I developed a project schedule that assumed a maximum of 6 hours of available work time for my staff members. After all, no one is available for the full day what with interruptions, sick time, meetings, etc. The schedule worked out to around 6 calendar months from start to finish based on input from developers and SMEs. My management objected and said that since the staff is in the office for 8 hours per day, then the schedule must be based on 8 hours availability. The schedule was arbitrarily cut to 4 months. Of course, the project took 6 months as originally planned and I was called on the carpet for the delay. Saving Changes...
Wai Mun KooPMO Director| Intergraph PP&MSingapore, Singapore
Hi Peter, first of all, thanks for sharing your experience so that others can learn and benefit from it (Russell, we have the first to go, will you be sharing yours next?)
In a way, when we do scheduling, we have to be realistic and take into consideration of things like holidays, vacations and resource actual availability. Blindly assuming that resource is available 100% is fatal, as you have already proven it in your example. This is scheduling without planning. The sad thing is you have to prove it right in a painful way. It goes back to the authority vs. accountability issue again (see Project Manager's Accountability). Thou shalt not be blamed for things that thou hath no rights.
Your management needs to understand this. Saving Changes...
Wai Mun KooPMO Director| Intergraph PP&MSingapore, Singapore
I guess, it makes sense for me to share my experience too.
There was once I was on a project that we have prepared and planned for several months. We were at a stage where we were about to wrap up the planning and kick off the implementation stage. When we put off the formal request for funding, we were told that due to strategical changes (the damn cost cutting again), we have to either cut the budget by half or cut the entire project. I was left with two options -
1) Announce the grand cancellation of the project or;
2) Go back to the drawing board and rework for an alternative.
We took some time to regroup and drafted a new plan with much of the scope and requirements slashed. We went for option 2 and squeezed the vendor and team to cramp more things into smaller timeframe. We managed to deliver the project eventually with a significant delay, an exhausted team, an unhappy vendor and a bunch of grumpy users (since they did not get all the functionalities they wanted).
Lesson learned - never try to be unrealistic and stretch too much for some quixotic goals. You might end up pissing everyone off by trying too hard to satisfy everyone. Assess your constraints realistically and learn to let go. Saving Changes...
Anonymous
in vivo - i picked up one of my current projects which was 5% complete and around 2 years late. Good starting point. Rearranged the resources and set up a dedicated room... we undertook some initial planning excercises which didn't show a positive outcome. I highlighted the need for additional resource. We identified the bottlenecks, attacked them and within 6 months had brought the project to nearly 75% complete... this despite having a new partial set of requirements, identifying hidden requirements and following a demonstration 6 weeks of additional work to address customer concerns. For MONTHS I had been saying that we need to plan for staff who were known to be leaving (maternity) and some who left taking valuable knowledge with them.
I kept being told that it takes months to bring people "up to speed" and that we couldn't justify the additional resource I was requesting - I had provided ample evidence to justify, and provided possible solutions to increase the speed-up time... time passed...a couple more staff became disgruntled and left...still no concerted recruitment activity. We were then even more under-resourced. I said that if we had followed my suggested course of action, even with a 3 months speed-up time those staff would have been productive by now and actually we would be nearly complete...
IT IS ESSENTIAL THAT YOU HAVE THE SUPPORT OF THE SENIOR STAKEHOLDERS AND THAT YOU CAN HOLD THEM TO ACCOUNT...back to Wei Mun Koo's rule "Thou shalt not be blamed for things that thou hath no rights"
I am looking forward to my next contract.
RG Saving Changes...
Russell GeakeProject Management Consultant| Deciduous Partners LtdLostwithiel, Cornwall, United Kingdom
actually despite the previous it's hard to think of the WORST experience...maybe the time that an engineer spliced the wrong cables causing widespread telephone outages - but that was just a case of handling an "ISSUE"... I think in my career, many situations have seemed like the worst - in fact they have provided some of the greatest learning opportunities.
I can happily say that (to my knowledge) nobody has died, been injured or suffered severe mental health issues as a result of the projects I have worked on. So actually, what is the worst that can happen? (remembering my uncle, who many years ago was crushed when some lifting gear failed)
Saving Changes...
Taralyn Frasqueri-MolinaSenior Project Manager| Independent ContractorPasadena, Ca, United States
I got to share my worst experience with a large audience at The NASA Project Management Challenge back in February. I was on a 5-person panel talking about Fixing Troubled Projects. My talk even got turned into and article - http://www.nasa.gov/offices/oce/appel/ask/...unexpected.html
Nothing like have your worst experience immortalized by NASA :) Saving Changes...
My worst experience as a PM? My worst experiences (plural) have always happened as a result of my actually believing that the management stain above me truly believed in transparent project management. If there was an issue I would bring them up almost matter of fact because after all, it's just business, They then proceed to explode to the smallest detail to the largest discussion point and the daily meetings continue until the issue solves itself with their assistance. I don't tolerate micromanagers as I am a PM and don't need that negative reinforcement. Saving Changes...
Sonya CalefSenior Project Manager| Hennepin CountyMinneapolis, Mn, United States
All my worst experiences share the same root cause: poor sponsorship. All the chest pain, anxiety, insomnia, hair loss, and weight gain during the worst project days were 100% due to sponsors who had alternate motives, were dishonest gamesmen, bad managers, acting out of scope for their role, micromanagers, and sometimes just incompetent.
Having vertical walls to climb technically speaking, insufficient resources, hollow budgets, change averse users, sneaky vendors, corner-cutting developers, and change requests coming in on the whimsy of a Nordic Wood Elf did not create bad times comparable to the magnitude of those capable by a bad sponsor. Bad sponsors are like category 5 hurricanes. Get out of town in advance or be prepared to have your loved ones claim your body later. Saving Changes...
My worst experience is being trapped in the hell of administrative tasks, doing nothing but fill cells in Excel sheets all day, holding the pen for people who should be perfectly competent to report their own status but for some reason seem to require some proxy between them and the keyboard. Leaving your brain on the shelf and doing nothing but this all week is downright nightmarish.
As for the second part of your question, how do I get out of it, well, if anyone out there has an intellectually stimulating job that actually require the use of brain cells, I'm all ears. Saving Changes...
