Project leaders consider that encountered difficulties and made mistakes are the result of their experience (or its shortage). Irrespective of the qualification in project management, there are typical mistakes made by many project leaders.
In fact that’s not important whether you stick to the waterfall methodology or the Agile one, in case of making the following mistakes your project is likely to fail:
- Setting unrealistic deadlines for the team: Although the fixed deadline is essential for some projects, in most cases it’s not like that. Setting optional terms of delivery reduces the morale of the team, leads to overtime work and turns you into a group of simple workers and not creative thinkers. Creative and agile planning can reduce tension from unrealistic deadlines.
- Losing control over the scope of the project: Although many of you will agree that very often it’s impossible to stop the changes in the project, one can inform the interested parties on the cost of the changes. Sometimes scope changing turns the project into something that is completely different from the one that has been planned initially. Changes in the schedule, cost and even quality of the completed project can appear very quickly.
- Unmanaged risk: A neglected risk will not disappear. Risk recognition and adjustment in advance minimize costly problems later. Risks and risk management should be established before the beginning of the project.
- Poor communication and bad collaboration: Taking into consideration all available technologies, there’s no excuse for poor communication in the project team. The right project management software, such as Comindware task management software (find more information here) simplifies collaboration significantly. Web based project management software ensures communication and allows working with distributed teams from all over the world.
- Lack of participation: Informing the interested parties on the status of the project is only the beginning. The real problem is to persuade them to become the defenders of the project. The engaged party should be able to lead the project through the approval in higher authorities.
- Unclear goals and tasks: In order to maximize the value of any project, it should be connected with some strategic goal. After establishing such goals, everybody should be explained the strategic value of the projects they are working on. Most people want to be a part of something bigger than they are. Most software development projects result in creating some commercial value and that’s not clear why so many companies do not share their plans with employees.
No software development projects are created equal. But overcoming the above mentioned typical mistakes will help you complete successfully more projects and provide your company with the planned commercial value.