Setting Up Sponsors for Success

Andy Jordan is President of Roffensian Consulting S.A., a Roatan, Honduras-based management consulting firm with a comprehensive project management practice. Andy always appreciates feedback and discussion on the issues raised in his articles and can be reached at [email protected]. Andy's new book Risk Management for Project Driven Organizations is now available.

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For many organizations, September represents the start of annual planning activities. The summer holiday season is wrapping up, and if the company year aligns with the calendar year, budgeting and planning will be gearing up. This is a critical time for project sponsors because it is when the majority of projects are reviewed and approved. Sponsors who are unable to secure funding in this period may well be faced with a year of being unable to deliver on their priorities, and that can have a knock on impact on their department goals, staffing levels and personal success.

The problem that I see with this process though is that sponsors--or perhaps more accurately at this point, potential sponsors--are frequently set up for failure by their organizations. The planning process frequently degenerates into a game of politics and/or a popularity contest where approval and funding decisions are based on tradeoffs and favoritism rather than objective business measures. That is clearly not the best approach for any organization, and that’s what I want to explore in this article.

The problem with annual planning
If we look at an organization from the most fundamental standpoint, it undertakes two types of work--the day-to-day stuff that represents the operations of the business and functions that support those operations, and the things that seek to improve that day-to…

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