#9 | Starting Your Project at the Right Time: Tips & Insights

In this issue:

We delve deep into the critical art of determining the optimal time to kick off a project - a skill that remains elusive for most companies. We'll introduce you to the s-curve learning framework as a handy tool to help you gauge if your project has what it takes before you go all in, saving you from a potential disaster.

When’s the last time you caught lightning in the bottle?

Right.

And you’re not alone.

Knowing when to start projects can kinda feel like this.

You'll miss the deadline when projects start too early - if it doesn’t outright fail. I’ve never seen any other outcome.

When you start too late, you’ll struggle with quality due to the paring down of scope, taking shortcuts, and probably burning out your people in the process.

Using the s-curve learning framework is not perfect, but it can help you make sure the project has legs before overcommitting resources and setting the team up for an undesirable experience.

S-curves can be useful for many things in project management like:

• Tracking project progress

• Resource allocation

• Expenditure vs. Cashflow

In this context, we can help decision-makers envision the right time to start a project and thereafter model its progress. The base of the curve represents a period of investigation (y’all know I love my discovery) where a tiny number of people are working on the feasibility of “the thing.”

Using the above picture, you can see that learning will happen slowly, then fast, then kind of taper off again.

You shouldn’t kick the project off until you’ve passed that really slow period of learning. You can call it initiation, discovery, or experimenting - it doesn’t matter, just don’t kick off the project until you have the momentum that will move the team at the right pace to get the work done.

What kind of signals would you see to know you’re at a kick off point?

Here’s a few questions that will be answered.

1. Has the project been done before? The newer the idea, the more time required at the low end of the s-curve. Just because Amazon did it doesn’t mean you can “figure it out”. DO NOT start this project right away if it’s your company’s first attempt. Timebox a period of discovery to figure out how to approach and staff this initiative.

2. Is the project part of your core business? Does it take advantage of your strengths? Yes - move fast and break things. But let’s be honest, do you know what you’re doing? Self and situational awareness saves lives. The further your project is from your core business, the more time you need at the lower end of the s-curve. Also, LIMIT the number of projects outside of your core business. If you’re an energy company that’s moonlighting as an augmented reality company - you could be putting the business at risk.

3. Do you know what the project will produce and look like when it’s finished? Working prototypes are lovely. But you know what’s even better? A service design blueprint. Operational changes are often left out of the prototype and discovery conversations. If you have less than 50% clarity on what happens when the project is done - keep iterating and exploring until you’re about 80% clear.

4. What’s the investment cost? Is it worth it? With the shift to Agile and Product teams, this question seems to have fallen by the wayside when it comes to starting projects. “We’ll just fund the teams & the teams will work on what they want.” That’s fine, but provide guidance. #runmemymoney 😎 LOL. ROI should be as clear as possible. Going back to the energy company above that decided to start AR projects - let’s say that the portfolio of projects is at a net loss (NPV) of -$ 2 million because of overestimated potential revenues. Or the ROI is negative because it won’t generate the profits to justify the cost and there was no in-house expertise which was a low strategic alignment score. Was it worth the $ 5 million budget? Because it’s giving failure that could’ve been avoided years ago. Figure out how much to spend and have an understanding of whether the ROI justifies the project BEFORE starting. Also, have mechanisms built in to pressure test your thinking throughout the course of the project.

5. Is there buy in from senior leaders AND the organization? Not just a sponsor or a singular senior leader, but everyone that’s critical in guaranteeing success. I can’t tell you how many passion projects are thrown around (without the buy in needed) all to be canned under new leadership or once a person leaves. Tudum at Netflix was an example of this. Don’t pretend this is just a [insert department] initiative that doesn’t require buy in. ALWAYS GET BUY IN.

6. What is the timeline? This absolutely should be established before kick-off. Projects that kick off and then languish trying to figure these things out are costly and will not produce the desired results. Establish a timeline for necessary benchmarks. This is a straw man that should be pressure tested (not enforced) with the team(s) doing the work.

As you’re getting answers to the above questions, eventually you’re going to reach an inflection point. The micro team doing discovery will get the vibes on whether they should pull the plug or actually kick off. It’s a feeling that’s hard to articulate, but everyone will be on the same page as long as you’re using the questions above as guide posts.

Projects should only begin after the critical needs have been identified and addressed.

The area of explosive growth on the s curve is where the project magic happens. You’re working against a plan with milestones - yes, even if you’re “doing agile”.

Remember to be intentional with staffing & discovery as part of the investigation phase as well.

How to Support

I want to give you all a special thanks for supporting a project that’s near and dear to my heart. To answer the many questions I’ve received on how to support this project:

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