Project Lessons Learned Dynamic Control & Systematic Monitoring

Project Lessons Learned Dynamic Control & Systematic Monitoring

What you would attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?

Project Management LESSONS LEARNED
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Dynamic Control & Systematic Monitoring LL

Lessons Learned

Project Points
Our Monthly Publication for Clients,
Prospects , Associates & Subscribers

Lessons Learned are snips of knowledge
regarding mistakes in project development,
management, control and/or finance. They
are put forward for the benefit of Project
Executive Group subscribers.

Do not accept project surprises as acts of God. While you cannot eliminate all surprises,
you can still anticipate many of them before they occur, leaving sufficient time to
attenuate and often deaden their impact on the project.
Quite often you do not really have to be a prophet to perceive what the issues are
before they become issues. You can surface critical assumptions and identify changes in
them early enough, when coping with the impact of changes is still quick and easy.
Plans are composed of many connected decisions. The further you get from the time of
planning, the more difficult it becomes to remember those connections.
Therefore, during project execution you often fail to make timely connections between
changes in the planning assumptions and the plan. Articulating these assumptions during
planning, and monitoring them systematically during execution, ensure early recognition
of the connection.
An acceptable management tool can go a long way toward changing long- held attitudes.
It may enable frank discussion of crucial issues with management that earlier we
considered taboo. The Critical Assumptions Matrix is instrumental in creating
opportunities to discuss uncertainty with management.
Identifying and monitoring critical planning assumptions is essential even for small
projects in which uncertain conditions prevail. It provides early warning of potential
changes.
Excessive control is no substitute for poor planning.
In unsuccessful projects there is never enough time to do it right, but there is always
time to do it over.
Management systems cannot control projects. Only people can, helped by management
systems.
Projects can be controlled only by team members who are directly responsible for
project implementation. They are not controlled by staff specialists.
Only what is yet to come can be controlled. Last week's performance is relevant to the
project team only where knowledge of it helps to decide how to do next week's work
better.
The stress on analyzing the gap between planned and actual performance is justified
only in cases in which the future is similar to the past. This is rare in today's projects.
It is more important to get timely data, even if it is approximate, than to wait for
processed and detailed data later.
A management control system that does not lead to decisions and actions is a total
waste.
More paperwork does not ensure greater information reliability or accuracy, it only adds
to the non-value-added cost.
It is a false assumption that adding more measurement and reporting provides better
control.
The illusion of control may partially explain the obsession with control.
An elaborate administrative information system does not necessarily provide better
information. To avoid negative consequences, employees will either systematically
distort the data or develop aberrant practices.
If you mistrust your employees, they will not disappoint you. Their behavior will prove
you right.
The vicious circle never ends. As employees suppress critical information for fear of
management reprisal, they provoke even greater management suspicion and scrutiny.
Formal reports are effective means for presenting common performance indicators in a
predetermined format.
Since formal reports cannot register changes in factors that are not covered by their
predetermined format, frequent moving about becomes a "must" in this fast-changing
world.
Before you can influence project performance you must understand what is going on. To
understand complex and changing situations, you must first be able to choose the right
questions to ask.
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