No Works of Art Required

Out there, in a galaxy far, far away, Project Managers create schedules which are not only objects (works of art as I used to call them), but also are effortlessly stuck to with no deviations from baseline - no scope creep, no unforeseen impacts, no resource constraints, etc, etc.

Now back to reality!

I always used to appreciate the benefits of re-planning projects at pre-defined periods within projects (e.g. the end of a phase), but am now coming around to the concept of iterative scheduling. In a traditional project plan (i.e. the initial schedule on this project), major pieces of work are scoped out in detail and then performed in a predetermined sequence - typically work on stages does not commence until previous stages (sometimes with predecessor tasks) are complete. Iterative scheduling is characterised by less rigid planning and much smaller chunks of work. The key here however is that these chunks of work are only decided upon after previous chunks have been completed.

Javed Iqbal PMP states that "the technique is based on the fact that detailed, accurate planning can only be achieved for tasks that will occur in the near future". Furthermore, "since accurate information is not available for the tasks that will occur in the distant future, their planning will, by definition, be inaccurate".

So, no more works of art need be produced which would not look out of place in the Tate Modern Art Gallery!