Decisions, Decisions—Making Good Project Decisions

 

The Swiss philosopher Henri Frederic Amiel said, "The man who insists upon seeing with perfect clearness before he decides, never decides."

I have observed that this is true of most project-based work.  The inability (or unwillingness) to make decisions has proven to be the downfall of many projects.  Project management software won't make decisions for you, at best it can only provide you with the information you need to make project decisions.  The ability to absorb information and make decisions is a critical "must have" skill for project managers.

It's been said that good decisions come from experience, and experience comes from bad decisions.  Although I don't entirely agree—oftentimes any kind of decision (even a bad decision) is better than no decision.  I've observed that sometimes in the heat of battle, as circumstances change, some managers procrastinate making decisions for fear that they might make a bad decision.  With that in mind, I think planning for procrastination the same way we plan the allocation of resources, project return, and risk might provide an answer.

By "planning for procrastination" I mean, making as many decisions up front as possible—reducing the need for spontaneous decision-making when it's crunch time.  That doesn't mean there's no room for making decisions as situations change, but it does eliminate the need to make decisions about the things that could easily be made in advance.  Thomas Edison said, "Good fortune is what happens when opportunity meets planning."  I think inventing the light-bulb was a pretty successful project.

Another option is to pre-establish the criteria for making decisions in any given circumstance.  Of course you can't anticipate everything, but you can plan ahead for many of the common challenges and situations that might occur.

With that in mind, we need to remember the words of humorist Will Rogers, "Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there."

With any project-based work, the ramifications of procrastination are serious.  There are project management tools that will make it easier to plan, communicate with team members, and evaluate success, but ultimately someone needs to be responsible for making decisions.

What are you doing to avoid procrastination?