Look, if you drove your project into a ditch from the very beggining, then read my article on How to earn your PMP in just 8 weeks, study PMI’s approach to Project Management and learn how to avoid the same mistakes twice. If, however, you inherited a problematic project, what do you do? How many times have you faced this problem where you replace someone who was hardly the magician at managing projects? Then before you know it, the world is crashing down on you.
Here are a few tips on how to dig yourself out of such dilemma:
- # 1 - How do you know? Honestly, how do you know your project is in dire straits? Just because the formula spreadsheets and Microsoft Project show all is lost doesn’t mean your life is over. Find out how bad the situation is. Meet with your project sponsor, the project team and your customers. Start by documenting the general perceptions of the project. Does your sponsor think the project should be canceled? Do you even have a sponsor? Have customer expectations changed? Were they even documented? Has your vendor dropped the ball one too many times? Do you even know who the vendor is? Use common sense and ask yourself these questions. Start a simple log of questions and make sure that you know the entire picture. You want to analyze what’s the status of the project from more than just the angle of spreadsheets and schedule formulas. Find out what cause the mistakes. You don't want to commit them as you move forward.
- # 2 – Then what? Now that you know how bad the situation truly is and what caused it, plan your next moves. Do you play chess? If so now is the perfect time to apply strategy based on the information you uncovered. What’s the political expectation for this project? Do the ‘big boys’ want to keep the project moving? What did your customers say about their expectations? What did the sponsor keep repeating? Listen to the messages between and behind the words. Even if there is no money, there always is some workaround. Time can also be gained with careful planning. What you need to do is know where you need to be, set a new goal, chart a course for improvement. You need a sponsor buy-in. You need to reset the schedule and the financials. You need a mission. And when you have it, draw a roadmap that shows the steps you’ll take to get there.
- # 3 - What next? Now that you have a goal and a roadmap, start communicating. 90% of Project Manager’s time is spent on talking, writing, speaking, motivating, asking and responding, communicating, communicating, communicating, both verbally and nonverbally with all project stakeholders. Keep in mind, you need to speak with your sponsors at least once a day in the beginning. The sponsors need to know that you are making progress towards the new goals. You are now the change agent, the leader that will make a change. Act like one. Meet with your customers on a weekly basis. Tell them where you are in terms of the deliverables. Don’t cease to talk about the new goals and the new schedule. Remind them over and over about the project’s new strategy.
The truth is projects fail. According to a study done in 2007 by Dynamic Markets:
- 62 percent of organizations experienced IT projects that failed to meet their schedules
- 49 percent suffered budget overruns
- 47 percent had higher-than-expected maintenance costs, and
- 41 percent failed to deliver the expected business value and ROI
These numbers are staggering. In order to succeed in a failing project you must remain calm, find out what happened in the past (so that you don’t repeat the same errors) and set a new course to fix the problems.
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Comments
Its a good start but now the final solution. when projects come in a state called dire straits, so you better take cover because the shit hist the fan and a lot of people get dirty.
Bottomline, if you inherit a project in trouble, do not take any chances and terminate it, full stop.
You can only loose and upper management will sacrifice you on spot.
Take my advice and keep your knees closed, this is the only way to stay a project management virgin.
best regards
Renato
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