Project behind schedule: the phenomenon of procrastination

Project start: Every beginning is difficult

If we assume that clients who are willing to invest want to commission a project manager and if we also assume the ideal constellation that the clients have also commissioned the project manager in the project vision phase - i.e. initially with the project idea - then the following process will usually take place:

The project management team analyzes the degree of completion of the project and, in particular, the status of the user requirements. Are the client's requirements and specifications known to the extent that a planning team can start planning the building? In most cases, the answer is: No! But not only that. As a rule, we are a long way from having reliable and consistent planning requirements.

Announcing the results of their initial analysis usually makes the project management team “unpopular” at first. Not only are there many tasks to be completed on the client's side, but these tasks, and even more so the results, often mean that the planned deadlines and costs are no longer realistic. Disillusionment sets in. It is good if this disillusionment leads to the realization that the deficits must be dealt with now and with the appropriate manpower. It is not uncommon for a tough process to begin at this point. The company was not even aware of the issues, does not have the specialist staff or does not have the capacity to deal with them.

The repression is omnipotent

Unfamiliar and unpopular tasks have to be completed. But true to the adapted principle: “What you can do today, ... put off until the day after tomorrow”, the tasks are all postponed until later. It is still comparatively easy to follow the market's simple call for more production capacity. It's about expanding what you can do, what you know and what you've always done. The situation is different when you have to look to the future with significant changes in content. What will the marketing strategy of the next 20 years look like? Do new products need to be added to the portfolio? Do I need a different production environment?

Admittedly, these tasks are difficult. Who likes to look into a crystal ball, who likes to think intensively about what might happen to the company in the future? This task is associated with uncertainties, imprecise forecasts - sometimes even with the realization that you don't even know how a certain market segment will develop. The task becomes an unpopular topic. The answers cannot be given reliably and with certainty. Management feels increasingly under pressure to decide something that it does not want to decide. The displacement mechanism sets in mercilessly!

As if this task is not already difficult enough, the project management also comes along and asks for specific technical requirements derived from the vision for the future. Specific requirements that are the basic prerequisites for a conventional start to planning with architects, structural engineers, technical building services planners, etc.

• Has the company's own process and workflow been verified and checked for future viability?
• Is the concept of space-relevant functions available? Do you know the requirements of these areas in terms of load-bearing capacity, hall height, etc.?
• Do you know the requirements for the production environment (climate, cleanliness, etc.)?
• Are the technical requirements clear (list of machinery, facility-utility matrix, media requirements, etc.)?
• Have the expected personnel numbers been estimated for the new conditions

Project coordination experience:

We repeatedly find that planning processes are started without this knowledge. It goes without saying that the planning team will ask for concrete specifications. This is in the na-ture of the task. It also goes without saying - actually - that the clients can only provide the answer if the preliminary thinking has been done by the client.

You might think that we are repeating platitudes here. In fact, our experience is that the client's thought process is shifted to the planning phase. The flash of inspiration that you cannot or do not want to achieve yourself is shifted to the planning team or to a phase where it should have been thought of long ago. The process of suppressing difficult decisions causes damage. The planning process comes to a standstill due to a lack of decisions. It is important to realize that the process of catching up on thinking generally leads to changes in requirements. Requirements that are rarely lower than previously known. They usually become higher. You can guess what is happening now. The budget and schedule are no longer correct.

Is it a platitude, a completely clear connection that we are writing about? Yes, it is. But it happens again and again and is one of the main reasons for escalating costs and project delays. That's why we keep revisiting the topic.

The way out of procrastination

Displacement mechanisms are human. Everyone knows them. They are also not completely avoidable. They become a problem when the repression occurs out of ignorance; quasi unconsciously. If you don't even realize that the task needs to be dealt with now and not later. Then the hurdle to postponing an unpopular topic is very low.

How can you avoid this extremely project-damaging development?

There is only one way and there is no alternative: the project must be supported from the outset by a project management team with experience in these issues. This can come from within the company's own ranks, provided the specialist knowledge and capacities are available. Or it must be supplemented by external project management. In Germany, external support is referred to as project management.