For projects that require little to no innovation, eliminate time buffers. We call these “negative time buffers.” For these types of projects, work will expand to fill the time available for its completion when excessive buffer or margin time is added to the schedule. Pull the schedule ahead of target. Deposit that time into the time-bank. That time ahead of the target is the positive buffer.
Read MoreThere are three stages teams go through to get to the point where they are consistently accelerating development schedules, which include Looking Back, Looking Forward, and Influencing Forward. Each step requires skill and commitment from all team members.
Read MoreWhat is your confidence in solving that problem on that date? This question is typical in every innovation project. Innovation projects, by definition, drive the technological envelope into the unknown. So how can you plan what you don’t know? You can’t, but you can make assumptions about how many tries it may take before you find a solution, based on the complexity of the problem you are trying to solve, in order to achieve the innovation required.
Read MoreWhy is picking and then sticking to a strategy so difficult? This article describes this problem in greater detail.
Read MoreWe have started to see the fallout from months of isolation at home, a lack of travel to project sites around the world, and the lack of regular human contact between team members. In this case, project teams working together towards a common objective to create new products.
Read MoreBe fast, have no regrets, you must be the first mover / If you need to be right before you move, you will never win / Perfection is the enemy of the good (in this context) / Speed trumps perfection / The greatest error is not to move; to be paralyzed by the fear of failure
Read MoreWe recently published a post on the similarities between FTTM and Agile. Written in response to confusion which sometimes arises where clients are under the impression that one must choose between the FTTM methodology or the Agile methodology, and somehow they are seen as competing methodologies. FTTM and Agile methodologies have more in common than they do differ (high customer satisfaction through continuous improvement, flexible requirements, self-organizing teams, etc.). Where we differ, is in the implementation.
Read MoreMost projects we work on around the world now involve simultaneous technology innovation and product development. R&D at the same time and in multiple places. Our clients are doing this at multiple sites, with multiple companies, and with multiple corporate stakeholders in each company. This is the norm for most complex technology projects. How are we managing them and what causes right product at the right time outcomes?
Read MoreWe are frequently asked to compare Agile and FTTM (fast-time-to-market). FTTM is the process of delivering the right-product at the right-time. It seems that people want to compare these two approaches to managing projects, as competitors to one another. The problem is not the principles behind Agile, which you will see are very similar to FTTM, but rather the way in which Agile software vendors implement software to track Agile-based projects, more on this later.
Read MoreThree critical principles that need to be understood in order to fully implement FTTM in an organization, explained in this article.
Read MoreThere are key decisions that are necessary to be made quickly during the concept stage of new product development. When these decision are not made or are unclear, project schedules drift and fail to converge in time. You end up with the wrong product at the wrong time or in other words, “late and not what customers want.” When you quickly get them right, you end up with the right product at the right time. Drift and confusion at the start of projects have the greatest impact on future product success. We have seen it many times go right and also spectacularly wrong when poorly managed.
Read MoreA common root cause of a failed portfolio system is that the fuzzy-front-end is an unmanaged process in most companies. It just happens in an ad-hoc way, with multiple stakeholders trying to influence it in their direction (i.e. the classic engineering versus marketing conflict). With no single point of leadership.
Read MoreSo you're chairing your 3 hour monthly project review. The project manager is presenting the current dates, the dates from the last review and the target dates. You listening and yet you don't feel that you have the whole picture. People use words like Portfolio Management and companies supply sophisticated tools, giving you a mass of information to "manage" your portfolio.
Read MoreRecently I read a marketing requirements document (MRD) for a sophisticated new mission critical software product for enterprise customers.
Read MoreA core principle of fast-time-to-market thinking is to know when to make a decision. Time is lost during "decision-churn" while teams attempt to gather "enough" information to make a decision. Their reasoning is that they want to be "right" and therefore, in the process, take a long time to gather the data in order to be right.
Read MoreWe observed on a recent program that the program manager was "taking control," but was also "avoiding responsibility" for the current state of the program and its eventual outcomes (it was very late). It seemed like the worst-case scenario in that the manager positioned himself as a gate keeper of information and control, while avoiding responsibility for the root causes of the problems (which were causing the delay).
Read MoreContrary to general belief, high control "systems" don't generate fast projects. In fact the opposite was the case in very fast organizations. One would think that that less control (i.e. low management overhead) would generate faster projects, like start-ups who have virtually no control systems. Again, this was not the case.
Read MoreHaving worked with and studied fast teams over the past 30+ years, they all share a common set of practices for executing their projects.
Read MoreSuccessful outcomes were the result of at least two out of three of his "success criteria" being met in the relationship.
Read MoreWe first observed this counter-intuitive idea with best practice teams and then again and again on projects we've worked on over the years. The most successful managers and executives have always been willing to push to the edge of failure in order to succeed. Some call it risk and others avoid this at all times, but in the end, they lose.
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