Change Isn’t the Problem

The first bogeyman new project and product managers are taught to fear is “scope creep”. We start the project building “a simple black Ford sedan” and end up building a chrome-plated hovercraft—then everyone is grumpy that the original schedule and cost estimates didn’t hold up. Some agilistas even argue, “If the hovercraft brings greater delight and value to the customer then the right thing happened”—but if the enterprise goes bankrupt and out of business because the revenue forecast from the timely sedan delivery wasn’t realized, the aglistas were wrong—the right thing didn’t happen. Change is neither good nor bad. Change isn’t the problem; the problem is changes adopted without conscious consideration of the consequences of the change on overall project goals and projected value.

Projects are defined in three dimensions:

1. Scope—What are the project goals, constraints, deliverables, and quality criteria that must be achieved to realize the expected value of the project?
2. Schedule—When must the project’s products be delivered to achieve their expected value?
3. Resources—What people, equipment, materials facilities, and funding is available to perform the project?

What many people don’t realize is that the initial project goals (hopefully clearly defined in a definition document or “charter”) are aspirational. Projects are initiated because there is a goal (scope) that is believed to be valuable if it can be delivered for a certain amount of resources by a scheduled date. In my 40 plus years of professional experience, I have never seen a project completed exactly as initially defined. Some argue that this is a failing of project management, when really it is just a fact of the universe. The future is an uncertain place and forecasts are imprecise.

We begin a project with the assumption that if we accomplish the goal within the assigned resources by the target date then the value will exceed the cost. There is also an assumption (implicit or explicit) that the value is significant enough to be worth the risk of failure. As a project progresses from concept to implementation, questions and issues arise that couldn’t be anticipated. These might result from ambiguity in the initial definition of what is desired, new stakeholders with different perspectives replacing the stakeholders whose needs were considered initially, changes in organizational priorities, supply chain problems, changes in interest rates, unusual weather, regulatory changes, and personnel issues (illness, turnover, conflicting demands on key staff). Each clarification or new bit of information puts pressure on the initial project parameters to adapt to new information—that’s what “change” is.

Some change is inevitable, and all change has the potential to nudge a project toward failure. What improves chances of project success is change management. Change management is the process by which project managers:

1. Identify pressure to change
2. Analyze and document the likely consequences of the change to the previously agreed upon schedule, scope, and resource goals
3. Seek formal approval from the projects sponsor(s) to either accept the change (and the forecast consequences to schedule, scope, and resources), reject the change, or cancel the project if the value proposition has diminished sufficiently

To be clear, it’s not that the goal posts never move—change management tries to ensure that they are only moved with the informed consent of the executives who are trying to achieve the project’s value. Once a change has been approved, the project definition documents are updated to reflect the new “best understanding of the project goals and constraints”—the new baseline against which future proposed changes will be measured.

Project managers need to ensure that sponsors, team members, and stakeholders understand that un-managed change is the real bogeyman. The mechanisms by which change will be managed should be defined and promoted from the outset to assure that changes are conscious choices made with an understanding of their consequences to avoid unpleasant surprises.

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