HBR Guy Says Commitment Is Not Motivation

Posted by: Timm J. Esque | Posted on: January 23rd, 2012 | 0 Comments

Management (and project management) is about getting things done.  When I say management, I don’t mean the things managers do, I mean the dictionary definition.  It is about pursuing a specific goal, making adjustments and overcoming obstacles to do so if necessary.  There are a variety of barriers to getting things done and part of the key to success is to sort out which one’s are hindering you the most and address those first.  Peter Bergman, writing at the HBR Blog Network, says we should be careful not to confuse the motivation barrier with the follow through barrier.  Great, but what is a follow through barrier?  Well if you keep reading the post you’ll see what Bergman is describing is a failure to commit.  It is one thing to decide something is a good idea, it is another thing to commit to a new course of action.

As always with commitment, some of the importance aspects, as Bergman describes are:

1.  Get crystal clear about what this new course of action is (what, when, where, who)
2.  Make a decision to follow the new course now, and do things to make it difficult to back out
3.  Tell others about your decision

Now imagine if you were on a team where everyone was adhering to these techniques in a systemic way.  The effect is magnified when you have a group of people applying this discipline to a complex, interdependent task.  What you are imagining is what we call Commitment-Based Project Management (CBPM).