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What are the top 3 things that would make you quit a project?

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Sante Delle-Vergini, PhD Senior Project Manager| Infosys Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Or even your number one thing.
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Milind Patil Bangalore, Karnataka, India
Assuming as a PM and I understood your question right :)

- If requirement is not properly defined and signed off. Or not getting enough time to define, specially in large and complex software projects.
- Lack of support from sponsors in the time of need
- When only one side of a coin given more importance
- Pulling resources off for other projects due to delays - the facts that are known for delay, specially to senior management and to all important stakeholders.
- "Save my skin" attitude of stakeholders
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Girija Ramakrishnan Chennai, Tamilnadu, India
1. Lack of clarity on the big picture, benefits & expected end-state of the project, from the Sponsors & Leadership teams.
2. Project not supported & prioritised by the leaders & stakeholders due to the above point, which results in delayed decision-making & demotivated teams,
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Eric Simms Senior Program Manager Baltimore, Maryland, United States
1. Not having the authority to do my job, and Management not getting me the things I need
2. Sponsor and stakeholders don't fulfill their responsibilities
3. Lack of any personal benefit from the project (i. e. the chance to work with a new technology, a worthwhile job title, worthwhile experience, a notable company to add to my resume, etc.)
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Kiron Bondale Retired | Mentor| Retired Welland, Ontario, Canada
#1 - Anything that would force me to compromise my integrity

#2 - If the constraints placed upon the project and the lack of flexibility on the part of key stakeholders makes it impossible to succeed without torturing the team

#3 - If it is not teaching me anything new or helping me grow
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Mark Hofmann Operational Development Manager - PMP| Jamaica Bearings Long Island, Ny, United States
A sponsor intentionally sabotaging a project. They are against the idea of the project but they know ownership wants it, so they sign on as the sponsor in hopes that they can influence the project toward failure. Their intentions are not initially clear.
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Sante Delle-Vergini, PhD Senior Project Manager| Infosys Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
All the posts so far raise many important issues that would certainly make a project not very nice to manage, but only one so far would make me leave a project, and that is Kiron's number 1 reason: "Anything that would force me to compromise my integrity."
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1 reply by maria antonette cardoso
Aug 07, 2018 9:19 AM
maria antonette cardoso
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I fully agree with Santi & Kiron that anything that would compromise my, and/or Company's integrity as the primary reason not to accept or quit a project.

Everything else can be worked out, but once integrity is gone its a done deal. You cannot anymore turn the pages back, and you will lose all chances for the future.
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Dinah Young Project Manager / Software Asset Manager| Prince William County Springfield, Va, United States
You are right Sante. I have actually had almost of these issues occurring but was unable to leave the project.
I have not had a project yet that asked me to compromise integrity. I did have one that was taking a negative toll on my personality. I finished that project but asked to not be assigned to work with that sponsor ever again.
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1 reply by Sante Delle-Vergini, PhD
Jul 10, 2018 8:51 PM
Sante Delle-Vergini, PhD
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Yes I have experience all of those issues also, but we have resilience to stick around, because there is something to be said for the integrity of the project also.
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Joshua Render Product Owner| Cognizant Harrisville, Ny, United States
Have to agree with Kiron and Sante:

#1 - Anything that would force me to compromise my integrity

Other than that- I really hate projects where no one knows what they want or cannot make up their mind. It seems as if a lot of organizations/people/groups like to adopt Agile as a means to justify their indecisiveness - then they fight against timeboxing and want to spend weeks debating a color of a button or the particular phrasing of a sentence in a web form; insisting it cannot be released until they get some manager's opinion who happens to be on vacation for the next two weeks, so we try to move on to other things and they still want to discuss the button color to make sure it is exactly right for the manager when he returns. Happened to me twice so far in my life, if it happens a third time I am going to be like, "Look, we're done talking about the button (or whatever they are stuck on this month). When you decide, get back to me, we have other things to do."
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1 reply by Dinah Young
Jul 10, 2018 10:13 AM
Dinah Young
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I knew a project manager that made everything hot pink and purple for demo purposes. He wanted to make it clear that the colors would be decided after the functionality is worked out. He said that if he tried to use realistic colors the customer would spend hours discussing the shade of blue or whatever and the important information would never come up. So he purposefully picked the most outlandish colors.
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Mansoor Mustafa Senior PM| Government Department Rawalpindi Punjab, Pakistan
Requirement of projects are not scrutinize correctly
Project initiated for desired objects are not able to attainable
Yes integrity is one of top most reason
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Dinah Young Project Manager / Software Asset Manager| Prince William County Springfield, Va, United States
Jul 10, 2018 10:07 AM
Replying to Joshua Render
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Have to agree with Kiron and Sante:

#1 - Anything that would force me to compromise my integrity

Other than that- I really hate projects where no one knows what they want or cannot make up their mind. It seems as if a lot of organizations/people/groups like to adopt Agile as a means to justify their indecisiveness - then they fight against timeboxing and want to spend weeks debating a color of a button or the particular phrasing of a sentence in a web form; insisting it cannot be released until they get some manager's opinion who happens to be on vacation for the next two weeks, so we try to move on to other things and they still want to discuss the button color to make sure it is exactly right for the manager when he returns. Happened to me twice so far in my life, if it happens a third time I am going to be like, "Look, we're done talking about the button (or whatever they are stuck on this month). When you decide, get back to me, we have other things to do."
I knew a project manager that made everything hot pink and purple for demo purposes. He wanted to make it clear that the colors would be decided after the functionality is worked out. He said that if he tried to use realistic colors the customer would spend hours discussing the shade of blue or whatever and the important information would never come up. So he purposefully picked the most outlandish colors.
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5 replies by Christine Mayfield, Joshua Render, Mayte Mata Sivera, Osama Sadi, and Sante Delle-Vergini, PhD
Jul 10, 2018 10:17 AM
Joshua Render
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I may have to try that.
Jul 10, 2018 3:13 PM
Mayte Mata Sivera
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That's a good one!
Jul 10, 2018 8:52 PM
Sante Delle-Vergini, PhD
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Hot pink and purple. Now the mind boggles to what product it could be...
Aug 07, 2018 8:18 AM
Christine Mayfield
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Brilliant idea
Aug 07, 2018 10:29 AM
Osama Sadi
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Good one Dinah, I would choose to make this as part of the solution preferences and have it as a configurable value so he picks whatever he wants.
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