Each project starts with some version of a plan. Maybe several different plans. We're trying to decide - beforehand - how to successfully get to the delivery stage on a Project.
However, what happens once we start executing? We start out to do the work and something happens. It doesn't go as we planned it:
- Something is late.
- Something is out of sequence.
- Someone does something completely "off the plan".
- The Customer changes the requirements.
It makes you wonder if all this "planning" was a waste of energy and resources.
No, it isn't a waste because it isn't just the plan that matters. What matters is the thought and debate and editing and reviewing and rethinking and re-editing that are required before we get "The Plan". It's in the preparation of the plan that we become able to handle the changes and the unexpected.
If we hadn't done the work of planning, we wouldn't have a clue where the Project was supposed to go. We wouldn't know if we were off track. It's the process that does it. The real work to benefit the Project is in the wondering if the plan is right and then deciding to scrap the original plan and re-write it. That's the type of real work that makes us ready for the failures and mistakes and unexpected events that happen as we proceed with the Project execution.
So, planning and plans are necessary Project work. But, if things get off track after the plan is published, we are ready - because we did the necessary work at the beginning.
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