One of the best things I experienced while working at Hake was the sales to PM hand off. I didn't fully understand how blessed I was, until now I am experiencing what happens when this doesn't go well.
If you work for an organization that has a separate sales and PM staff then it is critical that the project / service that is sold is clearly articulated to the Project Manager and team that is going to be executing the project.
Why is this critical:
1) Profit and Loss: For a Project Manager to best manage a project he must understand the scope of what was sold and what resources, services and agreements were made. Without understanding the sales perspective then the PM cannot manage the P&L. If its fully understood the PM can maximize profit.
2) Project Quality: If the specifics of what was sold are not communicated then it is very difficult for the PM to meet the expectations of the customer which will lead to poor quality or possibly gold plating. The PM may include services that were not purchased, or may execute a plan that was not structured in accordance with the contract or may not be on time. Additionally the PM is restricted from knowing to how best meet the needs of the customer.
3) Resource Management: Without knowing the scope or plan of what was sold, it is difficult for a PM to accurately managed resources and schedule.
4) Customer satisfaction and brand recognition: One of the biggest things that you can hurt or help with a good hand off from sales to PM is that the customer feels taken care of, has all expectations met, on time, on budget with good qualify. If this doesn't happen, there are immediate costs to the project and your P&L but in the long term, you can grow or destroy your brand which will lead to lost future revenue.
I am currently going through a kitchen renovation where the sales team seemed to skip out on communicating with the PM and the PM failed to communicate with the foreman. Now I am probably the worst customer as a construction PM but it has resulted in poor quality, rework, failure in expectation management on my end, triple the original execution timeline, and will likely result in me never using this vendor again. Cost of Poor Quality hurts much longer than the individual costs of the project.
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