Duck, Here Comes Your First Project

If you want to keep your job, you can’t “just say no” to a project, even if it spells disaster. As I trained for my entrance into project management, I was advised not to accept projects with problems. Perhaps that advice was intended for independently wealthy consultants who can pick and choose their assignments. As an employee with the new title of "project manager," I could only smile and say, “Okay” to a project that had already had two project managers and was overdue by months.

If I had to do it over again, I would start out by listing the problems with the project. Although I may not have been able to avoid the trouble, at least it would be good to know from what direction it would come at me, and how hard it would hit. 

1. The project was undervalued
   Our group was designing a backup system for a critical application. The application itself, however, was not seen as critical. But if a critical application fails and a backup system is used, that backup system becomes critical real …