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Mentor Mike item 1

Hi Mike,
I have joined an organisation that is fairly immature in project management and has had a track record of project failures.  I have been tasked with improving the overall project capability of the organisation and find that I have little support from senior management across the organisation due to past failures.  Most projects are treated as business as usual and many of the project managers have fallen into their roles.  Where do I begin? 
Andy

Dear Andy,
You have fallen into a common scenario which at first can appear very overwhelming.  You were obviously hired by someone more senior who sees the need for change.  I'd suggest that you enlist them as a champion as soon as possible. 
Your approach is going to require 3 levels of change:

 So where do you begin? 

• Identify quickly those current projects that are in trouble?  You may do this through a project health check, stage gate review or through the risks and issues register (or through enlisting external help).  Establish whether you are going to resolvie these issues or put a stop or hold on the projects.  It is very important early on to get some runs on the board
• Establish a project governance framework.  This may be as simple a checklist that identifies that you have such items as a valid business case, sufficient budget, stakeholder engagement , sponsor commitment  and adequately skilled resources
• Create a common project management language.  This can be achieved through training and mentoring on the fundamentals of project management, however training alone will not change behaviour and must be followed-up with coaching/mentoring, health checks and post implementation reviews (PIR’s)
• Establish a simple project management methodology inclusive of guidelines and templates that project managers can easily adopt
• Engage Senior Executives and Project Owners. Undertake some PIR’s on previous failed projects and explain to them the reasons why they have failed and how this will be addressed in the future. Listen to their concerns and create buy-in through workshop sessions on what successful projects look like and how to recognise early red flags/issues on projects
• Establish measures and incentives for staff development and project improvement
• CELEBRATE PROJECT SUCCESSES

Mentor Mike item 2

Hi Mike,
Our organisation has an extensive project management methodology based on PMBOK which works well for large projects, however in our department all our projects are relatively small, typically $50,000 to $150,000 in value and take weeks rather than months and we find that the methodology is a serious overhead in delivering these within time and budget, what do you suggest we do?
 
Steven

Hi Steven,

Firstly let me say that this is a common problem of large organisations that they seem unable to scale down the methodology to handle smaller projects.  In fact one such organisation I was consulting with told me that they no longer undertook small projects because they couldn’t justify the project management overhead that was involved.

The problem is that whether you are running a large project  or a small project the processes you need to perform are in most cases the same.  It is therefore difficult to skip parts of the methodology.  

We recently helped an organisation put a project management methodology in place, and were presented with the same problem.  We discovered that as well as the more noticeable large projects they conducted there were also lots of smaller projects. These smaller projects were being performed without any methodology and the cost of failure was significant, however to enforce the project management methodology would have been  impractical . 

As a result of our findings we built a new “lite" methodology for them that addressed the project management needs of these small projects, designing some simple templates and checklists to ensure that all the important areas were still considered, without bogging them down in documentation.  We found that this approach of tailoring the methodology from the “ground up” was far more effective that trying to scale down their project management methodology being used for large projects.

If you need help with this Steve let me know. 

 

 

Best regards,

 

Mike.

Mentor Mike item 3

Hi Mike,
I am concerned that my current project may get axed as a result of cutbacks in our organisation.  Is there anything I should do or just wait for the inevitable?

Regards,
 
Dave

Dear Dave,

 

 

Yes we live in interesting times as the Chinese proverb goes.  At this time all organisations will be taking a close look at the projects that they are running and assessing which ones they will keep, which ones they will put on hold and which ones they will abandon.  As a basic rule, if your project doesn’t stack up in terms of providing value to your organisation that exceeds what it costs then it is unlikely to proceed.
  
Rather than “waiting for the inevitable” as you put it you should have a look at the basis under which your project was initiated.  I presume from what you said your project isn’t essential from any regulatory requirement perspective.  Is there a business case? If so have a look at it to establish the justification for the project.  Has the situation changed?  Do the changes strengthen or weaken the business case?  Is there some additional benefits that have arisen that could improve the justification for the project?   Alternatively arrange for an independent organisation to do this for you to provide more credibility to your executive group.

I remember a project I was running for which the business case was based on a government regulation coming into effect.  We heard that the government had put the legislation on hold, and we were concerned that the project would be cancelled.  I held a workshop in which we “brainstormed” reasons why the project could still deliver benefits and we produced a revised business case.  The project proceeded to completion and as well as delivering the new benefits we had identified, we were well positioned when the legislation eventually did come into effect.

Finally, if you do have to close down your project, make sure you properly document and archive what has been completed to date so that the project can be restarted when the situation improves.

Best regards,

 

Mike.