How Do You Deliver Bad News About Your Project?

We know the expression "Don't Kill the Messenger" indicates that the person delivering the bad news is not the same person responsible for causing the bad news. In our day-to-day activity as Project Managers we find that the recipient of bad news (managers, project stakeholders, and customers) sometime forgets this and react inappropriately.

It is a given that the Project Manager is responsible for the success of their project. However, there are events that arise that may be entirely out of anyone's control. For example; shifts in management at a client could introduce delays, or new technology is taking longer to implement than anticipated.

Add to this the role that the PM plays as Risk Manager on reporting issues that have the potential of turning into bad news, and the messenger can turn into someone that nobody likes to see. This is not a good position to be in.

Over the years, I've watched three different approaches PMs have used to deliver bad news:

Delivering bad news about your project is an inevitable part of our jobs as Project Managers. It takes discretion, skill and good judgment on how to effectively deliver bad news without leaving a path of destruction behind.

Jennifer Whitt is a speaker, trainer, Certified Performance Coach, author, and company president of PDUs2Go.com. She is a PMI-certified Project Management Professional (PMP) and knows how difficult it can be to make time for classroom or online learning so she has developed a new way for Project Managers to Earn n' Learn while on the go. For more information, please visit http://www.pdus2go.com