Every week, someone tells me the same thing. "Scott, the project is failing." Nope. The project isn't failing. The decisions being made around the project are. That may sound harsh, but it matters because you can't fix a project if you're blaming the wrong thing. Projects don't wake up one morning and decide to go
Every failed project has a story. Sometimes it’s poor planning. Sometimes it’s unrealistic deadlines. Sometimes it’s weak leadership. But if you dig deep enough, you’ll almost always find one common thread. Someone assumed something. “We assumed the requirements were final.” “We assumed IT was handling that.” “We assumed the customer approved the design.” “We assumed
I’m going to say something that will probably upset a few project managers. Scope creep is usually your fault. Not always, but far more often than we’d like to admit. For decades, we’ve treated scope creep like it’s some unavoidable monster that sneaks into projects in the middle of the night. We blame customers. We
Project management theory is beautiful. Reality is ugly. Theory says requirements are documented, stakeholders align, timelines are realistic, governance works, communication flows, and change requests follow a neat approval path. Reality says your sponsor changes direction halfway through execution, your best resource quits, the vendor misses delivery, finance changes funding, legal appears from the shadows,
That headline tends to annoy people. Good. Because too many organizations keep trying to solve project failures by finding “better leaders” when the actual problem lives somewhere else entirely. They send people to leadership seminars. They buy books from former Navy SEALs. They hang motivational posters in conference rooms. They tell project managers to “step
Most project managers live in the rearview mirror. They obsess over status reports. They celebrate milestones that have already happened. They panic when budget reports show overruns. They scramble when customer complaints roll in. They hold emergency meetings when deadlines are already blown. That’s not project leadership. That’s project autopsy. And far too many people
I’m going to say something that will irritate a lot of people: Your inbox is probably full because you are part of the problem. Not your boss. Not your clients. Not your stakeholders. Not “corporate culture.” You. Because far too many professionals treat email like a lazy substitute for leadership, communication, planning, documentation, and accountability.
Let’s get something straight right out of the gate. Not all projects deserve the same level of effort. And yet… that’s exactly how most organizations operate. They treat every project like it’s mission-critical. Every task gets the same bloated process. Every initiative gets the same bloated meeting cadence. Every team is expected to “give 110%”
Most people don’t fail at productivity because they’re lazy. They fail because they’re improvising. Every day becomes a reaction. Emails come in, meetings get scheduled, someone drops a “quick ask” on your desk, and suddenly the day is gone. You were active, responsive, maybe even exhausted… but not effective. That’s not a work ethic problem.
There’s a brutal truth most professionals don’t want to hear: You’re not overwhelmed because the work is hard. You’re overwhelmed because you let the work sprawl. Meet Parkinson’s Law, a simple principle that quietly destroys productivity, timelines, budgets, and credibility every single day. Parkinson’s Law states: Work expands to fill the time available for its
