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9 - PROJECT HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

• Developing Trust. The challenges software teams face in working together and learning to trust one
another, thrash out issues, make decisions, and commit to shared responsibility are well described in
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team [39]:

○ Absence of trust. Unwillingness to express mistakes and weaknesses within the group. Team
members need to be open about mistakes and accepting of mistakes and weaknesses in others
in order to build a foundation of trust.
○ Fear of conflict. Teams that lack trust are unable to engage in unfiltered debate. Instead they
resort to veiled discussions and guarded comments.
○ Lack of commitment. Without passionate debate, team members rarely buy-in to or commit to
decisions though they may feign agreement during meetings.

○ Avoidance of accountability. Because of lack of commitment and buy-in, most people will hesitate
to constructively confront their peers on actions and behaviors that seem counterproductive to
the good of the team and the project.
○ Inattention to results. Failure to hold team members accountable leads to putting individual
goals (or department goals) ahead of the project.
These dysfunctions are ever-present risks for software teams. Project managers can help to build a culture of
trust and acceptance by sharing their mistakes with the team and demonstrating that it is OK to admit to mistakes
provided they are corrected.

9.3.3 Develop Project Team: Outputs

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The outputs from Develop Project Team in the PMBOK Guide are applicable outputs for developing a software
project team.

9.3.3.1 Team Performance Assessments

See Section 9.3.3.1 of the PMBOK Guide.
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9.3.3.2 Enterprise Environmental Factors Updates

See Section 9.3.3.2 of the PMBOK Guide.
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9.4 Manage Project Team

The inputs, tools and techniques, and outputs in Section 9.4 of the PMBOK Guide are applicable to managing
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a software project team, with the extension included in this Software Extension.

172 ©2013 Project Management Institute. Software Extension to the PMBOK Guide Fifth Edition
®