The Good Leadership Remedy

Action Matters

Fast-Tracking Finance: The Good Leadership Remedy

Even the healthiest and most vibrant companies can be susceptible to “catching a cold” in the form of an unhealthy project, with a list of symptoms ranging from not delivering the expected results, to going over budget (in dollars and / or time), to being culturally dysfunctional. When project inertia sets in, time is spent identifying possible causes and deciding on the right prescriptions to fill. Yet, in many cases, a careful examination often leads to one recurring diagnosis – leadership.

In many cases, an ailing project can be rooted in the following behavior:

Misunderstanding of Expectations – Both the leaders and project team members are not aligned on what is expected and realistic

Lack of Domain Knowledge – Project leadership does not have the domain knowledge to understand and lead the various moving parts of the project

Inability to Make Decisions – Leadership and / or the project team members are unable to make effective decisions

Organizational Inertia – Organizational status quo is stronger than the leadership and project team

However, the remedy can be as simple (and complex) as identifying the right leader – someone who must be transparent, create movement and unite the key project stakeholders (executives and team members) necessary to deliver the project successfully. This leader can either be found inside the company or, as is often the case, come from an outside source or team that understands the symptoms, can overcome complex obstacles and are capable of administering the necessary “medicine” to rescue an ailing project.

The Right Medicine

The necessary ingredients an effective leader will need to bring an ailing project back to good health should include:

Transparency — Quickly ascertain the critical path activities and success hurdles – both on a project and organizational level – and be transparent with leadership, project team members and other stakeholders. Transparency and accountability will generate the trust required to put the project back on track. There are no sacred cows. Everything must be evaluated and adjusted without judgment or bias.

Movement — Immediately break the inertia by making decisions that create movement, even with only partial information. Former Chrysler chairman Lee Iacocca is credited with saying that even a good decision is a bad decision when made too late, which is even more critical in an ailing project situation. Creating movement ruptures the inertia and creates dialogue that moves the project forward.

Unity — Identify the key stakeholders required to move the project forward and unite them through decisive change management practices that highlight their specific needs / requirements and align them with the project goals and outcomes. This is a “high touch” exercise. If obstructions are identified in the process and cannot be remediated, they must be removed to fully unite critical stakeholders and realign for success.

A Case in Point

A board of directors' member questioned the multimillion dollar spend on a financial planning and forecasting project that seemed to be perpetually spinning its wheels. The project was already twice what they had fully budgeted and had not delivered any results. No new technology or business processes were in place and the project suffered from all four of the root causes of unhealthy projects:

The board, executive management and team were not aligned with expectations – i.e., what was being planned and reported, the level of detail and project transparency. They simply said: “We need a new planning system.”

The project manager and team were very talented technically, but did not have domain knowledge of the business process (financial planning and forecasting) or the business acumen to understand the importance of business requirement gathering, change management and training.

The project team continually added “great technical ideas” to the project without the understanding of timeline and cost impacts. They were unable to make effective business decisions to drive the project forward and deliver discrete business functionality.

Due to a lack of requirements gathering and change management, the organizational status quo overpowered the proposed technical changes to planning and forecasting. Sales personnel didn’t understand how or why they needed to forecast differently and they were unfamiliar with the system components. The financial planning and analysis (FP&A) group viewed the implementation as a huge burden with an increased work load for no benefit.

The board member recommended contacting Alvarez & Marsal (A&M) to help the company complete its planning cycle on time in a reliable, accurate and consistent method. By addressing the project management, business process and organizational deficiencies, A&M was able to assist the project by establishing clear and achievable milestones. The scope was defined based on critical requirements and the team was realigned to be driven by the new business process, with technical resources supporting any business requirements. Sales, FP&A and general business resources (end users) were also engaged to initiate the change / adoption process early and enable buy-in through ownership.

Conclusion

Ailing projects are a reality in almost every company and simply need to be recognized as such in order to properly “nurse” them back to health to achieve the desired benefits. Managing an unhealthy project and administering the right remedy for a successful completion takes the discipline and expertise of a strong project leader who is confident enough to be fully transparent, strong enough to make decisions that break the inertia, and skilled enough to unite and remove obstacles.

Richard Holt, Senior Director, is the author of this story.