Tag Archives: project challenges

Issue management or Firefighting

The challenge for Project Managers is to keep the project moving through challenges – or identify when the project shouldn’t keep moving forward. If the PM is skilled in issue management they can navigate the daily issues (or hourly issues) on any project. If they aren’t as skilled, the project goes into firefighting mode. Continue reading

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Trust and delegation

Why don’t people trust? Well, I’d say the 99% of the time it’s not about thinking the person won’t do a good job – their desire and motivation, but more about the can’t – about their knowledge and ability. The can’t is where you hear things like ‘it will be faster to do it myself than show someone else’ or ‘they don’t have the experience’ or ‘they don’t have the time to learn’. Continue reading

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Is a list of tasks enough of a plan?

When projects struggle with planning sometimes the teams create lists of tasks. To add detail the lists contain names of people, they estimate how many days are needed for each task and even list beginning and end dates. So what’s the problem? Continue reading

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Planning, why is it so hard to sell

In the theoretical world it is sound practice to plan before you start anything. In the real world it seems so difficult to see beyond the next milestone or the next deadline. Continue reading

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Project data base for questions and answers

I received an email tell me to check out askaboutprojects. I’m naturally suspicious of unsolicited emails but then I looked closer, the email had come in response to my latest blog post – yay, someone is reading my posts. Continue reading

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Dirty little project management secret

Project Managers sometime fly by the seat of their pants. Okay, now it’s out in the open. Some PMs do this all the time. They like the rollercoaster ride, they love the heroics and they see creativity in the pressures … Continue reading

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Communication – why is it so hard?

I’ve been looking around at blogs for inspiration for today’s post. It seems like communication is the topic of choice for bloggers. It is complex, even though it sounds simple. How hard is it to be clear, paraphrase for clarity, follow up, listen… and all the other tips people have out there. Continue reading

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Are you sure you trust the effort estimation?

To be honest, I often found myself questioning the reality of the estimates when I started my career in project management. The process wasn’t well managed – there was no consistent process to manage. Continue reading

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Are you getting the truth?

A project manager needs to hear the truth from the team and the sponsor. In a project that is making significant changes in an organization, the PM can only be successful if they get the truth. It’s not a case of “you can’t handle the truth” but more of a case of “you can handle anything as long as you get the truth.” Continue reading

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Scope expansion, or scope creep

Scope can be the most difficult thing to control in a project. We all want to make sure we meet expectations, and, often it takes a long time to define the expectations. So, where does scope definition end and scope creep begin? Continue reading

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