1st day as a PM? 1st client project? Sameeee.
We are in week 5 of training and it’s time for client projects. As the first person in my cohort to serve as Project Manager, I had no idea what to expect, but having run many projects as a former classroom teacher, I was hopeful that a few transferable skills would have their time to shine.
I received the login instructions to obtain the data from the client on the Friday afternoon before project week. I was informed that there was a way to access the data using a WFH-friendly server and so I planned to take a look at the data over the weekend so that I could come in on Monday morning and be prepared with questions for the client during our kick-off meeting.
We can all have dreams right? Well sometimes dreams don’t come true. And that’s ok!
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TL/DR : It is okay to wait until after the client kick-off to get eyes on the data. In the meantime, start getting organized.
I’m not sure if it’s because my personal computer is a Mac or if the WFH-friendly server was just not as friendly as I thought, but I could not access the data. At all. A couple of hours later, I got to a point where I was downloading a driver using the command line only to be later sent to a webpage suggesting that I reach out to Tableau support. As instructed by my coaches, if you need help, post on Convo. I posted and waited patiently. My coach got back to me within a few hours and reassured me that we will be able to take a look on Monday morning and figure everything out.
I was now able to relax.
I set up a Google drive folder for myself and my team. I included a document containing questions that we should make sure get addressed by the client in our Monday meeting.
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Monday morning arrived and I informed my team of the Google drive folder and its contents. “Let’s all work together to make sure that all of the essential questions get answered.” They were all on board and we collaborated to get it done. In addition, almost everyone took notes, which I utilized next.
Lo and behold, there were no issues accessing the data from in the office. It was seamless. (Of course!) Next, I created a tableau packaged workbook with the data and uploaded that file to the Google drive folder so that all team members were able to access it smoothly.
I created a “Notes Share” document for all team members to add their notes. And following this step, I broke them off into groups of 2 or 3 by overarching topics to then go through those notes and clean them up (each on a separate document). Yes, the number of documents were starting to increase rapidly but it felt necessary to me to get as many perspectives down and sorted which also allowed for team members to get a better understanding of what some of our goals were.
Now, to the data. While we were initially encouraged in future sessions to try to get eyes on the data as soon as possible, I have also received the alternative feedback that it is also beneficial to get a good grasp on the requests of the client first and then go through the data to see what we are working with to meet their desires. So, yes, get eyes on the data as soon as possible but it does not necessarily need to be the VERY first thing that gets done. As all data analysts will claim, it depends.
The client sent along their slide deck, the schema, and their list of requests. I also added these to the Google drive folder for my team.
We started to build out the data model in Tableau. Here, I asked one team member to hook their computer up to the TV so that all others who wanted to simultaneously build can follow along. Some team members chose to observe so that they can take in the logic and confirm decisions rather than follow along. Having both roles going allowed for a more sound process.
Once the model was built out, my team returned to the cleaned up questions and began to work out what can be answered and what data issues they were encountering.
This is where having a coach and all of the resources available at The Data School comes in super handy. Our coach was able to assist with finding flaws within the client-provided data schema that led to inconsistencies for my team.
Lesson learned: You cannot always trust the client. (While it’s not the first time that we have heard that claim, it was definitely eye-opening to experience it for the first time).
Once those errors were addressed, my team was able to move on and focus on better understanding and analyzing the data.
I continued to gather questions and better familiarize myself with each individual’s focus.
I began to work on the dashboard template with the company brand colors to allow for a clean and unified set of dashboards that will be presented at the end.
To end the day, I had all team members submit to me what their plans for the next work session were so that they can come in with an immediate ‘to-do’ relevant to where they left off rather than needing to figure it out again the next time they opened their files.
Day 1 done.
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