The Titanic and the Five Deadly sins of the project manager

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The Titanic and the Five Deadly Sins of the Project Manager

• Luis Alberto Cáceres Villota, PMP©, Change Manager©, Coach©, Agile PM©• Jan 24 / 2017

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Luis Cáceres Associate Partner LATAM, Global PMI Partners

Author of the book "Murphy on projects: 101 frequent causes of failure in projects", speaker, specialist in project management who combines strategic planning skills with coaching and change management techniques to scale up results. Executed US$6 billion in M&A post-merger integrations. Leadership of startups from scratch until product launching. Management of international PMOs. Seven international certifications and fluency in three languages. Experience in companies like KPMG, EXPERIAN, CHUBB, SIEMENS, HP

About the speaker


Why the RMS Titanic sank?

Qual é seu objetivo?

Qual o prazo? O custo?

Por que isso é importante?

Do que depende?

Quais os próximos passos? Quais as datas de cada passo?


The unexpected iceberg

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• The region where the ship sank was known as "valley of the Icebergs"

• Olympic and other ships not only crossed the region, but alerted the Titanic

• Why the RMS Titanic fail in avoiding the iceberg?

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The business case at a glance

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• European Emigration to America

• White star: urgency in overcoming competition

• Modernity was the zeitgeist

• Technological advances allow bigger, fasters ships

• Company in difficulties, bet on building the most luxurious and modern ship of the time as competitive differentiator

• Maximizing first-class experience, would increase revenue


Great strategy. What went wrong?

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Analyzing failure in well managed projects


A different approach

Knowledge

Skills

Attitudes

Competence

Source: The three dimensions of the professional competence, KSA from Thomas Durand. This model is broadly used in management by competences and applied on the ISO 100015:2001. The mind, heart and hand comes from H. Pestalozzi.


The five deadly sins

FRAUDULENCE ABSTINENCEOVER AMBITION ARROGANCE IGNORANCE

?

Source: Chaos report 2010 by Standish Group. The five sins belongs to the project key success factor “emotional maturity of the project manager”


EXECUTING THE STRATEGY


Deadly sin: OVERAMBITION

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Luxury was the project mantra

The voyage was an important social event

Two lifts, Turkish baths, two coffee salons, the largest dining room ever seen in the sea

Overconfidence: the ship was considered unsinkable

The telegraph (allowing people to sent “tweets” from the ocean)


Deadly sin: ARROGANCE

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Presidents prioritized excessive luxury, sacrificing performance and safety

Reducing the number of lifeboats to allow a better panoramic view form the highest deck

The chief architect, Alexander Carlisle, quit in protest.

Arrogance and the team dynamics: the binocular case


Deadly sin: IGNORANCE

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Decisions were made ignoring the technical requirements

The largest dining room ever in the sea forced to reduce the bulkhead walls that protect in case of flooding.

Decisions were made believing everything will be fine, without having evidence supporting that thinking, and underestimating the consequences.


Deadly sin: FRAUDULENCE

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The Titanic had four smokestacks but only three engines.

The tests in open sea that should have took one (1) month were done in only (guess how long!)

half a day!!


Deadly sin: ABSTINENCE

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The team omitted their opinions.

They were afraid of contradict the powerful boss

Some were happy by their promotions.

Some refrained of reporting or solving problems. Example: the rope not long enough to collect seawater


HOW FAILURE DODGE THE MANAGEMENT?


How do failure dodge skilled managers?

• Planning• Risk management• Resources management • Stakeholders management

• ......

• Overambition• Arrogance• Ignorance• Abstinence• Fraudulence

• Superficial planning• Underestimating complexity• Unbalanced requirements• Disastrous decision making• Strategic misalignment• 101 frequent causes of failure

Cognitive Biases(wishful thinking, confirmation bias, normalcy bias)

They have the knowledge but some attitudes...

... leads to mismanagement


Five sins in the daily life

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• Prophets of the past: "I knew it was going to fail”

• (Abstinence)• Green Light: communicate only good news,

hiding problems.• (Fraudulence)• “Rule of the thumb” decisions• (Ignorance)• Gold platting: proposing a more

complicated solution than necessary• (Overambition)• Optimistic promises: promising a result in a

date, just to please a client or boss. • (Fraudulence)


Cognitive biases and the five deadly sins

Confirmation bias

• We don't need lifeboats, the Titanic is a life boat for other ships!

Normalcy bias• 16 min to accept the problem • One hour to lower the

lifeboats


Normalcy bias and project execution


Corporate silos & professional myopia

IT Sales Marketing Operations Finance

Silos??where?

Legal


RECOMMENDATIONS


Communications skills


Acquiring new toolsSoft skills

(communication, influence, leadership, team building)

Professional Coaching

Change Management

PMOs should have a coaches and change managers


Lessons from Napoleon Rely only in accurate data

Do not relay on conventional wisdom, rule of the thumb, neither back-of-the-envelope calculations.

Check you assumptions and desires

Resist the temptation in jumping into conclusions

Adopt this as a mantra!


Conclusions: do the Titanic sank because a unexpected iceberg?

IDENTIFY THE PATOLOGIES

• Better understanding, better management

• Be aware of behavioral issues• Understand the five deadly

sins

• Overambitious planning• Abstinent execution• Professional myopia• Poor decisions• 101 common causes

• Communication skills• Influence perceptions• Balancing power• PMO tendency:

coaching and change management

DEVELOP COMPETENCIESAWARNESS


THANK YOU!Let's stay in touch and share experiences!

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The Titanic and the Five Deadly sins of the project manager

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