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The 19 Negotiable Rules for a Successful Project
Although there is no one right way to successfully complete a project, there are plenty of wrong ways. Look at national statistics: on the average, U.S. software projects are 250% over budget and 180% late. This is not a good track record. Standish Group reports that 72% of all projects started are never completed. That means that the odds are against completing a project at all. How can we, as project managers and developers, help ensure our path to success? What are the Do’s and Don’ts of managing a project? How can one tell if the project is going off track and out of control? Al Cline will briefly describe 19 principles that a project manager must observe to avoid damaging his or her project. Phrased as clear Do’s and Don’ts these rules apply to the various phases of project development, from concept to deployment. To break one of these non-negotiable rules (NNRs) will result in unnecessary expense or unnecessary delay at best; project cancellation at worst. Some NNRs are technical, and are based on Putnam’s equation that relates cost, time, scope, and quality. Putnam’s equation is complicated, non-linear, and counter-intuitive; only empirical evidence guides us in our course to successful project completion. For example, Brook’s Law--Don’t add people to a late project—is a technical NNR. Some NNRs are based on political forces, some on culture, and some on psychology. Success is political and not technical--a product that doesn’t meet the customer’s business needs is still a failed project, regardless of how perfectly the product was built. For those companies who are enthusiastically building their own software development methodologies, they will want to know about these NNRs so they can increase the probability of building a more successful methodology. |
