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Handling a difficult team lead ?

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by verdantuk

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I have recently come into an organisation as a contract Project Manager, taking over a challenged project when the previous PM threw in the towel.
I have a serious personal & communication problem with the team lead. On previous projects, management has deserted his team to the wolves, and he feels the same is going to happen again. He is deliberately difficult, rude, aggressive and both maliciously non-compliant and non-professional in his approach. As a permanent employee, he has rights (this is the UK) and so cannot be downgraded, sacked or otherwise moved.
Management have been made aware, but their hands are tied.
What can I do to rectify the problem ? His behaviour is seriously undermining the project and the only alternative is toput up with it.
Anyone else had similar experiences and ideas on how to calm the waters ?

4 replies

by timwalsh

You need to quickly determine a couple of things:

What backing does this project have from upper management?

Why was this development team previously thrown to the wolves?

What is the status of the project? Was it doomed to failure from the start (either due to impossible requirements or an impossible timeline)?

Why did the previous PM throw in the towel (although it doesn't sound hard to guess)? Can you contact and talk to him about his experience?

What does this team lead hold over the heads of management that ties their hands?

From your research, you need to determine if this project is doable (without taking personalities involved into account) given the requirements and timeline? If it is doable, what roadblocks stand in the way of successful completion (although it sounds like the answer is obvious)?

Obviously, the first option would be try and gain this team lead's confidence and respect. This may or may not be possible. If you can't get through to thisguy that you aren't the enemy, it will be impossible.

I find it hard to believe that the labor laws of any country would prevent the management of a company from disciplining (or otherwise firing) ANY employee who is not meeting expectations or fulfilling his job responsibilities.

Obviously, there is history here between this team lead (and the rest of his team??) and upper management. What is the morale of the rest of the team like? Are there other team members that actually WANT to see this project succeed? Using these other team members (with managements backing of course), you may be forced to essentially make this team lead a non-player in the project in order to see its completion.

Or you may determine that this project isn;t worth the triple ulcer it's likely to give you and throw in the towel yourself. Some projects just aren't salvagable!

Good luck!

by verdantuk

The project has upper management support, and the team, apart from their lead, are enthusiastic and driven. It is doable.
This is one of the first projects this organisation has run properly : previously there was no project management at all, justa management-defined end date and variable scope. The previous PM put in place processes which has provided more certainty, but this has frustrated some developers as they see the overhead of Project Management a burden.
The team lead has had previous bad experiences because of poor management and is just assuming it will be the same this time. Nothing wrong with that - I just need to convince him otherwise. I have come across negative team members before, but nothing like this. It's both a bullying and aggressive personality combined with lack of confidence in the project.
As for management, yes, they would like to fire him or discipline him in some way. But UK labour laws allow employees a pre-defined grievance procedure with at least three written warnings, emotional and legal support, tribunals, and the like. Once you start on this path, it can take several months for someone to be moved or removed, in which time they can do untold damage to the morale of the team. And indirectly making them powerless by removing responsibility will just not be allowed under that process (unless I too, wish to appoint a lawyer!).

Not wanting to blow my own trumpet, but when I first came into this project there was low morale, panic and lack of direction or focus. Since then the entire team has perked up and are now both comfortable with the schedule and the development (it is, after all, just a rewrite so the technology is well known).
It just this one person. If they were just a developer, I wouldn't mind. But as the team lead they have the power to be disruptive and I want to minimise that and maximise their value to the team.

by timwalsh

How is this team lead perceived by the rest of the team?

Is there anyone on the team whose opinion the team lead trusts?

The ideal situation would be to find a long-term member of the team who is enthusiastic about the project, and is on speaking terms (hopefully friendly speaking terms) with the team lead. If the team lead won't work with you and continues to make it clear that you are just more of the same problem he has seen in the past, maybe he will listen to someone he has a long-term work relationship with and who has also seen the same problems.

Since the rest of the team appears to have "seen the light", don't be afraid to use them to try and convince the lead that this project is NOT like previous ones. Since it's obvious that you can't convince him solely by (your) words, all you can hope to do yourself is try to convince him by your actions.

In the mean time, just to CYA, start documenting all the disruptive behavior (preferably with substantiation from other team members). If nothing else, if the project does fall apart, at least you will have something to show that it REALLY wasn't you fault.

BTW, while US labor laws are not as stringent as UK laws appear to be (as far as process), the prudent USmanager will follow much the same process (documentation, counseling, etc), to avoid possible claims of job discrimination ("you just fired me because I'm brown, female, elderly, gay, disabled, Jewish, and come from Mars").

Good luck.

by pm grrrrl

I remember an article in gantthead.com about this kind of thing. Deal with it on a performance level and document specifics. I think the article author was Tom Mochal.

You also need to have ground rules for the team that everyone has signed off on. Ground rules can save you when there is one person who is so disruptive. An example: all issues must be brought to the table during the alloted time during project team meetings. All team members have the responsibility for reading the meeting minutes and staying apprised of group decisions.

Then you have something highly specific you can have a discussion with this one individual about. You can point to each item on the rules list and discuss why they are breaking the rules, and an action plan with due date. If the action plan isn't met, then you can escalate through Human Resources. You will have documentation as to why this person is causing problems on the project and how you have specificallly tried to rectify it and when.

The key here is to be very, very detailed about what they have done and when. Being general will get you nowhere.

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