Is Project Management Just Common Sense?
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.
I was chatting with a colleague recently, and he said something he described as “deliberately provocative.” Well, that sounds like something I might enjoy writing about, so I will repeat the statement here: “Project management is nothing more than common sense.”
Discuss!
His point—and again, he knew he was being controversial by suggesting it—was that most of the skills applied within project management are also needed to successfully navigate life. He used the example of getting kids up and ready for school: sequencing tasks, making sure there was enough time allocated, validating that teeth were brushed and shoe laces tied, motivating reluctant sons and daughters who were worried about the test that afternoon, etc.
He suggested that the “snooze” button was akin to a risk management strategy—trading off a few minutes of extra sleep for the increased likelihood that you would be late for work. He argued that a recipe was really a project plan, that a family meal was a status meeting, and so on.
And he suggested that because all families to some extent navigate these challenges of daily life with a reasonable amount of success, everyone had the ability to be a project manager.
Yes, but…
Let me start my response by acknowledging that he’s right. I love to use examples from real life when I’m …
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