Grace Design Studios · Module 7 of 12

Quick Reference · The Kickoff Playbook

Project Kickoff · the Module 7 Quick Reference · companion job aid and interactive tools

One sentence successThe Kickoff BriefPlant the flagExperience PointsThe three beliefs

Readiness

Write success in one sentence

A project is ready for kickoff when its success fits a single sentence the client would sign. If that sentence does not exist yet, have the conversation before the meeting. Draft it here.

This project succeeds when ______.

Resolve any tradeoff first: budget against schedule, scope against speed. Get the answer from the client in writing before kickoff. Readiness is cheaper than rework.

The worked example · Oakhaven

Build the sentence from the three success targets the client stated in Module 4. Name all three. A sentence that carries only one of them will be read as a sentence about only one of them.

Performance

Deliver the facility as designed while emergency operations continue without interruption. Dispatch never goes dark.

Experience

Karen Whitfield is never surprised in front of City Council.

Financial

Deliver the $1.4M Grace fee at the planned 20 percent profit. State the fee and the profit as one idea. Never state either one alone.

The Oakhaven sentence

This project succeeds when dispatch never goes dark, when Karen Whitfield is never surprised in front of City Council, and when the $1.4M Grace fee earns 20 percent profit.

Twenty nine words. All three targets, in her order, in her language. Test your own sentence against the same 30 word limit in the Kickoff Readiness Board.

Stage 1 · Prepare

The Kickoff Brief checklist

Preparation creates internal clarity. Align the team before facing the client. Thirteen things get confirmed before anyone walks into the room, and they answer two questions rather than thirteen. Confirm every item below. The running total shows how ready the team is to lead the kickoff.

Skipping this stage is the most common kickoff failure. A team that has not aligned internally performs disagreement in front of the client.

0 of 13 confirmed

Does this team understand the project? (seven)

Can this team run it? (six)

All preparation confirmed. The team has the internal clarity to lead a kickoff that creates alignment rather than activity. This is the Kickoff Brief.

Score the same 13 items with owners and a verdict in the Kickoff Readiness Board.

The move

Plant the flag · what you present, and why

Somebody leaves that room as the person the project runs through. Claim the seat, or watch it get assigned to the principal, to the contractor, or to nobody.

  1. Present the plan rather than the project. The client already owns the project. Only this team owns the plan, so the plan is the thing that carries authority.
  2. Put the artifacts on the table by name. The WBS at 9 deliverables and 14 work packages. The schedule with its protected QAQC weeks and its Week 13 submission. The one page communication plan with the client decision calendar on it.
  3. Show command of work nobody in the room has seen. Command of unfamiliar work is what assigns leadership. Demonstrate it early, in specifics, without apologising for detail.

A kickoff does not explain the project. It assigns the project.

The design work

Design your Experience Points

An Experience Point is a designed moment in the kickoff that visibly serves the stated Experience criterion of the client. It is not a courtesy and it is not a tone. It is a planned, observable move the client could point to afterwards.

Performance is delivered over months. Experience is delivered in moments, and the first moments are at kickoff.

The three properties test

  1. It traces to something the client said. Use the words of the client from Module 4, not a criterion the team assumed.
  2. It is placed on the agenda before the meeting. Plan it. Do not improvise it.
  3. It is visible. The client can see it happen and could describe it afterwards.

A moment that fails any one of the three is hospitality rather than an Experience Point.

The worked example · three Experience Points for Karen Whitfield

What the client saidThe Experience PointWhere it lands on the agenda
I cannot be surprised in front of City Council.Present the communication plan with the Council meeting calendar already on it, and every Grace update landing at least five working days before a Council date.Communication rhythm
I cannot be surprised in front of City Council.Open the risk register in the room rather than holding it back, with the three live risks named, so the first time Karen hears a risk is never in a public session.Risks and assumptions
I cannot be surprised in front of City Council.Schedule the dispatch system selection with its decide by date and its request by date visible, so Karen can see the runway she holds on a decision she has to defend publicly.Communication rhythm

Now design two for your own project

Write the sentence the client actually said. Write the move that answers it. Place the move on the agenda. Then copy the result into the kickoff agenda.

Your Experience Point 1

The client said ______. In the kickoff we will ______. It lands on the agenda at ______.

Your Experience Point 2

The client said ______. In the kickoff we will ______. It lands on the agenda at ______.

The mechanism

Make the client feel heard · the three plays

Warmth is not the mechanism. Warmth is easy to manufacture and easy to mistake for alignment. Playback is the mechanism. Run these three in order, before presenting anything the team produced.

Play 1 · Play it back

Use their words

State the success definition of the client in the words the client used, attributed to the person who said it.

Play 2 · Show the plan built on it

Point at the element

Point at the specific plan element that exists because of that sentence. Name the sentence and the element together.

Play 3 · Ask what is missing

Then stop talking

Ask what is missing. Then stop talking, and write down whatever comes back.

Play 3 is the one that gets skipped. It is also the one that produces the belief that the team understands the client.

Stage 2 · Execute

The five alignments

Lead a conversation, not a presentation. Make the implicit explicit across five areas while everyone is in the room.

1 · Success

Confirm the purpose

Lock how success will be judged.

Ask: What outcome matters most? What wins if priorities collide?

2 · Scope

State the boundary

Name what the team will deliver and what it will not, so “extra” is recognizable later.

3 · Roles

Name who does what

Discipline leadership and decision authority on each side.

4 · Risks

Surface assumptions

Put early risks and the assumptions behind the fee on the table while they are cheap to manage.

5 · Rhythm

Set communication

Cadence of meetings and updates, and how decisions get recorded and confirmed.

The standard

What kickoff must leave behind · the three beliefs

Do not measure kickoff by how the room felt. Measure it by what the client and team believe walking out. All three must be genuinely true.

“I chose the right team.”

Competence, leadership, and organization: command of the project.

“They understand me.”

The team gets the priorities, the constraints, and the definition of success held by the client.

“There is a clear plan.”

Roles, milestones, and communication expectations are clear.

The mapping · the move that produces each belief

A belief with no move attached is a wish. Attach the move, and the standard becomes a method.

The beliefWhere it comes fromThe move that produces it
“I chose the right team.”Planting the flagPresent the plan rather than the project, and show command of work nobody in the room has seen before.
“They understand me.”Playback and Experience PointsRead the three success targets back in the words of the client, then run the designed Experience Points that answer them.
“There is a clear plan.”Presenting the planPut the WBS, the schedule and the one page communication plan on the table, with owners and dates attached.

Warmth is easy to manufacture and easy to mistake for alignment. These three beliefs, not a pleasant room, are the real standard.

Stage 3 · Follow through

The 24 hour close

Protect Integrity. The 24 hours is the deadline.

Alignment starts decaying the moment the room clears. Convert it into execution inside 24 hours.

  1. Document the decisions and the open items, and send them inside 24 hours. Name the decision, the owner, and the date it was made.
  2. Schedule the communication rhythm rather than promising it. A cadence that is not on a calendar is not a cadence.
  3. Make every commitment visible to the person who has to keep it. A commitment held only by the project manager is a commitment at risk.
  4. Distribute the Module 6 one page communication plan as the record. It is the artifact the whole rhythm gets audited against.

A decision made in a room and not written down was not made.

Score all three stages before the meeting in the Kickoff Readiness Board, and rehearse the first ninety seconds out loud at Stage 2b. The summary does not generate until the three plays are written.