Some of us have been in firefighting mode so long that getting far enough ahead of the fires to carve out some time to make sensible plans can seem like an unattainable goal. But by changing the way we deal with urgent problems, we can increase the likelihood of returning to routine. Here are four suggestions for breaking out of firefighting mode by changing how we address the fires.
- Triage the problems
- Instead of letting the order of discovering problems determine their priority, set priorities consciously. Designate a small team — two or three people are usually enough — to assign a priority to each problem as it arrives. Let them decide who is available to work each problem when its time comes.
- This is the group that must occasionally make the hard decisions to "let some fires burn." (See "How to Get Out of Firefighting Mode: I," Point Lookout for January 25, 2017) Such decisions will stick only if the members of this group have the respect of the team and their management.
- Empower the problem solvers
- Concentrating decision-making authority in the hands of a few carries a risk of creating bottlenecks, which then compromise a team's ability to get ahead of fires.
- With regard to problem solving, push decision making out onto a larger circle of problem-solvers by creating authority boundaries that enable more people to solve problems with autonomy. Some tactics that help:
- Specify classes of problem solutions that can be implemented at lower levels.
- Assign problems to the lowest level available team members who are qualified to deal with those problems.
- Provide expert advice and support to less-expert problem solvers rather than dedicating experts to solving problems.
- Search for common causes
- Sometimes Concentrating decision-making
authority in the hands of a
few carries a risk of
creating bottlenecksproblems that appear to be unrelated are actually different sets of consequences of the same underlying problem. When this happens, solving problems independently wastes resources. Worse, independent "solutions" are unlikely to succeed, and might even conflict. - Keep in mind the possibility that a single issue can manifest itself differently in different contexts. Before investing significant time and resources in solving two problems independently, seek convincing evidence that they really are independent.
- Include firefighting in risk plans
- If your organization has much experience with firefighting mode, planning for firefighting risk can reduce the likelihood of fires, and reduce fire lifetime when fires erupt.
- A firefighting risk plan could include criteria for declaring and terminating states of fire danger. Three levels of fire danger are probably sufficient. Define routine procedures for each level. Examples:
- Level 3: Elective paid time off is suspended
- Level 2: Triage team is activated
- Level 1: Triage team deactivated and elective paid time off is encouraged
Study the tactics and strategies of wildland firefighters and emergency incident responders. There's no need to re-invent what has already been invented. First in this series Top Next Issue
Projects never go quite as planned. We expect that, but we don't expect disaster. How can we get better at spotting disaster when there's still time to prevent it? How to Spot a Troubled Project Before the Trouble Starts is filled with tips for executives, senior managers, managers of project managers, and sponsors of projects in project-oriented organizations. It helps readers learn the subtle cues that indicate that a project is at risk for wreckage in time to do something about it. It's an ebook, but it's about 15% larger than "Who Moved My Cheese?" Just . Order Now! .
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Related articles
More articles on Project Management:
- The Risks of Too Many Projects: II
- Although taking on too many projects risks defocusing the organization, the problems just begin there.
Here are three more ways over-commitment causes organizations to waste resources or lose opportunities.
- Planning Disappointments
- When we plan projects, we make estimates of total costs and expected delivery dates. Often these estimates
are so wrong — in the wrong direction — that we might as well be planning disappointments.
Why is this?
- Vendor Mismanagement
- When we outsource knowledge work to vendors, we expect to achieve the desired result with less risk
and uncertainty than if we did the work ourselves. But mission creep, mission retrenchment and employee
capture can lead to less welcome results.
- Tuckman's Model and Joint Leadership Teams
- Tuckman's model of the stages of group development, applied to Joint Leadership Teams, reveals characteristics
of these teams that signal performance levels less than we hope for. Knowing what to avoid when we designate
these teams is therefore useful.
- The Risk Planning Fallacy
- The planning fallacy is a cognitive bias that causes underestimates of cost, time required, and risks
for projects. Analogously, I propose a risk planning fallacy that causes underestimates of probabilities
and impacts of risk events.
See also Project Management and Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness for more related articles.
Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout
- Coming May 15: Should I Write or Should I Call?
- After we recognize the need to contact a colleague or colleagues to work out a way to move forward, we next must decide how to make contact. Phone? Videoconference? Text message? There are some simple criteria that can help with such decisions. Available here and by RSS on May 15.
- And on May 22: Rescheduling Collaborative Work
- Rescheduling is what we do when the schedule we have now is so desperately unachievable that we must let go of it because when we look at it we can no longer decide whether to laugh or cry. The fear is that the new schedule might come to the same end. Available here and by RSS on May 22.
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