PM’s #1 Priority: Make Projects Go Away!

As a Project Manager, our top priority is to make projects go away.

When I say go away, there are 2 potential dispositions:

1. We drive a project to successful completion.
2. We determine the project doesn’t have the necessary legs to run on or is no longer feasible. In these cases, we (the PM) will suggest that a project be killed.

“Really?” some might ask, “I thought my job was to produce a project plan, identify and manage critical path, schedule, facilitate and follow-up on meetings, manage risks, define a RACI matrix, produce status reports, executive-level dashboards and so on…”

Please realize, the ONLY reason for engaging a Project Manager is to support making the project go away! All the tools and methods we discuss are simply aids to getting there successfully.

When assigned a project, senior management has dubbed the PM as the day-to-day owner of the project. By doing so, they have engaged a point person whose ONLY role is to DRIVE the project across the finish line or, if/when conditions materialize that suggest a project is no longer feasible, or possible, to escalate that to senior management attention.

As such, PM, please do NOT sit in a room observing team members banter various topics about as you take notes on what seems to be materializing, capture action items for follow-up, update your artifacts, etc. A High Performing PM does (and can be highly paid for) so much more!

What “is” expected, for example, is that we DRIVE every meeting with the ONLY intention of making the project go away. You (the PM) may have some GREAT ideas on how to solve the problem the project is chartered to address. And, just because you may not be one of the people “in the business,” it doesn’t mean you can’t share input or ideas. In fact, being that we aren’t in the business, we can often ask some of the best, what I call dumb, questions which can provide fresh, objective perspectives serving to break log jams and/or make significant breakthroughs.

What is also expected is that we constantly inject enthusiasm, insights, guidance and/or exhortations into every project-related meeting and/or communication to consistently assert the objective of making the project go away. THAT is our ONLY purpose here… Generally, this goal relates to bringing a project to successful completion.

From another angle, don’t be afraid to fire yourself when a project simply isn’t going to make it…

Some years ago, I was asked to take over leadership of a flagging ERP implementation. To say that the business was evolving (e.g., changing strategy, management, technical infrastructure, etc.) was an understatement. I did all I could do to capture and maintain the attention of the team-members amongst the greater business turmoil.

Due to this turmoil there was a mass exodus of key team members. At one point, I realized that while the remaining team members were smart, dedicated people, we had lost key subject matter expertise. And, at the same time, the anticipated changes in requirements and scope in support of the evolving business were so enormous, it became obvious the project was doomed.

It was at this point, I went to my client and said something like, “You can pay me another $100,000 to keep pushing this forward, but I’ve already seen the end of this movie and you aren’t going to like it. As such, I’d recommend we kill the project and pick it up again in the future, afresh, when the business strategy and overall technical infrastructure settles down.” Both the CFO and CIO immediately agreed and we killed it!

Make no mistake; that was a successful outcome! Why? Because, if we had continued the project, my client would have invested countless additional dollars, burned out even more employees and the “flagging” cycle would have continued given the uncertainty of where the business and technical infrastructure were going at the time.

To put things into perspective, what follows is a chart I created long ago, to coach and mentor PM’s on their role. I hope you like it 🙂

In summary, a High Performing Project Manager…

So, PM’s, what is the biggest thing we can do to fulfill our objective? Ask ourselves daily: what am I doing today to make this project go away?

In closing, if you are seeking to up-level PM competencies in yourself, or organization, please reach out to discuss how we can help.

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