Estimating is hard enough. It is even harder if you are not prepared. Estimating a 20 hour chunk of work is not so hard. Estimating for full projects or large chunks of work can be challenging. Templates can help, but consider the following steps before you begin the estimating process.

Get a clear picture of the work that is being estimated

Many problems with estimation come because the estimator is not really sure what the work entails. You should avoid estimating work that you do not understand. This should not imply that you can know every detail. The estimating contingency is a way to reflect some of this remaining uncertainty.

Determine who should be involved in the estimating process

The project manager may or may not know enough to make the estimates on his or her own. It is usually a good practice to look for estimating help from team members, clients, subject matter experts, etc. This will usually result in the estimates being far more accurate than you would get by yourself.

Determine if there are any estimating constraints

If there are estimating constraints, it is important to know them up-front. For instance, the end-date may be fixed (timeboxed). You should also know if the client expects Six-Sigma level quality in the deliverables, or if the 80/20 rule will apply. It is possible that there may be a fixed budget that cannot be increased. (This would be of interest so that you can reduce the scope of work, if necessary, to meet the fixed budget.) Knowing these constraints will help the estimators make valid assumptions regarding the cost, duration and quality balance.

Determine multiple estimating techniques to utilize if possible

There are a number of techniques that can be used to estimate work. If possible, try to use two or more techniques for the estimate. If the estimates from multiple techniques are close, you will have more confidence in your numbers. If the estimates are far apart, you need to review the numbers to see if you are using similar assumptions. In this case, you can also try to utilize a third (and fourth) estimating technique to see if one initial estimate can be validated and the other rejected.

Document all assumptions

You will never know all the details of a project. Therefore, it is important to document all the assumptions you are making along with the estimate.

When was the last time you rode in a car with wheels that were not properly aligned? Chances are it was a pretty rough ride. The car either pulled in one direction, making it hard work to keep it in your lane, or, it worked against itself as one tire pointed one way and another tire another way.

The same thing can happen in our companies. The ride can be pretty bumpy, not to mention noisy, unless everyone is pointed in the same direction. That’s why it’s important to understand the five benefits of an aligned organization

Benefit #1 – Ensures Everyone Works on the Right Things

The first benefit of an aligned organization is that with a common goal for everyone to strive towards, the right things are worked on. Here’s the trick – you need make sure that everyone clearly understands the goal and the end game. The best way to accomplish this is to clearlycommunicate the strategy of the company. What are the three to five most important things your company is working on? Once those are communicated and understood, you can then align everyone’s activity to accomplish those initiatives.

Benefit #2 – More is Accomplished

An aligned organization is structured and disciplined. This doesn’t mean the company lacks creativity or is oppressive. Rather, it means that projects not aligned with company strategy are not allowed to infiltrate the company. Alignment allows resources to stay focused on the tasks at hand and not waste time on other distractions.

Benefit #3 – Teamwork Increases

A third benefit of alignment in the organization is increased camaraderie. The ‘us’ versus ‘them’ mentality is nipped in the bud while everyone works toward the same goals together. Departments and groups of people that are not properly aligned have a tendency to look after their own interests. This will still occur in the aligned organization, but there is also more of, “what can I do to help?” Team members in the aligned organization realize that everyone must cross the finish line at the same time in order for the project to be successful.

Benefit #4 – Profitability Rises

An aligned company is a company that runs efficiently. Engaged teams that are working on the right things are naturally going to get more done. Getting more done in less time results in increased profitability. There are fewer misunderstandings and mistakes – and rework is few and far between. Alignment helps keep resource costs in check, and reduces expenses, both of which are areas that impact the bottom line.

Benefit #5 – Opportunities Abound

People like working with people and companies that have a track record of success. The aligned organization will have plenty of success stories to tell. That credibility allows salespeople to sell more, executives to explore new strategies, and managers to optimize opportunities. It generates more top-line revenue that ultimately trickles down to the bottom line.

A car that is not aligned will still run; however, the ride is rough and it’s not very efficient on gas. Once aligned, the car rides much more smoothly and fuel efficiency increases dramatically. Your company can still run if it’s not aligned, just not very efficiently. Take the time to align your organization and begin realizing the benefits!

Sometimes the project manager places too high an expectation on the amount of foresight and vision that customers and sponsors have. In many cases, the project manager will go to the customer looking for answers to help define the project and the customer will not have all of the information needed. This happens all the time and it does not mean that the customer does not know what they are doing. In many cases, especially for large projects, the customer has a vision of what the end results will be, but cannot yet articulate this vision into concrete objectives, deliverables and scope. 

There are three approaches for when you don’t know very much information on the nature of the project.

Increase Estimating Range Based on Uncertainty

Based on having less than complete information, the  project manager may feel the need to guess on the details. This is not a good solution. It is better to state up-front everything that you know, as well as everything that you do not know. If you are asked to come up with estimated effort, cost and duration, you will need to provide a high and low range based on the uncertainty remaining. On a normal project, for instance, you might estimate the work within +/- 10%. On a project with a lot of uncertainty, the estimating range might be +/- 50%. 

Break the Work into Smaller Projects

Another good alternative is simply to break the work down into a series of smaller projects based on what you know at the time. Even if the final results cannot be clearly defined, there should be some amount of work that is well defined, which will, in turn lead to the information needed for the final solution. You can define a project to cover as far as you can comfortably see today. Then define and plan subsequent projects to cover the remaining work as more details are known.  For instance, you could create a project that gathered business requirements, and then use the results of that project to define a second project to build the final deliverables. 

Uncover the Details as the Project Progresses

If you are not allowed to break the project into smaller pieces, you should at least know enough that you can plan the work for the first 90 days. In this third approach, you plan the short-term work in more detail, and leave the longer term effort more undefined. Each month you should redefine and plan the remaining work. As you uncover more and more information, you can plan the remaining work at a more detailed level. As you uncover more details, you can refine your estimates and work with the sponsor to make sure it is still okay to continue.

This last approach uses an Agile philosophy. Agile projects are generally exploratory. The details of the project are uncovered as the project progresses. (There are many more differences in Agile projects, but this philosophy is one.) In a traditional project management model this would also be known as ‘progressive elaboration’ – which also means more details are uncovered as the project progresses.  

A Primer on Processes and Templates

Recipes for cooking are a beautiful thing. A recipe tells you the ingredients and how much of each you should include in whatever you are making. It then describes what you need to do to these ingredients in order to make a dish that is not only edible, but tasty as well. It’s great that someone else has already spent the time in putting together a recipe to follow that nearly guarantees success each time.
To a certain extent we use recipes in our profession as project managers. The recipes we follow are the processes and templates that guide our projects to success each time. How can you put a process together and make the most of templates? Consider the following:
A Primer on Processes and Templates

Start with Phases

To put a process together, a good starting place is defining the major phases in which a project must go through. Think about how a project moves through your organization, and document those major steps. For example, a simplified software development approach would include the following phases: Planning, Design, Development, Testing, and Implementation. These phases are the framework in which you begin filling in details about the process.

Move on to the Outputs
The next area to concentrate on is the outputs, or end results, from each of these major phases. Ask yourself what tangible deliverable needs to be complete by the time you finish the Planning, Design, or Development phases. Focus on tangible results, or something you can see, touch, perform an action on, or feel. For example, the Planning stage is going to be filled with meetings and conversations that by themselves do nothing to move the project forward. However, the approved Business Requirements Document is an invaluable output that can propel the project forward to the next Phase of Design.

Back up to Inputs

Now that you have the tangible end results (or deliverables) of each phase defined, ask yourself what needs to be present at the beginning of each phase to create such results. Continuing with our example above, the output of the Development phase would be software functionality that can be tested. In order to accomplish this, the engineering team will need High Level and Low Level design specifications as Input. This will allow them to know not just what they are going to build, but more importantly, how they are going to build it.

Establish Conversion Activity

You now have the Inputs and the Outputs for each of the phases of your process. The final step is to determine what needs to be done to convert the Inputs to Outputs. Think about it this way…what has to be done to change the gooey mess of runny batter into a cake? You need to bake the cake. There’s your conversion activity. Likewise, what do you need to do to convert software that is ready to be tested to software that is production ready? You need to create test plans, execute test plans, and document the results.

What About Templates?

Templates are incredibly useful for all areas of process you create. You can use templates for your inputs (i.e. Business Requirements Document), your Outputs (i.e. an approved User Acceptance document from the customer) and all points in between. Create templates that will provide consistency and make it easy to transition from one phase to the next with confidence.

One word of caution when it comes to process and templates…don’t overdo it! Create just enough process and documentation around your project to float the boat. It can be tempting to have a process or template in place for every little thing. Resist that urge. Remember, too much of a good thing can ruin a good thing. Stick to the recipe and you’ll be able to guarantee consistent results time and time again!

The larger your project gets, the more you will find that the issues you encounter are political in nature. “Politics” is all about interacting with people and influencing them to get things done. This can be a good thing, a bad thing, or a neutral thing, depending on the tactics people use. Let’s consider some examples of how utilizing political skills might be good, but can also be bad.

• You are able to move your ideas forward in the organization and get people to act on them (good), by currying favor, suppressing other opposing ideas and taking credit for the ideas of your staff (bad).
• You have an ability to reach consensus on complex matters with a number of different stakeholders (good),by working behind the scenes with people in power, making deals and destroying people who don’t get on board (bad).
• You receive funding for projects that are important to you and to your organization (good), by misrepresenting the costs and benefits, and by going around the existing funding processes (bad).

The point of the examples is to show that influencing people and getting things done in a company is a good thing and “office politics” can have good connotations or bad. 

Dealing with office politics is not a standard project management process. However, once the politics start to impact the project adversely, the situation should be identified as an issue, since it is a problem whose resolution is outside the control of the project team. You can’t utilize a checklist to resolve political issues. Political problems are people-related and situational. What works for one person in one situation may not work for another person in the same situation because people, and their reactions, are different. Identifying the problem as an issue will bring visibility to the situation and hopefully get the proper people involved in the resolution. Keep three things in mind to manage a political issue.

• Try to recognize situations and events where politics are most likely to be involved. This could include decision points, competition for budget and resources, and setting project direction and priorities.
• Deal with people openly and honestly. When you provide an opinion or recommendation, express the pros and cons to provide a balanced view to other parties. Make sure you distinguish the facts from your opinions so the other parties know the difference. 
• If you feel uncomfortable with what you are asked to do, get your sponsor or your functional manager involved. They tend to have more political savvy and positional authority, and they should be able to provide advice and cover for you.
  

If you feel good about what you are doing, how you are influencing and how you are getting things done, then you are probably handling office politics the right way. If you feel guilty about how you are treating people and if you have second thoughts about the methods you are using to get things done, you are probably practicing the dark side of office politics.

Mistake #2: Poor scope management practices

Managing scope is one of the most critical aspects of managing a project. However, if you have not done a good job of defining scope, managing scope will be almost impossible. The purpose of defining scope is to clearly describe and gain agreement on the logical boundaries and deliverables of your project. The business requirements are gathered to provide more detail on the characteristics of the deliverables.

Defining scope means that you have defined the project boundaries and deliverables, and the product requirements. These should all be approved by your sponsor.

The project manager and project team must realize that there is nothing wrong with changing scope – as long as the change is managed. If you cannot accommodate change, the final solution may be less valuable than it should be, or it may, in fact, be unusable.

Every project should have a process in place to manage change effectively. The process should include identifying the change, determining the business value of the change, determining the impact on the project and then taking the resulting information to the project sponsor for their evaluation. The sponsor can determine if the change should be included. If it is included, then the sponsor should also understand the impact on the project, and allocate the additional budget and time needed to include the change.

The most common problems with scope change management are:

• Not having the baseline scope approved, which makes it difficult to apply scope change management.
• Not managing small scope changes leaving yourself open to “scope creep”.
• Not documenting all changes – even small ones.
• Having the project manager make scope change decisions instead of the sponsor (or designee).

If you find that your project is starting to trend over its budget and schedule, try to find the cause. In many cases you will find that you are simply taking on more work than you originally agreed to. If you do not have a good scope change process in place, it is never too late to start.

If you are a project manager dealing with what you perceive to be an unrealistic budget, the first thing you will want to do is discuss this with your sponsor to see if there are any factors that are driving the project budget. For instance, there may be budgetary restrictions. If you are a vendor, it is possible your sales people committed to a fixed price for the project. In some cases your manager or sponsor might set an arbitrary budget without much justification. It does not necessarily make your challenge any easier, but you may find that by better understanding the reason for the fixed budget, you may have an easier time getting yourself and your team members motivated to achieve it. When you have a full project management methodology you will have tools and techniques to respond to these concerns.  There are a number of responses to a project with unrealistic budgets.

• Reduce scope. Talk to your sponsor about reducing the project scope. See if there are features and functionality that he can live without for now so that you can deliver the project within the budget specified.
• Identify and manage the budget as a project risk. Utilizing risk management will help better manage expectations early in the project and also be a way to gather input and ideas for ways that you might be able to hit the budget.
• Manage scope with zero tolerance. On many projects, you start with an aggressive budget and the situation gets worse because the project manager does not effectively manage scope. If you are on a project with an unrealistic budget to begin with, it is absolutely critical that you manage scope effectively and do not increase scope without an approved scope change request. Disciplined scope management will ensure that you only have to deliver what was originally promised, and that any approved changes are accompanied by a corresponding increase in budget and timeline.
• Look for process improvement opportunities. Lastly, take an honest look at your budget and your approach for executing the project. Talk to your team, clients, and manager about any ideas they may have for executing the project at a cheaper cost. This will get everyone thinking about being part of a solution. For instance, perhaps you could buy used equipment that will still meet your needs instead of new equipment. Perhaps you can change the process for gathering requirements so that they are competed earlier. This may result in budget savings as well.

Although it appears that you are being held accountable for budgets that are not within your control, you do have control over the processes you use to manage the project. Look at all aspects of project management to see if the unrealistic budget can be achieved.

Perhaps the place to start is to understand whether there are employees available in the time-frame needed for your project. It usually doesn’t make sense to hire contract people when you have employees that are available and otherwise would have nothing to do (assuming the employees have “close-enough” skills).

Let’s assume that you do not have current employees available to staff your new project. Let’s also say you work for an organization that is open to utilizing contractors or hiring employees depending on the needs of the specific project. Let’s look at some of the criteria that you can use to make the hiring decision.

• Urgency. If you need to get started very quickly, you may need to hire contractors. In most organizations you can put a call out to the local contract companies and be interviewing people in a couple days. Most organizations can’t (and don’t want to) hire employees that quickly.

• Length of the need. If you need a resource for a short, finite duration, then a contractor may be the way to go. You can bring them in for a short contract and then release them when the work is done. If you have a full-time, long-term need, an employee would make more sense.
• Strategic vs. non-strategic work. Many companies identify certain types of work to be more strategic that other types. For instance, many companies chose to staff the senior project positions, like the project manager, with employees, and are more willing to use contract labor to assist with project team members.
• Skills and knowledge needed. Many companies make decisions about staff based on the type of skills needed. For instance, if you are moving into a new technology or new equipment, you may hire contractors that already have the expertise. If the skill is needed long-term you might want to transition in some employees so that they can learn the new skills before the contract staff leave.

• Confidentiality. Many companies chose to staff positions with employees if the project team will handle confidential or proprietary information. There is a sense that the information might not be confidential once the contractor leaves the company.

• Cost. With a contractor, you typically pay a higher hourly rate, but only for the length of time the contractor is needed. Employees may cost less in the short-term, but you are taking on a long-term cost commitment.

If you look at the decision criteria above, you can see that much of the answer for using employees of contractors comes down to risk. If a project is short, it might be risky to hire an employee since you may not be sure if you can keep the employee busy long term. If the project involves core skills to your organization, confidential information, or is strategic to your business, it may be too risky to hire a contactor.

Organizations tend to keep a leaner staff of core employees these days. The core staff stays relatively constant from year to year, while increases in workloads are staffed through contract resources.