7 Reasons Why Project Managers Fail & What to do about it.

Although failure is a crucial part of us learning & growing, who are we kidding? No one likes it.

I’ve managed hundreds of projects, across industries, around the globe. There aren’t ONLY 7 reasons why Project Managers fail; listed below are simply the most common reasons as to why they fail that I’ve come across.

By identifying our failure points in project management, we can work to prevent them, which is why each common failure has a few ways you can prevent or resolve. I hope you find the below useful in preventing your own project failure.

1.Lack of Relentless Discipline. As a project manager, it's important to follow up regularly with team members and stakeholders to ensure that projects stay on track. Being clear and consistent is not an option; it's a life raft.

Resolve by:

• Establishing a communication cadence. Templatize your communication and create a schedule for consistency. This allows team members to see & acknowledge the pattern and begin acting proactively.
• Using project management software to streamline communication and accountability.
• Cutting out email distractions. Pick times to check email throughout the day - don't keep the tab open. Only open an email if you have time in that moment to respond.
• Ensuring every task includes an action, a person assigned, and a due date.

2. Lacks team trust. If the team doesn’t trust the project manager, the project is going to fail. Why? A couple of reasons stand out:

• team members lack motivation to complete tasks with a PM they don’t trust.
• the PM isn’t listening to their SME advice, so SMEs stop providing it.
• lack of acknowledgment of team member contributions can lead to burn out, indifference, and overall negative project team dynamics.?

Resolve by:

• Flexing Emotional Intelligence. Awareness is key in order to pick up on conflict within the team and improve working relationships that positively impact the outcome of the project.
• Asking for feedback. How's the project going? Where could team members use more support?
• Having 1:1 interaction with project team members. Some may feel more psychologically safe in providing further detail regarding obstacles, issues, and updates this way.
• Eliminating relationship conflict & supporting task conflict. Adam Grant describes the difference of the two really well in his book “Think Again”. Encourage differing insight and opinions when tackling project problems; eliminate relationship conflict among the team so that the project, and other people, aren't negatively impacted.

3. Not given the tools to organize projects. Without the proper tools, projects can't be structured in a way that everyone can digest, make updates, etc. We want to make this as easy as possible to ensure project success.

Resolve by:

• Picking PM software that matches organizational requirements. Many tools are unusable because a needs audit or requirements list was never comprised prior to paying for the software.
• Accountability of use. Many times, organizations implement tools as a good idea, and then abandon them. Often, top level management requested the tool’s implementation and doesn’t follow through with using it themselves. All levels need to adopt the tools, not just the project manager & team.

4. Unable to identify tasks. As PMs, we are not the experts on the subject matter of the project; we are experts in identifying and organizing actions that need to be completed in a way that makes sense to the overall success of the project.

Resolve by:

• Speaking up. It's crucial to be able to raise our hands and ask for clarification during meetings and standups. A framework I like to use is this following: “I’m hearing that X needs to be done to resolve Y, is that right?”? followed up with a “and who is taking that on?” followed up with a “and by what date are you expecting this to be finished, realistically?”.?
• Asking for participation on meeting recaps. Send out meeting notes with action items, risks, and accomplishments, requesting those on the email to chime in with their items, if they captured anything differently.?

5. Unsure of roles. I'm sure we've all experienced "everyone wearing 'many hats' ", project members continuously changing, or simply having "too many cooks in the kitchen". Defining clear roles and responsibilities is crucial for any team or organization to function effectively. Making it part of any project’s initiation is a great way to avoid the pitfalls of role confusion.

Resolve by:

• Outlining goals & objectives of the team; providing this information to everyone working on the project.
• Work Breakdown Structure, then role assignment. Once you know what needs to be done by completing a WBS, skill-matching individuals can be assigned to roles accordingly.
• Roles, then responsibilities & duties. This can be mapped out using a RACI Matrix and kept on file with other project management documents.

6. Lack of direction or decision making from leadership. Many times, project managers are one of many individuals vying for an executive's time, seeming impossible to get the information needed to move forward.

Resolve by:

• Creating a project dashboard. Keep leadership in the know on project progress by creating a dashboard overview of the progress, status, risks, and mitigation tactics being used. Tools like Monday.com make this super easy which in turn makes the decision making process easier.
• Calendarize reminders. Make sure that all decision points are included within the project plan, built out into tasks, and integrated into leaders' calendars for proactivity.
• Stakeholder / sponsor management. Make sure that part of the PMO's standards for every project include a plan for stakeholder and sponsor management. This can be decided during Initiation and referred to throughout the project by documenting.?

7. Lack of project buy in. Nothing quite stifles project momentum like not understanding the importance behind projects. Not knowing the why and getting people on board is one of the quickest ways a project manager can fail.

Resolve By:

• Demonstrating value. Clearly demonstrate the value of the project by providing the “why”. Highlight how it aligns with the organization's strategic objectives, and how the project team was assembled to accomplish this on behalf of the organization. Use data and metrics to support your claims.
• Documenting the "why". Here's another cool project management template that can be made by the PMO and set as a standard for every project. This should also be reiterated during every single internal kick off call. Knowing the why behind the project can help when times get tough.

Ultimately, project managers can take steps to address and resolve these common reasons for project management failure. By being disciplined, building trust, planning effectively, managing time well, communicating clearly, managing scope creep, and providing strong leadership, project managers can increase the likelihood of project success.

Be sure to comment below with your experiences of project failure and how to resolve. Like, comment, and share this article so that we can help more PMs prevent failure more often within their projects.?

Kirsten Ebey PMP MSIA? is the Owner and Principal Project Manager at Path to Summit LLC, a virtual project management firm that focuses on everything and anything project management related. For more information on how Path to Summit can provide you and your team with PM expertise, check out the website. For tutorials, tips & tricks within project management, check ‘em out on YouTube.?