Reasons for Project Failure

Let’s start with why we traditionally think projects go wrong. In 2009 I first published my top nine reasons for project failure in “Project Management in easy steps”. These were based on my own experience and other published research, they were:

• Unrealistic estimates
• Fuzzy objectives
• Poor communications skills
• Changing objectives (scope creep)
• Lack of top management support
• Poor leadership
• Lack of stakeholder ownership
• Poorly defined responsibilities
• Lack of resources

Recent studies might suggest the addition of inadequate risk management to the list.
Clearly a case can be made for most of these problems leading to an increased risk of project failure. But I find myself wondering if we are just looking at symptoms of problems rather than causes. Are there any problems on that list that an effective project manager cannot deal with? And if these are not the causes of failure, then what is?

More next week...

Meantime I had an interesting contact this week from Shivram at Classle regarding putting a project management course on-line, sounds interesting, so I am pursuing it.