How to Know if Your Project Was Effective

No matter what your profession, you have projects. Projects are larger-scale tasks/initiatives that gather multiple people with a myriad of steps to accomplish something of impact for a recipient. They take a lot of energy and time. And, I believe that anything worth doing is worth evaluating–both for what worked and what could be improved for the next project.

Sure, the main metric for effectiveness is whether we got ‘er done, but what about looking at many different gears in the process for fine-tuning. Doing a post-mortem following a project’s completion might include a rating scale of 1-10 on these statements:

• The team worked together well (good communication, dynamics, and relational connections).
• The team was able to succeed without the leader.
• We did our best work within the time frame allotted.
• Everyone was given the big picture. Expectations were aligned to the vision and well-communicated on the front end and clarified throughout based on ongoing results. Feedback flowed freely–with respectful candor.
• The team held themselves accountable to their action items.
• Status reports were timely and well-communicated to those who needed to be included.
• We hit our milestones along the way and celebrated them. The final product accomplished what was intended.
• We included those who needed to be engaged.
• Our constituents were pleased with the results.
• We stayed on or under budget.
• Our work benefited our organization and each team member.

Then there are questions to ask yourself as team leader (or team member) for evaluating your part in the project:

• Did I contribute quality work?
• Did I meet the deadlines with my tasks?
• Did I improve the project in some way?
• Did I learn something that will help me in future projects from someone else?
• Did I stretch myself outside my comfort zone?
• Did I help someone get over some hurdles, stay out of trouble, and succeed?
• Did I delegate appropriately both responsibility and authority?
• Were the expectations on my role fulfilled?
• Did I stand on high moral ground and take the high road when in conflict?
• Did I self-regulate any negative feelings along the way?
• Was I approachable for communication and never a bottleneck to progress?

You might want to add your own questions to mine to customize it to your situation, or to emphasize an area of greater importance to what success looks like.  I’d love to hear your additions to the list! I’m at growingforward@paulcasey.org