How to overcome project failures

Even if a project has been a complete write-off – or conversely, a total success – there are always lessons to be learnt from the experience. Taking the time to reflect, and training yourself to think critically will help you overcome project failures and work towards future successes....

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Failure Fuels Better Results from Lean

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Colleagues at a Lean conference I attended supported this claim, claiming greater than 90 percent failure rates in their experiences. I do not have the data to support this anecdotal “data,” but these numbers beg the question: Why? If true, this failure rate for Lean initiatives would seem...

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Next Move: Should You Study PRINCE2 or ITIL?

IT professionals are often looking for methods to expand their skill sets, with project and service management qualifications commonly the best approaches. Of course, several options can make choosing the right program hard. ITIL and PRINCE2 Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) and PRojects IN Controlled Environments (PRINCE2) are...

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People Complexity Can Require a Special Roadmap

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Despite the awareness that the standard Six Sigma DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control) toolkit can be applied to process problems in so-called transactional environments as well as manufacturing – improvements to existing processes do not always involve just tweaking of “settings” in the process. This is because...

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Six Sigma Tools Still Fit in Projects Lacking Data

In organizations struggling through the early phases of Six Sigma implementation, practitioners often find themselves doing projects with little or no data. Sometimes they can begin collecting the needed data, which causes delays in the project. In other situations, where past information is critical to understanding the evolution...

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Standard Work: What It Is and Measures of Success

Many companies have jumped on the Lean/continuous improvement bandwagon since the 1990s. Most have failed to sustain the changes. Even many of those that have achieved some level of success have failed to achieve true standardized work. For the sake of convenience, in this article standard work and...

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Case Study: Defection Prevention for Software Development

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Organizations face many problems that impede rapid development of software systems critical to their operations and growth. The challenge in any software product development lies in minimizing the number of defects. Occurrence of defects is the greatest contributor to significant increases in product costs due to correction and...

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