By Rick Nason, PhD, CFA
Partner, RSD Solutions Inc.
Partner, RSD Solutions Inc.
I worked for an organization
that in one area was still very much in a growth mode. In essence the organization was taking on a
new project and the project manager was a lively and energetic person who had a
knack for getting things done.
The launch of the new product
was a smashing success and the project manager cemented their reputation for
getting things done. As the new project
rolled along, more people were added to the team and slowly things started to
become institutionalized. As more
administrators were added, the demand for process and planning documents
increased. However there was a problem;
the project manager who brought the project to life and who was still the key
player in making things successful was not all that skilled in process and
planning documentation creation. This
created a problem as the demand for more and more structure took hold. It was not long before the project manager
was pushed out.
You can probably stop reading as
I suspect you know how things ended.
With the original project manager out, the number of processes and
planning documents increased, while the quality of the project declined to such
a state as to declare it unsustainable.
Professional
managers often confuse process and planning documents for getting things
done. Only getting things done is
getting things done. Furthermore, the
more experience working with people I have, the more I understand that the
skills in getting things done are not the same skills that lead to creating
process and planning documents. This
holds for projects and it holds for risk management.
