Project Planning - A Creative Adventure

To All Presenters:

An associate of mine has a poster on his wall that reads something to the effect of, "Don't do project planning - this way failure can just sneak up on you and you avoid many months of worry."

I find project management to be a pretty interesting creative exercise - especially when it comes to risk management. The need to think about what could go wrong, and what could be done to mitigate risk in each case is to me, the modern day business version of a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book.

What happens if the vendor suddenly goes out of business?

What happens if we get hit by a seasonal natural disaster and have to close for a week mid-project?

What happens if the project is delayed past the target date?

What if the current system fails before the replacement is in place?

At a minimum - do we have a plan "B", "C' and "D" for all possible contingencies?

To go into the cave turn to page 16. To walk past the cave turn to page 22.

Discussions around risk and "what ifs" are opportunities to examine the creative thinking / level of paranoia that exists within stakeholders or members of the project team as well. I find sales people are the greatest source of obscure apocalyptic scenarios. If there is an opportunity for me to have to develop a "what if" strategy around alien invasion - it likely originates in a meeting with sales.

So while creativity in this instance generates unnecessary work - it also gives the project manager a chance to flex their creative muscles in turn.

So . . . project planning, who knows where that road may take you.

THE POINT: Creative adventure awaits, all it takes is a little planning.