I have been focusing on project management in the last 14 years. Throughout the places that I've worked in; from the extremely hierarchical Singapore Army to various bureaucratic government agencies and statutory boards to free-for-all startups and digital marketing agency. There is an increasing recognition on the importance and value of effective project management. This is especially true for IT projects.
According to The Standish’s
CHAOS Summary 2009 report*, 24% of all IT projects failed (i.e. cancelled prior to completion or delivered and never used) and an additional 44% were challenged (i.e. delivered late, over budget, did not provided all of the required features or functions).
Here’s a comparison table compiled by The Standish from 1994 till 2009. To give credits to the greater fraternity of PMs, the amount of failed projects has greatly reduced.
But still. Those are scary numbers! I worked in a digital agency currently; the PM team and I will get slapped on a daily basis if only a third of the projects we run are deemed successful!
To put into context, the projects audited as part of the report are mostly large scale and highly complex IT projects for large corporations or governments. The digital marketing projects that we run for our fortune 500 clients are nowhere near that scale or complexity.
But considering the stats above and lessons from my daily work, there is definitely relevance and need for competent PMs with strong leadership skills to handle digital projects. The PM has to find ways to motivate and inspire the project team to meet deadlines and deliver quality work.
Digital marketing projects, like most IT projects has certain key project success factors that must be met. Here are the top 10 identified within The Standish report:
- User involvement
- Executive management support
- Clear statement of requirements
- Proper planning
- Realistic expectations
- Smaller project milestones
- Competent staff
- Ownership
- Clear vision & objectives
- Hard working, focused staff
Have a quick look at that list, and you can clearly identify the ones that require proven project management strategies and tactics.
Next, I will talk a little more about the key considerations that a PM has to take care of.
Getting users involvement and strong management sponsorship of the project is a must have. No point in delivering a project that no one would use because users’ buy-in or requirements were not considered. Or if the project did not have the management’s blessing. The PM must always ensure that both of these key factors are taken into account during project initiation.
A key nemesis to IT projects is ‘scope creep’. This little bugger could come in all shapes and form. Especially difficult to managed if there is not clear definition of the project scope in the first place. How many times have we received a brief from sales that the client has $X to develop a website and no other details. What kind of website, what features will it have, who are the targeted audiences, what technical platform will it be on, when is the go live? etc." Everything for everyone by end of Q2" is not the answers we are looking for. A talented PM knows exactly what questions to ask to clarify the scope. With a define scope, the PM is in a better position to manage the project and scope creep.
You will only know if someone cross the line, when you know where the line is.
Stakeholder management is a key area greatly emphasized in PMBOK or other PM methodologies and theories. But in real live, this area is grossly ignored or under-considered. Knowing who the stakeholders are and what are their involvement and key objectives in a project is critical in understanding their motives and expectations.
Proper planning is essential. All PMs must spend some time just thinking through the project and how they intend to approach it. A project timeline does not equal to a project plan. Other areas like, project communication, project organisation, risk management etc must be considered and planned out. Planning out smaller, more frequent and quantifiable project milestones helps in managing expectations and progress of the project. No one likes to be on radio silence for 3 months after the initial project kick off meeting, wondering what had happened to the project.
P.S. *In case this ‘infamous’ report is not known, the Standish Group collects information on project failures in the IT industry. They aim to make the industry more successful and to highlight ways to improve project success rates and increase values of IT investments. The latest result were compiled into the CHAOS Report 2009 and was published in April 2009.
