How Do You Determine Project Success?
Is fulfilling the triple constraints sufficient to determine if a project is successful? I asked this question of PM students in my online course about management and leadership in a project environment:
“I worked a project that had rules in place by upper management when I arrived that said that if you used a tool to do your job, you were not invited to meetings and your input was not required. Basically you were a tool jockey and you had nothing to contribute. Management felt that if you weren’t at your desk running your tool, you weren’t producing. If you showed up for a meeting, you were asked to leave embarrassing you to the point where you wouldn’t make that mistake again. The project failed.”
“No, a project can be completed on time, under estimated costs and within scope but with the wrong level of quality, without satisfying the customers needs and/or by misinterpreting the customers' needs and developing requirements to solve a different problem.”
Another question: What criteria might evaluate project success more accurately, as reflected in actual practices? How does your organization describe success?
“In addition to the triple constraint elements, project success can be defined as the willingness and acceptance of management and end users to adopt the developed changes (in processes and systems), adaptability of project deliverables to accommodate to different external and internal factors.
For example, a new system is developed to capture regulatory data requirements on time, within budget and for the right audience. However, the system is not easily modified to accommodate a change in the forms established by the regulatory agency. In this case, the organization has no control over the regulatory requirements (external factor); if the system can't be easily modified it would become obsolete fairly quickly.
Another example is for restaurants developing state of the art POS (Point Of Sale) software to later realize that simple tasks such as adding more items after the check was closed is not allowed.”
“I don’t believe that fulfilling the triple constraints is
the only factor in determining whether a project is successful. There are many
other factors that contribute to success. Also, depending on who you ask, you
will always get a different answer. You may have successfully avoided any
issues with the triple constraint, but worked your team to the point of
quitting. Understanding human factors definitely help determine success. Also,
you must know how to manage your stakeholders’ expectations. Sometimes we have
had stakeholders that don’t really understand what they actually want out of
the project even though it is already defined. They have an idea in their heads
and when we give them the finished product they aren’t happy even though it fits
within the scope, budget and timeframe.
Sadly, my organization judges success by the amount of
noise we hear from our customers after a project is complete. If they aren’t
bugging us about the project and they don’t complain to upper management, then
we were successful.”
To which I add this note: The comment was prefaced with
"Sadly," but the point is extremely viable. These expectations are
often the factors that determine project success, in spite of all other factors
we work on. When we pay attention and observe that practices like lack of
customer noise are perceived as important within the organization, then we can
place extra effort to attend to those factors. Doing this is part of the
reality that makes for mature and more consistently successful PMs. I agree
that success is largely determined by human factors.
Taking a high level view of key factors these PMs identified for success
and failure factors, I'd say the aspect they have in common is that they all
are about PEOPLE. People do matter. Projects typically do not fail or succeed
because of technical factors or because we can't get electrons traveling faster
than the speed of light; they fail or succeed depending on how well people work
together. When we lose sight of the importance of people issues, such as
clarity of purpose, effective and efficient communications, and management
support, then we are doomed to struggle. Engaged people find ways to work
through all problems. Our challenge as leaders is to create environments for
people to do their best work.
Meeting the triple constraints is just a starting point. Sometimes you can be
right on scope, schedule, and resources, and still fail to be successful,
perhaps because the market changed, or a competitor outdid you, or a client
changed its mind. You could also miss on all constraints but still have a
successful project when viewed over time, as witness the Sydney Opera House in
Australia.
Here’s my suggestion of an overarching criteria for project success: check with
key stakeholders and ask for their definitions of success. Pin them down to one
key area each. You may get some surprising replies like, "Don't embarrass
me." "Keep out of the newspaper." "Just get something
finished." Integrate the replies and work to make that happen. Having this
dialog early in the project life cycle provides you with clear marching orders.
Randy Englund, Englund Project Management Consultancy, www.englundpmc.com
