I have learned a lot in the last week about how not setting expectations and not being prepared can have a huge negative affect on a project. I know that sounds really logical and obvious. I have seen how being unprepared can slow projects. I have seen how not setting expectations can cause a project to totally derail. But the complexity and importance of a project affects proportionately the level of preparedness and the level of expectations that need to be set. You can’t walk into a large and very important project with confidence unless you have spent a major amount of time and effort. And you can’t go into a project without knowing what is expected and making damn sure the customer understands those expectations. It is essentially asking for disaster to strike if you do that.
That is exactly what I have experienced on two different projects last week and this week. One was a wireless technology demonstration that is the first step into wireless for a very large enterprise company in Houston (I won’t discuss the other for fear of someone there reading this post). The project is easily over $1 million in equipment and services, and is likely going to get close to $2 million. With that kind of dinero in play, and with the possibility of even more on the far back end, you have to come loaded for bear. You have to be organized, and you have to test. That didn’t happen (there were multiple issues and people in play, but I blame myself for a lot of it). We had one day to prepare for a three day demo, and we didn’t make it happen. Consequently, the first 1 1/2 days were disastrous.
A major issue with the project was that expectations were not set adequately with the client. They had a process for gauging technologies, and unfortunately that was kept mostly hidden from the team trying to setup the demo. Another contributor to the problem (don’t want to call it a failure yet) was a lack of preparedness. Under advisement from one of our wireless consultants, we had the technical team come into our local Houston offices the day before the demo was scheduled so we could do a dry run. Though we spent several hours on that, we still were not comfortable with the results. But we really had no choice but to move ahead because this was our one shot at the project. Put all of that together, mix well, and bake for 20 minutes on 450 degrees, and you have a disaster pie waiting for you at the end.
But what about knowledge and flexibility, Michael?? Those words are in your title? Well, here’s what I have to say about that. The missing factors that would have allowed us to be successful from day one in that demo were knowledge and flexibility. We had to end up calling in a big gun from the wireless company that had both of those factors after the original resource starting losing it. The original engineer on the job had a good degree of knowledge (though he was still fairly new), but was severely lacking in flexibility. When the customer went on a tangent and asked for something even slightly outside the scope of the original demo, he locked up and started making excuses (I hope he doesn’t read this, but oh well). That did not go over well with the customer. But when the big gun walked in a took over, that went out the window. He knew the product well, and he was flexible. Thus, he was able to meet whatever the client threw at him.
The other things that chaps is that if the big gun had been engaged on day one, the original problems would not have appeared. Oh well.
So summary, you have to prepare, and you have to set expectations. But if those turn out to be too light, or if you just run into a customer who likes to stroll down tangent lane, then you have to have a high degree of knowledge, and you have to be flexible. They ARE the customer, after all.
BTW, the second 1 1/2 days were much, much better. Actually, it was extremely successful. But by then a lot of damage had been done. And to top it off, the project lead got called on emergency meetings during the successful part of the demo, so the bad taste stayed in her mouth. Not good. I’ll let you know what happens. I also plan on podcasting about this when Jim and I next get together.
Vet
