A03 – Appoint the solution ideation team members

This is a draft of the manual for review. If you have any comments, please email them to info@omimo.org. Please check back for the final version.

What

At this point, you form a team of all the experts needed for ideating solutions for achieving the expected outcomes of the program. The program is not approved yet, and it may never be executed, but these appointments should be done formally, and the team must be available to work on the program if it’s approved later on.

Why

One of the main purposes of the Program Initiation is to evaluate the viability of and justification for the program, which will guide the decision as to whether it’s a good idea to invest in the program. This information is based on ideating solutions and designing them at a high level, which requires experts in the solution ideation team. If not performed well, some beneficial programs may be rejected, and some unjustifiable programs may be selected.

Some may consider it a waste of time to work on a program that might not be executed. The program manager should ensure that everyone understands that this is, however, an important investment for the organization because it allows them to select the best programs to invest in. Even if it’s decided not to execute the program, their efforts are not wasted, as they saved the organization from investing its resources in an unjustifiable program.

Similar to P3.express and micro.P3.express, P4.express doesn’t accept the common approach of one team initiating the program or project and another team executing it, because a team that will be responsible for executing it will be more realistic in its initiation.

Who

In general, members of the solution ideation team have a profound impact on the success of the program, and, therefore, no one outside the program may set up the team. The sponsor should have near-absolute authority over it, and they should trust and delegate the selection of the team members to the program manager.

How

Deciding who has to be in the team is not easy and needs an understanding of what’s involved in the potential solutions. For that reason, the program manager should start with a few obvious choices and then, using their help, discover other people who are also needed for the program. This process can be repeated a few times with the new team members until the team becomes capable enough. Later on, during Program Initiation or Monthly Initiations, as solutions are ideated, the need for more experts may be identified, and they can be added as required.

Many programs (for example, organizational change programs) depend largely on the acceptance and support of their stakeholders. In such cases, people who feel that their needs are not considered properly will resist. Therefore, for the interests of each group of people, there should be at least one team member who’s completely aware of them and shares the information with the team. When possible, it’s best to even have representatives from each group of key stakeholders in the team.

Sometimes, you might appoint a few people to the team mainly because being a team member makes them supporters of the program, whereas being left outside the team might make them opposers. This approach can be helpful, but you also have to ensure that you don’t have negative team members with destructive behaviors, and that you’re not making the team unnecessarily big.