Managing your three-ring circus

THE PROJECT manager has never been a highly touted position in information
technology. One reason might be that it requires far more discipline than creativity,
much like being a drill sergeant in the armed forces. Also, it can be detrimental to
your career if you're the manager of a project that fails -- and many do.

The Standish Group, which researches IT project management, reports that only 26
percent of corporate IT projects in 1998 were successful -- completed on time, on
budget, and with all the features originally specified. That number was a big
improvement over the 16 percent success rate in 1994.

These figures may seem depressing, but Standish reports there are several signs
that IT is getting better at projects and the role of the IT project manager is winning
newfound respect, especially since corporate executives gained an appreciation for
their importance during Y2K initiatives. We asked some IT project managers and
consultants to offer their solutions for keeping IT projects on track.

1. Get users involved from the start.

It has almost become a cliche to say you have to have a business "champion" for
your project to succeed. But as important as an executive's backing may be, so is the
involvement of end-users, says David King, director of architecture and strategy at
Enterprise Systems Consulting in Irvine, Calif.

IT staffers don't see business in the same way as users and line managers, King
says. "Left to their own devices, IT people will create the best technical system, but
perhaps not the best system from a business standpoint." When he's called into a
company to fix a project that's gone off the rails, often his audit trail leads to the
fact that they didn't have users on the project team, King says. In fact, there's been
a push in the corporate setting to have a business manager be the project leader,
rather than an IT person. "There has been some resistance to this notion on the IT side
in the past, but that's changing for the better," King says.

2. Choose your project team carefully.

OK, so it's important to include users in project design. But what kind of users
should you be looking for?

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