Technology Projects are *Always* Interesting. Right?
When titling this post, I reminded myself of the ancient Chinese curse, “May you live in interesting times.” Actually, what we strive for at MIPRO are uninteresting implementations and upgrades. So, that said, before beginning a project, one should always review the following:
- For every action, there is an equal and opposite malfunction.
- To err is human… to blame your computer for your mistakes is even more human; in fact it is downright natural.
- He who laughs last probably made a back-up.
- If at first you don’t succeed, blame your computer.
- A complex system that does not work is invariably found to have evolved from a simpler system that worked just fine.
- The number one cause of computer problems is computer solutions.
- A computer program will always do what you tell it to do, but rarely what you want it to do.
- When computing, whatever happens, behave as though you meant it to happen.
- When you get to the point where you really understand your computer, it’s probably obsolete.
- The first place to look for information is in the section of the manual where you least expect to find it.
- When the going gets tough, upgrade.
- When you need to send an email quick, that’s when the modem wireless router won’t connect!
So, how does one avoid as many of these real – though humorous – problems and maximize success? One word: planning. Throughout the rest of this post, you will see numerous examples of platitudes, conventional wisdom, and corny advice – all of it real and all of it worth emphasizing.
So, plan your work and work your plan. Sound reasonable? You’d be surprised how many projects fall into the ready, fire, aim category. In fact, if you don’t have time to do it right, how are you going to find time to do it over?
Projects should be planned. In fact, the planning phase of a project should consume 10-15% of the total cost and effort of the entire project. I’m sure your momma once told you that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Or, as the Cheshire Cat told Alice, “If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.”
So plan already. In fact, if you plan well enough, you can probably find someone else to do the work (just kidding!). But, laying out the plan well, and then measuring how your project conforms to the plan, is the surest method to ensure success. In fact, if you are serious about planning and measuring, this is one time that no good deed goes unpunished will probably not come to fruition.
For those of us with some engineering background, remembering the 2nd law of thermodynamics is always critical: increasing entropy, or while the quantity of something may remain the same, the quality of it deteriorates gradually over time.
Projects are like this, in spades.
Without a good plan (and good measurements against that plan), and serious scope control, projects tend to drift, slow down, get more expensive, take too long, and generally offend the sensitivities of the very stakeholders who are paying for – and should be receiving the benefits of – the project. In fact, most projects end up living up to this maxim: all’s well that ends.
So, if we know that everyone’s enthusiasm will wane (definitely a 2nd law truism) and management will become impatient (you know that the frequency and severity of system crashes are in direct proportion to the importance of the audience), being able to demonstrate and document where the project is (and where it will be in X days) will mitigate against our bosses saying about our project, ‘After all is said and done, a heck of a lot more was said than done.’
It’s interesting that in my legal world, we are ethically bound when taking a case that we must (a) be knowledgeable about the subject matter, or (b) study up to become knowledgeable fast enough not to prejudice our client, or (c) associate in some other St. Louis car accident lawyers who is knowledgeable.
How does this apply to our enterprise IT projects?
Well, how often does your organization actually do a project like this? If it’s an upgrade, when was the last time you successfully performed the upgrade on your own? If it’s a new system – financials, human resources, payroll, maintenance management, etc. – when was the last time you successfully implemented a complex software system that affected all or a large portion of your organization? Are you knowledgeable enough about the subject matter? Can you do the project with OJT fast enough? Or will you require assistance from someone who is knowledgeable?
It first comes down to planning: what you want to do, when you want to do it, what resources it will take, how long will it take, and, last but certainly not least, how much will it cost. For sure, unless you have both the plan and the expertise to work that plan, you should re-read the Murphy’s Laws at the beginning of this post. Remember, if there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong. And the corollary adds the word “first” to the end of the sentence.
In conclusion, plan, measure, plan, measure, and make sure you took plenty of time to plan. I planned for this article to run two pages as I draft it here in Word. Ahh, I can change the font size to ensure that it’s two pages: if I declare “success” loud enough, my project is a success! With proper preparation, YOUR project can also be a success. Remember, Murphy was an optimist….
Questions, comments or feedback about this? Don’t be afraid to email me.
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More links:
MIPRO Consulting main website.
