CHAPTER 7
Critical Incidents: When Traumatic Events Strike the Project Team

A critical incident is a painful or traumatic event that is outside the range of normal day-to-day events and involves some component of loss or harm, such as death or serious injury. The event creates a variety of feelings for the individuals involved, including grief, shock, fear, confusion, or numbness.

Examples of critical incidents include the death of a team member, violence in the workplace, the sudden illness of a team member, the experience of surviving a natural disaster, or being the victim of domestic violence (Herman 1992). Less obvious events, such as the firing of a valued team member or extensive company layoffs, can also be critical incidents.

Critical incidents have an impact on not only the individual team member (the “victim”), but on the team as well. The project manager can take certain actions that will help the individual and the team return to normal levels of productivity. In situations where a critical incident causes extensive disruption to a project team, the project manager may need to implement a project recovery plan—or the PMO may need to bring in a project recovery manager—to save the project.

IMPACT ON THE VICTIM

An individual team member who experiences a critical incident (such as a physical assault) may exhibit a number of reactions and behaviors that will affect his or her work performance. These reactions and behaviors may include:

• Increased level of fear and anxiety. The traumatized individual is more vigilant and “on guard,” easily agitated by noises, routine fears, or any situation or stimulus that is reminiscent of the traumatic event. Following a trauma, the victim often feels as though he or she is operating “outside” of the body, distant from the normal sense of feeling centered.

• Somatic problems. Sleep disturbances, fatigue, changes in appetite, increased risk for illness, and weight gain or weight loss are examples of somatic problems. It is common for some trauma victims to have difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep. Other victims may sleep for 10 to 12 hours every day but still feel fatigued and listless.

• Temporary cognitive effects. Decreased concentration skills, a reduction in short-term memory capabilities, confusion, a loss of objectivity, and a diminished capacity to make decisions are examples of cognitive effects following trauma. During the weeks immediately following a traumatic event, victims have difficulty learning new tasks that require significant cognitive focus and attention.

• Presence of intrusive thoughts. For many trauma victims, flashback memories of the traumatic event flood their consciousness with little or no warning. What makes these flashbacks so frightening and upsetting is that other sensory experiences accompany the visual memory of the event. Frequently, the victim will notice smells, textures, and other sensory cues that were a part of the original event.

• Emotional problems. Depression, emotional numbing, apathy, alienation, and feelings of helplessness and isolation are examples of emotional reactions to trauma. Each trauma victim responds to a situation with different feelings, based in part on his or her personality and history before the event.

• Issues with substance abuse. During the tumultuous, emotional periods following a traumatic event, it is not unusual for the victim to seek any form of available relief. Occasionally, this search for relief results in periods of substance abuse as the victim attempts to self-medicate the pain away through excessive use of alcohol or drugs.

HOW CAN THE PROJECT MANAGER HELP?

While the victim needs to take the lead in adopting coping strategies, the project manager can also be helpful by supporting the following activities:

• Encourage the victim to talk with others. The project manager can encourage the victim to talk about the experience with appropriate individuals, such as family members and friends.

• Encourage the victim to continue regular activities. It also is appropriate for the project manager to encourage the team member to spend casual time with friends and family and stay involved in activities that routinely have been pleasurable in the past. Remember, however, that the trauma victim will probably experience a time-limited decrease of pleasure, regardless of the activity. This is normal, but should not keep the victim from being active.

• Encourage the use of humor, when appropriate, to get through this period. Even during periods of crisis, one may be able to find small aspects of the experience that are humorous. These rare moments should be enjoyed, as they become subtle reminders that life may not always look as dark as it looks now.

• Suggest counseling resources if the problems persist. It is not the role of the project manager to direct a team member to personal counseling, but such a resource can be very helpful if the victim of the traumatic event feels at some point that he or she is not making progress. Individual counseling or psychotherapy with a professional experienced with trauma can aid the natural recovery process and help the victim move back to normal levels of productivity. The human resources department should have options for such a referral should the team member be looking for professional assistance.

In assisting the victim of trauma, the project manager should remember that the primary goal is to maintain a supportive, understanding, but business-related focus with the affected team member.

IMPACT ON THE PROJECT TEAM

When a critical incident strikes a member of the project team, other team members will be affected in personal and professional ways. Consequently, the project itself may suffer. The reactions of team members will vary and will often be surprising.

The most common reactions that team members have when a traumatic event happens to a fellow team member include:

• Emotional reactions. Team members will display a variety of emotions, including sadness, shock, anxiety, denial, and remorse. Some people will display these feelings immediately, while others will show the feelings after a day or two has passed. Others may display no overt emotion or feeling.

• Behavior related to workplace duties. Some team members will talk among themselves for a few hours, with little focus on project work. Other members will ask questions and gather information. Some team members may step forward and volunteer to pick up some of the extra workload.

• Surfacing of old grievances. Traumatic events often evoke old issues, angers, emotional injuries, and grievances held by the team members. For example, the death of a team member may prompt a surviving team member to express feelings such as “how the company has always worked people too hard.” Often, the old grievances that surface have no direct connection to the current issue. When these feelings surface, the project manager should work to help the team maintain its focus on the current goals of the project.

The project manager may react to a trauma with personal guilt, questioning whether he or she could have done anything to prevent the event. Frequently, the event is clearly out of the manager’s control. However, events whose causative factors are less clear, such as an employee who has been working long hours of overtime experiencing a stroke, often cause the project manager to examine his or her own behavior. Specifically, the project manager may wonder if he or she pushed the team member too hard.

When the project manager feels personally “guilty” or “responsible” for the traumatic event of a team member, a personal exercise can help place those feelings in perspective.

Take a piece of paper and divide the page down the middle into two columns. In the left-hand column, list all aspects of the traumatic event over which you had no control. For example, when using this method to address an event where a team member suffered a heart attack when traveling on business, items in the left column could include:

1. The team member’s high risk for heart attacks

2. The team member’s poor dietary habits

3. Weather conditions, which delayed the team member’s travel and increased deadline pressures.

Conversely, entries on the right-hand column should reflect actions over which the project manager does have control, such as:

1. I can continue to push for an increase in staff, therefore reducing team member travel.

2. I can continue to push for “flex time” for the team member as he recovers from the heart attack.

3. I can distribute some of his tasks to co-workers.

This method of listing the “no control” and “have control” aspects of the event is a good way to keep a realistic focus on issues of personal accountability and responsibility. Without this clear focus, it is easy for the project manager to assume undue responsibility for certain types of traumatic events.

CRITICAL INCIDENT STRESS DEBRIEFING

A key recovery strategy for the team that the project manager should consider immediately after the critical incident occurs is to hold a critical incident stress debriefing (CISD). This debriefing is a structured meeting, usually facilitated by a mental health professional skilled in working with trauma reactions, in which employees are presented with the facts of the critical incident and are offered an opportunity to ask questions or share their reactions to it.

The human resources department of most companies can identify a facilitator to lead this type of meeting. The debriefing is not group therapy. However, the CISD helps the co-workers begin to adjust to the loss, planting seeds for the easing of their personal pain, while proactively providing a resource to prevent a significant decrease in team productivity.

Beginning the Debriefing Meeting

The debriefing meeting opens with the project manager telling the team that the debriefer is present to help the team members process their reactions to the traumatic event. The debriefer tells the group that this is a confidential meeting and that verbal participation is voluntary. Generally, a debriefing lasts 90 minutes.

The first step is to go around the room (a small group of three to ten people may be best) and ask each person to tell the group how he or she learned about the critical incident. This step provides a means for facts and details to surface. As team members listen to each other speak, information gaps are filled.

The debriefer does not push people to speak or to bring up strong feelings and emotions. The debriefer asks structured questions (such as, “How did you learn about the incident?”) as a method of facilitating the discussion. The debriefer takes cues from the members and does not push beyond what is appropriate.

Letting Members Tell Their Stories

As team members tell their stories, the debriefer periodically augments a member’s comments by inserting information about the natural process of going through a trauma. Such a comment may be, “As John is saying, shock and numbness are often big parts of these experiences.”

The process continues, with team members occasionally and voluntarily offering favorite memories of the affected person or raising suggestions about how they might help the victim’s family. Many of these types of issues have no immediate answers, so some of the CISD process is often spent brainstorming how these personal needs could be addressed at a later time.

Usually, some team members remain silent. Other members may become overly involved in the process, talking too much and taking up too much time. The debriefer will want to be sensitive to this type of situation and will want to help establish some personal boundaries that reflect the purposes and limitations of the debriefing.

Concluding the Debriefing

As the debriefing concludes, the debriefer will summarize the group’s general thoughts and reactions. Written materials, often a two-page handout describing common reactions to trauma and what recovery steps can be taken, may be distributed. If the organization has an employee assistance program, the debriefer will provide the phone number, reminding the members that counseling services can be a helpful resource when going through this type of difficult period.

When the debriefing ends, the debriefer, the human resources representative, and the project team leader meet separately to discuss how the meeting went and to discuss any follow-up steps that may be helpful. One of these steps may be to schedule an on-site counselor to be available for voluntary meetings with self-identified employees.

In summary, the goal of the debriefing is to be supportive of the affected team members by providing them with a setting to discuss initial reactions and to receive appropriate information on how to handle the normal processes of recovery and how to return to normal levels of productivity.

WHEN ALL ELSE FAILS: THE PROJECT RECOVERY PLAN

Even in the best of situations, critical incidents can have such a negative effect on the status of the project that the project manager must consider extraordinary measures to save the project from failure. When significant variances exist in the areas of project time, cost, and technical performance, an orchestrated process of immediate salvage should be undertaken. This project rescue effort is known as project recovery.

Variances can easily occur within the context of a project team that has had its efficiency, productivity, and focus disrupted by the turmoil resulting from traumatic events in the workplace. Four indicators in particular suggest that the project is in trouble, and a project recovery plan should be considered:

1. The project customer is giving signals of being dissatisfied with the product or service or with project status. These signals can be overt (such as an angry exchange during a project meeting or a critical letter or phone call) or subtle (such as not returning phone calls or minimal participation at project reviews). At the first indication, these overt and subtle signals must be addressed actively. Waiting for the customer to “come around” and regain a positive attitude toward the project is a risky strategy that may result in permanent customer dissatisfaction over the life of the project and in the future.

2. An excessive amount of project rework is taking place because of poor product quality, team member performance, and technical errors. Tests fail and peer reviews indicate discrepancies. Project rework is a common by-product for a team that is functioning at temporary levels of diminished capability because of a recently experienced traumatic event.

3. Levels of unacceptable project variance (in the key areas of project time, cost, and technical performance) have become routine for this team, possibly because the traumatic event forced everyone to fall behind in their work. Frequently, operating behind schedule causes teams to work in a hurried and rushed manner, thus increasing the probability that the product will have errors that require rework by the team.

This process of rushing to catch up becomes a vicious cycle for the team. “Trying harder” and “working longer hours” do not necessarily mean reducing the key variances. In fact, trying harder often makes things worse and typically increases project costs as overtime is then required.

4. Standard project controls are proving unsuccessful, such as acting on variance analysis or earned value data that forecast potential project difficulties with bringing the unacceptable variances under control. In essence, application of the usual tools and techniques is not getting the project back on track.

In many situations, these four indicators of the need for project recovery are clear to the project manager. However, when dealing with the fallout from a traumatic event on the team, it is easy for the project manager to miss these indicators. Occasionally, this occurs because the project manager sees the symptoms of a problem but is hoping that they correct themselves over time. Clearly, the goal is for the project manager to locate the root cause of the problem and to take action.

Specific Steps to Project Recovery

There are four distinct steps in a project recovery plan.

The first step for the project manager is to identify actions or alternatives that will help eliminate the significant variances to project time, cost, and technical performance. Specifically, the project manager should identify ways to minimize damage to the “off-course” project, such as adding or subtracting team members, identifying the need for additional funds or resources, and revising the schedule to expedite a reasonable delivery of the product to the customer.

The second step involves executing specific actions or alternatives that may help reduce the project variances. These specific actions could include conducting team-customer meetings to establish a turnaround strategy, holding team-sponsored meetings to discuss possible recovery options, and conducting a tangible, concrete review of the project scope. This process may result in the preparation of a specific project recovery plan, with a schedule of activities to be performed during the recovery efforts and a budget for the recovery initiative.

Once the plan is prepared, the third step is for the project manager to closely monitor the plan against the executed actions and alternatives. It is important to review the revised scope of the project frequently, consult with subject matter experts regarding documentation, hold regular status reviews with team members, and then regularly schedule customer meetings, technical reviews, and audits.

Finally, a project recovery process will involve the fourth step of controlling specifications and alternatives designed to reduce the unacceptable variances. It is necessary to take actions to minimize the risk of project disaster and ensure that similar project variances do not occur again. The experience and information available from the problems encountered in the current project can be documented in a lessons-learned database or repository and applied proactively to establish risk management responses for future work on the current project and for future projects in the organization.

Assessing Team Effectiveness and Performance

As the project manager begins to craft the four-step recovery strategy following a critical incident, he or she will want to investigate in detail the level of effectiveness of the project team as a unit as well as its individual team members.

Specifically, the project manager should assess the team to determine whether members are using the resources provided to them to meet deadlines and milestones. In addition, performance reports should be reviewed to determine the level of overall team performance.

Another important approach for the project manager is to request feedback from all team members to ascertain how the team is functioning as a unit and how individual team members are functioning when working alone.

The success of the recovery effort is not solely the responsibility of the project manager. Indeed, there are specific actions that the team members must take to assist in the recovery process. It is the duty of the project manager to remind the team members of their responsibilities during recovery.

IS A PROJECT RECOVERY MANAGER NEEDED?

Even the best project recovery plan is not always successful. In certain situations, the existing project structure (i.e., the project manager and the project team) may be unable to execute the recovery plan. The PMO may then need to identify and appoint a new person to serve as the project recovery manager and reassign the project manager to another initiative.

The recovery manager should be someone who has previous experience with similar projects. He or she should have the skills needed to motivate the team members, work with the stakeholders, make decisions, and hold the team accountable for achieving the project’s goals (Rad and Levin 2002).

The primary mission of the project recovery manager is to ensure that project recovery risks are accurately defined, identified, and assessed so that concrete action steps can be taken. The project recovery plan must be clearly described and should be approved and supported by key internal management. Without true meaningful support by management, the plan’s chances of success are minimal.

A key element of the recovery plan will be the project recovery manager’s review of the assessment results concerning the project and the incorporation of those results into the recovery plan.

Need to Review Progress and Actively Communicate

As the recovery plan is created and implemented, the recovery manager must focus on reviewing progress and assessing future risk. This review and assessment of risk can be accomplished by holding frequent reviews with the project team members. As these reviews take place, the recovery manager is then charged with updating the recovery plan as necessary. Additionally, the recovery manager must keep detailed records and track the financial implications of the action items in the recovery plan.

Another key focus for the recovery manager is to make certain that all lines of communication with senior managers, functional managers, suppliers, and other stakeholders are effective and viable. The recovery manager should be aware of the type of communication that stakeholders require and how often they should receive it.

Consider preparing an analysis of stakeholder information requirements to be certain that the needed information is provided to project stakeholders in a timely manner. Stakeholders should also have access to information in an ad hoc manner between scheduled communications. The recovery manager should update the project’s communications management plan and review the effectiveness of the plan frequently. The recovery manager should often ask, “Who else should we be talking with about the needs and status of the recovery effort?” During the stress of a recovery effort, it is easy to overlook a key stakeholder while the team works on day-to-day activities.

Personal Qualities of the Effective Project Recovery Manager

Leading a project recovery effort can be a thankless job, given all the problems that must be corrected and the strong risk of high-visibility failure. This role is not for every project professional.

Leadership Skills

A crucial set of skills for the recovery manager involves the ability to demonstrate “people” leadership skills under trying circumstances. These leadership skills involve the ability to:

• Motivate team members (see Chapter 4) and make difficult decisions

• Hold the work group accountable for achieving goals in a timely manner (the “manager” role discussed in Chapter 2).

The project recovery manager must perform these leadership roles during times of great stress for all involved. Performance of individuals under stress, ironically, is bimodal: Some people improve their performance under stress while others suffer decreased performance.

Interpersonal Skills

The recovery manager should be proficient in applying a wide variety of sophisticated interpersonal skills, including the ability to :

• Resolve conflicts (see Chapter 5)

• Build (or rebuild) the sense of team without critical fault-finding or finger-pointing (see Chapter 2)

Customer Service Skills and Focus

The project recovery manager should also have excellent skills in the area of customer relations. Customer service during situations of project recovery is challenging. The recovery manager must address customer issues forthrightly without becoming defensive.

The project recovery manager should try to understand the needs and concerns of the customer without attempting to defend the previous work of the team. Trying to defend the team at this point creates a “yes, but” interaction between the customer and the team that becomes circular and does not help get the project back on track.

Some project recovery managers enjoy the challenge of the recovery process, but do not spend sufficient time on customer service issues, choosing instead to immerse themselves in the technical content and team details of the project. Typically, it is easier to avoid situations that may be confrontational. This is a natural response, but it can become a serious problem when insufficient attention is paid to the service needs of the customer. The ideal posture for the recovery manager should be to balance time spent working the technical details with time spent addressing customer needs.

When dealing with issues of customer service, the recovery manager should avoid the tendency to over-promise. Some recovery managers may tend to play the hero, swooping in during the crisis and saving the project and the organization’s reputation with the customer. The risk in this approach is that the recovery manager may make unreasonable promises to the customer about what can be fixed in the situation.

Any over-promising can come back to haunt the recovery manager, the team, and the organization in not only the current project but also in future business dealings with the customer.

Active Communication Skills

The project recovery manager must be assertive in reaching out and communicating with key project stakeholders. These efforts must involve providing regular updates and interacting frequently with management and with customers.

At this point in the project, all stakeholders are aware that things have not been going well, and tensions are high. Stakeholders such as project sponsors and customers do not want any surprises. The best approach to dealing with sponsors and customers is to keep them updated with both the good news and the bad news.

PROJECT FAILURE AND PROJECT CLOSURE

Even with the best efforts, some project recovery efforts following critical incidents will fail and the project should be ended.

Although closing down a project is never a pleasant task, it can be handled in an efficient and professional manner.

For many of the stakeholders, the closure will be a personal loss of significant emotional proportion—not to mention the fiscal and reputation losses. Using sensitivity in delivering this bad news can help team members maintain a positive personal, team, and organizational image as they move forward to the next project.

CRITICAL INCIDENT CHECKLIST FOR THE PROJECT MANAGER

Critical incidents in the project world require that the project manager address a number of issues and challenges. The following are key points for a project manager to consider when a critical incident or event strikes the project team:

1. Determine whether a critical incident debriefing should be held for team members.

2. Avoid the temptation during the aftermath of the critical incident to over-promise to team members and stakeholders. You cannot fix everything.

3. Adopt realistic expectations regarding the team members’ current ability to perform.

4. Adopt a balanced “yes, but” position with team members, acknowledging that “Yes, we have undergone a crisis and we are all upset about its implications, but we still must find a way to focus on the tasks of the project the best we can.”

5. Gradually set boundaries and limits with the team that acknowledge both the loss and the need to stay task focused.

6. Monitor individual work performance, and address possible performance issues by describing the issue and the goal while providing internal and external resources to achieve the desired performance levels.

7. As the aftermath of the critical incident begins to stabilize, determine whether the effect has been sufficiently negative to the progress of the project to warrant developing a project recovery strategy, bringing in a project recovery manager, and reassigning the project manager.

Discussion Questions

A project manager walked into her office on Monday morning and was immediately told by her human resources representative that one of her team members had died over the weekend following a business trip.

This team member, a telecommunications engineer, had suffered a stroke while traveling. This woman had been working long hours for months at a time, frequently volunteering to travel to other states to help fellow team members with difficult projects. Many of the junior team members had looked up to this woman as a mentor and had been trained by her from their first days of employment at the company.

As the team members began entering the building for work that Monday morning, the project manager wondered what she should do.

If you were this project manager:

1. What would be your approach to addressing your team about this issue?

2. What types of reactions and performance issues might you expect from your team members?