi, I'm Ray Sheen.
00:05 In this lesson, I'd like to talk about the project core team.
00:09 According to the Project Management Body of Knowledge, the PMBOK Guide,
00:13 a project management team is the members of the project team who are directly
00:17 involved in project management activities.
00:20 The project management team is often called the core team.
00:23 The entire project team is often represented by three concentric circles.
00:28 The inner circle is the project leader.
00:30 The project leader is responsible for directing the overall project effort.
00:34 Normally, he or she does most of the communication with the stakeholders and
00:38 finally they also take the lead managing project risk throughout the project.
00:42 This is discussed in more detail in another lesson.
00:46 The next circle is the project management team or core team,
00:49 which is what I want to focus on in this session.
00:52 The core team members are the subject matter experts and functional leaders for
00:55 the project.
00:57 It's normally composed of one individual from each department that has a major role
01:01 in conducting project work.
01:03 In my illustration, we have a construction project.
01:06 So, the team consists of engineering, construction ops, planning, permitting,
01:11 contracts, and safety.
01:13 In your project, it will be the functions doing your project work.
01:16 I'll talk more about what these core team leaders do on the next few slides.
01:20 The outer circle of the project team is called the extended team.
01:24 The extended team represents the other people who will be doing work on
01:28 the project.
01:29 They're not project level decision makers, but
01:31 they're vitally important to project success.
01:34 On a small project, there may not be any extended team members.
01:37 The core team may be, actually, doing all the work.
01:41 So, let's talk about the core team and their responsibilities.
01:45 First, with respect to planning, core team members are responsible for
01:49 the functional plans within the overall project plan.
01:52 The core team members must work together to ensure their plans are fully
01:56 integrated.
01:57 This often leads to the identification of risks.
02:00 Risk from a functional perspective, and risk from an integration perspective.
02:05 Once a project plan is in place, core team members are responsible for
02:09 reporting status of the project work within their functional areas.
02:14 This will require them to coordinate with the functional managers in their area.
02:18 If there are problems within their function, completing project work,
02:22 the core team member should work with the functional manager to resolve it.
02:26 In addition, the core team members keeping functional management informed on
02:30 the overall project progress and preparing them for any project reviews
02:34 that they will attend, such as management reviews or technical reviews.
02:38 If a core team member is attending a review with stakeholders, they should
02:42 assist the project leader, or whoever is presenting for their project team, by
02:46 answering any questions that are pertinent to their function and department.
02:50 The third area of responsibility is that of actual execution of project work.
02:55 On a small project, the core team member is usually doing the project work for
03:00 their function.
03:01 On large projects, that area often includes a group of extended team members.
03:05 Also, as a core team member, they're working with other core team members to
03:10 make wise cross-functional project decisions.
03:13 They are providing functional perspective on project decisions,
03:16 to ensure the decision, both, meets project objectives and
03:20 maintains alignment with functional objectives and standards.
03:24 That brings us to the next area that we need to discuss.
03:27 This is the best practice for core team members.
03:30 Being a core team member is a difficult job.
03:33 He or she must be a subject matter expert across the functional discipline and
03:37 they have to be able to lead a team of extended team members.
03:41 They are leading in two directions, simultaneously.
03:45 They lead within the function to ensure the project objectives are being met, and
03:49 they lead within the core team to ensure the functional standards are being
03:54 maintained.
03:54 A challenge for core team members is to maintain functional alignment.
03:59 When in core team meetings, the core team member is representing the function.
04:03 But core teams are often meetings of give and take, as all of the functions,
04:07 needs, and constraints are balanced to achieve the project objective.
04:11 This means a core team member must negotiate and compromise at times.
04:16 To do this well, they need to be in close communication with
04:19 the functional managers, to understand the standards and
04:22 practices within the function, and what decisions are negotiable.
04:26 In their meetings with functional managers, they identify concerns and
04:30 take those back to the project team to work with the other core team members to
04:34 resolve.
04:35 A good core team member understands the issues and is granted the authority by
04:39 the functional managers to make decisions and resolve issues.
04:44 A core team member without authority to speak and negotiate for
04:47 their function just wastes everyone's time.
04:49 The core team should not just be a bunch of messengers running back and
04:53 forth from project meetings to functional managers.
04:56 In addition to managing the functional alignment within the core team,
05:00 the core team member also needs to be a good planner.
05:02 They need to understand all the functional work that must be done on the project and
05:06 create a reasonable plan for
05:08 doing that work based upon guidance from the functional managers.
05:11 Then, they must integrate their plan with the other core team members to create
05:16 an overall project plan.
05:17 The project plan is the guide for the work done on the project and
05:22 the core team creates this project plan.
05:25 As I mentioned, already, the core team members role is a leadership role.
05:29 They're either executing the project tasks for their function, or
05:33 they're overseeing the execution of those tasks by extended team members.
05:37 These individuals are not only planners, they are doers and problem solvers.
05:42 They ensure the project achieves its objectives.
05:45 When there are problems or issues,
05:47 they proactively engage with the other functions to resolve them.
05:51 The core team member role is one of the most difficult within a project.
05:55 They have to be able to manage well with authority in two directions.
06:00 They're a functional leader within the project and
06:03 a project leader within their function.

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Core Team

About this lesson

Exercise files

Quick reference

Core Team

When to use

Instructions

Hints & tips