“Apology Accepted, Captain Needa.”

 

Most fictional stories, plays, and movies use conflict to advance their plots. However, movies are particularly dependent on conflict expressed as physical violence to attract audiences, and these incidents of silver screen violence are usually performed by characters who are supposed to be experts in their particular martial specialty. Bruce Lee, Jean-Claude Van Damme, and Chuck Norris are just a few of the martial arts specialists whose fighting exploits have represented significant parts of popular movies. I think, though, that it’s fairly easy to forget that what we are witnessing when we see martial arts experts engaged in violent conflict on-screen is not actually a violent conflict. It is, in fact, an acted-out representation of a violent conflict. When Darth Vader extends his hand towards an unfortunate Imperial Officer with his thumb and forefinger about one inch apart , that “officer” can, in reality, still breathe, his gasping and croaking notwithstanding.  When Bruce Lee took on multiple opponents in his movies, he didn’t win because of his superior training, because he was in better physical condition, or because of his characters’ inherent virtue or the goodness of his cause. He won because the script said he was going to win.

Meanwhile, back in the world of Project Management, we’re always grounded in reality, right? I mean, if a project out-performs its scope, cost, and schedule baselines, that’s ipso facto evidence of a superior project team, yes? Conversely, when a project fails to meet its objectives within the constraints of cost and schedule targets, that project team performed, shall we say, sub-optimally, and everyone knows it, amirite?

Well, not so fast.

Projects’ cost and schedule performance measurement systems perform two functions:

• Put into the hands of the project’s (or organization’s) decision-makers the information they need to make the best choices, and
• Provide supporting evidence for the creation of an audit trail, a narrative about how the project came about, was executed, and encountered the results that it did.

It’s this second function that tends to create mucho problemas, and where the work of consultants gets pulled back into the conversation. Few “analysis” techniques are easier than going through the records of a failed project, and pointing an accusatory finger at those whose decisions led to the project’s difficulties – unless, of course, the narrative has been manipulated to deflect blame from the real perps and towards either vague, inchoate sources, or (worse) against the innocent members of the project team.

So, how does this narrative get manipulated? Sadly, there are many opportunities to do so, as indicated in Table 1.

Table 1. Some Of The Ways Charlatans Change The Narrative

It’s as if you have a room full of script writers, all with their own hidden agenda, pretending to want to legitimately contribute, while they provide inconsistent (or even conttradictory) dialogue for the same film. And – wouldn’t you just know it? – the narrative never seems to reach a conclusion on precisely who provides such dopey project management as to be avoided in future major contract awards.

In my last blog, I showed how the utilization of fear as a motivation tactic has only limited effectiveness. But I will say this for the Galactic Empire: they do have a way of keeping profoundly inept players from returning to the game.