Project Sponsors Often Fail Us

With the collapse of firms such as AIG, Lehman Brothers, Countrywide, General Motors, Ford, Chrysler and many others, the light is shining on Presidents and CEOs of corporations, causing the board of directors, shareholders, and the general public to assess the effectiveness of executive leadership. They are now “behind the eight ball” to demonstrate how their decision-making as Commander-in Chief has benefited stakeholders. As project managers, this is a perfect opportunity for us to request what we frequently need – an available project sponsor to support our delivery efforts.

Project sponsors are to projects what CEOs are to corporations. Both are expected to utilize their expertise (or the expertise of their delegated) to critically analyze requirements, proposals, status reports, schedules, change requests, and the like – all in an effort to reduce constraints that may impede project or corporate success. We often attribute factors such as an incomplete scope and an unrealistic budget allocation to justify late deliverables and cost overruns. Many project failures (of course you and I have never been late completing a project or run over budget) are the direct result of the sponsoring organization’s failure to be actively engaged throughout the project management lifecycle.

As project managers, we recognize that most project sponsors are not involved in day-to-day project execution. However, we expect these leaders (or their delegated resources) to either be engaged throughout the project management lifecycle or empower us with decision-making authority and control. This empowerment will support our efforts to deliver our projects on time, under budget and according to the specified scope. We need project sponsors to remove barriers that may impede our progress or give us decision-making authority and support to remove them.

Empower us in decision-making and control
Empowerment is particularly important when the project manager is an outside consultant and team resources are either part of the sponsoring organization or are assigned by the project sponsor. Under this scenario, team resistance can be high and cause late completion of project tasks. Gone are the days when we have dedicated project support. We now work in matrix organizations utilizing matrix resources who are not 100 percent committed to the most important projects – ours. Of course, as project managers, we have the skills necessary to keep our team inspired and motivated, but sponsor empowerment allows us to respond appropriately to low performers. Also, with empowerment along with decision-making authority, we can quickly analyze and mitigate risks, as well as make prompt decisions regarding change requests. With this empowerment, timely decisions will be made, reducing the likelihood of delay to our project schedule and thus, keeping cost under control.

Engage Project Managers and Subject Matter Expert during Initiation
Much heartache could be avoided if we could specify every minute detail of every single project prior to starting the execution phase of each project? Today, we often work under contract and frequently join projects after requirements have been gathered, the scope has been defined, and a targeted completion date has been set. However, during planning and execution, new details of project requirements ultimately present new discoveries, which introduce the need for adjustments to project scope, schedule, and budget. Generally, these adjustments are necessary when fixed completion dates are dictated rather than allowing subject matter experts to identify the estimated work effort for completion. To create more realistic scope, schedule and budget estimates, subject matter experts should be involved during the initiation and planning phases in order create work breakdown structures. This task allows us to establish a more realistic scope, schedule, and cost baseline for more accurate targets. Whether we gather these details during the planning phase or during the execution phase, this work effort must be factored into schedule and budget estimates if we are to keep our projects on track. Project managers and subject matter experts should be involved as early as possible.

Be critical of status reports we present
Project managers are like magicians. We juggle a multitude of moving parts. We lead and motivate people. We analyze details. We communicate appropriately to all audiences with a very reasonable project status. Then we approach our finally – the delivery date. But, now we need to extend the project because of a delay in approving a change request. Or, one of our vendors has experience difficulty receiving a needed part to complete its project task. Or, we are over budget because we added additional resources to backup the many who suddenly left the project. Now, the sponsor is wondering, “What went wrong?”

As the smoke dissipates and the mirrors are revealed the sponsor recognizes that our status reports could have been more detailed. As project managers, we believe that we can get back on track without missing a beat. We build strong relationships with our teams and inspire and motivate each team member to give extra effort. As a result, we provide status reports that reflect the best estimates of our projects. We are always truthful; we simply provide our best estimates. However, if our project sponsors become more critical of the status reports we present, we would be challenged to provide a more accurate assessment of project temperature. We need our sponsors to “pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.” We need them to ask more detailed questions during our status meetings. Similarly, we need to ask more detailed questions of our subject matter experts. This way, late deliveries, increased budgets, or changes in scope would be no surprise.

Summary
Project sponsors that empower project managers, involve them and subject matter experts during initiation, and are critical of project status reports will enjoy a higher percentage of successful projects. A more collaborative team environment will result, individual performance will be enhanced, and on-time completion of projects will increase. Although these benefits are our direct responsibility as project managers, various factors such as an incomplete scope, change request submissions, or an ineffective project team member jeopardizes project success. With empowerment from project sponsors or sponsor involvement, we enhance our ability to deliver.