Will I Have To Turn In My Secret Decoder Ring Now?

 

My take on ProjectManagement.com’s May theme of complexity is this: project management isn’t that complex. It’s kind of the dirty little secret amongst practitioners, but it is undeniably so.

Now, that’s not to say that the projects themselves can’t be complex. They are often obscenely so. They can involve advanced technology, never-before-seen architecture, ruthlessly dynamic environs and conditions, both natural and political, and even (especially?) labyrinthine personalities and organizational structures.

But Project Management, itself, as a discipline? Not so much.

“Are You Insane? What About…”

Take a look at the basics. Developing a Work Breakdown Structure is pretty simple. Everyone knows it’s a basic hierarchical decomposition of the project’s scope. Without fail, every single time I have seen a WBS become overly complex, it’s due to somebody shoe-horning in an element that’s not a piece of scope, usually an organizational breakdown structure (OBS) element, or a functional breakdown structure element. There’s actually a simple (get it?) test to determine if a WBS element is valid: at some point after that particular element has started work, is the question “What percent complete are you?” a legitimate one, or a dopey one? If it’s a legitimate question, you’re probably looking at a piece of work. If it’s dopey, the element probably isn’t scope. Just to reiterate – in those circumstances where a WBS is needlessly complex, it’s because somebody is doing it wrong.

“Look you here, Michael” I can hear my UK readers objecting, “the WBS is one thing – what about Earned Value Management Systems?” My response is the same: if it’s coming across as complex, it’s being done wrong.

I’ve long maintained that every PM “does” Earned Value, whether they realize it or not, and here’s the proof. If you are a PM, and your accountant comes to you and says “you’ve spent half of your budget,” what’s the first thing that pops into your mind? Isn’t it “am I half-done?” And, guess what, you’ve just performed a rudimentary EV analysis. It really is that simple. Sure, you can have a much more finely parsed project, but you’re doing the same analysis every time your accountant tells you what percentage of the budget you’ve spent/have left. If you have accomplished more than you’ve spent, you’re in great shape, and not so much if you haven’t. Oh, the actual EV reports are usually way more detailed, but that’s not the same as being more complex. The principal is rather simple, even while the resulting information can be very powerful.

“Aha! What About Critical Path?!”

Again, if it’s coming across as complex, it’s being done wrong. All Critical Path Methodology (CPM) scheduling is about is putting your subtasks in order of what has to finish before other subtasks can start. But there’s something about stating something as obvious as “you can’t start the roof before the foundation is done” as representing schedule logic (ooooh!) that makes it sound sophisticated. Again, the ordering of tasks can be more refined and detailed, and the resulting analysis results is a very powerful information stream, but to say that the concept of CPM is, itself, complex is to say more than I know. If it is overly complex, it’s invariably because the ordering of the tasks is suspect, or somebody is doing it wrong (like putting an OBS element into the WBS, maybe?).

Unconvinced? Consider the following scenario: a construction PM is meeting with her team leads, plus an additional guest: a CPM auditor.

PM: Okay, John, you and Pat can start at the same time. You too, Chris and Jake.

Auditor: You are exceeding the recommended number of start-to-start relationships in your schedule, and you can’t do that.

PM: Why not?

Auditor: Because it might distort schedule performance reporting.

PM: There won’t be anything to report if these people don’t start performing.

Auditor: Why do they have to start at the same time? Why can’t one follow the other?

PM: If they can start at the same time, why should they wait?

Auditor: Because someone speculated that too many start-to-start relationships might distort schedule performance reporting, and made a rule out of that speculation.

(Absolute silence, as everyone in the room stares at the auditor. After a couple of seconds, somebody’s pocketed smart phone emits a ring tone that, coincidentally, is modeled after the theme from the 1960s television show F Troop.)

Of course I am aware that many (if not most) of the people reading this blog are in the professions associated with Project Management, and may be misinterpreting my point here. I will clarify these points in my next post, I Said It Wasn’t Complex, I Didn’t Say It Was Easy.