AACEI – AGS

QATAR
TECHNICAL DINNER MEETING
February 18, 2010

PROJECT MANAGEMENT
BLIND SPOTS
By: Ignacio Manzanera, MBA, CCC, ME, CPM, PMA
 The core of Cost Engineering and
project management excellence lies on
repeated demonstrations of skills, leadership,
reliability and devotion all tied together with
qualities of talent and integrity to
bring projects repeatedly to
a successful completion1

Abstract
Life, as we all know it, has plenty of blind spots and project management activity is not the
exception.

This paper presents a variety of blind spots we all face while practicing project management in
general and cost engineering in particular and it suggests practical solutions for them. The blind
spots scheme is utilized to address as many as possible project management areas and give the
reader a chance of not only reviewing available solutions, but to use them as a guideline
whenever necessary.

Although I have come up with more than 15 blind spots in project management, only some of
them are presented in this paper, reserving the rest for possible sequels of this technical paper.

The emphasis is set on allowing the reader to visualize typical project management bad situations
and then pointing at the means to overcoming them.

This paper also features a graphical representation of project management available tools in all
the areas requiring the project team intervention, the growing influence of emotional intelligence
to properly lubricate the wheels of team understanding, cooperation and collaboration, and the
tremendous importance of hiring the right people at the right time.

Blind spots are usually created by a project manager and his/her team having different perception
about the available tools, techniques and skills required to do a good job.

Poor perception is the origin of all kind of misunderstandings and chaos if not exposed on time.

This paper also suggests an intelligent, strong, focus, integrated project start-up to create a
unified and solid workforce capable of handling together any possible business outcomes.

Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est2

(Knowledge itself is power)

1
Bubshait K., Manzanera I., (B&M)
2
Bacon F.

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BS1 - DO YOU HAVE THE PM MILLENNIUM SKILLS?
IF NOT, YOU HAVE A BLIND SPOT IN YOUR PM PRACTICE

Not having the millennium skills is usually a serious project management blind spot. It means
not having a comprehensive experience about what it takes to make projects successful. The
Millennium skills represent a range of techniques, tools, skills, and information required to
manage projects efficiently.

As it can be derived from the picture next page, there are plenty of angles to be covered when
you are handling projects. Neglecting any of these angles will automatically create additional
blind spots that will come back to hunt your project when less expected.

Clear this blind spot by:

• Recognizing the generalist characterization of the project manager; One of the first
definitions of project manager was that of a person that have experience in many fields
without necessarily being an expert in each of them;

• Making it understood there are few people that can provide insight into so many issues,
but you as a project manager expects everyone to raise to the occasion and participate in
all of them;

• Using the graphic to guide your project team continuous education;

• Providing a strong, open forum where team members feels a home to express their
opinions and contribute to bring issues to a successful conclusion; and

• Using the graphic to give area managers the minimum requirements to comply with
project team integration.

3
4
 “Wanted: Young, smart, crafty fellows
not over 28. Must be experts in PM
willing to risk failure daily.
Orphans preferred.”

BS2 – HIRING THE WRONG PERSON AS A PROJECT MANAGER

Hiring the wrong people for the job might be the single most impacting blind spot in
projects management.

A considerable percentage of today’s project managers are what it is popularly

called accidental project managers. They landed the job as project manager without
knowing the demanding complexity of a project environment.

They and their employers are so poorly informed about the scope of project
management they do not even have a job description to match project requirements.

Besides being a leader, a project manager should have hands-on experience on nine
different project management knowledge areas. It is not enough to know they exist
and being able to recite them when it is required to do so. Today’s project managers
have to be fully conversant and experienced on these knowledge areas as a condition
sine-qua-non to have a successful project outcome.

More over, hiring a project manager requires experienced human relations

management people. Project management and cost engineering are new professional
dynamic endeavors and as such there are not too many people prepared to
implement a proper selection procedure and to decide on the right person for the job.

Not less impacting is having an additional blind spot on the subject by hiring other
key project management team positions.

Cancel this blind spot by following a Project Management Competency Model3

which identifies observable behaviors grouped into discrete competencies:

Leadership

Competent project managers show leadership by:

• Controlling pressure;
• Establishing and communicating their foresight for the project;
• Making success or failure a team's result;
• Exhibiting positive attitude when problems arrive;
• Leading by example;
3
IPMA, PMI, SEI, Pendse P., B&M
 • Establishing rapport and empathy with the rest of the team; and
• Accepting responsibility for failures.

Customer Relations

Competent project managers cultivate customer relations by:

• Working based on customer feedback on project performance;

• Understanding customer's point of view;
• Loyally representing the customer;
• Communicating other project stakeholders' point of view to the
customer;
• Being accessible, available, and responsive to the customer;
• Creating mutual interest in repeat business; and
• Showing ethical behavior and respect for the customer at all times.

Project Planning

Competent project managers properly develop project planning by:

• Securing clear, complete statements of project scope;

• Developing written plans for all project management endeavors;
• Documenting and distributing the project plan;
• Administering the project plan as needed;
• Having well-defined project cost and duration issues;
• Utilizing state of the art planning tools effectively; and
• Supporting project team members planning efforts.

Performance Measurement

Competent project managers implement good performance measuring by:

• Actively monitoring project status;

• Insisting on constructive analyses of variance;
• Using the plan to manage the project;
• Holding regular status review meetings;
• Encouraging an atmosphere free of surprises;
• Measuring and reporting performance against the plan; and
• Submitting status reports on time.

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Communicating

Competent project managers excel on communications by:

• Using clear communication means;

• Matching messages form and timing to the expected audience;
• Implementing professional communications;
• Choosing proper and adequate language;
• Checking on how accurate information sent and received is;
• Explaining things unequivocally; and
• Listening to what others have to say.

Organization Effectiveness

Competent project managers organize effectively by:

• Knowing where to go to for help;

• Gaining approval of requests for support;
• Showing respect for individuals regardless of position;
• Maintaining a network of contacts from whom to get assistance; and
• Managing resources according to their availability and importance.

Team Building

Competent project managers build project teams by:

• Sharing management responsibilities with the team;

• Talking about process as well as results;
• Achieving consensus on all major decisions;
• Drawing attention to team achievements;
• Developing team players; and
• Encouraging teams that perceive themselves as teams.

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Staff Development

Competent project managers develop their staff by:

• Insisting on the best that each individual can do;

• Demonstrating knowledge of team members' personal and
professional goals;
• Valuing the individual's growth and achievements;
• Giving credit promptly and sincerely;
• Providing constructive criticism promptly and in private;
• Providing timely and useful performance reviews; and
• Delegating according to the professional and the situation.

Perspective

Competent project managers develop a good perspective of the project environment

by:

• Getting real: If you’re on-site, dress like your colleagues. Eat with
them. Joke with them. Make sure your work area and equipment is
equivalent to theirs;
• Being willing to learn from your team members, and give them credit
for their contributions; and
• Knowing another point of view in the way we know our own; and
• Understanding that project management perception is about changing
the way people see things, shifting attitudes and creating recognition;

Negotiating

Competent project managers show proficiency on negotiations by:

• Advocating for interests rather than positions;

• Seeking agreements that satisfy interests of both parties;
• Working to keep personalities out of the negotiations;
• Being open to innovative and creative solutions;
• Using objective criteria to evaluate proposed agreements;
• Negotiating agreements that can be kept; and
• Negotiating agreements that preserve a working relationship.

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Risk Management

Competent project managers perform good risk control by:

• Considering both the impact and likelihood of risks;

• Using contingency and management reserves appropriately;
• Distinguishing between risks and problems;
• Taking calculated risks and exploiting unexpected opportunities; and
• Viewing past problems as current risks and planning for them.

Problem Solving

Competent project managers demonstrate good problem solving skills by:

• Using a structured approach to tackle significant problems;

• Looking for root causes, not just symptoms ;
• Requesting and listening to both facts and opinions;
• Encouraging innovative and creative solutions;
• Involving the team in problem solving;
• Asking perceptive questions; and
• Following up to ensure that the problem remains solved.

Decision Making

Competent project managers practice good decision making skills by:

• Using a structured approach for all significant decisions;

• Requesting and listening to both facts and opinions;
• Making timely decisions;
• Documenting decision-making;
• Delegating or escalating decisions as needed; and
• F
ollowing up to ensure decision was implemented.

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 The truth is rarely pure and never simple4

BS3 - INSUFFICIENT PROJECT TEAM INTEGRATION

Project team integration (PTI) means more than PM consultants are usually willing
to accept or recommend.

PTI means every member of the project team knows what is going on with areas of
the project they are not responsible for and they can visualize the impact of those
areas on the job they are responsible for.

PTI means there are periodical project performance reports available to all project
team members.

PTI means project changes are known by every member of the project team and
communicated officially through regular reporting systems.

PTI means the project schedule is permanently reviewed and revised and everyone
within the project team is familiar with it.

PTI means cost control is a team function and the project team, as a whole, shares
the problems and the possible solutions to different project scenarios.

PTI means the project risk planning has been consulted with every area manager of
the project and its regular review and revision is shared by all.

PTI means everyone in the project team has participated in procurement planning
and everyone is aware of continuous updates and coordination within the overall
procurement plan.

PTI means all project team members are familiar with a responsibility allocation
matrix and it is respected and properly addressed whenever necessary. PTI means
quality assurance and quality control is an essential task within the daily activity of
the project team and the quality assurance plan is permanently review and revised as
the project progresses.

PTI means safety and environmental issues are given the required importance and
they are not taken for granted.

IT MEANS UNDERSTANDING THAT THE PRICE OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT

EXCELLENCE IS
ASSUMING AND SHARING RESPONSIBILITY

This blind spot can be easily avoided by utilizing human relations and project
management basics at the project inception stage, at the time when the project
manager is creating a team, at the time when professionals start joining the project,

4
Wilde O.

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at the time when people listens and when great things are created, at the time when
enthusiasm is at the highest possible level.

Just make sure there are ground rules and balanced knowledge about
communications, cost, schedule, quality, procurement, risk, personnel, and scope
management. But more importantly keep an eye on how your personnel manage the
emotional intelligence required to have a truly valuable project team.

Project managers cannot afford to be out of touch with the personal skills required to
lead their teams through good rapport, empathy and consensus on the projects at
hand. Nor can they allow project team members to ignore the importance of
cooperation and collaboration at all stages of the project.

Emotional intelligence should be given paramount importance among the project

management skills required to develop projects in the 21th century. The best experts
on the nine project management knowledge areas will give you a real headache if
they do not have enough emotional intelligence to conduct business in this new and
complex scenario of mega projects.

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 Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none5

BS 4 NEGLECTED PLANNING AND SCHEDULING

Modern Projects’ complexity does not leave room for neglected planning and
scheduling. This PM blind spot is characterized by popular misconceptions such as:

• ‘This project is not that complicated we do not need a work breakdown

structure (WBS)’;
• ‘Excel or any similar software are enough to control procurement’;
• ‘There is no need for schedule resources allocation, excel can handle
histograms with flying colors’;
• ‘Critical path calculations do not usually support project team decisions’;
• ‘Network schedules are seldom followed, real life is quite different from
empirical plans’;
• ‘Critical chain management is another useless tool complicating projects
planning’;
• ‘Planning meetings are a waste of time’;
• ‘We have tried that software before and it does not work’;
• ‘Cost engineers are too expensive. A clerk can be trained to handle the
software and the engineers will direct the planning process’; and
• ‘I have a friend that knows how to do it better than anyone else in the world
and he happens to be available’

Overcoming this blind spot passes by:

• Recognizing the advancement of PM and CE as professional and well-

structured disciplines, both of them based on planning and scheduling scenarios;
• Recognizing the difficulty of handling projects with more than 50 activities
without proper professionals and the corresponding software;
• Hiring experienced planning professionals and integrating their skills and
advice into the PM team;
• Continuously training the whole project team to understand and use modern
planning and scheduling techniques; and
• Establishing a communications system whereby project planning and
scheduling status reaches all stakeholders on a continuous basis.

5
Shakespeare W.

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 Whether is nicer in the mind to suffer
the slings and arrows of outrageous projects
or take arms against a sea of changes
and by proper project management to end them….6

BS5 – FEAR TO FACE BAD PROJECT INTERIM RESULTS

Experience tells us how frequent it is to find project managers hiding or

manipulating bad interim results for fear of being criticized or even dismissed.

Project managers fear on interim bad results usually translate into accumulation of
problems that they hope will go away as a result of a ‘wishful’ improved
performance during the next reporting period. This approach, we should know, is a
recipe for disaster, especially when it is sustained by growing expectations that no
matter what the problems are, they are going to be assimilated next term…

What makes this project management blind spot difficult to handle is its concealed
nature. Project team members find it difficult to resist a project manager. The project
team members start abandoning integration and irreparable damage is cause to
cooperation and collaboration within the project team.

Avoidance of this project management blind spot may require:

• An integrated project management approach where members of the team feel

free to express not only their view points, but empowered to recommend
against false reporting;
• Experienced team members capable of highlighting the seriousness of
doctoring results;
• A structured and well-implemented auditing system;
• Project management skills capable of addressing and solving the troubled
spots; and
• Strong believe on timely consultation and assistance from a third party

6
B&M Adapted from Shakespeare W.

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 More matter with less art7

BS6– LACK OF BENCHMARKING OR PROFESSIONAL ASSOCIATIONS

PARTICIPATION

Failing to use benchmarking to ascertain the use of the latest technological advance during
execution of project usually drops you and your company into a situation you would prefer
not to be in and this constitutes another important blind spot to be considered. The same
effect is achieved when there is no participation in professionals associations and its
consequential missing of constant updates to members in order to gain access to new skills,
state of the art software, systems and procedures.

It is not rare to find project management people not only outdated on modern technology
applications, but hearing from them statements as:

“Conventional old systems beat computers and their new technological advance....”

“The proposed system is good, but it requires specialized personnel difficult to find in this
market….”

“The initial effort needed to implement the system does not justify the cost…..”

With these attitudes they introduce early blind spots into the running project to the point
they are convinced it would be an easier job not to follow global and local regulations which
can be implemented otherwise.

Institutions such as the Project Management Institute (PMI), the Project Management
Association (PMA), the Association for Advancement of Cost Engineers International
(AACEI) and many similar ones provide us with a set of best practices which most of the
time are available for free.

One good example is given by the Operational Project Management Maturity Model
(OPM3) developed in the early part of this decade by PMI with the participation of a global
team of more than 40,000 practitioners and highlighting an evaluation of your current
project management system while presenting the interested parties with an organized set of
best practices for Projects, Programs and Portfolio Management capable of taking you and
your organization to a superior level of maturity and effectiveness.

It is not difficult to see how this benchmarking or participation in professional associations

will contribute to avoid this blind spot.

7
Shakepeare W.

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 REFERENCES

Goleman, D., "WORKING WITH EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE," January 1999

Peters, T., " THE BRAND CALLED YOU," Fast Company, September 2001

Howard, A., Bray W., D., "MANAGERIAL LIVES IN TRANSITION", 1988

Agor W., "THE LOGIC OF INTUITIVE DECISION-MAKING," 1986

Lazarous R., "EMOTION AND ADAPTATION," Oxford University Press, 1991

Rosier R.H., "THE COMPETENCY MODEL HANDBOOK," Deloitte & Touche, 1996

McCarty P. A.,"EFFECTS OF FEEDBACK ON THE CONFIDENCE OF MEN AND

WOMEN,' Academy of Management Journal 29, 1996

Shakespeare W., "HAMLET," 1608

Bacon F., "MEDITATIONS SACRAE," 1597

PMI, “OPERATIONAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT MATURITY MODEL (OPM3), 2004

You are welcomed to contact the authors of this paper at:

Dr. Khaled Bubshait, Saudi Ports Authority President, Bubshait2004@gmail.com

Eng. Ignacio Manzanera, MZ & PARTNERS Projects Director, manzanerai@asme.org

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