Do you know why project management fails?

Project Management sounds like a very simple term but chances are, there are some key aspects of managing projects you do not know. Even people with advanced degrees in project management sometimes find it difficult to resolve real-time project problems. Applying the practices, tools, and techniques, and knowledge, and skills of project management help increase the probability of project success in difficult situations.

Project management is not simple, but have you ever wondered why Project Management is so challenging? There are several reasons.

Let me give you a hand full number of reasons.

Team member alignment with project objectives

The lack of consensus is often driven by competing priorities. Most engineering and design professionals are driven by the desire to work on challenging and exciting projects.

The project side of design, engineering, procurement, or construction is often viewed as a necessary evil. It can be challenging to get the appropriate attention paid to working on the project’s main objectives. The path to getting your project team on the same page requires intentional focus.

Start with clear communication on what your team is doing, why we are doing it, and what is there for them. Formulate clear criteria for making decisions based on reliable data.

Data does not lie and provides valuable insight for decisions; it can be easier to get everyone to decide about the best path forward. This data will be an invaluable resource for your strategic planning process. Get feedback from clients, project team members, and other stakeholders.

Unclear goals and objectives

A lack of direction and unclear goals are among the largest reasons why projects fail. While it may be impossible to predict every outcome, taking time early on to define and communicate objectives and goals can radically increase the chance your team successfully completes a project.

Although “goals” and “objectives” can be used interchangeably, it’s important to point out some key differences. According to a Forbes article, a goal is a broad primary outcome or the “destination.” An objective, on the other hand, is a measurable step you take to achieve a strategy. Think of objectives as the project’s “road map” with specific tasks that need to be completed to reach the goal.

A study states that about 39% of projects fail due to the lack of project planning and a clearly defined goal.

Unclear success metrics

How do you measure success?

Remember project management is a complete cycle starting from initiation to closing covering multiple phases and iterative processes. There have to be various metrics to measure eth success of each phase.

To have a metric the ties that altogether sounds easy, but there’s a tradeoff between the type of project and various phase of the project lifecycle. No matter what system of metrics you have, it’s very difficult to get something that really looks at the end-to-end project performance as well as each individual phase.

One way that people have been overcoming this is they look at something called project phase outcome-based performance indicators. And the idea is your primary metric for the effectiveness of the whole project management process should in perfect order or a perfect shelf.

It is critical to come up with a way of quantifying project progress by setting up milestones and gate reviews. In addition to helping your team progress, having a clear set of metrics will also help project managers defend their vision in front of the upper management and other stakeholders.

Scope creep

What is Scope Creep, Anyway? Adding additional features or functions of a new product, requirements, or work that is not authorized (i.e., beyond the agreed-upon scope).

The Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge PMBOK® Guide describes the scope creep as “adding features and functionality (project scope) without addressing the effects on time, costs, and resources, or without customer approval” (PMI, 2008, p 440).

Change on projects is inevitable, so the possibility for scope creep is also inevitable. Perhaps this is the reason why taming scope creep is so challenging.

It doesn’t mean to imply that additional functionality or work is not desirable on projects. Also, it doesn’t mean that scope creep occurs just because requirements change. The key part is whether changes are authorized or not. If an expansion of scope is approved, then it is not scope creep.

As per the PMI, 52% of project teams reported facing scope creep in 2017 and the trend is continuing upwards.

Changes to scope can be either uncontrolled, resulting in scope creep, or controlled, resulting in documented changes to the project requirements. Managing scope creep boils down to controlling those changes in scope via a change control process.

If approved change requests affect the project’s overall scope and cost baseline, then the scope statement, Work Breakdown Structure (WBS), and/or cost baseline is updated and sent out to stakeholders.

Improper communication

A study conducted by the Project Management Institute (PMI) revealed that ineffective communication had a negative impact on successful project execution. Surprising? Well, not really.

And this problem still holds true today. Likely anyone ever involved in a project of any size knows this basic fact. What may surprise you is the number of projects still lacking effective communications management and the resulting magnitude of economic impact this deficiency has on projects.

However, without a well-thought-out communication strategy and tools designed to store and regulate project information and communications put a big question mark on the project’s success.

 “High-performing organizations (those completing an average of 80 percent or more of projects on time, on budget and within goals) create formal communications plans for nearly twice as many projects as their lower-performing counterparts (which complete fewer than 60 percent of projects on time, on budget, and within goals).”

A formal communication plan is an absolute necessity.

Project Cost overrun

Almost every project manager considers project cost overruns issues as one of the biggest hurdles in effective project management.

A cost overrun is the amount by which actual expenditures exceed the planned amount. This may occur for many reasons including scope change, missed scope, variation in BOQ, design changes etc.  All this change added to the project scope without a sufficient increase in its planned cost.

The project management team must be capable of identifying the possible event of cost overruns as early as possible. Early warning ensures timely mitigation of cost risk with minimal cost.

A study in 2017 revealed that 49.5 % of manufacturing managers’ report costs as the biggest project management challenge they face. By efficient cost management, a manager can avoid various common complications a project may face and strive for better and quicker results.

Lack of information sharing

Modern project management process produces massive project data and information through various data management systems. One of the key factors for project success is the right information available to the right people at right time.

Massive data ≠Shared & accessible information

Data visibility – Who can see what and how quickly?  Since data is being stored in different system/ sites with all stakeholder may not have equal access.

Knowledge is not power – unless it’s shared. For effective project management, it important that project team members share updated information regularly with to right people in the right manner.

Lack of project control

What is project control? Well in simple terms, Project Control means measuring the key performance indicator of the project against the project plan and approving change requests, including recommended corrective and preventive actions.

Project Control is the toughest aspect of project management where the project controllers are expected to know how to control a project that has been planned and managed in a very formal, proper way.

However, in the real world, many project managers do not use dedicated project control in their projects.

The development of a suitable Project Control system is an important part of the project management effort (Shtub, Bard & Globerson 2005). Project control and monitoring play a major role as the cause of project failures.

It has been proved time and again that Project performance can be improved if dedicated Project control systems are in place. Success factors are based on good Project Control practices, which result in good cost and schedule outcomes.

One failed project can potentially wipe out an entire year’s profit and this risk puts the value of Project Controls into perspective (Mckinsey).

Improper risk management

Uncertainty – Who knows what is going to happen?

Projects are executed over a period sometimes runs for several years. During its lifecycle, the project encounters several uncertainties. These could be internal as well as external factors with varying potential to jeopardize the project.

Having the foresight to identify potential ‘what if’ scenarios and making up a contingency plan is an important aspect of project management. Projects rarely go exactly as planned because there are so many variables that can create unlimited possibilities.

It is the project manager’s responsibility to come up with a detailed risk management plan including risk response. Its the collective responsibility of the project team to identify and report the possible risks.

Inadequate skills of Project Manager

Project managers who lack the necessary experience to carry out the project can be particularly rough, resulting in missed deadlines reduced productivity, lost business, and even internal conflict.

Key project management responsibilities include creating clear and attainable project objectives, building the project requirements, and managing the constraints of the project management triangle (which are cost, time, and scope/quality).

As a project manager, you need your team to be well-versed in project management to make your projects a success.

By 2027, employers will need more than 87 million people working in project management-related roles, according to the Project Management Institute’s 2017 Job Growth and Talent Gap report.

Conclusion

As a project team member, you need to constantly stay on your toe to identify and mitigate risks in terms of cost, schedule, quality, and scope.

Despite the availability of multiple resources, processes, project management tools, training materials, and methodologies, organizations struggle to tackle the project management challenges.

The three-pillar of project management: People, Process, and Tool are the key ingredients for the success of any project, in the modern world.

Project management today is completely different from what it was a decade ago. With the introduction of different cloud-based project management tools, project teams are no longer bound by geographical location or tedious departmental regulations.

Did I miss any challenges? What is the biggest challenge you are facing with your project right now? Let me know by leaving a comment below right now.

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