return to archive list • this month's article

Project Management Pitfalls: Why Most Projects Fail
By Steven Kepler, PMP

What is project failure? Generally, it means that the project was not completed on time, was over budget, or failed to deliver a solution to the customer needs. When analyzing failed projects (an exercise that is not done nearly as often as it should) the reason, or reasons, for failure can usually be identified. Interestingly, most failed projects can be shown to be doomed from the start. The reason for this is simple. Planning should be done at the beginning of the project, is critical to success, and is often neglected. Following are some of the pitfalls that often lead to project failure.

Poorly defined scope
The scope of a project – exactly what the project is to deliver – must be clearly defined. Without a detailed specification of what is included in the project scope, as well as what is not included, it is impossible to accurately plan and budget the activities and associated resources required to carry out the project. Lack of a clearly defined scope invariably leads to scope creep during the life of the project as well.

Failure to assess stakeholder needs
A critical project planning activity that is often overlooked is performing a stakeholder analysis. The project team should list everyone who has an interest in or might be affected by the project. Stakeholders within the company might be the executive management team, various departments of the organization, and the organization’s employees. Outside stakeholders might include customers, vendors, and the local town. Careful stakeholder consideration might make the difference between an adversary and an ally. Sometimes the stakeholder analysis identifies opportunities for additional resources as well (for example, sources of grants).

No communication plan
Reporting project progress to stakeholders is critical – reinforcing the importance of a proper stakeholder analysis. Also critical is tailoring the content, and often the method of delivery, to meet specific stakeholder needs. For example, the executive team is typically not interested in reams of project minutia. And, it’s probably inappropriate to unnecessarily share project financial data with external stakeholders.

Insufficient level of detail in work planning
In planning the work to be performed, a work breakdown structure should be prepared with each line item (work package) representing about 40 hours of work. Without this level of detail tracking project progress becomes very difficult. Accuracy of the initial project budget is likely to suffer as well. The work plan should also make clear how each work package contributes to specific project deliverables.

These pitfalls can be avoided by using a disciplined approach to project management. In organizations without formal project managers, however, this can be difficult to do. What usually happens is that a team is assigned to a project and one of the team members is appointed as project manager. The appointment to project manager is typically based on technical knowledge rather than project management expertise. While this approach may be acceptable for smaller projects, the likelihood of failure increases as project size and complexity increase. Possible solutions are to either hire a professional project manager to work with the team or to train the team in project management skills.

The Project Management Institute (PMI) is the world’s leading professional association for research and development of project management methodology. The PMI website (www.pmi.org) contains a wide variety of resources for project teams.

Aptimise offers contract project management services by seasoned professionals, project management training and mentoring, and project team building.

About the author – Steve Kepler is a Project Management Professional (PMP) certified by the Project Management Institute (PMI®).