Integrated Project Management

Communication Skills

The project manager and the team must “speak the same language” in order to work together. If they are not absolutely clear on all the terminology used in the project, chaos will reign. For example, to an engineer the term “quality” means “all parts for the product fall within the plus or minus tolerance specifications on design drawings.” To the person leading the quality movement, “equaling or exceeding the expectations of the customer,” is generally the interpretation. (This last statement raises this question: What is meant by 'the expectations of the customer?') To others, quality simply means a pleasant appearance. A product manager, however, may think of quality in terms of “99.6 percent of the products falling within ...