Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.  So said Albert Einstein.  Yet every year countless projects hit trouble for the same reasons, again and again.  Why?  Because the fundamental principles that determine project success are not being respected.  These principles can be distilled into five laws, realities that always hold true irrespective of the nature or complexity of project.  Here they are:

Law #1  Ambiguity kills Projects

Ambiguity is the enemy of project success.  Clarity is what is needed.

Without clarity there is confusion.  Confusion is not hard to find in projects.  Look for ambiguities in roles and responsibilities, goals, objectives, requirements, scope, estimates, status reports and more.  Each ambiguity is a potential source of conflict, rework and failure.

Make it a priority to seek out and remove ambiguity from every element of your project.  Thoroughly.  Start by reviewing project scope.  Is this as unambiguous as possible?  Is everyone clear on what is in scope and what is out of scope?  Do not rely on assumptions or memory.  Insist on clear communication.  Document every important decision.  Clarity is everything.

Law #2  Credibility requires Detail

Detail is the basis for accuracy in all projects.  Plans that lack detail cannot be believed.

Most projects are underplanned.  They are already late before they start.  Project teams that claim not to have time for detailed planning, typically end up working all hours to meet deadlines.  Insufficient detail in the plan means time and effort requirements will be underestimated.  Only when we get to the detail is the full extent of work revealed.

If you do not know the detail then you will not have credibility in front of your team or your boss.  Define what completion specifically means for each task and deliverable.  If it is at too high a level, break it down.  Avoid surprises.  Get to the detail.

Law #3  No Truth, No Trust

Projects are performed by people.  And people work together best when there is mutual trust.

But trust does not come free.  It is tied to truth.  You cannot have one without the other.  So trust but verify.  Assigning tasks demonstrates trust but what are sometimes missing are the accountability for results and adequate checks to verify status.  Without ownership and truth, we cannot trust ourselves to be focused on the right things.

When you know the truth, good or bad, recognize it, openly.  Be honest about the challenges ahead.  Reward outstanding commitment and performance.  Acknowledge the reality of delays and tough decisions.  Do not hide bad news.  Tell the truth or face the consequences.

Law #4  Uncertainty is Certain

Plans are not crystal balls.  Plans are incomplete views of the future, which means they are at least slightly wrong.

Most project managers ignore most risks.  Yet as sure as the sunrise, sudden events and changes will occur, triggering changes to the plan.  But sudden does not necessarily mean unpredictable.  Experience and a little insight will always expose risks that we can plan ahead for.

Ignoring project risks is the first and biggest risk to the project.  There is no such thing as a risk free project.  Prevent risks where you can and have contingencies ready where you cannot.  Expect the unexpected!

Law #5  Satisfaction is not Guaranteed

Projects do not carry guarantees, whatever the customer was told.  Satisfaction depends on competence, commitment and communication.

Respecting all the preceding laws will count for nothing if this trio is lacking.  Project management is a discipline that has to be worked at.  Learn as much as you can on each project, then use that knowledge to energize yourself and others on the next project.

Communicate with focus and sensitivity, to align the varying interests of stakeholders and team with the needs of the project, repeatedly, throughout the ups and downs of its life.  This is no simple task!  So if you want to be a great project manager then you will need to be an outstanding communicator.  Period.

Stop the Insanity!

I do not claim that observing these five laws alone are a panacea for all project ills.  But they are the strongest forces for shaping success or failure on most projects, most of the time.  Stop the insanity.  Respect the laws!

Managing your website development need not cause you sleepless nights providing you learn the secrets of successful project management. Perform the best practices in project management and give your project the best chance of success.

Define objectives

Objectives guide everyone on the project to your final goals. Are your objectives to sell your product online, to provide customer support, to promote investor relations? Carefully decide and clearly document your objectives.

Decide the critical success factors ?the things at the end of the project which tell you if you’ve been successful. Make them measurable so you know if you’ve achieved them. For example, the website development should result in an increase in online sales of 25% by year end.

Stakeholder analysis

A stakeholder is someone with an interest in your project’s success (or failure). Decide who they are and whether they support your project. Perform stakeholder analysis by classifying them (high or low) according to how motivated they are in helping (or blocking) your project and how influential (high or low) they are.

Highly influential and supportive people are your allies. Gain their support whenever you can. Aim to reduce the influence of people who are both highly influential and against your project as these people could act to damage your project.

During your stakeholder analysis, draw up strategies for dealing with each group of stakeholders.

Define deliverables

Deliverables are tangible things produced during the project. Talk with key stakeholders to help define deliverables. Will your website design include web page layouts and sitemap for use by the programming team? What is the content for each page? Write all this down.

Key stakeholders must review and agree the deliverables accurately reflect what they expect to be delivered.

Project planning

Define how you will arrive at your objectives. This involves planning how many people, resources and budget are required. If delivering this in house, decide what activities are required to produce each deliverable.

For example, you might decide a web designer will develop page layouts and navigation diagrams. You might decide the marketing team will supply all product details and photographs. You might decide the finance manager will set up merchant and payment gateway accounts to enable e-commerce transactions via your website. If outsourcing work, specify exactly what the sub-contractor should deliver.

Estimate the time and effort required for each activity and decide realistic schedules and budget. Ensure key stakeholders review and agree the plan and budget.

Communication planning

Hold a kick off meeting with the team and explain the plan. Ensure everyone knows exactly what the schedule is, and what is expected of them.

For example, the web designer needs to know that he is to produce page layouts and navigation diagrams based upon the marketing manager’s requirements. He needs to know his expected start and end times.

Share your project communication plan with the team. This should include details of report templates, frequency of reporting and meetings, and details of how conflicts between teams and their members will be resolved.

Project tracking

Constant monitoring of variations between actual and planned cost, schedule and scope is required. Report variations to key stakeholders and take corrective actions if variations occur. To get a project back on track you will need to juggle cost, scope and schedule.

Suppose your programmer hits technical problems which threaten to delay the project. You might recover time by re-organising or shortening remaining tasks. If that’s not possible, you might consider increasing the budget to employ an additional programmer, or consider reducing the scope in other areas.

Be aware that any adjustments you make to the plan might affect the quality of deliverables. If you need to increase the budget, seek approval from the project sponsor.

Change management

Once started, all projects change. Decide a simple change strategy with key stakeholders. This could be a committee which decides to accept or reject changes which comprises of you and one or more key stakeholders.

Assess the impact of each change on scope, cost and schedule. Decide to accept or reject the change. Be aware that the more changes you accept the less chance you have of completing the project on time and within budget unless you reduce scope in other areas.

Suppose the marketing manager wants to add a popup window to display full size photographs of products. Assess the impact of this change. You might need to remove some remaining tasks to include this change and stay within budget. Or, it might be impossible to include the change without increasing the budget or schedule.

Don’t blindly accept changes without assessing the impact or your project will overrun.

Risk management

Risks are events which can adversely affect the success of the project. Identify risks to a project early. Decide if each risk is likely or unlikely to occur. Decide if its impact on the project is high or low.

Risks that are likely to occur and have high impact are the severest risks. High impact but unlikely risks, or low impact but likely risks pose a medium threat. Unlikely and low impact risks pose the least threat.

Create a mitigation plan of the actions necessary to reduce the impact if the risk occurs. Start with the severest risks first, then deal with the medium risks. Regularly review risks. Add new ones if they occur.

Suppose the marketing manager cannot decide what he wants from the website. Without knowing what the marketing manager wants, the team cannot deliver a website to meet his expectations. You assess this risk as highly likely to occur and having high impact. Your mitigation plan might be that the web designer develops page layouts to be reviewed by the manager early in the project.

Summary

Performing best practices in project management will give your website development project the best chance of success.

Managing a project can be daunting. Whether planning your wedding, developing a new website or building your dream house by the sea, you need to employ project management techniques to help you succeed. I’ll summarise the top 7 best practices at the heart of good project management which can help you to achieve project success.

Define the scope and objectives

Firstly, understand the project objectives. Suppose your boss asks you to organise a blood donor campaign, is the objective to get as much blood donated as possible? Or, is it to raise the local company profile? Deciding the real objectives will help you plan the project.

Scope defines the boundary of the project. Is the organisation of transport to take staff to the blood bank within scope? Or, should staff make their own way there? Deciding what’s in or out of scope will determine the amount of work which needs performing.

Understand who the stakeholders are, what they expect to be delivered and enlist their support. Once you’ve defined the scope and objectives, get the stakeholders to review and agree to them.

Define the deliverables

You must define what will be delivered by the project. If your project is an advertising campaign for a new chocolate bar, then one deliverable might be the artwork for an advertisement. So, decide what tangible things will be delivered and document them in enough detail to enable someone else to produce them correctly and effectively.

Key stakeholders must review the definition of deliverables and must agree they accurately reflect what must be delivered.

Project planning

Planning requires that the project manager decides which people, resources and budget are required to complete the project.

You must define what activities are required to produce the deliverables using techniques such as Work Breakdown Structures. You must estimate the time and effort required for each activity, dependencies between activities and decide a realistic schedule to complete them. Involve the project team in estimating how long activities will take. Set milestones which indicate critical dates during the project. Write this into the project plan. Get the key stakeholders to review and agree to the plan.

Communication

Project plans are useless unless they’ve been communicated effectively to the project team. Every team member needs to know their responsibilities. I once worked on a project where the project manager sat in his office surrounded by huge paper schedules. The problem was, nobody on his team knew what the tasks and milestones were because he hadn’t shared the plan with them. The project hit all kinds of problems with people doing activities which they deemed important rather than doing the activities assigned by the project manager.

Tracking and reporting project progress

Once your project is underway you must monitor and compare the actual progress with the planned progress. You will need progress reports from project team members. You should record variations between the actual and planned cost, schedule and scope. You should report variations to your manager and key stakeholders and take corrective actions if variations get too large.

You can adjust the plan in many ways to get the project back on track but you will always end up juggling cost, scope and schedule. If the project manager changes one of these, then one or both of the other elements will inevitably need changing. It is juggling these three elements – known as the project triangle – that typically causes a project manager the most headaches!

Change management

Stakeholders often change their mind about what must be delivered. Sometimes the business environment changes after the project starts, so assumptions made at the beginning of the project may no longer be valid. This often means the scope or deliverables of the project need changing. If a project manager accepted all changes into the project, the project would inevitably go over budget, be late and might never be completed.

By managing changes, the project manager can make decisions about whether or not to incorporate the changes immediately or in the future, or to reject them. This increases the chances of project success because the project manager controls how the changes are incorporated, can allocate resources accordingly and can plan when and how the changes are made. Not managing changes effectively is often a reason why projects fail.

Risk management

Risks are events which can adversely affect the successful outcome of the project. I’ve worked on projects where risks have included: staff lacking the technical skills to perform the work, hardware not being delivered on time, the control room at risk of flooding and many others. Risks will vary for each project but the main risks to a project must be identified as soon as possible. Plans must be made to avoid the risk, or, if the risk cannot be avoided, to mitigate the risk to lessen its impact if it occurs. This is known as risk management.

You don’t manage all risks because there could be too many and not all risks have the same impact. So, identify all risks, estimate the likelihood of each risk occurring (1 = not likely, 2 = maybe likely, 3 = very likely). Estimate its impact on the project (1 – low, 2 – medium, 3 – high), then multiply the two numbers together to give the risk factor. High risk factors indicate the severest risks. Manage the ten with the highest risk factors. Constantly review risks and lookout for new ones since they have a habit of occurring at any moment.

Not managing risks effectively is a common reason why projects fail.

Summary

Following these best practices cannot guarantee a successful project but they will provide a better chance of success. Disregarding these best practices will almost certainly lead to project failure.