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Shaping complex projects
By
Kiko Antonio
UNCERTAIN. Project management used
to be about driving out uncertainty. You nailed down all the deliverables
right at the outset, thought through issues around scale, sequence,
and size, and fine-tuned your specs so that the implementation could
be as routine as possible. With today's projects, however, much
of the uncertainty surrounding information management simply can't
be eliminated.
If you're in charge of a complex project,
all the talk you hear about the importance of being able to manage
uncertainty and adapt to unanticipated developments takes on new
urgency.
The traditional operational focus of
project management will doom a complex project. Studies of exceptional
project managers in fast time-to-market industries show that the
initial phase of a complex project, often referred to as the fuzzy
front end, has a disproportionately large impact on the end results.
It's easy to look at a fuzzy situation
and, based on scant experience, assume you know everything about
it. This quickly leads to the conclusion that you already know what
the solution should be-and the urge to dive right into the implementation.
Resist this operational thinking and
focus instead on articulating the problem as clearly and as broadly
as you can. Defining the problem first gives you greater degrees
of freedom in solving it.
Many organizations develop the plan
to do the project and hope to build the community around it. But
complex projects often require input from key stakeholders before
you can reach a robust understanding of the nature and scope of
what needs to be done.
STAKEHOLDERS. That's why you first
want to build the community to develop the plan before you can do
the project. The goal here is to achieve coherence: Making the perspectives
of different stakeholders converge into a collectively meaningful
understanding of the problem.
Ask people in a variety of groups likely
to be affected by your project to help you explore the opportunity
space. Asking upfront the questions about the unmet needs and the
value of what you're doing can help prevent unsatisfactory results
down the road-for example, bringing out products to a mature and
declining market.
Other questions to ask: What do you
think the issue is here? What's at stake? What resources do we need
and where can we find them? Who else should I talk to?
As you invite others into the work
of defining the problem, you soon realize that the community affected
by your project is much larger than you originally imagined. It
also shifts over time. Stakeholders who have only informational
input into the early phases of the project may wield decision-making
power later on.
You can't treat everyone in the project
community equally, but you do need to identify the key stakeholders
at each stage of the project and include them at the appropriate
time. As you share your developing vision for the project with a
colleague whose assistance you'll need, ask her what's in it for
her. Help her find her project within yours.
(Kiko welcomes comments at kiko_antonio@yahoo.com)
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