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OOPS: Project Management Lessons - And What Happens When They're Not LearnedJuly 4, 2008 Businesses often start working on a project with the best of intentions. All too often, however, that's not enough. Here are some stories, taken from Ultimate Guide to Project Management for Small Business (Entrepreneur Press, October 2005, $29.95, ISBN: 1-932531-72-6) by project management professional Sid Kemp illustrate what can happen if you forget the basic project management lessons.
A computer program saw his company had a problem. They needed to do some fancy financial calculations but didn't have a program that would do that. So he wrote the program. Unfortunately, when he started writing the program, he wrote it for computers with the UNIX operating system, because that's what his company had. He didn't ask around and find out that the company was planning to replace UNIX with the Windows operating system. By the time he finished writing the program, everyone had Windows, no one had UNIX, and no one could use the program. LESSON: Communication is of utmost importance in starting projects. Make sure that you have all the information you need before starting work.
A man mentioned that he wanted a trailer for his car. A friend went out and bought a trailer, found the car parked in the driveway, and hooked up the trailer. When the man came home and saw this, he was upset, for a number of reasons. He didn't know how to drive with the trailer. Now, he couldn't use his car until he found his friend. He realized he needed new shock absorbers to haul the trailer, so he had to unhook the trailer and take the car to the shop before he could use it. He discovered that his gas mileage was going to go down, and he hadn't budgeted for that. LESSON: A project is likely to make things worse unless it includes good communication, training for people to adjust to the change, and planning to make sure everything works when the project is done. A team of two MBAs and a scientist developed a new way of treating wastewater, which was more effective and less expensive than any other method on the market. Their business plan was simple. A wastewater processing facility gave them some space to build a full-scale model. The inventor would build and install it, and the team would sell it. They made one mistake in their plan. They figured that the scientist who invented the device was the best person to build the full-scale version. But making something work at a new size is the realm of a very specialized engineering discipline called scaling. They used the wrong genius! The scientist built the test system and it did not work. He didn't know what to do, and before they could find the right expert, they ran out of time and money. LESSON: Don't assume you know everything. Instead, find someone who knows what you need to know. Get the right expert.
LESSON: Calculate all costs--development, maintenance, and decommissioning--before starting a project. Dr. Harold Kerzner, a recognized world expert in project management, asked his best clients what problems they were having managing their projects. Their biggest problem? Time zones. When a project spans the United States, Europe, and Asia, someone is going to have to wake up very early in the morning to make the weekly project status meeting. LESSON: Sometimes, there are problems you just can't solve. Want the latest news & helpful tips? Get
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