Why Your Projects Are Not Being Completed
by: Ryan Leibowitz
Here are 5 common reasons why your projects are going over schedule, over budget, and generally under expectations of quality.
1. Overextending on your resources: Or simply doing more than what your resources whether it be in finances, human capital, strategic partnerships, time, etc.
2. Micromanaging: Instead of looking over the shoulders of your team mates, focus more on the overall strategy alignment and faciliate intra/extra departmental communications.
3. lack of strategic vision, feature-creep, too tactical (putting out fires, playing catch-up vs how to sustain long term competitive advantage)
4. Eating an elephant whole: no matter how well thought out the project is, the individual pieces may be perfectly executed on time and on budget but then it's impossible or extremely difficult to integrate the pieces. Instead it is probably a better idea to chunk out the projecs to produce measurable results such as described in the "rapid results initiative" where specific quantifiable milestones are set, and once reached can be either built upon or scrapped depending the the goal discovery process.
5. Poor communication between cross-functions: Bureaucracy is part of the game, get used to it, or better yet, learn to be a better communicator and have not just let the marketing or engineering head decide on the project requirements but set aside time to get insight from all constituents and stakeholders.
The untold story, beyond financial losses
Not only do failed projects cost time and money, sometimes amounting to several years, and millions of dollars. But it demoralizes all the stakeholders to the project, especially the frontline employees and managers that had direct reign and input into the project.
As has been quoted in the media and surveys, the majority of projects fail to meet expectations or even sustainable results. Therefore an improvement in the knowledge of the field of project management is perhaps the bare minimum in advancing one's career, or business success in this high paced environment.
About The Author:
Ryan Leibowitz
For more career propelling project management consulting tips and an up to date blog, please visit http://www.managethat.com/ and http://www.managethat.com/blog respectively.
March 2006
Disclaimer: The information presented and opinions expressed in these articles are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of BIZBUD.com and/or its partners.
Unless otherwise stated, the contents of this site are
Copyright © 2006 BIZBUD.com - All rights reserved.
Articles are copyright materials of their respective authors.
|
