The Professional Project Manager

Survivorship bias is a logical error that focuses on the survivors of a particular process, while overlooking those that didn’t make it. In the context of project management, this can lead to misguided conclusions about what it truly takes for a project to succeed.

The term "survivorship bias" originates from wartime observations when aviation experts examined planes that returned from battle in WWII to identify where they had taken the most damage. They mapped where all the damage was found and then with this information they considered reinforcing these areas to make the planes more resilient. However, a statistician named Abraham Wald pointed out a flaw in this approach. The planes they were examining had survived, despite their obvious damage. It was the planes that didn't return—those hit in other critical areas—that needed to be studied. By only looking at the survivors, they were missing vital data on the planes' vulnerabilities and in fact had they gone ahead they would’ve reinforced areas of the planes that didn’t need reinforcing, and not reinforced areas that did.

How does this relate to project management?

Imagine you want to discover the secret to successful project management (and who doesn’t?). You might be tempted to analyse only successful projects and identify common factors in them (like mapping damage to aircraft that made it back). You then describe successful project management according to these traits of these particular projects and focus your training on these processes, tools, techniques or competencies. On the surface, this seems logical right?

But here's the catch: by only looking at successes, you're missing out on a vast amount of data from projects that failed (the planes that didn’t return, and the reasons they didn’t return). These failures can offer crucial insights into pitfalls and challenges that successful projects either avoided or overcame (sometimes by dumb luck!).

Fortunately for us the world of project management is littered with failures. In fact, it could be argued that the ‘norm’ in project management is failure – after all, most projects are somewhat unique, and subject to a myriad of constraints and risks. I’ve never shocked at those oft repeated statistics that 60-70% of projects fail, often used by people to ask what is the point of professional project management when this figure hasn’t changed over 10 or 20 years. I always think that the number is a constant because that’s just what projects are – failure magnets – and yes, that’s a topic for another post but chime in on this if you want.

Success is not just a product of hard work, planning, and strategy. Sometimes, it's also about being in the right place at the right time – plain old dumb luck. Recognizing the role of luck in project success is essential. Also, don’t discount the role of external factors beyond the control of the project manager. Two projects could be managed similarly, but external factors, timing, or sheer coincidence could lead one to thrive and the other to flounder.

For instance, a company might initiate a project to launch a product just when there's a sudden surge in demand due to unforeseen circumstances, making the project seem brilliantly managed and executed. Another similar project might face unexpected competition or market changes. Is it fair to label one as superior management and the other as lacking, without considering the impact of luck, coincidence, or external factors?

And that’s why it’s important to analyse and learn from success AND failure. So yes, I’m saying celebrate failure as a learning opportunity. I’m not saying throw a party, give bonus’s and promotions, and advertise to your clients how wonderful you are at project failure. I’m saying, treat them as real opportunities to learn something that will help you be more successful in the future.

So don’t fall into the trap of survivorship bias. We all want to be more successful at delivering projects but to truly understand project management the factors that contribute to project success, we have to consider both the winners and the losers. So, maybe at your next monthly community of practice meeting, or your next post implementation review, or your next portfolio planning session, take time to have someone present about failures and what they learned from them. Do this without judgment, compare it to what you learn from successes, and you are probably on your way to discovering what makes your projects successful (oh, and please take time to really define project success and how you will measure it – again, that’s a topic for another blog, but chime in on this if you want).

There is something weird (and unique) about the profession of project management and its view of credentials.

Often on LinkedIn you will see an opinion or post expressing doubt about the usefulness of credentials and qualifications, and quite loudly proclaiming that experience is the only thing that matters.

What’s weird is that I’ve never seen the same attitude from accountants, engineers, dentists, lawyers, plumbers, or builders. Those professions take it for granted that experience is best, but should be built on credentials and qualifications.

When I’m looking to recruit or appoint a project manager I always look at their experience AND their credentials/qualifications. Their credentials tell me a lot about their breadth of knowledge and can sometimes indicate levels of competence (and also their commitment to professional development).

The answer is, and always has been, that a project manager needs both experience AND credentials just like any other profession or trade. You wouldn’t use (or trust) an accountant or engineer that said their experience was all that mattered and they didn’t need credentials. Heck, you wouldn’t employ a plumber who said the same.

And for all those project managers out there without credentials and qualifications wondering if I’m dismissing your years of experience, I’m not because experience rules. But, generally speaking, you would be better project manager with some credentials and qualifications.

Now in terms of what credentials are best, well that depends on the type and complexity of your projects, the industry you are in, and obviously the credential itself - they aren’t all created equal. For me, anything that comes from a reputable professional organisation (PMI, IPMA, or APM) means the credential has been through a rigourous process in development, and also aligns with internal and external standards (eg ISO17024). Any tertiary level qualification (e.g Bachelors, Masters, or PhD in project management) from a reputable university is also a good one as I know there was academic teaching and assessment. When it comes to the commercial methodology credentials (eg Prince2, Scrum) they’re great as an indicator someone can attend a 3-5 training course and has at a minimum knowledge of a particular approach (I would have to learn more about their experience to know how well they can apply it).

So, you should always value experience without a doubt. But you need to place equal value on credentials and qualifications (and become familiar with what each one represents).

And yes, it is long overdue that the profession of project management actually becomes a regulated profession with definitions of who can call themselves a project manager. If we are entrusting complex initiatives into the hands of people and hoping for successful delivery then it’s about time we defined the expectations in terms of experience and credentials that we have of those people.

As a consultant who works with organizations around the globe, I get to see many forms of a PMO and I get to see what works and what doesn’t.  A well thought out and value adding PMO can add measurable strategic and operational value to any organisation regardless of its size or maturity. Getting the right PMO for your organization can be a challenge and I want to share with you some thoughts and observations on what exactly a PMO can be. Hopefully from these thoughts you can take some tips on what your PMO should be.

Let’s start with what do the letters “PMO” stand for? Well the “P” can stand for Portfolio, Programme or Project. The “M” and the “O” generally stand for Management Office. You can add an “E”, for Enterprise, in the front to get an EPMO to indicate it stretches across the entire organization. You can have individual PMO’s that answer into an EPMO. It can even not be called a PMO at all, and there are many other names it can go by. You can call it what you want as long as the name is an accurate representation of what the function actually does.

Answering the question about what a PMO can be takes a bit more time. It is not a single standard format you can apply to your organization which makes it a little hard to define appropriately. The easiest why I have found to describe, at a high level, what a PMO is, is that it should be the center of excellence, whatever that means, for professional project management in your organisation to support the current and future portfolio, program and project management aspirations of the organisation. That is a long winded way of saying that your PMO should support what you currently do but also take you into the future and a better, more mature state.

At one end of the spectrum I have seen a very low maturity organization have a ‘PMO’ that was as small as a few ring binders with templates in it that were regularly updated. At the other end of the spectrum I have worked with large and complex PMO’s which can be a fully separate and resourced unit that does full portfolio management, strategic alignment, governance, project selection & reporting, and also employs, deploys, & trains all the project management personnel. Somewhere between these two extremes is the PMO that is right for you and your organization.

Here is a list of functions that a PMO might consider:

• Governance and sponsorship
• Developing standards, methodologies, processes, tools and templates
• Maturity improvement
• Strategic alignment
• Project selection
• Full control and reporting of all initiatives
• Assurance
• Benefits management at all levels and at all stages
• Programme management
• Allocation of project management resources
• Recruitment of project managers
• Training and development of project managers

What have I missed?

These are the types of things to consider when thinking about introducing or upgrading a PMO:

1. Maturity of your organization – a low maturity organization may want a PMO that helps it increase in maturity in specific ways, while a high maturity organization will want a PMO that supports and maintains its high level of maturity.
2. Size of your organization – larger organizations generally need a larger and better resourced PMO
3. Complexity of the work that you do – the more complex the work that you do the more complex the PMO will need to be to support your efforts
4. C-Level understanding and support – without full support from senior and executive management your PMO will never be considered a full-time part of the organisation.

Unfortunately, the research tells us that there are many threats to a PMO and its success. These include the following:

1. Making a PMO a bureaucracy
2. Not proving the value a PMO brings to the organization. The PMO, whatever its form and name, must deliver real value to the organisation, and not be afraid to tell everyone how good they are. I’ve seen great PMO’s fail because they kept their success to themselves
3. Lack of senior management support
4. Tough financial times – it seems that when finances get tight for an organization the first thing to go is the PMO
5. Trying to be everything to everyone – focus on what you do well, and just do that
6. Being under resourced and overworked and letting everyone down
7. Looking backwards at what you have accomplished and not looking forward to the value you have yet to create
8. Assuming a PMO is static – a PMO should change with the organisations needs. If your PMO is the same as it was 2 years its probably out of date.

Just a reminder, this is just a high level introduction to the PMO. There has been plenty of research done on the topic and if you are academically minded you can easily find some serous pieces of research out there on the topic. There are also many people more on projectmanagement.com who I know would love to share their experiences, both bad and good. So don’t be afraid to reach out and find out as much as you can before deciding on what sort of PMO is right for you.

This is not a normal post for this website as most of them focus on specific tools and techniques that help the management of projects. But as a project management consultant who works globally I am on the road (and planes, and trains, and Ubers) a lot and during my travels I have put together these tips for other project managers who may travel a lot.

I was born traveling and didn't really settle in one place until my early teens. I now live between two countries in different hemispheres, and as a professional consultant I spend a lot of my time traveling around the world. As such, I consider myself quite a seasoned traveler and I’ve learned a few things over the many many years I’ve been on the road. Here are my top tips for other professionals who travel a lot:

1. Use a backpack with easily accessible laptop section for carry-on luggage. Single strap briefcase type bags get real heavy real fast if you have to walk a long way through airports. Having a wheeled carry on can be annoying when you collect your main wheeled luggage. A good quality backpack is easy to carry when pulling larger wheeled luggage.
2. Use a range of different colored packing cells to pack all your clothes separately. The colors make it easy to find different clothing and having different types of clothing in different packing cells makes it easy to find shirts, underwear, gym gear or jeans really fast instead of rummaging through a suitcase.
3. Use wheeled luggage for getting around easily. Make sure it works well being pulled on just two wheels. Only use four wheels for very smooth services. Oh, and make sure you weigh you bag before getting to the airport. Don't be the person who has to repack their bag at the front of the queue and move a book and a pair of shoes into your carry-on luggage to get your main bag checked in.
4. Throw out 1/3 of what you packed - you won’t need it. You can prove this by checking out your suitcase contents when you get home and realize you didn’t need 1/3 of it.
5. Find a laundry near where you are staying and use it. In a pinch use the hotel shower and let clothes dry overnight (a portable clothes line is great for this).
6. Wear shoes that are comfortable for airplanes (e.g. the change in air pressure will make your feet swell), and that are easy to get on and off as you go through airport security
7. Wear layered clothing so you can adjust your comfort temperature easily
8. Get yourself ready to go through airport security before you get there. Remove metal objects and put them in your bag or coat. Loosen you shoelaces. Unzip your laptop part of the bag. Don’t be the person who holds up the line doing all this (and more) at the screening point.
9. Know where your passport is at all times. Do not lose this as replacing it will take time and money and will interrupt your travels.
10. Carry enough cash for a few days’ worth of incidentals. If you carry more than that you will worry about losing it.
11. Only use your credit and debit cards at reputable merchants. If in doubt use cash. Also, use credit card over debit card as it’s easier to get your money back if it’s used for fraudulent purposes.
12. Take and wear comfortable walking shoes that suit multiple purposes. My favorites are black fashion sneakers as they can be used for casual and semi-casual events.
13. Take something to read or listen to while traveling. Make sure you have quality headphones.
14. Take a spare lithium battery for recharging your devices (make sure it’s fully charged)
15. Use Google maps and any other favorite travel apps. I have a folder on my phone just for travel apps of all sorts.
16. Make sure you have purchased cell phone data for your destination. If you are there for a while consider getting a local SIM card and pre-pay plan.
17. Make sure you have easy access to all your reservation details. You may need these to show customs officials, taxi drivers or to check in. Have them in the local language if possible.
18. Know a few basic phrases for the country you are traveling to if it uses another language.
19. Take a small bottle of hand sanitizer and use it frequently.
20. Make sure you have travel insurance, and know the terms and conditions of it.
21. Take a sealable laundry bag for your used clothing. Making sure it’s sealable ensures that the rest of your luggage doesn’t smell like worn clothing.
22. Ensure that copies/photocopies of all your important travel documents are stored in the cloud or with someone back home. This way if you lose one you can speed of the replacement process by knowing numbers etc
23. Take easy iron clothing. Some brands advertise themselves as non-iron but that simply isn’t true unless it’s 100% synthetic fabric and you don’t want to be wearing that. Take easy iron clothing and if the hotel you are staying at doesn’t have an iron you can hang it in the bathroom when you shower, and the steam will “iron” it for you.
24. Do not look like tourist. Do not be the person wearing cargo pants, hiking shoes, fleece jacket, backpack and/or bum bag. You wouldn’t dress that way for wandering around the streets of your home town so why are you dressed like that now?
25. Buy quality luggage. There is nothing worse than seeing your luggage come off a airport carousel with a broken zip or ripped surface.
26. Dress for your destination. You may leave a warm destination and be dressed for that, but once you get to the other side of the planet and its winter and all your cold weather gear is lost with your luggage you will feel good knowing you have layers of clothing with you.
27. Essentials are wallet, phone and passport - if you have these you can get other things you have forgotten.
28. Make sure you have the necessary visa's etc. Nothing worse than getting to a new country and finding out you can't enter because you have the wrong visa.

What did I forget? What are your best travel tips?

There are many types of projects, each unique in its size, duration and complexity. Assigning the right type of project manger to each type of project is a key factor is determining whether or not the project will be a success. Different project managers have different levels of skills and experience, and they also have difference personality attributes. This mix of skills, experience and personality attributes defines the type of project manager you are. The specific type of project manager I am interested in today is the entrepreneurial project manager.

I would proudly call myself an entrepreneurial project manager. I know that I have a very strong entrepreneurial streak in me, and this is an essential part of who I am. I have been setting up businesses, and advising others on this, for over 30 years. There have been some great successes, and also some opportunities to learn some great lessons. When it comes to the types of projects I prefer to manage, I tend to choose those where I can truly leverage my strengths in this area. What I want to do in this article is to examine what are the key characteristics of an entrepreneurial project manager and what sort of projects should they lead?

Let’s start with defining what an entrepreneur is:

From Dictionary.com: “a person who organizes and manages any enterprise, especially a business, usually with considerable initiative and risk.”

There are a couple of key words there – initiative and risk. An entrepreneur takes an initiative at the earliest idea stage, and usually with a lot of passion throws themselves into ensuring that the idea becomes reality. Along the way they may have to solve a wide range of technical, legal, financial, regulatory, and stakeholder problems. In doing this they take on and manage a great deal of risk, and in fact it can be dealing with this risk that provides excitement and challenges to the entrepreneur.

What kind of projects is an entrepreneurial project manager best suited to manage?

Entrepreneurial project managers should be put in charge of managing projects:

• with a lot of unknowns,
• that involve leading a small dedicated team,
• that need a strong vision to get to the end, that
• require a multi-disciplinary solution, that
• require a great deal of autonomy and problem solving.

If you want to develop a specific entrepreneurial skill set and attitude here are nine key characteristics of an entrepreneurial project manager:

1. Motivation

Self-motivation is key. An entrepreneur must be the one who gets out of bed in the morning thinking about the project and what the next steps are to make it successful. Being passionate about a venture, initiative or project is possibly the easiest way to be motivated as it will come without trying. Don’t be afraid to be passionate about what you are doing, and perhaps only select those ventures that you are truly passionate about to get involved with. Your motivation will spread to you team members and stakeholders.

2. Creativity

This is perhaps one of the more important characteristics of being an entrepreneur - you must be able to see creative solutions. Entrepreneurs work best dealing with solutions that haven’t been invented yet and solving these takes creativity. Don’t be afraid to think of many different possible solutions. Eliminating the less effective ones for whatever reason will leave you with a creative solution. Another tip I have learned is that creativity and curiosity go hand in hand. Don’t be afraid to be curious, ask a lot of questions and develop your knowledge about a lot of topics.

3. Vision

You must be able to see into the future and imagine what the end result may be. Perhaps more importantly you must also be able to communicate this vision to others to get them to see it, believe it and commit to achieving it as well. Being passionate about your vision will help in getting others to follow you. Your vision doesn’t need to specific, it can be a general outcome focused on success, whatever that means, with the details being filled in as you move along the project lifecycle.

4. Persuasiveness

Persuading people to believe in your vision and join in the pursuit of success takes skill. There are many ways to persuade people and you will have to appreciate that your team members and stakeholders may require different ways of persuading. Remember that you are convincing people to follow you in to the unknown so practice your influencing techniques.

5. Versatility

Being versatile means being able to demonstrate a wide range of skills, and not necessarily be an expert at any of them. In many ways, the entrepreneurial project manager needs to be a jack of all trades, and master of one – being entrepreneurial! You will need to have a working knowledge of technical solutions, financial matters, stakeholder expectation management, rules and legislation. Where you don’t have the required level of knowledge you will have to bring someone into the team who does.

6. Risk tolerance

Some people are naturally risk adverse and this is a great attribute to have in many projects. Entrepreneurs tend to be more risk tolerant and will generally rely on reactive rather than proactive measures to deal with risk. There needs to be a balance to make sure risks taken are reasonable, but the nature of entrepreneurship is to take risks and reap the rewards.

7. Flexibility

You must be able to move on from what you thought was a solution when it becomes inefficient. Learn to let go, and quickly move to the next solution. Don’t get hung up on one idea far past its ‘best by’ date. Realise that change is always going to happen, and you need to be flexible. When a roadblock appears, find a way to go around it, over it or under it, and if this can’t be done, then be prepared to reverse and find another path completely.

8. Decisiveness

You must be able to make a decision and live with the consequences. If it turns out to be a wrong decision you must be able to learn from it. Making a decision means being to take on board all the available information at that time and decide what the next course of action will be. No decision is ever set in stone and you should be prepared to change it if it doesn’t turn out to be the correct one.

9. Colloboration

A great entrepreneur knows their strengths and their weaknesses and will seek out people to fill in their weaknesses. They will usually seek out people with exceptional skills in these areas. An entrepreneurial project manager will assemble a great project team with the correct balance of skills, experience and attitude. They will also know how to train people, or move them on, who aren’t quite right for entrepreneurial types of projects.

So, if you have a high-risk project with some uncertainty in the solution and outcome, consider putting an entrepreneurial project manager to work.

To end, I would like to amend this quote I found online which I think sums up the role of the entrepreneur with just my own small change. The original quote reads “An entrepreneur is someone who jumps off a cliff and builds an airplane on the way down” (Reid Hoffman), I would amend it to say ““An entrepreneur is someone who jumps off a cliff and finds a way to fly on the way down”.

If you have any questions, comments or feedback please feel free to email me.