There is a project in my past with an outcome that I was never very happy with. Years ago I undertook to direct a play for a non-profit organization. I had a lot of experience as an actor in plays before this and some support experience in set construction, but had very little with the role of director. I came to be in this position because a group of people and fellow actors had a particular play they wanted to have staged. I was asked to take on the role of director so the play would be staged. As I look at the production of a play through the eyes of the information I am getting in this class on project management it becomes apparent to me that play production is a great example of project management. The process involves goals and objectives that are time sensitive, there are many differentiated skills that must take place at correct times to be successful, many tasks must be coordinated to take place at specific time, and the manager must have the buy-in from stakeholders both drivers and supporters. In all it is a highly complex undertaking. Because this play was a production for a non-profit and not staged as a business event, the judgment of success will not be strictly seated in monetary gain or loss. As I review my conclusion of failure or success I look at many different aspects of the process.
The show had many supportive stakeholders in the roles of actors and stagehands. This contributed to the level of success that took place. However when I look back at the experience of the production I see many areas that were weak and I did not handle correctly. The result of these mistakes created a production that did not come together smoothly at the point when all components should be coming together. When staging, scenery, costumes, and lighting needed to be meshed together for the final production problems began to arise. Advertising and marketing were weak and therefore slow to get off the ground to secure ticket sales needed to fill the house.
The biggest insufficiency in planning on my part was an overall schedule of the work that needed to be done. There was no doubt that the part of staging this play that held the most of my attention was the actual directing and working with actors, however in a play that amounts only to a percentage of the work that must come together and work as a single unit. All of them have individual time lines and yet must knit together with the acting to be a show in total. I lacked a scheduling system that was sophisticated enough to make the work happen with efficient effort and maintain the continued satisfaction of the supportive stakeholders such as the costume and scenery crews. If I had the knowledge of the Gantt chart (Mindtools, website) (Portny, Mantel, Meredith, Shafer, Sutton, and Kramer, 2008) as a tool I would have been able to attempt to fix my problems. I had many deadlines placed too late and this caused rushed and frantic work to be done at the last minute. This contributed to the cast being more nervous than necessary and lowered the quality of the acting.
In the area of marketing and ticket sales, I would have benefitted from using linear responsibility charts that record personnel and tasks. (Portny, Mantel, Meredith, Shafer, Sutton, and Kramer, 2008). In the Portny text an example of a matrix that shows the roles that different leaders will take would have helped on two counts. One, it would have specified tasks that were under the each person’s prevue. Second, it would have assisted in making sure that all duties were accounted for and no steps left out of the process (Portny, Mantel, Meredith, Shafer, Sutton, and Kramer, 2008).
References
Portny, S. E., Mantel, S. J., Meredith, J. R., Shafer, S. M., Sutton, M. M., & Kramer, B. E. (2008). Project management: Planning, scheduling, and controlling projects. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Mindtools (2011). Gantt Charts. Retrieved from http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newPPM_03.htm.
Christopher,
ReplyDeleteThis was a good example of project management gone bad. However, it sounds like a good learning experience. I never thought of a director as a project manager before, but all the components are there. There are so many aspects of a project that a PM has to oversee, it is almost essential that tools are used to track everything. Otherwise, it would be easy to overlook critical tasks and overrun deadlines.
Christopher,
ReplyDeleteThis seemed like a major project you faced with a lot of involved stakeholders. I can tell by watching plays on television or reality shows, there are a lot of different people who play important roles which are delegated by the director. A director has a lot of responsibilities. You stated you had little experience as a director but based on your acting, you figured you could handle it. I'm sure at the end of the project you were glad it was for non-profit because if not, you probably would have lost a lot of money. Did the experience make you want to pursue directing or was it just a lesson learned?