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  ProjectsAtWork  

Three principles to reduce resource fights in multiproject environments.

As soon as a project begins, uncertainties strike: requirements change; vendors are late; approvals are delayed. With so many uncertainties, it takes luck and pluck to deliver a single project.

In a multiproject environment, with shared resources, uncertainties multiply exponentially. Resources promised to one project might be snatched away to fix another project's problems. In this environment, it takes much more than luck and pluck to be successful.

"Multiproject management is difficult because uncertainties that might be managed by sheer brute force on a single project quickly wreak havoc due to resource-sharing," says Sheri Phillips, associate partner for IBM Business Consulting. "As project managers scramble to get their projects on track, the fight for resources begins. Wanting their delays to be recovered first, project managers induce shared resources to multitask, causing further delays and loss of capacity."

The unhealthy competition is a chief cause of project failure, says Shailesh Sood, vice president at project management software developer Realization Technologies in San Jose, Calif. "The first natural reaction is to [implement] some software and train people on traditional project management," Sood says. But as failures continue, many companies have been forced to look for a …

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