98.8%! Is project failure
acceptable & inevitable?
Paul Summers
The Standish Group
• 98.8% project failure – April 2014 when
measured against six criteria as follows:
• Cost
• Time
• Value
• Scope
• Customer satisfaction
• Strategic objectives
The Standish Group success criteria
• Failure when the project is cancelled before
completion,
• Success is delivery on time, in budget and with
all features,
• Challenged is anything in between these two
outcomes,
Top five reasons for failure
• Lack of user input;
• Incomplete requirements and
specifications;
• Changing requirements and
specifications;
• Lack of executive support;
• Technology incompetence
Flyvbjerg
• Underestimated costs and overestimated
benefits
• Use of deception and lying
• Grouped as forecasting errors
• The common denominator?
• Not the project manager’s fault!
Nelson’s retrospectives
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Poor estimating or scheduling;
Ineffective stakeholder management;
Insufficient risk management
Insufficient planning;
Short changed quality assurance;
The big issue?
• No one considers WHY?
• Why is planning poor?
• What are the conditions which are
causing ineffective engagement with
stakeholders?
• Why does the system promote
forecasting errors?
Project manager’s lens
• The reasons for failure are being viewed through the
lens of an inappropriate albeit widespread definition
of projects; an output delivered against targets of cost
and time. The project manager’s perspective.
• “A project is a temporary organisation that is created
for the purpose of delivering one or more business
products according to an agreed Business case.”
(Office of Government Commerce, 2009)
• “A project is a temporary endeavour undertaken to
produce a unique product, service or result.” Project
Management Institute (PMI,2008)
Project boundary
Change the lens
• If the lens is altered to delivering beneficial change
then the lists of reasons become symptoms of a
limiting worldview caused by pursuing these targets.
• “The Standish Group believes that organizations
should forget the triple constraints and focus on the
value of their project portfolio, not individual
projects.”
• The business manager’s perspective
Business lens
• Projects are defined as a temporary
endeavour comprising activities with
resource constraints with the purpose of
realising benefits.
• Projects are investments and should be
managed as such.
• Projects are not just outputs, we must
consider the totality of the project
Conclusion
• Too much of project failure and success
is viewed from the perspective of the
project manager
• Projects need a systemic view to include
the achievement of benefits
• Project definitions need to broaden to
include benefits
References
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Flyvbjerg, B. (2013). Quality control and due diligence in project management:
Getting decisions right by taking the outside view. International Journal of
Project Management, 31(5), 760-774. doi: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2012.10.007
Flyvbjerg, B. (2014). What You Should Know About Megaprojects and Why: An
Overview. Project Management Journal, 45(2), 6-19. doi: 10.1002/pmj.21409
Flyvbjerg, B., Bruzelius, N., & Rothengatter, W. (2003). Megaprojects and risk An
anatomy of ambition (1st ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Flyvbjerg, B., & Budzier, A. (2011). Why Your IT Project May Be Riskier Than You
Think. Harvard Business Review, 1 - 4.
Flyvbjerg, B., Garbuio, M., & Lovallo, D. (2009). Delusion and Deception in Large
Infrastructure Projects: Two Models for Explaining and Preventing Executive
Disaster. California Mangement Review, 51(2), 170-193. doi: 10.1225/CMR423
Nelson, R. R. (2005). Project retrospectives: evaluating project success, failure,
and everything in between. MIS Quarterly Executive, 4(3 September), 361 - 372.
Nelson, R. R. (2007). IT Project Management: Infamous Failures, Classic Mistakes,
and Best Practctices. MIS Quarterly Executive, 6(2 June).
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The Standish Group. (1995). The CHAOS report.
The Standish Group. (1996). Unfinished Voyages A Follow-Up to The CHAOS
Report. http://www.umflint.edu/~weli/courses/bus381/assignment/vo.pdf
The Standish Group. (1999). CHAOS 1999.
The Standish Group. (2009). CHAOS Summary 2009. Retrieved 14 June, 2011,
from http://www.standishgroup.com/newsroom/chaos_2009.php
The Standish Group. (2013). The CHAOS manifesto 2013.
The Standish Group. (2014a, 1 April 2014). Definition of Project Success.
Retrieved from http://blog.standishgroup.com/news
The Standish Group. (2014b). SURF. Retrieved 6 May, 2014, from
http://blog.standishgroup.com/surf