The importance of transparency

In traditional project management, clients are seen as an abhorrence. After they’ve approved a project’s objective, defined scope, and acceptance criteria, the contact with the client is limited until the project closes. Changes from the client in the middle of the project are viewed as unwelcome interference. Even under the least favorable conditions, it could spell disaster.

Transparency - a fundamental principle for lean project management

As opposed to this lean project management depends on the client’s active involvement all through the improvement procedure. Continuous collaboration between the client and the project team is viewed as fundamental to a project’s success. A customer representative is considered a member of the development team in numerous other agile methodologies. Customer representatives are urged to work with the team members.

Further, lean project management promotes client collaboration by keeping up customary contact and respecting clients’ change requests. Customer input is frequently adjusted by the team and its work is based on clients’ criticism. The collaboration that is accomplished will rely on the client’s wish for involvement, as well as the scope and requirement for it.

Conventional project management includes levels of hierarchy. The project manager is allocated higher authority than other team members who are given particular and individual orders. Lean project management urges the entire team takes collective ownership and responsibility of a project. The project manager’s role changes from leader to facilitator. The direction that needs to be taken and how work should be divided is determined by the team members. The whole team is held responsible if problems occur. You should promote collaboration to support collective ownership and engage team members in decision making.

Depending on how much project control you need, you should assign to each team member a certain level of responsibility. The project’s success will depend on the culture of your organization and the capacity of the team members regarding the decision-making process. To ensure open and honest communication you should apply the agile principle of transparency. This involves feedback about success or failure in the development cycle that occurs during each iteration.

In a lean project, the project is sliced into small iterations. This enables the team to detect and resolve problems regularly through daily meetings. Members can make small adjustments along the way instead of waiting until the project has been completed. With this approach, the agile team can implement changes quickly. Learning through experience and experimentation can be applied after each iteration. Problems can be identified and solved before they become more extensive (and expensive).

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