After a project, you may meet with your team and discuss what went well and what you will improve next time. But how often do you meet before a project to think about what could go wrong? This can be super helpful in uncovering hidden risks before they even happen.
David Bethoney, the former president of The Muse, likes doing these kinds of “premortems” because they allow the team to surface what they’re thinking but haven’t said out loud yet. When projects fail or something goes awry, he says it usually happens through a series of small moments — and many of these moments are entirely predictable.
In this issue of PromoPro Daily, we share Behoney’s thoughts on some common issues and what you can do to get ahead of them.
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Why Projects Fail
- Unrealistic timelines. Timelines are often built assuming everything goes right the first time, Behoney says. Someone estimated based on best-case conditions, nobody pushed back in the planning meeting because the energy was good and by week 3 the schedule is already off. The team isn’t behind because they’re slow. They’re behind because the plan didn’t account for reality.
- Other teams weren’t accounted for. Bethoney sees this happen all the time: You and your team knew what was needed and assumed the other teams would be aligned and ready. But they weren’t. When those dependencies surface, they don’t just delay one workstream. They knock everything else sideways, he says.
- Differing definitions of success. Projects fail when different stakeholders have fundamentally different definitions of what a project should accomplish. If issues aren’t brought up early on, reversing course can be costly. You could spend weeks or months working toward a finish line that no one actually agreed on.
What To Do Before A Project
Set the frame (5 minutes). Before any thinking starts, Behoney recommends establishing the premise clearly. Tell the group: we are going to assume this project has already failed. Not that it might fail. It did. Our job today is to figure out why.
Individual brainstorm (10 minutes). Next, Bethoney advises having everyone write their failure reasons down independently before anything gets shared with the group. He says allotting 10 minutes of silent, individual thinking will surface more honest and varied risks than 30 minutes of open discussion.
Share and capture (15 minutes). Go around the room and collect one risk at a time from each person, rotating until everything is on the board. Bethoney says there should be no discussion yet. The goal at this stage is to get everything out without evaluating it.
Prioritize (15 minutes). In this step, go through the list and pressure-test each item against some simple questions: How likely is this to happen and how bad would it be if it did? Bethoney says you’re looking for risks that score high on either dimension.
Assign and close (10 minutes). For each high-priority risk, someone needs to own it. Not a vague commitment to “keep an eye on it,” but a specific person who is responsible for monitoring that risk and flagging it if it starts to materialize. Then, Behoney says you should close the session with a commitment to updating the project plan.
Before your next project, create space for honest conversations. Take a few minutes to surface issues like unrealistic timelines or concerns people haven’t brought up yet. This can often help you get ahead of issues before they happen.
Compiled by Audrey Sellers
Source: David Bethoney is the former president of The Muse.
