Leandro Herrero
4. Everything a project
Projects, big or small, have objectives, a beginning and end, allocated resources, accountable people, timelines and a budget. If you are doing anything in your organisation that doesn’t qualify as a project, chances are it is redundant.
‘Everything is a project’ is a powerful philosophy. It injects discipline into what we do. If you work in an organisation that has ‘projects’ and ‘other things’ (not called projects), you may be at risk of having two separate worlds with different standards. When we say Joe works on a project or is a member of project X, we usually mean that he is part of a group that has objectives, timelines, milestones and resources. We understand that.
When HR manager Mary needs to hire 3 new people, we don’t call this a project and don’t see it the same way as Joe’s work on the project team. Why? We see this as Mary just doing what she is supposed to do. But there is no difference between Joe and Mary. Both tasks should be a project. If this is already obvious to you, congratulations!
But before you sing the ‘what’s all the fuss about’ song, take a look at your organisation and see if this really is the norm. This is one of the many trivial-looking things that are easy to dismiss. If you are a manager, can you tell yourself - with your hand on your heart - that everything in your department has the discipline of a project? Just by doing the exercise you may actually find that there are many things that perhaps still do not fit. If this is the case, I suggest you ‘projectise’ everything that moves…
For a long time, I have been using our ‘Project AnatomyTM‘ model to dissect activities and see how the ingredients of the project work. This is not only a useful exercise to understand projects, but also to convert ‘other things’ into a project with the consequent discipline. These are the components of ‘Project AnatomyTM‘:
- Planning: is there any? Most ‘declared’ or labelled projects would have some planning, but other ‘activities’ may not. Inject it everywhere. What does it look like?
- Decision making: who decides what, when, how? And, equally important, who does not make decisions? Ask people to think ahead, days or even months and see if they can answer the question, “who will make a decision when we reach that point?”
- Resource allocation: where are the resources? How are they managed? Think beyond money. Think time and people, perhaps even people that do not report to you.
- Priority system: is there one? How do things move up and down on the priority list? In many cases, prioritisation means things only go up, never down! Do you know the trade-offs?
- Accountability: who is doing what and who is not? Where does the buck stop? Accountability can’t be shared. Responsibilities can. Who is ultimately going to be ‘taken to account’?
- Reporting: how do we know we are on track and who needs to know? Could you have a snapshot of what is going on as frequently as you want to?
- Knowledge transfer: is there a mechanism to share the learning or is everything staying in people’s heads?
The above is a simple framework to launch or monitor projects, or to convert ‘other’ activities into projects. It does not try to replace a project management system! You see, project management is a state of mind, not a piece of software or a method. When I say, “everything is a project“, I am referring to a philosophy, a mentality, an attitude towards work and organisation, not to the creation of bar and Gann charts for everything. Those may help to visualise and discuss, but their existence does not ensure a ‘project management mentality’ per se.
Examples of projects, other than the ones we see naturally in Product Development, are:
- Hiring somebody
- An induction programme for somebody joining the organisation
- A company conference or convention
- Exploring the benefits of a new software and finding a vendor
- Finding new premises
- Finding an external consultant
- Rolling out a financial plan
- Making division A and division B talk to each other
- Review all salaries
- Persuading John of the merits of X
- Get the Board to approve B
You will notice that some of the above resonate easily as projects, whilst others - such as ‘get the Board to approve B’ - don’t naturally come to mind as such. And that is the issue! Your goal should be: 100% of all activities around me are projects, i.e. feel like projects, behave as projects and are treated as projects. So, what can you do?
Look around and ask: “Is this a project?” If not, what is it? Should you do it? Don’t dismiss this exercise too quickly. All the 10+10+10=1000 practices are relatively simple on their own. Let’s say that you are already converted to the project philosophy (everything has objectives, beginning and end, allocated resources, accountable people, timelines and a budget), but:
- your colleagues or subordinates may not be and you have never had a proper conversation with them on this topic.
- you may discover that the ‘non-project’ activity surpasses the project activity. If this is the case, I think you are in trouble.
- you may find people saying, “We don’t have time to run projects, we have jobs to do.” Again, if this is the case, you are in trouble.
Projectise everything.
Call it a project. We are all projects. (My company is a project.)
If it isn’t a project, what is it?
If it isn’t a project, it shouldn’t have a budget (Works wonders to focus minds).
‘Doing stuff’ and ‘busy-ness’ are not synonymous with projects.
Market yourself on your ability to run projects.
