I find it fascinating that most of us managers know the common pitfalls, but few if any, put in place and execute systematic procedures that include process steps (with best practice knowledge descriptions) on how to minimize these risks. We spend all of our time in meetings (putting out fires) and heads-down with our 1000-line MS Project work plan and say implementing best practice processes would be great, but we don’t have the time.

I think focusing on defining, executing, and governing best practice procedures should become corporate policy and mandated. Just think of the longer term power that could come out of implementing tips from you, Mr. Ford, and countless others who share common sense solutions to the top project problems. If feel the only solution is to incorporate the “stay-out-of-trouble” steps into 100% of all stakeholders’ daily task list, which need to be executed and governed in real-time. Turning these best practices into transparency and accountability will yield predictability. Then it’s up to us to constantly evolve the process. Just think how easy it would be to go to the VP of Sales and say, “we have a systematic best practice process in place working wonders in IT, now if we can plug our process into your sales presentation, we can stay out of trouble with the client, and in addition, we can use this as a differentiator to expand client business.”