Common Sense in Projects
First identify the problem: The Problem is People
Problems with projects are deeply rooted in people, so too are the solutions. Our observations start with the earth at that stage where it is a spinning ball of hot rock devoid of oxygen. Some time later, but still lots of millions of years ago the elemental forces of nature that today shape markets had created oceans containing so much bacteria manufacturing so much oxygen that those bacteria poisoned themselves (after 300 million years of flourishing). If they had had newspapers and sentience they may have recognised the onset of their own equivalent to ‘global warming’.
Somewhere in the ensuing years came dinosaurs from whom we inherit a primitive brain stem but eventually “us” with our tribal, social programming. Amongst the many fascinating illustrations of how the world has changed and the bacteria have given way to the human is the story of the coyote.
The World Does Not Run to Man's Plans
The coyote and the corporation are both agents within ultimately the same Complex Adaptive System (CAS). To understand projects requires understanding of complex adaptive systems.
Returning to the coyote: less than 200 years ago the coyote was a small, dumb dog with a limited foot-print in North America. Following years of persecution by farmers whose aim was to eradicate them the (surviving) coyotes are (apparently) now bigger, stronger, smarter and able to claim residency in 50 of the 52 state of the USA. Every plan generates unintended consequences - every project needs the mechanisms to detect them, to exploit the positive and eliminate the negative side effects.
The mechanisms that shaped the Earth’s population so profoundly over the last half-billion years are still in play. In play in our projects today! To ignore the elemental forces when formulating hypothesis that may explain how to make projects succeed is at best missing an opportunity, at worst it subjects any set of ideas to fatal flaw. Witness the Project Management Body of Knowledge, and PRojects In Controlled Environments (PRINCE2tm): so much defined process yet globally project performance is most often less than expected.
In a normally distributed, Gaussian world there must be as many early projects as late ones . There are'nt, so something more than PMBOK and PRINCE2's prescription must be in play. Something for which defined process models are necessary (maybe) but insufficient (definitely).
Something more is in play - peoples psychology in estimating, in quality, in teams, in group decision making, in corporate politics, in disconnection between strategic direction, tactical project actions, empowerment and blame-cultures. Complex Adaptive Systems dynamics are operating within the mechanics of schedule dependencies, earned value, quality management and oh so much more: Identifying the causes of project challenge is a long step towards taking corrective actions - Our training & consulting activities will show you how to add insight and opportunity to your project plans & actions.
The Reptilian (and Higher Order) Brains Run Your Project
While you read the previous paragraphs you were breathing. An action carried out by that part of your brain largely shared with reptiles, and certainly not the result of thinking “in-breath, out-breath, in-…” Next time you say something in a project context of which you are les than entirely certain try not to touch your nose. It is possible (as a result of thinking about it), it is not necessarily easy. Next time some one tells you they agree with you listen to their phrasing. Is it "I see what you mean", "I hear what you say", "We're headed in the same direction"? their words reveal their world view and their preferred communications mode.
Projects are the creation of people; people the creation of elemental forces. Those forces have given us all one programmed imperative: to proliferate our genes. As a result two universal truths have driven behaviours since at least the dinosaurs' time if not before: the world is driven by sex and death. Their manifestation in the business world maybe by metaphors such as personal promotion or increased share-price, a nicer car in the garage, more leisure time and sleeping more soundly at night. These drivers (some analysed & described by Abraham Maslow) are there in our tribal behaviours as we form & storm through forging teams, embrace goals and seek recognition for a job well done.
To run a project successfully requires command of tools, for example the family of breakdown structures with which we express scope. Appreciation of the elemental forces of evolution, appreciation of human group behaviour and motivation should make clear that collaborative activity to define project scope is one place where project success is promoted. Techniques for creating breakdown structures, when correctly employed harness tribal instincts to the good of our projects.
In fact the mechanics of running a project are so simple that a few short paragraphs set out the recipe in full. Yet the whole of our services catalogue is insufficient to fully cover everything needed in every context.
A benefits management initiative starts with an idea. The idea germinates in the mind of a person who sees opportunity to pursue or a problem to overcome. In many contexts the idea competes with other ideas for allocation of resources (like the coyote?).
Means such as NPV, IRR or strategic fit vie with politics & power-broking, stakeholder whims and serendipity. When the idea is selected effort is expended to define scope. Often by establishing goals and deliverables, or “Project End-Point” (benefits start point!) perhaps measured by KPIs, CSFs and KGIs used during Benefits Realisation. We test: the deliverables do meet the goal, can resolve (totally?) the problem or satisfy the need of the (sufficiently significant?) stakeholders. [Note: we've no intention of expanding and explaining the alphabet soup here but our knowledge transfer activities do]
Once deliverables are defined the tasks to create them and the time taken, skills needed and resources consumed can be calculated, plotted and requested. All such requests will (should) include allowance for uncertainty, allowance for change of intention, allowance for failure of capability versus aspiration and for every other way in which either the half-billion year forces or the reptilian and higher minds can confuse and confound purpose. In this jumble of uncertainties is the reason the rest of our services offerings are insufficient to prescribe everything. 'Pre-scription' (write in advance), 'fore-casting' (establish how the future will happen) otherwise know as planning is only part of the answer. Often planning is not actually possible. Our corporate approval processes would do well to recognise when the 'plan' is a soap-powder ad designed only to release funds before being ignored. Of course preparation is always possible. Normally but not always preparation is justified.
Projects REQUIRE Active Management at Every Level
Monitoring and acting situationally is far more important than just planning. Planning may not always be possible but active control always is. Reactive control is not an excuse for failing to 'pre-pare' (being ready in advance for what is not as hoped). Many enterprises fail in their projects because people at every level from technical team member to chief executive fail to perform their part in the start-up, preparation, monitoring, responding and termination of projects.
Once a project is planned and base-lined (or prepared and strategies for adaptive control are in the place) then the project is executed. Reality dictates that many factors effect plan content; mostly they are expressions of uncertainty that cause accurate plans to accommodate increasing imprecision. If we have the insights into quality control and scope verification techniques to gauge progress then and only then can results be compared to aspirations. Variances from intention & expectation identified. Advances and advantages are consolidated. Problems and short-falls are responded to.
The sequence of plan (aspire), execute (respire? perspire?), measure, re-plan/ react, execute (expire?), and measure again cycles around repeatedly until all tasks are complete, deliverables whether physical or not are produced, participant needs satisfied and either current stage closed and the next one planned or the initiative moves into benefits harvesting (sometimes spelt as "the project is closed and the project manger moves on to a new challenge").
Project closure is really only the beginning – for who ever did a project for its own sake? Projects are just a necessary evil to enable some benefit to be born (the metaphor for 'commercial sex') or some problem to be avoided (the business euphemism for causes of 'commercial death'). When the deliverables are ready and the professional, trained change agent moves on has the change sponsor the skills or support to drive the implementation of change?
Understanding the context by which people plus process produce products = common sense project management.
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