While trying to recollect on all the projects I have participated in, whether through work or school, it was clear that the ones that tend to jump out immediately are the highly successful projects or the ones where the biggest losses were incurred. Sure the highly successful projects receive a lot of praise and recognition, some become blueprints for future project structures or the project manager moves on to head another project, but what are we learning from the failed projects. More importantly, what are the pitfalls and commonalities between the failures that we can learn from?
I am currently assisting with the strategic administration of a new project on a separate business venture and I am realizing that we are running in some similar problems as previous projects. Some causes seem unavoidable due to necessity for trial and error, but some reasons tend to be much more obvious and easily expected; these common sources of planning and operations failures needs to be recognized and anticipated by the project manager.
I found an insightful article from project-management.com that lists their “Top 10 Main Causes of Project Failure”. http://project-management.com/top-10-main-causes-of-project-failure/. Of the list, I have isolated a few that we find to be our biggest concerns as well as a few that are common amongst many projects throughout. Afterwards, I have asked a few questions to generate some insight and continue the discussion, please feel free to address:
- Inefficient way to document and track progress – The project does not currently have a standardized method to track new data in real time. As it stands, as new data populates, it is being collected by the operating manager and then manually sent to the rest of the project team as an update at the end of each week to be updated on a spreadsheet that is controlled by someone else. In order to improve the status tracking process, the system needs to be standardized, synchronized, and universally accessible.
- Inadequately-trained project managers – Following the first referenced cause of project failure, the disconnect arises from the training of the project managers, or lack thereof. If we can take the time to train the operating manager to use the progress tracking spreadsheet, it will eliminate the step of forwarding the manually recorded data for the next manager to input. In order for the team to progress, all members of the project need to be able and competent in their area of contribution. The project manager needs to be able to be aware of everyone skill set and use them to the best of their ability as it applies.
- Inaccurate cost of estimation – A big reason for project failures comes down to the misalignment of cost and equivalency of budget expectations. Budgets and cost estimations should be reasonably calculated, modestly accurate, strictly followed. The project should consider the financing as a resource of foundation as oppose to a fail-safe to taking chance.
- Lack of communication at any level – Communication between project members should be transparent and frequent. If one member or the project has an idea or foresees a potential concern, it is import for that person to speak up and communicate. Each member of a project needs to assert their ideas in order build rapport, show interest, and ensure trust and reliability. A strong communication platform will allow the project cohesion and synergy.
- Competing priorities – Much like the case in class where the accounting firm was spread too thin and the one member, Olds, was be pulled by the two managers, a lot of projects will undoubtedly have competing priorities. Sometimes these priorities are human, capital, or simply physical space. Proper planning and open communication would be allow for these resources to be best allocated and can adjust as practice ensues.
- Disregarding of project warning signs– From the list given be the article, one of the most crucial causes of project failure is knowing the signs but not acknowledging them. A problem will not get better or go away if no one addresses it. There are a lot of responsibilities with being a project manager, and one of them is to recognize a threat and react to it. I believe it to be every team member’s inherit responsibility to lookout and defend the integrity of the project as well. The first sign of a warning should always be communicated in order to give the necessary level or time and attention to correct it before it becomes a cause of failure.
Are there any other causes from the list that you find more common?
Are there any causes you feel the list is missing?
How would you rank the list in order of worst to least concern?
Great list! These are all definitely project pitfall to watch out for. The one I have seen the most in my experience is “Inefficient way to document and track progress.” Track progress is critical! It is a quick way to see when you are behind and allows for fast recovery without the project going off the rails. Commutation is right up there with tracking, they tend to go hand in hand. If one is bad it is likely the other is a mess too. My subjective ranking after that would go: Disregarding of project warning sign, Competing priorities, Inadequately-trained project managers, and Inaccurate cost of estimation. Great reminders to watch out for, thanks!
I find one of the biggest problems that cause failure is a lack of trust between team members of a project. When you do not have trust, you often have less effective and open communication. This follows closely with your item number 4 but I think it can at times the root of the problem and leads to poor communication.
I’ve also found that people that are not qualified to make project estimates are going ahead and making such estimations and then expecting the resources to complete each task within that estimation – even if it is grossly inaccurate. And think that ties in closely with your item number 2 about inadequately trained project managers.
I believe lack of communication is the biggest concern in this list. When communication crumbles, everything around the project crumbles. The second biggest concern would be inadequately trained project managers, but I think this could be spread across any discipline. I feel the rest are of about equal weight in regards to concern.