There are many techniques and processes to help you be successful on a project. Some of them like better estimating and defining requirements are pretty standard and obvious. Here are some other ways to increase the likelihood of success on your project that are not so obvious.

1. Understand the big picture and the details If the devil is in the details, there is nothing more devilish than the complex and intertwining dependencies of a project. You need to be aware of the details, even if you don’t react to each detail each time. At the same time, it’s just as important to see the big picture. Understanding the overall purpose and objectives of the project allows you to make decisions based on broader context. The big picture also allows you to see trends before problems emerge.
2. Make decisions quickly Over analyzing and procrastination are a problem on many projects. Use the best information you have available to make decisions quickly. Even if it’s not the BEST decision, a GOOD decision suffices in nearly all cases.
3. Communication heavily You can never have enough communication. If the worst thing is that somebody says they already know what you just told them, great. The discussion will be short. However, for every time you hear that, you will have five more instances where the person was not aware.
4. Manage risks proactively This one might fall into the more obvious category. But it is surprising to me how many projects do not formally manage risks. Some projects identify risks but don’t put a plan in place to manage them. Risk management does not take so much time. All successful project managers do it.
5. Manage expectations Many project managers communicate, but not effectively. The do not realize how to communicate what is happening now and the future looks like. If you have ever surprised a sponsor or customer, you probably were not managing expectations well.
6. Make sure you get major documents approved Sometimes we are just too busy to get approvals for documents even if you know you need them. The result is often that there is a disagreement with the approver after the fact, causing rework and conflict.
7. Involve stakeholders throughout the project We should all know it is important to understand project stakeholders. But often we focus on stakeholders at the beginning and the end of the projects. To be really successful you need to engage key stakeholders all the way through the project.
8. Cultivate excellent relationships with the Project Sponsor Stakeholder management is important, but one stakeholder is more important then the rest – the sponsor. Go out of your way to develop a good relationship with the sponsor.

Use all the obvious techniques for project success, plus these eight that are a little less obvious. You will have a much better chance for success.

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It might seem that once a project makes it through the approval process it is ready to start. This is not the case. There is one more step that has to happen before a project can actually start. In portfolio management this is the “authorization” process. In project management it is “initiation“.  On the surface it might seem that this is an extra bureaucratic step that does not add value. Actually it is a very important step to make sure that the best decisions are made based on the most current information.

Think about how project work is approved in most organizations. The major work for next year is planned in the current year so that budgets and projects are ready when the new year starts. In fact, all of the work cannot start on the first day of the new year. The work is staggered to start throughout the year. It may be up to 12 months (or longer) between the time a project is approved and when it is actually ready to begin.

It does not make sense to allow projects to start based on information that could be many months old. Therefore we have the authorize/initiate step to make sure that the project is still viable and that the organization is ready to start. There are a number of things that need to be validated before the project begins.

• Validate the Business Case. The time lag between approval and when the project is ready to start may have changed the Business Case. For instance, it is possible that a competitive opportunity has come and gone.
• Identify the stakeholders. It is important to know who the people are that have an interest in the project. These people need to be engaged and may be needed for project planning.
• Validate sponsorship. It is possible that the sponsor has changed or is no longer committed to the project. You need to validate the current sponsor of the project.
• Validate staffing. You should not start a project without staff availability. It is possible that the resources that were going to work on the project are no longer available.
• Validate budget. It is possible that budget cuts, or overruns from other projects, have resulted in a lack of funding for the project.

You can now see that there are a lot of reasons why a previously approved project may no longer make sense by the time it is ready to proceed. It is usually the case that the shorter the timeline between approval and authorization, the more likely it is that the project will in fact proceed as envisioned. If the project no longer makes sense the organization has a chance to utilize the funding on an alternate project instead – one with more clear business benefit.

Do you need help optimizing your portfolio management processes? We help organizations with portfolio management all the time. TenStep Consulting Services can help you get these processes right. Contact us to see how we can help you.

A Feasibility Study may need to be completed for your project. The best time to complete it is when you have identified a range of different alternative solutions and you need to know which solution is the most feasible to implement. Here’s how to do it.

Step 1: Research the Business Drivers

In most cases, your project is being driven by a problem in the business. These problems are called “business drivers” and you need to have a clear understanding of what they are, as part of your Feasibility Study. For instance, the business driver might be that an IT system is outdated and is causing customer complaints, or that two businesses need to merge because of an acquisition. Find out why the business driver is important to the business, and why it’s critical that the project delivers a solution to it within a specified timeframe.

Step 2: Confirm the Alternative Solutions

Now you have a clear understanding of the business problem that the project addresses, you need to understand the alternative solutions available. For example, if it’s an IT system that is outdated, your alternative solutions might include redeveloping the existing system, replacing it with a package solution or merging it with another system. Only with a clear understanding of the alternative solutions to the business problem can you progress with the Feasibility Study.

Step 3: Determine the Feasibility

You now need to identify the feasibility of each solution. The question to ask of each alternative solution is “can we deliver it on time and under budget?” In other words – is it feasible to complete this project for a reasonable timeframe and cost? To answer this question, you need to use a variety of methods to assess the feasibility of each solution. Here are some examples of ways you can assess feasibility:

• Research: Perform research to see if other companies have implemented the same solutions. This may tell you if the solution is practical.
• Prototyping: Identify the part of the solution that has the highest risk, and then build a sample of it to see if it’s possible to create. This will tell you if the solution is technically feasible.
• Time-boxing: Complete some of the tasks in your project plan and measure how long it took vs. planned. If you delivered it on time, then you know that your overall schedule may be feasible.

Step 4: Choose a Preferred Solution

With the feasibility of each alternative solution known, the next step is to select a preferred solution to be delivered by your project. Choose the solution that is most feasible to implement, has the lowest risk, and you have the highest confidence of delivering.

After completing these four steps, get your Feasibility Study approved by your sponsor so that everyone in the project team has a high degree of confidence that the project can deliver successfully.

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Do you need help with project definition, feasibility or business case? Contact us today to discuss how we can help your organization choose the right projects.

There are many great techniques that help you manage the schedule on your project. Here are a couple.

Investigate Further When ‘Completed’ Activities Are Not Really Completed

Sometimes a team member says that an activity is complete when in reality it is not quite done. This can happen for the following reasons:

• The activity should have been completed and the team member believes he needs just a short amount of time to complete it. He might say it is complete and then finish it up quickly, rather than deal with the consequences of the activity being late.
• A deliverable is ’completed’ by the team member but not approved. The team member may say the work is complete, but when the deliverable is checked it is discovered that it is incomplete or needs additional follow-up work.

To avoid this, make sure that there is an approval process for all major deliverables, and that the schedule leaves time for the approval process and for updates based on feedback. Then there is no question that the deliverable is completed, because it has either been approved or it hasn’t. If an activity does not call for the total completion of a deliverable, you would expect that when a team member says an activity is completed, it probably is. If you find a pattern of this not being the case, the individual team member might need coaching on how to better report the status of his work.

Use the Concept of Triple Constraint to Manage Cost, Schedule and Scope

[image source_type=”attachment_id” source_value=”918″ align=”right” width=”300″ autoHeight=”true”] At the end of the planning phase you should have an agreement with your sponsor on the work that will be completed (Charter/Scope Statement), the cost (or hours) and duration that are needed to complete the work (the schedule). These three items form a concept called the “triple constraint”. If one of the three items change, at least one, if not both, of the other items need to change as well.

This is more than an academic discussion. The concept actually has great relevance to the management of the project. The triple constraint makes logical sense and can be easily explained to your clients as well.

This concept is easy to visualize if you think of the triple constraint as a triangle, with the sides representing cost, duration and scope of work.

For example, if the scope of work increases, the cost and / or deadline must increase as well. This makes sense. If you have more work to do, it will take more cost (effort) and perhaps a longer duration. (Likewise if you reduce the scope of work, the cost (effort) and / or the deadline should decrease as well.)

Similarly, if you are asked to accelerate the project and complete it earlier than scheduled, it would also be logical to ask for less work. However, if you are asked to deliver the same work in less time, the third leg of the triple constraint (cost or effort) should increase to maintain the balance. You will need to increase costs (effort), perhaps by working overtime hours or perhaps by bringing in more resources to complete the same amount of work earlier.

Once the project manager really recognizes this relationship in the triple constraint, he will automatically recognize when one leg changes and instantly look for ways that the other legs will change to maintain the triple constraint balance.

Do you need help with building or managing schedules? Contact us today to schedule a great one-day class on building and managing schedules.

Most of us still create some variation of a paper status report to communicate progress on our project. I remember when these reports were printed on paper. An old manager of mine once asked me to review a large binder of paper status reports and tell him if there was anything interesting that he should know about. There were probably over a hundred paper reports in the binder.

Even though most organizations no longer print out status reports, the need for status updates is still here. Here are some old and new ways to report status.

1. Status reports. Yes, what is old is also new. Many organizations still create status updates. Usually these are reviewed online instead of printing in large binders.
2. Many organizations send the status information in-stream in an email These emails can still follow a common format so they are easy to read and digest. The information can be easier to digest if it is directly in the email instead of having to click on an attachment.
3. Status meetings. Some organizations do not have status report, but go over the status in meetings. The Agile community does this through their daily stand-up status meetings. This can limit the status update to the people in the room, but in many projects that is acceptable.
4. Some organizations do not have formal status reports, but just hold formal or informal discussions with the sponsor and others with a need to know. This is very informal. Usually if a person such as a sponsor wants an update they set up a time to talk to the project manager – maybe just as a hall discussion.
5. There are a number of tools that can help. These could be specialized status reporting and consolidation tools, or perhaps a general purpose environment like SharePoint.
6. Phone messages. You could leave a status report voicemail. This eliminated the initial need for a paper based report. Usually you are also time bound to complete the report in two or three minutes – the length of a voicemail.

Remember that although there are many options for the format and technology of reporting project status, the need to communicate status. Status reporting is the way you manage expectations on a project and it is the minimum communication requirement for a project manager. …

Do you need help with project status reports, or the rollup to consolidated reporting or portfolio dashboards? Contact us today to discuss how we can help your organization and your project teams get better at project management processes in general, and status reporting in particular.