Reality Check: Stop Being So Optimistic
From the Voices on Project Management Blog
by Cameron McGaughy,
Lynda Bourne, Kevin Korterud, Peter Tarhanidis, Conrado Morlan, Jen Skrabak, Mario Trentim, Christian Bisson, Yasmina Khelifi, Sree Rao, Soma Bhattacharya, Emily Luijbregts, David Wakeman, Ramiro Rodrigues, Wanda Curlee, Lenka Pincot, cyndee miller, Jorge Martin Valdes Garciatorres, Marat Oyvetsky
Voices on Project Management offers insights, tips, advice and personal stories from project managers in different regions and industries. The goal is to get you thinking, and spark a discussion. So, if you read something that you agree with--or even disagree with--leave a comment.
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Date
By Cyndee Miller
My modus operandi is straight-up realist. But deep down inside, I admit there are times when I think I’m special — that I will somehow emerge as the grand exception to the rule.
We all do.
“People are wildly optimistic about everything,” said author, academic and psychologist Daniel Gilbert, a keynoter at PMO Symposium™. His dispiriting findings show people are terrible at estimating odds because they “confuse the ease of imagining something with the odds of it happening.”
And project, program and portfolio managers have no special powers against optimism bias, either.
One prime example: the infamous Big Dig. The tunnel construction megaproject was originally slated to be finished in 1998. The team’s worst-case scenario? 2000. Its best-case estimate? 1998 — the same as the official completion estimate. Actual completion date? 2006.
Gilbert pushed symposium attendees to move past wishful thinking and ask themselves: “Have I used my imagination or have I just let it use me?”
For better or worse, my imagination tends to go into overdrive when I see any list of business trends. It’s like catnip for my brain.
As Ford Motor Co.’s resident futurist, closing-day keynoter Sheryl Connelly tries to move the team beyond visions of the future that merely extrapolate from the past.
“My role is to slow down the conversation long enough to say, ‘What are the underlying assumptions upon which you base your plan?’”
In those kinds of discussions, project professionals can’t be afraid to challenge status quo thinking.
“Not for the sake of being the contrarian in the room, but to expand your organization’s eyes to the possibilities, the range of things that can really happen,” she said.
Threats aren’t just coming from the usual competitors anymore. They’re bubbling up from entirely different categories, like how hotel companies didn’t see Airbnb coming, she said.
Echoing Gilbert’s call for realism, Connelly recommended scenario planning across the whole range of possible futures: world peace and vanishing poverty on one end, and cataclysmic suffering and economic depression on the other.
“When you explore these two extreme possibilities, the goal is to try and come up with business plans,” she said. “Solutions can work at either end of the spectrum. If you can do that, then you don’t need to know the future. You just know that you have a really robust plan that can weather just about anything you can imagine.”
Futurist title or not, that’s just solid risk management.
Connelly also offered up four big trends to look for: aging populations, urbanization, talent shortages and girl power. And indeed, we’re already seeing plenty of project management action on those fronts.
As of now, there’s one prediction I’m pretty sure I can make: I’ll be heading to San Diego, California, USA for next year’s symposium on 6-9 November.
Posted
by
cyndee miller
on: November 13, 2015 02:10 PM |
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Comments (7)
Please login or join to subscribe to this item
Manas De Amin
Director| Computer Technology Group Kolkata
Kolkata, West Bengal, India
Good article, Cyndee. Thanks for the post.
Andreia Reis
PMO Coordenator| Adimax Indústria e Comércio de Alimentos
Mairinque, São Paulo, Brazil
Hi,
Thank you for Sharing.
Regards,
It is a practical approach not to be to optimistic about any thing.. Also, in the current market conditions of falling oil prices, Oil & Gas project owners are demanding much more than usual at the reduced price. This is their optimism that the current market conditions allow them to do so. But remember, such condition will not last for long..
For long term relationship, one need to be optimistic, but not too much..
Keep it simple, be practical and adapt to the changing situations.
Regards to all
Kishan Solanki
fosco frongia
Senior project manager| ENTE PATRIMONIALE CHIESA GESU' CRISTO SUG
Fino Mornasco, Como, Italy
nice article, many thanks to share it.
optimistic vision should be accompained by a deeply and correct analysis of the environment
Steven Zachary
Director| Alberta Health Services
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
"catnip for my brain"
I will be stealing that line and using it generously from now on.
Great article!
Ramesh Chalamalasetti
PMI ATP Instructor – PMP®| PMI Certified Instructor - PMP Exam Prep®
Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India
Cyndee: Enjoyed my read. Thank You !
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