Writing management plans that actually work

Have you ever experienced a polar shift in your point of view?

Many years ago I was working on a project where the principal contractor dictated that every month we had to produce a certificate stating we had worked in accordance with the project’s management plans. At the time, I was aghast. It was not possible or logical to do this. Plans were drafted to satisfy the faceless few offsite and then put in a drawer to never be seen again…unless of course there was a major issue, at which time they’d be pulled out to support our position! Producing a personally-signed certificate sounds simple enough, until you factor in the need to actually read and follow the plan.

I’ve been in the game a long time and have seen hundreds of management plans. Here are my top four lessons for making them real, practical and useful.

Lesson 1 – less is more

With management plans, the shorter the better. Too much of what I see in management plans belongs in supporting procedures instead. A good plan should be a succinct document, not a 100-page monster. These days, if I see a plan of more than 20 pages, I get suspicious.

Lesson 2 – keep it real

If you don’t want to do something, or you’re considering a commitment you’re not sure about, don’t write it in a project plan. We set ourselves up for failure by promising the world when we should have promised what the client expected and the project needed.

Lesson 3 – know how you will measure yourself

Another classic misstep with management plans is writing bold statements but having no defined process to manage failures. They are fairly inevitable on projects. A good management plan should clearly state who is doing what, and then go on to detail what will happen when something has not been completed to the standard required or in the timeframe promised. It can be as simple as confirming that some measures or checks should ideally be completed monthly, but missing one every quarter is still compliant. Or it might be to mandate that any error is a sufficient basis for a non-conformance being issued to the client for their review. It could be that you create parameters for doubling up in future periods to meet schedule – or disciplining those tasked with an action that hasn’t been delivered. There are lots of options, so there’s no need to leave yourself with no way out.

The other side to this coin is that if you say you’re going to measure or track performance, ensure you understand what the metric will be and ideally use a measure that is already being produced. Too often, the measuring side of plan conformance becomes bigger than the doing, simply because there was insufficient thought given to how performance would be scored.

Lesson 4 – plan for the unplanned

Some of what you plan can become irrelevant or simply not required during the course of delivery. Weak plans fail to offer a mechanism to make a change. These days, I always ensure there is agreement as to who can suggest a change and who can approve its adoption.

It’s true I once was a hater of plans. Now, I’m someone who passionately believes in their use. Projects plans let everyone know what ‘good’ looks like, and that’s pretty important as it’s easy for a team to pull in different directions. Good management plans set the tone and create the framework for success…when they are written to actually work.

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