Donna Fitzgerald“Project results will improve because there is an agreed upon methodology to be followed that helps repeat earlier successes from similar projects”
This is one of the most common misconceptions in the PM space. One of the reasons it’s so seductive is that it sounds like it should be true. After all if we can just figure out what experienced people did to succeed and then ask less experienced people to do the same thing everything will be great. Won’t it? Nope. It doesn’t work like that. It never has and it never will as long as we’re talking about human beings. So let’s let’s look at the desires that underlie this statement and see if there’s any way we can get to the desired result. I am going to contend that there are three things that need to replace the statement above
1) Project results will improve if the team has time to think and then takes action based on the reflective process.
Believe it or not this is where a single agreed upon method comes in very handy. The role of a method is to make the low value tasks easier to perform. Formatting a status report is a low value task. In fact in about 90% of the cases, formatting anything routine is a low value task. A single method can help by offering standard formats. For new PMs having a cheat sheet is very good and a method fulfills that function. The method can’t necessarily give them more experience or improve the quality of their thinking but it will keep them from wasting significant time reinventing the wheel. A method also eases some of the burden on the organization with regard to exercising control.
So a method should provide more time for thinking even if it doesn’t actually make people think. The next problem then is encouraging thinking. We could focus next on how to make people think or we can jump directly to action. Anyone who knows me knows where I’m going to go…
2) Project results will improve if PMs take the appropriate action at the appropriate time
This is the real goal behind the method compliance programs. The assumption is that the brain will engage when thought is required to fill out the form. As much as it pains me to admit it this simply isn’t true. I won’t bore everyone with stories as to the number of times I’ve seen even smart, capable people put down something that they think will be acceptable to the PMO without EVER thinking about how it pertains to their project. I also know that in all the years I’ve been running successful projects and programs I’m the queen of paperwork light and I personally would drive any process centric PMO head into fits.
So somehow I’ve done it with very little paperwork, but as Bill Duncan, the Mr. Dad of the 1996 version of the PMBOK Guide® likes to remind me, the truth is that I’m only paperwork light because I don’t publish 90% of the work I do. As he has pointed out time and time again, I consistently and conscientiously do the thinking and the analysis I need to all the right times; so in truth I’m communication impaired occassionally not process impaired.
And therein lies the answer. The PROCESS, which essentially says, “we’ve found that it makes sense to think about these things at this point in the standard project” is absolutely right. It can’t hurt and can only help. The problem is that for the sake of control someone asks you to prove you actually thought about it by filling out a form, which leads to either annoyance or the phenomenon I discussed above which is artificial compliance by way of form over substance.
I’m going to hold off on the third point until my next post since there’s enough here to spur some good discussion. I look forward to everyone’s thoughts and experiences. If the world looks to be different through your eyes, please share. After all we all form our own mental models through our experiences and the experiences that people share with us. I am sharing mine through this blog in the hope that others will share theirs and we will all be the richer for the experience.
For current Gartner clients interested in some of our research around this topic you can find my most recent note here:
Findings: PPM Leaders Must Build Consensus Around Common Practices. Published: 28 April 2009 | http://www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?doc_cd=167757
Category: PMO Tags: PPM Maturity, PPM Process
6 responses so far ↓
1 IT For The Small Business May 11, 2009 at 3:21 pm
[...] http://blogs.gartner.com/donna_fitzgerald/2009/05/11/the-fourth-great-lie/ [...]
2 Donna Fitzgerald May 11, 2009 at 3:42 pm
Thanks for linking back. I’m always delighted to see where my line of thinking leads others. You correctly focused on what Gerald Nadler (author of Breakthrough Thinking: The Seven Principles of Creative Problem Solving) calls the uniqueness principle. There is a certain non-repeatability quotient attached to all projects. Understanding this non-repeatability and in fact capitalizing on it is what separates good PMs from great PMs. You also indirectly touched on why communities of practice are so important. It seems that we never think to question why A and not B when alternative A is presented to us as a best practice from a PMO. BUT if we’re sitting across a table from someone telling us a story about how they were successful with a project by choosing A, we might ask them why they didn’t chose B. As you pointed out the true value in knowledge sharing is in knowing why A or B made sense in that specific case rather than in just knowing that A worked.
3 Bill Duncan May 11, 2009 at 5:05 pm
I agree with your objections to your premise as the premise was stated. However, I think there is another, more powerful rationale for methodologies:
“The likelihood of major disasters will be reduced if we force our project managers to stop every so often and fill out some forms. Filling out the forms requires some minimal amount of thought, and that is better than no thinking at all.”
In my experience, methodologies are there for the guidance of the neophytes and for control of the experienced PMs who have refused to learn. One of my clients once documented the following as a key competency for their project managers:
“Follows the rules except when it is necessary not to.”
Warren Bennis makes essentially the same point in “Managing People is Like Herding Cats.” We want people to follow the rules, but we also want them to be creative when faced with problems and issues not covered by the rules.
Duncan
4 Donna Fitzgerald May 11, 2009 at 5:32 pm
Bill,
What caught my eye in your response was the statement “when faced with problems and issues not covered by the rules.”
There are two responses to situations not covered by the rules. Make more rules and be creative. As we know, the PM organizations in the US and in the UK have both taken the approach of making more rules. In some ways their logic makes sense. If the real work involved in project management is in the messy 20% of projects then a good method should probably help you manage during the times when things get difficult. The problem is that the messy 20% is really messy and very unique. To John’s comment about the repeatability of projects (http://stasysinc.com/?p=29 ) when you can’t follow the happy path (which is linear and straightforward) you end up with enough branching possibilities to make a quantum physicist happy. In my next post I’m going to be covering this as the third key element, which is finally acknowledging that the 20% needs to be handled by its own rules.
Donna
5 The 4th Great Lie (Continued) June 10, 2009 at 10:06 am
[...] The Fourth Great Lie Saying Thank You [...]
6 The Nimble PM » The 4th Great Lie (continued) June 25, 2009 at 8:32 pm
[...] my last post I discussed two perspectives that will lead to better project results. In this posting I’ll be [...]