Project Management at MM2

Weve got a real warm puppy here, Brian Smith told Werner McCann. Make sure

you make the most of it. We could use a winner.

Smith was MMs CIO, and McCann was his top project manager. The puppy in

question was MMs new venture into direct-to-customer marketing of its green meters, a

product designed to help better manage electrical consumption, and the term referred

to the projects wide appeal. The strategy had been a hit with analysts ever since it had

been revealed to the financial community, and the companys stock was doing extremely

well as a result. At last, one had written in his popular newsletter, we have a company

that is willing to put power literally and figuratively in consumers hands. If MM

can deliver on its promises, we fully expect this company to reap the rewards.

Needless to say, the Green project was popular internally, too. Im giving it to you

because you have the most project-management experience weve got, Smith had said.

Theres a lot riding on this one. As he walked away from Smiths office, McCann wasnt

sure whether to feel complimented or terrified. He had certainly managed some successful

projects for the company (previously known as ModMeters) over the past five years

but never anything like this one. Thats the problem with project management, he thought. In

IT almost every project is completely different. Experience only takes you part of the way.

And Green was different. It was the first truly enterprisewide project the company

had ever done, and McCann was having conniptions as he thought about telling

Fred Tompkins, the powerful head of manufacturing, that he might not be able to have

everything his own way. McCann knew that, to be successful, this project had to take an

outside-in approachthat is, to take the end customers point of view on the company.

That meant integrating marketing, ordering, manufacturing, shipping, and service

into one seamless process that wouldnt bounce the customer from one department to

another in the company. MM had always had separate systems for each of its silos,

and this project would work against the companys traditional culture and processes.

The Green project was also going to have to integrate with ITs information management

renewal (IMR) project. Separate silos had always meant separate databases, and

the IMR project was supposed to resolve inconsistencies among them and provide

accurate and integrated information to different parts of the company. This was a huge

political challenge, but, unless it worked, McCann couldnt deliver on his mandate.

Then there was the issue of resources. McCann groaned at the thought. MM had

some good people but not enough to get through all of the projects in the IT plan within

the promised timelines. Because of the importance of the Green project, he knew hed

get good cooperation on staffing, but the fact remained that he would have to go outside

for some of the technical skills he needed to get the job done. Finally, there was the

schedule that had to be met. Somehow, during the preliminary assessment phase, it

had become clear that September 5 was to be the hard launch date. There were good

reasons for thisthe fall was when consumers usually became concerned with their

energy consumptionbut McCann worried that a date barely twelve months from now

would put too much pressure on his team. Weve got to get in there first, before the

competition, Smith had said to him. The board expects us to deliver. Youve got my

backing and the support of the full executive team, but you have to deliver this one.

Six Weeks Later

It was full steam ahead on the Green project. Its amazing what a board mandate and

executive sponsorship can do for a project, thought McCann, who knew how hard it usually

was to get business attention to IT initiatives. He now had a full-time business counterpart,

Raj Sambamurthy. Samba, as he was known to his colleagues, had come out of

Tompkinss division and was doing a fantastic job of getting the right people in the room

to make the decisions they needed to move ahead. The Green steering committee was no

Mickey Mouse group either. Smith, Tompkins, and every VP affected by the project were

meeting biweekly with him and Samba to review every aspect of the projects progress.

McCann had pulled no punches when communicating with the committee.

Youve given me the mandate and the budget to get this project off the ground, he had

told them. But we have to be clear about what were trying to accomplish. Together,

they had hammered out a value proposition that emphasized the strategic value of the

project and some of the measures they would use to monitor its ultimate success. The

requirements and design phase had also gone smoothly because everyone was so motivated

to ensure the projects success. Linking success to all our annual bonuses sure

helped that! McCann had remarked wryly to Samba.

Now McCann was beginning to pull together his dream team of implementers.

The team had chosen a package known as Web-4-U as the front end of the project, but it

would take a lot of work to customize it to suit their unique product and, even more, to

integrate it with MMs outmoded back-end systems. The Web-4-U company was based

in Ireland but had promised to provide 24/7 consultation on an as-needed basis. In

addition, Samba had now assembled a small team of business analysts to work on the

business processes they would need. They were working out of the firms Cloverdale

office, a thirty-minute drive from ITs downtown location. (It was a shame they couldnt

all be together, but space was at a premium at headquarters. McCann made a mental

note to look into some new collaboration software hed heard about.) Now that these

two pieces were in place, McCann felt free to focus on the technical guts of the system.

Maybe this will work out after all, he said.

Three Months to Launch Date

By June, however, McCann was tearing out what little hair was left on his head. He

was seriously considering moving to a remote Peruvian hamlet and breeding llamas.

Anything would be better than this mess, he told Yung Lee, the senior IT architect,

over coffee. They were poring over the projects critical path. The way I see it, Lee

stated matter-of-factly, we have two choices: We can continue with this inferior technology

and meet our deadline but not deliver on our functionality, or we can redo the

plan and go back to the steering committee with a revised delivery date and budget.

McCann sighed. Techies always saw things in black and white, but his world

contained

much more gray. And so much was riding on thiscredibility (his, ITs, the

companys), competitiveness, and stock price. He dreaded being the bearer of this bad

news, so he said, Lets go over this one more time.

Its not going to get any better, but here goes. Lee took a deep breath.

Web-4-U

is based on outmoded technology. It was the best available last year, but this year the

industry has agreed on a new standard, and if we persist in using Web-4-U, we are

going to be out of date before Green even hits the street. We need to go back and completely

rethink our technical approach based on the new standard and then redesign

our Web interface. I know its a setback and expensive, but it has to be done.

How come we didnt know about this earlier? McCann demanded.

Lee replied, When the standard was announced, we didnt realize what the

implications were at first. It was only in our quarterly architecture meeting that the

subject came up. Thats why Im here now. The architects were a breed apart, thought

McCann. All tech and no business sense. Theyd lost almost three months because of

this. By the way, Lee concluded, Web-4-U knew about this, too. Theyre scrambling

to rewrite their code. I guess they figured if you didnt know right away, there would be

more chance of you sticking with them.

The chances of that are slim to none, thought McCann. His next software provider,

whoever that was, was going to be sitting right here under his steely gaze. Seeing an

agitated Wendy Chan at his door, he brought the meeting to a hasty close. Im going

to have to discuss this with Brian, he told Lee. We cant surprise him with this at the

steering committee meeting. Hang tight for a couple of days, and Ill get back to you.

OK, said Lee, but remember that were wasting time.

Easy for you to say, thought McCann as he gestured Chan into his office. She was

his counterpart at the IMR project, and they had always had a good working relationship.

I just wanted to give you a heads-up that weve got a serious problem at IMR that will

affect you, she began. Llamas began prancing into his minds eye. Tompkins is refusing

to switch to our new data dictionary. Weve spent months hammering this out with

the team, but he says he wasnt kept informed about the implications of the changes, and

now hes refusing to play ball. I dont know how he could say that. Hes had a rep on the

team from the beginning, and weve been sending him regular progress reports.

McCann was copied on those reports. Their pages of techno-jargon would put

anyone to sleep! He was sure that Tompkins had never got past the first page of any of

those reports. His rep was a dweeb, too, someone Tompkins thought he could live without

in his daily operations.

Damn! This is something I dont need. Like all IT guys, McCann hated corporate

politics with a passion. He didnt understand them and wasnt good at them. Why

hadnt Samba and his team picked up on this? They were plugged into the business.

Now he was going to have to deal with Chans problem as well as his own if he wanted

to get the Green project going. Their back-end processes wouldnt work at all unless

everyone was using the same information in the same format. Why couldnt Tompkins

see that? Did he want the Green project to fail?

The best way to deal with this one, advised Chan, is to force him to accept

these changes. Go to John Johnson and tell him that you need Tompkins to change his

business processes to fit our data dictionary. Its for the good of the company, after all.

Chans strong suit wasnt her political savvy.

better way. Let me talk to Samba. Hes got his ear to the ground in the business.

Ill speak with him and get back to you.

After a bit of chitchat, Wendy Chan left McCann to his PERT chart, trying again

to determine the extra cost in time if they went with the new technology. Just then

the phone rang. It was Linda Perkins, McCanns newly hired work-at-home usability

designer. She was one of the best in the business, and he was lucky to have snagged her

just coming off maternity leave. His promise of flexible working hours and full benefits

had lured her back to work two months before her year-long leave ended. Youve got

to do something about your HR department! Perkins announced. Theyve just told

me that Im not eligible for health and dental benefits because I dont work on the premises!

Furthermore, they want to classify me as contingent staff, not managerial, because

I dont fit in one of their petty little categories for employees. You promised me that you

had covered all this before I took the job! I gave up a good job at LifeCo so I could work

from home.

McCann had indeed covered this issue in principle with Rick Morrow, ITs HR

representative, but that had been almost eight months ago. Morrow had since left the

firm. McCann wondered if he had left any paperwork on this matter. The HR IT spot

had not yet been filled, and all of the IT managers were upset about HRs unreceptive

attitude when it came to adapting its policies to the realities of todays IT world. OK,

Linda, just hang in there for a day or two and Ill get this all sorted out, he promised.

Hows the usability testing coming along?

Thats another thing I wanted to talk with you about. The teams making changes

to the look and feel of the product without consulting me, she fumed. I cant do my

job without being in the loop. You have to make them tell me when theyre doing things

like this.

McCann sighed. Getting Perkins on the project had been such a coup that he

hadnt given much thought to how the lines of communication would work within

such a large team. I hear you, Linda, and well work this out. Can you just give me a

few days to figure out how we can improve things?

Hanging up, he grabbed his jacket and slunk out of the office as quickly as he

could before any other problems could present themselves. If he just kept walking

south, hed make it to the Andes in three, maybe four, months. He could teach himself

Spanish along the way. At least the llamas would appreciate his efforts! MM could

take its project and give it to some other poor schmuck. No way was he going back! He

walked furiously down the street, mentally ticking off the reasons he had been a fool to

fall for Smiths sweet talk. Then, unbidden, a plan of attack formed in his head. Walking

always did the trick. Getting out of the office cleared his head and focused his priorities.

He turned back the way he had come, now eager to get back in the fray. He had some

things to do right away, and others he had to put in place ASAP.

Discussion Questions

2. Other organizational factors decrease a projects likelihood of success. Identify these

barriers for the Green project.