Calling Project Managers - need some help

[PomBstard]

I'm trying to find a way of improving our Project Management record - its not bad, but we sometimes lose money too easily on some projects, and don't seem to have learned too much from those experiences.

I work for an engineering design consultancy and our current system is based on PMBOK, which is OK if you have PMs capable of picking and using the right bits. I've used PRINCE2 in the UK, which is much more process oriented, and I'm proposing finding a way of inserting bits of PRINCE2 into our process to help. Most of our failings are around proper project control - identifying responsibilities, and planning.

Training is one thing, and lessons-learned is a bit more talking, but I think the process needs a bit of sharpening.

I'm after any experiences, case studies, advice, whatever - grateful for all relevant info. I realise I've not provided too much info to start with - happy to add details as people need, as I'd rather fill in the actual blanks than guess them.

Cheers

[rescynic]

PomBstard said:

I'm trying to find a way of improving our Project Management record - its not bad, but we sometimes lose money too easily on some projects, and don't seem to have learned too much from those experiences.

I work for an engineering design consultancy and our current system is based on PMBOK, which is OK if you have PMs capable of picking and using the right bits. I've used PRINCE2 in the UK, which is much more process oriented, and I'm proposing finding a way of inserting bits of PRINCE2 into our process to help. Most of our failings are around proper project control - identifying responsibilities, and planning.

Training is one thing, and lessons-learned is a bit more talking, but I think the process needs a bit of sharpening.

I'm after any experiences, case studies, advice, whatever - grateful for all relevant info. I realise I've not provided too much info to start with - happy to add details as people need, as I'd rather fill in the actual blanks than guess them.

Cheers

Pom,

I work in project control at present so know the feeling, a few questions to see if i can help in anyway:

- How are the PM's tracking budgets, forecasts and actuals at present? (from your above i would guess either not at all or not very well)
- Do the projects have a project support/ control person or team?
- Do they keep a track of risks, issues & actions, and are these costed?

[V8mate]

Sounds like your planning phase and change control aren't sufficiently robust.

Plenty of PM books out there; or maybe get a training firm to deliver some specific modules?

[Bullett]

Sounds like you are not estimating the workload accurately or not including any contingency.

[GT03ROB]

No.1 : Do your projects have budgets which are based on an adequately detailed SOW, contract & schedule?
No.2 : Are the budgets in sufficient detail to be able to manage?
No.3 : Do you have a change control process, which documents changes in scope, costing basis, etc.?
No.4 : Do your projects periodically do a bottoms-up reforecast irrespective of the change control process?

However.......

Scope control & creep will always be the killer. The rest are just tools to manage it. It is imperative that you drive throughout the project organisation an understanding of the scope & contractual requirements. Project controls are normally an after the event response. You need to drive responsibility for scope control down onto everybodies desk.

[PomBstard]

Thanks rescycnic - some answers!

rescynic said:

Pom,

I work in project control at present so know the feeling, a few questions to see if i can help in anyway:

- How are the PM's tracking budgets, forecasts and actuals at present? (from your above i would guess either not at all or not very well)We have full financial tracking, and are just about to introduce a system with automatic Earned Value Analysis - but its how the PMs understand and use this information
- Do the projects have a project support/ control person or team? No, not yet - on the cards for sometime soon though - what's your experience as a controller?
- Do they keep a track of risks, issues & actions, and are these costed? Kinda sort of - bit of a mish-mash, and some do it better than others depending on their understanding of risk

[PomBstard]

GT03ROB said:

No.1 : Do your projects have budgets which are based on an adequately detailed SOW, contract & schedule?Usually, yes - though some get through...
No.2 : Are the budgets in sufficient detail to be able to manage?Yes - detailed EAC required at the start of each project, and for every change in funding
No.3 : Do you have a change control process, which documents changes in scope, costing basis, etc.? Yes, but its getting the gits to use it!
No.4 : Do your projects periodically do a bottoms-up reforecast irrespective of the change control process?No, not tried this, but use EAC on all projects, and introducing EVA to more

However.......

Scope control & creep will always be the killer. The rest are just tools to manage it. It is imperative that you drive throughout the project organisation an understanding of the scope & contractual requirements. Project controls are normally an after the event response. You need to drive responsibility for scope control down onto everybodies desk. Agree - I think part of our problem is accountability - but I'm not in a position to change that soon. I can make it easier to follow though

[JRM]

As some people have mentioned already, it sound very much to me like you aren't spending enough time on requirements gathering and nailing down the deliver before you start the 'real' work.

I don't know your industry, but with really broad brush strokes look at previous projects and the time spent on Analysis, Build and Testing and try to lump items into those 3 buckets. A basic plan should have all 3 with the same duration - but very rough guide. Even is testing is different in your industry, the time to 'Build' a solution should be similar to the time spent analysing what you are trying to do.

I'd guess from what you are saying that the Anaylsis phase is far too short, or there is not enough control around scope creep and that just needs firm management

[rescynic]

PomBstard said:

Thanks rescycnic - some answers!

rescynic said:

Pom,

I work in project control at present so know the feeling, a few questions to see if i can help in anyway:

- How are the PM's tracking budgets, forecasts and actuals at present? (from your above i would guess either not at all or not very well)We have full financial tracking, and are just about to introduce a system with automatic Earned Value Analysis - but its how the PMs understand and use this information
- Do the projects have a project support/ control person or team? No, not yet - on the cards for sometime soon though - what's your experience as a controller?
- Do they keep a track of risks, issues & actions, and are these costed? Kinda sort of - bit of a mish-mash, and some do it better than others depending on their understanding of risk

As a controller its my experience the PM's need to have their hands held and walked through any processes you have inplace.

we are tasked with helping them forecast their projects, manage budgets and variance we have monthly meetings with the PM's where we go over their project financials

("you have spend X to date, have Y left in budget and are forecasting to spend Z before end, meaning your coming in under/over budget so need to cut some stuff back) alot of them really appreciate this approach as it frees them up from the paperwork to focus on the projects.

As part of the monthly review we also review their risk & issue logs, ensure they are up to date contain accurate costings etc

I agree with the other post re change control, whats the process you use at present? are all changes costed? and are these costs passed onto customers? (i assume you have a number of 'freebies' you cant bill them for) but for the most part pass the costs onto customer?

Edited to add:

- Dont know the systems etc but i think it would be fairly simple for someone in the company to knock together some reports that will give you more focus on the financial side of things.

- Tracking of spend to date (done via Purchase orders etc), variance against budgets etc
- Development of a robust forecasting system
- More controlled project startup including proper project costings/ forecasts (including potential revenues, margins etc
- (depending on change control answer) think the change control system could do with an overhaul, PRINCE 2 has a fairly robust (if i rememebr rightly) change control process,

- Change requests are logged (short form description, nature of change etc)
- Changes are reviewed and costed
- Passed back to customer with results of the review "It will cost you X to implement this do you want to go ahead"
- Change is implemented
- Change is signed off as completed to satisfaction
- Change is billed
- Change is closed.

Edited by rescynic on Wednesday 7th April 12:14

[GT03ROB]

PomBstard said:

GT03ROB said:

No.1 : Do your projects have budgets which are based on an adequately detailed SOW, contract & schedule?Usually, yes - though some get through...
No.2 : Are the budgets in sufficient detail to be able to manage?Yes - detailed EAC required at the start of each project, and for every change in funding
No.3 : Do you have a change control process, which documents changes in scope, costing basis, etc.? Yes, but its getting the gits to use it!
No.4 : Do your projects periodically do a bottoms-up reforecast irrespective of the change control process?No, not tried this, but use EAC on all projects, and introducing EVA to more

However.......

Scope control & creep will always be the killer. The rest are just tools to manage it. It is imperative that you drive throughout the project organisation an understanding of the scope & contractual requirements. Project controls are normally an after the event response. You need to drive responsibility for scope control down onto everybodies desk. Agree - I think part of our problem is accountability - but I'm not in a position to change that soon. I can make it easier to follow though

Ok, well it sounds like the basics are already in place. Assuming you have in place what you say then focussing on systems will not make you any better. What it sounds like is you need to focus on the behavioural side of the problem. This means getting people to recognise this stuff is part of their job & responsibility. How you do that will depend very much on the culture in the company, however irrespective of this a good starting point is ensuring everybody is involved/understands the budgets/scope/schedule. Basically tell them their job is to develop a wonderful design but only within the agreed budget/scope/schedule parameters. This needs to be a carrot & stick approach. The standard project control approach of telling an engineer they are late & over budget won't cut it. The engineers needs to feel part of the process.

The bottoms up reforecast is essential periodically dependeing on the length of the project. The best change control programmes in the world will still miss stuff. It is totally wrong to assume that your current forecast is the sum of all processed changes plus the original budget. If you don't do that bottoms up reforecast you will miss stuff, then wonder why you've overrun forecasts. As a guide on a 3 year project we would probably do 3-4 full reforecasts.

rescynic said:

As a controller its my experience the PM's need to have their hands held and walked through any processes you have inplace.

That really cracked me up. As a PM it's my experience most controls people need their hands held & walked through the scope of the project; what engineering, procurement & construction actually do; then walked through how to control a job without drowning me with 300 page schedule & cost reports with no analysis! That comes from an ex-project controller!

[rescynic]

GT03ROB said:

rescynic said:

As a controller its my experience the PM's need to have their hands held and walked through any processes you have inplace.

That really cracked me up. As a PM it's my experience most controls people need their hands held & walked through the scope of the project; what engineering, procurement & construction actually do; then walked through how to control a job without drowning me with 300 page schedule & cost reports with no analysis! That comes from an ex-project controller!

LOL GTO sounds like we got our PM's and PCM's mixed up somewhere along the line, will swap you a pile of clued up PCM's for a pile of clued up PM's

[spikeyhead]

Do the engineers get any say in the plans at the project start?

Without the buy in from the team doing the work, no atteempt to control them will ever work.

[zippy3x]

How about sacking all the PM's who just sit around writing reports, filling out spreadsheets and think how they can make more work for themselves, and invest the money saved in getting more people who actually do something productive and chargeable?

[Murph7355]

Just reading your original post, it sounds to me like you're expecting a methodology to deliver your projects. It won't.

How many PMs do you have? What sort of experience have they got? What's their delivery track record? How much importance is placed on the individuals (what do you pay them? What part of the project process are they engaged from? Who do the projects report into?).

Too many places rely on methodology boxes being ticked and assume any old resource will be able to deliver as long as they follow the methodology...

Increasingly I am seeing more and more people tout themselves out as project managers when all they really are is project administration resource. No amount of process books will get these type of people successfully delivering projects.

[MoonMonkey]

Agree with the above. My tuppence worth...

Make time for effective post project evaluation / lessons learned and use this as the basis for the next project kick off. Do you follow a formal kick off process where the scope, objectives, key perfomance indicators etc are communicated.

How accurate are your cost estimates? Do you use a front end loading process to nail down cost, scope etc??

Be wary of getting carried away by EVA. It's a good guide / tool but that's all it is. In my experience it means very little the first 20% or so through the job and the final 20% as it's too late by then. However, mgt like SPI, CPI, smilie faces etc etc

Risk mamangement is very important a) to ensure you identify what could go wrong but and what mitigation strategies you may need to employ and b) to ensure you have enough provision if things start to go tits up. In addition don't just focus on costs look at schedule risk as this often gets overlooked and time related costs can then spiral out of control. Don't forget RM also needs to consider any opportunities and should be hand in hand with / value mgt

For effective project control the 2 most important people on the job - besides the PM are your costy and planner.

[PomBstard]

Thanks for all the replies - certainly helping me look inthe right places.

I think our situation is that we have too many design managers who are being allowed to call themselves PMs, and not enough sticks to go with our carrots. I don't think changing our process or methodology will provide all the answers, but some more control and support around the PM might help the organisation to take responsibility rather than just pointing the finger at the PM.

Anyway, I've got some buy-in from the Finance Manager and the State Operations Manager to try some new approaches, so, here goes...