(up-tempo piano rift)
(sustained music note
(serene piano music)
- Ascent Architecture & Interiors is a commercial,
architecture, and interior design firm.
We focus primarily on breweries,
medical, senior housing, storage,
and working with small business owners
on their tenant improvements.
- We have a model in our firm of always doing better.
It's where our name comes from.
We live in beautiful Central Oregon,
where we have the Cascade Mountain Range right near us.
Really, the goal of the firm was always
to improve our process,
improve the working relationship with our clients,
improve the atmosphere of our office for our employees.
And we've really strived
over the last seven years
to accomplish those goals, but they're never done.
So, we have a staff of 17,
and we have a lot of projects.
So, we're always looking for tools,
and technology, and new opportunities
to just help us just do more with less,
and to be efficient.
Our firm has a philosophy of being transparent,
both with our staff and with our clients.
We really see it as a way to communicate
with those individuals.
And communications brings buy-in
from both clients and from staff.
When people understand the why behind what we're doing,
usually it's a lot easier to get everybody going
in the same direction.
- One of the catchphrases for project management is,
"Manage Expectations."
If your client has an expectation
that they can get deliverable X, Y, or Z,
done in three weeks,
and that's just not realistic.
But that's not communicated to them.
At the end of those three weeks,
if they don't have that,
they're not gonna be happy clients.
I think also, vice versa,
there's a lot of things that we need from our client
in order for us to hit our deadlines.
If they don't understand what is expected from them,
the whole project suffers as well.
So, the expectation does go both ways;
and having that transparency,
and allowing them to see what effect,
even missing a deadline by a week,
can have on the rest of the project is hugely helpful.
- For our team management,
we're really upfront with the team about what deadlines are,
what we need to hit to get there,
and we're also really upfront with our clients about,
"This is when we can get the project done.
"Just, it's what it is."
And so, for us, having tools that really clearly, visually
show that this how big a block of effort this is gonna be.
If we're coming up to a deadline,
and we just have to hit a deadline.
It's helpful for everyone involved;
for us, and for the contractor, and for the client,
to all have this visibility around,
"This is how big the lift is to get there."
We, maybe a month-and-a-half ago, got through a big push.
It was one of the biggest pushes we've done
on a really big project.
And, Amy and I have been able to look at that and say,
"Well, this is what happened,"
and all the way along, we were able
to keep everyone appraised of,
"This is the deadline,"
and "This is what's left,"
and "Here's how we gotta get there."
We're able to look at that and say,
"Well, this is what it took,"
and schedule-wise, and in a very human way,
trying to not burn people out,
trying to meet deadlines in a really excellent way.
We were able to look and that and say,
"So how do we do that better?
"and how do we construct a very long schedule
"to not have this crunch at the end?"
And that's something that is ongoing
and we're really excited about.
- That communication really is,
it's a certain level of transparency;
but just making the process visible to our clients allows
for just a smoother process and project.
- The benefit of having that clear scheduling,
those clear expectations,
for project milestones and project durations,
that's what it's gonna be.
And when we get to the end of the day,
it doesn't make sense for me. or for our team,
or for anybody involved to pretend it's gonna take less time
or to hide that information somewhere.
And so, having a clear outlook of,
"This is what it is, and this is what comes next,
"and this is how we get to project success;
"and maybe, this is how we'd do it a little bit differently
"and we'll do better next time,
"but this is where we are right now."
It's just best course of action; and from a business sense,
as well as, a human sense of
we're all people in this together, and why pretend.
That's just the way we run our teams.
- The transparency that a software like TeamGantt allows
is really beneficial from a project manager stand-point,
because my communication with the client
sometimes happens a little bit in a vacuum;
and so it's up to me to disseminate a lot of information,
that the rest of the team doesn't get a chance
to be a part of.
It allows me to extrapolate important information
about the client's needs and the milestones
that they need us to hit in order for them
to hit whatever requirements they have.
Put it into a framework that can be shared,
both with our internal team
and also with the client and their team;
so that everybody kinda is on the same page.
And it's a way for me, to keep me honest;
make sure that I'm disseminating the right information
and there wasn't a missed representation
or a misunderstanding.
It's great to have visibility from both sides.
- Being able to communicate the process allows for everybody
to understand what their role in the project is.
And being transparent really does allow people
to have buy-in to the project;
and just in total, results in a better project.
- So, I can look at almost every project
that's gone really badly for me,
and say the issue was almost always either a lack
of understanding or a lack of honesty.
And being upfront with the information,
whether that's information that's coming to me,
I didn't understand or aware the information
that was coming wasn't maybe the whole story.
And then, when I've been on,
for teams that I've managed,
when those relationships,
those projects have gone really well,
every single one of them, I can say,
it's because I was really upfront.
I just said, "Here's what is is.
"Sometimes it's not great news, but here's what it is.
"And, how do we get to the end?
"How do get to the end in a way that works really well,
"and what lessons can we document along the way
"to do it better the next time?"
But the theme through all those pieces is
that we have to be honest about it.
Because when I'm writing schedules,
if I write a schedule that I'd hidden tasks
or glossed over a really important deliverable,
because it's uncomfortable to talk about, every single time,
that deliverable is absolutely the problem.
And so, my advance to project managers
or people dealing with time,
is deal with the reality of it and be upfront about,
"Here's what it is.
"We're not going to hid it.
"We'll have hard conversations if we need to.
"We'll find other ways to work on it if we need to,
"but we have to be authentic
and honest about what's really going on."
And then from there,
we can make good plans that are actionable,
that we can succeed with;
instead of plans we think are gonna work
and then fall apart 'cause it's not the whole story.