Many project emergencies are actually the result of setbacks — negative progress. Sometimes these mishaps are unavoidable, but often they're the result of patterns of organizational culture. How can we reduce the incidence of setbacks?
ometimes projects experience setbacks — already-completed work becomes useless after people discover problems that require new approaches incompatible with work completed. When the pattern is common, its source might lie neither in the projects, nor in the teams that experience setbacks. Sometimes, the source of the pattern lies in the culture of the organization, in the way it's run, or in the way people view negative progress itself.
Here are some insights to help you reduce the likelihood of experiencing negative progress.
The Brooklyn Bridge spans the East River between Manhattan and Brooklyn. Several setbacks occurred during its construction, but perhaps the most dire involved the suspension cables. Over a period of at least six months, a corrupt contractor delivered to the bridge construction company more than 200 tons of defective steel cable. By the time the fraud was discovered, the defective material had already been installed in the bridge suspension cables, and it could not be removed. The bridge engineer calculated that this would weaken the cables from a margin of six times maximum required strength to only five times maximum strength. He addressed this by adding an additional 150 wires to each cable, and they remain in place to this day. The contractor carried out his malfeasance by switching rejected material for accepted material after the inspection but before delivery. The public was not informed at the time, and the only penalty exacted was the cost of the material in the additional cables installed on the bridge. Photo by Peter Basich, courtesy New York City Department of Transportation.
Accept the bad news as good news
When you discover unexpected complexity or an unanticipated problem, accept its significance. Be glad you're now aware of the problem — awareness is the first step to resolution. Acknowledgment is the second. The alternative to acknowledgment, denial, is a great way to mess things up even more.
Change your tactics or strategy
When things aren't going well, adjust tactics or strategy. Sometimes people convince themselves that they've made adjustments when they really haven't — they've just renamed or rearranged the old approaches. This happens, in part, because making real adjustments sometimes feels like acknowledging failure. To determine whether the adjustments are real, notice how people feel about them. If some people are really upset about the adjustments, they're probably real.
Increase information distribution
Most negative progress involves information that was known to some, but not enough of the right people. It's likely that more negative progress awaits you, and information sharing can prevent some of it. Encourage people to share information and teach each other more of what they know. See "What Haven't I Told You?," Point Lookout for December 11, 2002.
Take smaller bites
Perhaps project goals are too aggressive — the organization might lack the skills or resources required. Carefully review all activities to determine whether other such overly ambitious efforts are underway. See "Geese Don't Land on Twigs," Point Lookout for June 13, 2001.
Reward honesty and failure
Investigate your recognition practices regarding successes, ethics and failures. If you aren't honoring at least some failures, you're encouraging their concealment, and that practice increases the likelihood of future negative progress. Rewarding success regularly but only rarely rewarding integrity, honesty, conscientiousness, reliability, originality or courage drives these other attributes underground. This can increase the risk of setbacks, because these attributes are your best insurance against further surprises.
Reduce overload
If you aren't honoring at least some failures, you're encouraging their concealment
Probably the most effective — and most difficult — change an organization can make is to reduce the number of projects underway. Overloaded people can't focus on anything long enough to do much good. They feel that they can't afford to explore, experiment or take the kind of risks that lead to breakthroughs. Lighten the load to enhance productivity. See "Make Space for Serendipity," Point Lookout for September 25, 2002.
Any effort to reduce setbacks across the organization could itself encounter setbacks. Since the organization's limitations in preventing or dealing with setbacks can become an issue in such a change, making this change can be particularly difficult. TopNext Issue
The information about the Brooklyn Bridge is in a wonderful book by David McCullough, The Great Bridge: The epic story of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1972.
Are your projects always (or almost always) late and over budget? Are your project teams plagued by turnover, burnout, and high defect rates? Turn your culture around. Read 52 Tips for Leaders of Project-Oriented Organizations, filled with tips and techniques for organizational leaders. Order Now!
Sometimes, the clichés the losing team's players feed to sports reporters can have hidden meaning. So it is with Project Status Reports, especially for projects in trouble.
You're chairing a meeting, and to your dismay, things get out of hand. People interrupt each other so often that nobody can complete a thought, and some people dominate the meeting. What can you do?
Sometimes companies or projects get into trouble, and "fires" erupt one after another. When this happens, we say we're in "firefighting" mode. But it's more than a metaphor — we have a lot to learn from wildland firefighters.
Here's part two of a list of films and videos about project teams that weren't necessarily meant to be about project teams. Most are available to borrow from the public library, and all are great fun.
Participating in or managing a virtual team presents special communications challenges. Here are some guidelines for communicating with members of virtual teams.
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Managing Virtual Teams for Real Results
Managing global or dispersed teams is challenging — miscommunications, misunderstandings, and interpersonal conflict all thrive in the typical environment of the distributed team. And they're even more common in global teams, because of time-zone offsets and language and cultural differences. We'll inventory the challenges distributed and global teams face, and provide tools for anticipating and addressing them. The focus of this program is practical — attendees will learn concrete techniques for preventing and dealing with the problems that accompany global and distributed teams. Read more about this program. Here are some upcoming dates for this program:
Organizational Politics for People Who Hate Politics
Have you ever felt powerless to implement an important new idea? Have you ever been "blind-sided" at a meeting? Have you ever lost two good employees because you could find no way to keep them from attacking each other? These are some of the issues of organizational politics. Many of us have become enmeshed in them from time to time, but we've also known some people who seem to be able to engage and prosper. How is that done? We'll inventory the challenges of organizational politics, and provide tools for anticipating and addressing them. The focus of this program is practical — attendees learn concrete techniques for dealing with the problems that arise in workplace politics, while keeping their integrity intact. Read more about this program. Here are some upcoming dates for this program:
The Politics of Meetings for People Who Hate Politics
There's a lot more to running an effective meeting than having the right room, the right equipment, and the right people. With meetings, the whole really is more than the sum of its parts. How the parts interact with each other and with external elements is as important as the parts themselves. And those interactions are the essence of politics for meetings. This program explores techniques for leading meetings that are based on understanding political interactions, and using that knowledge effectively to meet organizational goals. Read more about this program. Here's an upcoming date for this program:
Person-to-Person Communication for Project Managers
When we talk, listen, send or read emails, read or write memos, or when we leave or listen to voice mail messages, we're communicating person-to-person. And whenever we communicate person-to-person, we risk being misunderstood, offending others, feeling hurt, and being confused. There are so many ways for things to go wrong that we could never learn how to fix all the problems. A more effective approach avoids problems altogether, or at least minimizes their occurrence. In this very interactive program you'll learn a model of inter-personal communications that can help you stay out of the ditch. In those moments of intense involvement, when we're most likely to slip, you'll have a new tool to use to keep things constructive. Read more about this program. Here are some upcoming dates for this program:
Ever wonder if there isn't a better way to travel? Travel is essential, but the hassles of travel aren't. Read 202 Tips for Business Travel to learn how to convert business travel from a time-wasting hassle to a breeze. Revised and updated for 2008 with 101 new tips! Check it out!
Projects never go quite as planned. We expect that, but we don't expect disaster. How can we get better at spotting disaster when there's still time to prevent it? How to Spot a Troubled Project Before the Trouble Starts is filled with tips for executives, senior managers, managers of project managers, and sponsors of projects in project-oriented organizations. Check it out!
Are you doing work you love? Are you less in love with the job? Bad boss, long commute, troubling ethical questions, hateful colleague? Read Go For It! Sometimes It's Easier If You Run to learn what we can do when we love the work but not the job. It helps you get moving again!
The key to managing virtual or global teams is creating a sense of team despite the obstacles of separation. Read my tips booklet, 303 Tips for Virtual and Global Teams, to learn how to make your virtual global team sing. Newly revised and updated for 2008 with 101 new tips! Check it out!
Are you managing a change effort that faces rampant cynicism, passive non-cooperation, or maybe even outright revolt? Read 101 Tips for Managing Change to learn how to plan and execute your change efforts to inspire real, passionate support. Check it out!
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Do you ever wonder if all these meetings are really necessary? (They aren't) Or whether there isn't some better way to get this work done? (There is) Read 101 Tips for Effective Meetings to learn how to make meetings more productive — and more rare. Check it out!
Exchange your "personal trade secrets" — the tips, tricks and techniques that make you an ace — with other aces, anonymously. Visit the Library of Personal Trade Secrets.
ometimes projects experience setbacks — already-completed work becomes useless after people discover problems that require new approaches incompatible with work completed. When the pattern is common, its source might lie neither in the projects, nor in the teams that experience setbacks. Sometimes, the source of the pattern lies in the culture of the organization, in the way it's run, or in the way people view negative progress itself.
Top 
Next IssueThe information about the Brooklyn Bridge is in a wonderful book by David McCullough, The Great Bridge: The epic story of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1972.
Are your projects always (or almost always) late and over budget? Are your project teams plagued by turnover, burnout, and high defect rates? Turn your culture around. Read 52 Tips for Leaders of Project-Oriented Organizations, filled with tips and techniques for organizational leaders. Order Now!
Status-Report as a Second Language
Discussus Interruptus
Organizational Firefighting
Films Not About Project Teams: Part II
Virtual Communications: Part I
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Ever wonder if there isn't a better way to travel? Travel is essential, but the hassles of travel aren't. Read 202 Tips for Business Travel to learn how to convert business travel from a time-wasting hassle to a breeze. Revised and updated for 2008 with 101 new tips! Check it out!
Projects never go quite as planned. We expect that, but we don't expect disaster. How can we get better at spotting disaster when there's still time to prevent it? How to Spot a Troubled Project Before the Trouble Starts is filled with tips for executives, senior managers, managers of project managers, and sponsors of projects in project-oriented organizations. Check it out!
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Are you doing work you love? Are you less in love with the job? Bad boss, long commute, troubling ethical questions, hateful colleague? Read Go For It! Sometimes It's Easier If You Run to learn what we can do when we love the work but not the job. It helps you get moving again!
The key to managing virtual or global teams is creating a sense of team despite the obstacles of separation. Read my tips booklet, 303 Tips for Virtual and Global Teams, to learn how to make your virtual global team sing. Newly revised and updated for 2008 with 101 new tips! Check it out!
Are you managing a change effort that faces rampant cynicism, passive non-cooperation, or maybe even outright revolt? Read 101 Tips for Managing Change to learn how to plan and execute your change efforts to inspire real, passionate support. Check it out!
A Tip a Day arrives by email each business day. It's 20 to 30 words at most, and gives you a new perspective on the hassles and rewards of work life. Most tips also contain links to related articles. Free!
Do you ever wonder if all these meetings are really necessary? (They aren't) Or whether there isn't some better way to get this work done? (There is) Read 101 Tips for Effective Meetings to learn how to make meetings more productive — and more rare. Check it out!
