This is a true story. The company name
has been changed.
Background
Acme Corporation had a six-month
project under way to implement a new Logistics system. In order to streamline
and to take advantage of the new system’s features, the business processes were
being reviewed and modified as part of the implementation.
On the project team, the business was
represented by the Logistics Manager and two supervisors from her department. These team
members were very good choices. The manager, who was acting as an adviser with
a significant time commitment, was experienced and knew the organization and
its needs well. Both supervisors were power users, with good problem solving
skills, as well as in-depth knowledge of the current system and department
practices. They were the hands-on active participants on the team.
The first three months of the
implementation of Logistics went very well, with no unusual problems.
The takeover
Then, Acme started planning the
takeover of a competitor. The project sponsor needed the Logistics manager to
assist in evaluation of the target company’s operations, so she removed the
Logistics Manager from the project. The sponsor also announced that she really wouldn't
have time to continue her project sponsor role.
The project manager urged the sponsor
to provide a new adviser and new sponsor to the project. When that was denied,
he asked for the project to be delayed or paused during the takeover.
However, the sponsor had been impressed
with the progress to date on the Logistics project. The team seemed to be doing
very well, and replacing the manager was not a priority. The sponsor also felt
that the essential team members were the two supervisors, as they were the
doers on the team.
The takeover would require many company
resources, and the sponsor couldn't see the point in keeping unnecessary
resources on a project that was doing just fine.
The manager and the project sponsor
were unavailable to the team for the remaining three months of the project, in
order to work on the takeover planning, and the resulting acquisition.
The outcome
The implementation team managed to
finish the project on time and on budget without the manager, and without any
further input from the project sponsor.
When the new system went live, the
users in Logistics were very pleased with the results. The new business
processes were easily put into practice, and the new system provided much
needed functionality for the department.
The project manager heard from the
project sponsor after go-live on the new Logistics system. The sponsor was very
upset, as she had been receiving calls from irate plant managers. Several of
the reports used in the plants no longer provided the level of detail they used
to.
Investigation determined that the
design and configuration of the Logistics module had eliminated the detail that
the plant managers had relied on in their reports. Several of the reports were
essential to plant operations.
Re-work of some business processes and
system design decisions began immediately and took two and a half months to
complete.
Some of the updated business processes were
awkward, due to the difficulty of retrofitting an already-configured system. As
a result, the anticipated benefit from re-designed business processes was not
fully realized.
Conclusion
The loss of the Logistics Manager had
been significant, as she had been knowledgeable about the needs of the
organization outside of the Logistics department. Without her, the plant
managers’ reporting requirements had been neglected. In addition, the lack of project
sponsorship during the same time meant that there was no high level review of
the decisions being made by the team.
Management commitment is critical to a
successful project. The sponsor’s first mistaken assumption was that the
project would continue to succeed without her commitment and without her
supporting the manager’s time spent on the project.
The sponsor’s second incorrect
assumption was that the doers were the only important team members, and that
the team could do without the adviser and the involvement of the sponsor.
Unfortunately, the sponsor made a third
mistake. She assumed that since the project was already going well, that it
would continue to do well without key resources. These were incorrect
assumptions.
Copyright
2015 Debbie Gallagher
