HKSM

Purpose & When to Use

Develop Team focuses on building skills, trust, and ways of working so the group can perform at a higher level. Use it throughout project execution, starting early and continuing as the team evolves, especially after new members join, roles change, or performance dips.

Mini Flow (How It’s Done)

• Review team composition and goals to understand required skills and behaviors.
• Assess current capabilities and team dynamics using observations, feedback, and simple assessments.
• Create a development plan covering training, mentoring, pairing, job shadowing, and team-building activities.
• Establish or refine working agreements, communication norms, decision-making approaches, and ground rules.
• Improve the environment: set up collaboration tools, define core hours, and enable co-location or virtual team practices.
• Run targeted activities: workshops, cross-training, retrospectives, and problem-solving sessions.
• Recognize and reward helpful behaviors promptly and fairly to reinforce desired culture.
• Track team health and performance trends; adapt the plan and raise change requests if time or cost impacts arise.

Quality & Acceptance Checklist

• A documented team development plan exists and is understood by the team.
• Skill gaps are identified and addressed through training, coaching, or pairing.
• Working agreements and ground rules are visible and consistently followed.
• Team-building activities have clear objectives and measurable outcomes.
• Recognition and rewards are timely, transparent, and linked to specific behaviors or results.
• Collaboration and trust indicators are improving, as shown by feedback or metrics.
• Virtual team needs are covered: reliable tools, shared norms, and overlapping hours.
• Updates to plans, calendars, and lessons learned are recorded and communicated.

Common Mistakes & Exam Traps

• Confusing processes: Acquire Team brings people on; Develop Team builds capability; Manage Team monitors performance and handles issues.
• Assuming team-building is a one-time event rather than an ongoing practice.
• Rewarding only individuals when a team effort is needed, or rewarding the team when a specific individual behavior should be reinforced.
• Skipping working agreements and expecting tools alone to fix collaboration problems.
• Ignoring virtual team needs such as core hours, video use, and informal connection time.
• Sending everyone to generic training instead of targeting actual gaps.
• Escalating conflicts too quickly; on the exam, collaboration and problem-solving are preferred first steps when appropriate.

PMP Example Question

A newly formed, mostly remote team shows low trust and poor collaboration. What should the project manager do first to develop the team?

1. Revise the procurement plan to add more resources.
2. Schedule targeted team-building and establish working agreements.
3. Replace underperforming team members with more experienced staff.
4. Update the risk register and continue monitoring.

Correct Answer: B — Schedule targeted team-building and establish working agreements.

Explanation: The goal is to improve team dynamics and capability. Early, focused team-building and clear norms address trust and collaboration more directly than adding resources or replacing staff.