From Military To Management: Effectively Managing Risks And Failures In Project Management

It is common knowledge that hindsight is always 20/20

. Unfortunately, hindsight is nowhere to be found when youre in the thick of a project management failure. Instead, you hear things like, "I should have seen this coming!" or "I knew this might happen!"

There is a way to preemptive these situations and manage risk rather than relying on hindsight to teach us all a lesson. In project management, it is imperative that managers understand how to predict, manage, analyze and minimize failures. Of course, it is impossible to eliminate failures, because it is impossible to eliminate risk, but both of these factors can be managed.

In the 1940s, the U.S. Military used a method referred to as FMEA (Failure Modes and Effect Analysis). This approach focused efforts on looking for any of the following:

1. Possible defects in the design of a product;

2. Shortcomings of a service rendered; or

3. Flaws in a manufacturing process.

Fifty years later, this same method was used by IBM to monitor the likely failures of their new hard disk drive.

The idea of this method is to consider any design or process as something that is bound to fail in one way or another. If you can anticipate all the possible areas of failure, you can keep yourself one step ahead in predicting, managing and minimizing risk. Using this method involved asking how can we make this fail? rather than what could possibly go wrong? By predicting failures before they happen, rather than analyzing them after they occur, you can work towards zero defect and maximum efficiency.

Working to predict and anticipate potential pitfalls is only one piece of the risk management puzzle. The other part is contingency planning. Plan B should always be part of your plan and should be followed by Plan C, D, and possibly E. Backup plans are a necessity and should be discussed as often as possible, so team members can contribute and suggest alternatives. The more people you have thinking of alternative plans, the more likely youll be prepared to handle unexpected problems. In addition to having a plan B, you need to know when and how to switch to plan B if necessary. At what point do you determine that Plan B is necessary? This needs to be decided beforehand to avoid the "fire-fighting" response to project risks.

The failures anticipated, the Plan Bs created and the unexpected problems will change and fluctuate throughout the life of your project. A new competitor might move in, customers demands change, technology moved forward. While risk cannot be eliminated, some studies show that up to 90% of project problems can be handled effectively by using proactive risk management.

by: PMCAMPUS

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