BEING PROACTIVE - AN UNDERRATED PM SKILL

“A PM’s proactiveness lets the entire org sleep peacefully at night!” And I am not exaggerating!

But before jumping into it, let us first understand what this term actually means.

As per Oxford dictionary definition, “Proactiveness is creating or controlling a situation rather than just responding to it after it has happened.” In a professional setting, it involves taking responsibility for your work, anticipating potential obstacles, and finding solutions before problems arise.

As a PM, how can you really do it? Here is what I do & has worked well for me:

Over-communication to stakeholders: Feature delivery getting delayed? Drop an email. Project on track? Keep sharing weekly updates! Silence causes anxiety, solve it via communication.

Tracking releases: Have met so many PMs who think their work is done after release, without even bothering to track if things are working fine & delivering the expected impact. In my experience, there is hardly any big release that is 100% stable from day 1.

Upfront planning: Murphy’s law states that - ‘everything that can go wrong will go wrong’. So be prepared! Keep some bandwidth after delivery to fix any issues that may arise.

Stakeholder alignment & taking digilent notes: Many PMs do the former but forget the latter. 2 months later when a feature gets released & something goes wrong, they have nothing to backtrack to! Send minutes after every meeting.

This list can go on and on. Figure out what works well for you!

“Even though it is more rewarding to be a fire extinguisher, be a fire preventer!” :)