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Issue 8 - November 2005
PROJECT NEWS: The Official eNewsletter of ProjectWorld & The World Congress for Business Analysts
Welcome to Issue 8 of PROJECT NEWS. If you are receiving this newsletter, but have not yet subscribed to our complimentary newsletter, please click on the following link to subscribe: http://www.iirusa.com/optin
If you have any colleagues or friends you think would be interested, please feel free to forward this email along!
Ten Guaranteed Ways to Screw Up Any Project
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A web-published article by Michael Greer
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1. Don't bother prioritizing your organization's overall project load. After all, if there's a free-for-all approach to your overall program management (i.e., "survival of the fittest"), then the projects that survive will be those that were destined to survive. In the meantime, senior management need not trouble themselves aligning projects with strategic goals or facing the logical imperative that people simply cannot have 12 number one priorities!
2. Encourage sponsors and key stakeholders to take a passive role on the project team.
Let them assert their authority to reject deliverables at random, without participating in defining project outcomes in a high-resolution fashion. And above all, don't bother project sponsors when their constituents (such as key SMEs and reviewers) drop the ball and miss their deadlines.
3. Set up ongoing committees focusing on management process (such as TQM groups, etc.) and make project team members participate in frequent meetings and write lots of reports… preferably when critical project deadlines are coming due.
4. Interrupt team members relentlessly … preferably during their time off. Find all sorts of trivial issues that "need to be addressed," then keep their beepers and cell phones ringing and bury them in emails to keep them off balance.
5. Create a culture in which project managers are expected to "roll over" and take it when substantive new deliverables are added halfway through the project. (After all, only a tradesperson like a plumber or electrician would demand more money or more time for additional services; our people are "professionals" and should be prepared to be "flexible.")
6. Half way through the project, when most of the deliverables have begun to take shape, add a whole bunch of previously unnamed stakeholders and ask them for their opinions about the project and its deliverables.
7. Encourage the sponsor to approve deliverables informally (with nods, smiles, and verbal praise); never force sponsors to stand behind their approvals with a formal sign-off. (In other words, give ‘em plenty of room to weasel out of agreements!)
8. Make sure project managers have lots of responsibilities and deadlines, but no authority whatsoever to acquire or remove people from the project; to get enough money, materials, or facilities; or insist on timely participation of SMEs and key reviewers.
9. Describe project deliverables in the vaguest possible terms so sponsors and reviewers have plenty of leeway to reinvent the project outputs repeatedly as the project unfolds.
10. Get projects up and running as quickly as possible – don't worry about documenting agreements in a formal project charter, clearly describing team roles/responsibilities, or doing a thorough work breakdown analysis. After all, we know what we're doing and we trust each other. So let's get to it without a pesky audit trail!
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Copyright 2004 from Michael Greer's Project Management Resources web site. The URL is http://www.michaelgreer.com. For more information, send e-mail to greers_pm@yahoo.com.
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Want to Take a Break From Your Projects?
Test your puzzle solving abilities by playing the game that has become the latest craze, SUDOKU. Please check our website, www.projectworld.com on Monday, November 7th and see how well you did.
How To Play? Find the missing numbers. Each 9x9 box must contain all the numbers from 1 to 9 only once. Each column and row must also contain all the numbers from 1 to 9 only once. Enjoy!
PROJECT NEWS QUOTES OF THE MONTH
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Just a few project management quotes that we thought you would like
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"All project managers face problems on Monday mornings - good project managers are working on next Monday's problems."
"Any project can be estimated accurately (once it's completed)."
"Good project management is not so much knowing what to do and when, as knowing what excuses to give and when."
This Newsletter has been brought to you by ...
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ProjectWorld & The World Congress for Business Analysts USA
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Join us November 15-18, 2005 in Orlando, FL for the co-location of ProjectWorld and the World Congress for Business Analysts USA - the ONLY event in America to unite the project management professional with the business analyst, cross-industry.
More than .... 134 Sessions, 32 Pre-Conference Events and 80% Practitioner-Led Presentations & Case Studies... To help you complete more projects on time, on budget & in alignment with your corporate strategy.
For more information on ProjectWorld, please visit www.projectworld.com
For more information on the World Congress for Business Analysts USA, please visit www.bawusa.com
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** TIME IS RUNNING OUT TO REGISTER FOR |
SAVE THE DATE FOR THE 2006 PROJECTWORLD & THE WORLD CONGRESS FOR BUSINESS ANALYST
When: November 6 – 9, 2006
Where: Caribe Royale All-Suites Resort & Convention Center, Orlando, FL
Visit: www.projectworld.com and www.bawusa.com for program updates as they become available.
Interested in ProjectWorld? You'll also enjoy...
The 11th annual PDMA/IIR Co-Sponsored Event, Strategic & Operational Portfolio Management Event. February 27-March 1, 2006 in Ft. Lauderdale, Fl. http://www.iirusa.com/portfolio
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