Project Management

ignore it. If you’re not familiar with these techniques, I’d

recommend that you make the study of risk manage-

ment an integral part of your self-development plans.

• Project managers are victims of the “rose-colored glasses”
  syndrome. When they prepare project plans, they tend to
  plan to an all-success scenario. They simply visualize that
  everything will go perfectly. Projects that are planned this
  way have only one direction to go—downhill.


• Project managers yield to pressure from stakeholders,
  clients, or the market. Generally speaking, risk and uncer-
  tainty have the apparent effect of extending schedules or
  making things cost more. That’s an unfortunate perception,
  one that puts project managers under tremendous pressure
  to ignore or underplay the effects of risk. I once knew a
  project manager who’d taken great pains to properly assess
  and plan for risk on his project. Unfortunately, this extended
  the most likely completion date beyond the end date that
  had been imposed. He presented his thorough and thought-
  ful analysis to his management, reporting that he would not
  be able to complete the project in the allotted time frame
  with a high degree of confidence, given the current
  assumptions. What was the reaction from his manage-
  ment? “Fine. Then we’ll get somebody who can!”

Failure to Keep the Plan Current.For some project managers,
planning is a one-shot deal. They create a plan and then store it
away in a notebook on their shelf for the remainder of the proj-
ect. Project plans mustbe kept current. They must continuously
reflect what’s occurring on the project. Variations from the origi-
nal plan are inevitable. If you don’t take these variations into
account, it’s harder to maintain control, chaos is more likely,
and you hurt your chances of bringing the project in on time
and within budget.

How Much Planning Is Enough?

As is true of so many questions that arise in project manage-
ment, the answer to this question is ... it depends. In this case,

An Overview of Planning and Estimating 105

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