• Question: What would you do if a project fell behind schedule and it was your fault?

    Asked by ColeSprouse:) to Xu, Leah-Nani, Kathryn, Ian, Hina, Andrew on 12 Jun 2018.
    • Photo: Kathryn Burrows

      Kathryn Burrows answered on 12 Jun 2018:

      Project management is about continually reviewing the plan! If you think the schedule is slipping, you notify all those involved and make a new plan of what to do.

    • Photo: Leah-Nani Alconcel

      Leah-Nani Alconcel answered on 12 Jun 2018:

      Apologise, and then work overtime to fix it (if possible).

    • Photo: Andrew Margetts-Kelly

      Andrew Margetts-Kelly answered on 13 Jun 2018:

      Schedules are fluid, especially when you are researching or developing anything. This is understood in engineering circles and there is no blame culture at all. There is a standard process we follow in project management and work package management. Our duty is to show integrity. We constantly monitor our work to make sure we are aware of issues.
      We:
      1. Figure out how far behind we are
      2. Report falling behind
      3. Identify the cause
      4. Learn from it and GUESS how much more work there is to do
      5. Adjust the projection of the completion date
      —
      The important word is “Guess”. Schedules are estimates and no one is surprised when they are wrong.

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