Q: Troubled Infrastructure Project?

by Derek Leitch

A common thread in addressing the major causes of troubled projects is the ability of the project manager to effectively deal with these issues, mitigate some of the risk in these areas, and be a strong enough leader to stand up to senior management or go to bat to manage expectations and resources.

The top causes of project troubles are:

1. Requirements: Unclear, lack of agreement, lack of priority, contradictory, ambiguous, imprecise.

2. Resources: Lack of resources, resource conflicts, turnover of key resources, poor planning.

3. Schedules: Too tight, unrealistic, overly optimistic.

4. Planning: Based on insufficient data, missing items, insufficient details, poor estimates.

5. Risks: Unidentified or assumed, not managed.

Your Actions to help a troubled project recover:

1. Improve communication, stakeholder management

2. Redefine the project - reducing the scope, re-justifying the project financially, etc.

3. Add and/or remove resources

4. Resolve problematic technical issues

5. Replace the project manager or bring in a consultant to manage the recovery

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