Reining in the Wandering Project

Kenneth has 14 years of healthcare experience in government and private industry. Over eight years of experience managing healthcare IT projects, operations, contracts, and personnel. His work experience includes project management, contracts and procurements, data analysis, claims adjudication, business writing, and business process modeling. Kenneth was certified in 2006 as a Project Management Professional.

  Communications Management   Risk Management  

A project can be like a big old dog--and the project manager or program manager has the responsibility to guide the dog to where it needs to go. Unfortunately, sometimes the dog can lose control and the tail ends up wagging the dog instead of vice versa. When this happens, the project manager loses control of where the dog is going and it can end up way off its intended path. Trying to rein the dog back in can be very difficult. Here are some issues to look for so that the tail will not wag the dog--and the project manager can keep a tight hold on the project’s leash.

Skewed Priorities
When priorities are skewed, the tail will begin to wag. This might happen because one small team is pushing their part of the project to the forefront even though other areas make up the bulk of the project. This upside-down behavior puts the focus on the wrong area of the project and the important things can be shuffled to the background (or forgotten). Skewed priorities can occur when there are strong personalities involved or when managers or stakeholders have a vested interest in a small part of the project instead of the project as a whole. The project manager should work to make sure priorities remain in order.

Getting Stuck
Another issue that leads to the tail wagging the dog is when the project gets stuck on something. It may be that an issue is preventing tasks from …

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