Advanced Multi-Project Management

Book Preface

This book will show you how to complete your projects at least 25% faster, without sacrificing scope or budget. Dozens of organizations that implemented the approach succeeded in doing exactly that (see Appendix B). But that is not all. They were able to increase the number of projects executed with the same resources by 70%, and in the process generated over 50% more throughput for their organizations. They represent some of the biggest, well-known names in the world—Boeing, Rio Tinto, ABB, Chrysler—organizations with dozens or hundreds of projects. The list also includes some very small organizations that were struggling to get a few projects completed per year.

These organizations are atypical. In our opinion, most multi-project management systems today behave like the U.S. air travel system—unpredictable at best, often taking much longer than planned with unpleasant surprises. Managers often point the finger at not having enough resources, or at Murphy—variation that they encountered. We can tell you definitively that looking to solve the multi-project challenges by getting more resources does not work. And the organizations mentioned above that succeeded beyond their wildest dreams haven’t found a way to lock Murphy in the basement. Elimination of project variability is not a magic wand; managing variability differently is the key to success.

Six multi-project gears must be perfectly meshed to drive speed with predictability. If you only address one of the six, the organization will have invested time and money yet will still be grinding away in the world of grim statistics, with more than 50% of all projects delivering late, over budget, or not within scope. If you have five of the six gears synchronized well but ignore one, our last 15 years of experience screams that you will be leaving a major portion of the benefits on the table. The six gears provide:

1. Staggering of projects according to an organization’s project capacity
2. Resource-based project networks that meet the organization’s goals
3. Strategic buffers used to managing project Murphy or variation
4. A single priority system in execution
5. Fast, daily execution management
6. A consistent project recovery process