Constraints – Again

While writing yesterday I discovered that the topic of constraints was larger than a single post. What came to mind is the negative connotation that the word carries. I once managed a project manager that suffered from “the sky is falling” perspective. I’ve been there so I can relate. It comes from a belief that “the client wants what they want when they want it and we’ll never be able to do it”. The constraints that project team is handed will doom my project to failure. These are not the self imposed constraints they are the organizational constraints that every project faces. Since each project has constraints, I thought about the successful project managers I’ve known over the years to see how they handled project constraints. There is a common thread.

I did a little more research into the project management world of constraints. Harold Kerzners’ book Project Management: A Systems Approach to Planning, Scheduling, and Control (seventh edition) discusses constraints as “Trade-Offs” and has a chapter dedicated to this topic. The key to his chapter is the discussion on the decision-making process associated with the “Trade-Offs” or constraints. He mentions the big three of time, cost and performance (quality) but goes further to show resources (not just human resources) as forces (which could be described as constraints) influencing the cost, time and performance “Trade-Offs”. A text by Robert K. Wysocki called Effective Project Management: Traditional, Agile, Extreme discusses the constraints in terms of a “Scope Triangle” and emphasizes the need to balance these constraints. His big three are Time, Cost and Resource Availability with Scope and Quality in the center. He goes on the show the application of the “Scope Triangle” in the areas of problem solving (decision making) and scope change impact analysis. Lawrence P. Leach has two texts that discuss the Theory of Constraints (TOC), a management philosophy developed by Dr. Eliyahu M. Goldratt. TOC suggests that complex systems are inherently simple and that the numbers of constraints that limit achieving a goal are few in number and could be as few as one. The texts are Lean Project Management: Eight Principles for Success and Critical Chain Project Management.

So, back to “the sky is falling”. Constraints can make you feel as if you are in a corner and you can’t find your way out. They restrict your movement like a cast keeps you from moving in ways that could be harmful. They are like the boundary of a sandbox in which you can play to your hearts’ content. You just can’t go outside of the sandbox. The common thread in those successful project managers is that they used the constraints as a catalyst for creative ideas. They saw the constraints as part of every project. It isn’t that they didn’t question the constraints, try to stretch the constraints or work to alter the constraints. They didn’t see the constraints as the enemy of the project and they didn’t deny the constraint existed. They had a clear sense of what the constraints were, how important each individual constraint was to the project sponsor and organizations leadership (their primary stakeholders). They used constraints as a tool for effective decision making. That is what a constraint is in the project world, a tool for effective decision making.

Determine your decision making model and then apply the project constraints to close out your decisions with the knowledge that your constraints will drive you in the right direction.

Ride On, Manage On