To start a project, you need a plan. The plan never happens as planned.

To reach a goal, you need an objective. The objective will be different from the result.

It’s true when working on a project on your own. It’s just as true when it’s a team project.

How can there be clarity?

To be able to work together with others, you start by negotiating a contract. Instead of contract you could also call it agreement, understanding or alliance. The advantage of using the word contract is its formality. It helps to establish responsibility. The idea of the contract is to determine the way you will be working together. In this process you will define a common objective, that is what you will achieve together. You will also set up a plan, i.e. how you will be working with one another. Doing it together in a group helps to develop a common image and starts to develop the habit of how you will work together. It’s an important step in the project and cannot be skipped.

The challenge in this process just as well as in the following steps is any assumption that something is understood and thus fixed. What this assumption forgets is that anything that evolves implies change. Thus, new elements appear and affect plan and objective. It’s how clarity appears. Change allows clarity to develop. And that means that execution is impacted and new questions are raised.

The consequence is, that we must constantly watch where clarity might missing and must be addressed. The contract then is adapted by addressing the clarity where it is missing and making new decisions.

It sounds straightforward. It is only straightforward if change is addressed and expected.