The Importance of Strategic Value Delivery for Project Managers Transcript (Part 1)

Introduction

Idris Manley:

Welcome to Future of Work 2.0. I'm your host Idris Manley.

Ross Martin:

And I'm Ross Martin. Thanks for joining us today. So Idris, what we're thinking of talking about today is the importance of strategic value delivery for project managers. So what is that? So traditionally, project managers have been focused on what we call tactical project delivery, which is making sure that within the projects that you're actually running, that each of the different deliverables and all of the different milestones and the action items that are all taken care of as per the plan. And that's tactical. What strategic value delivery then focuses on instead is, but what is the point of doing this project? What is the strategic value that the company is looking for in doing this project? Through the why. The why. Why are we doing this project? Why are we investing this team? Why are we investing these resources and this money? What's the business case that we're trying to take? Exactly. Exactly. So that's what we're going to delve into today.

Segment 1: Project Management is Strategically Underutilized by Companies. Why?

Ross Martin:

The first topic that we're going to tee up here is project management is strategically underutilized by companies. What does that mean and why? Project management is strategically underutilized by companies, right? Idris, what do you think?

Idris Manley:

So my view on that is project management is oftentimes looked at as operators to supporting business goals, right? So there's a business goal that needs to be achieved and the executives are putting together the strategies for achieving that business goal. And more than likely, there's some change initiative or change management require to support achieving that business goal. And so it is at that point where project management sort of gets involved to support the execution of some planning and execution of a deliverable or a set of deliverables that will ultimately support achieving that business goal. More often than not, those deliverables require an operator, usually in some other function, to take responsibility for executing on those deliverables or for operationalizing those deliverables after go live to ensure that they're actually achieving the business goals and outcomes that are desired, right? And so from a project management perspective, they aren't a part of the conversations prior to the initiation of a project. They're not involved in the strategic planning, the creation of the business case, any of that sort of strategic work. They are really tapped after all of those things have been defined and there is a clear need to initiate a project. nor is a project manager involved, you know, after the deliverables have completed, you know, in terms of, you know, the key metrics and KPIs and just being able to contribute to the operational side of achieving or getting to the business goals or outcomes that are desired either.

Ross Martin:

Yeah, and thinking back to Silicon Valley, big tech company that I worked at, the reality is, like you said, some sort of strategy shift has happened, and there's a realization that we need to implement some sort of software, or make a change, or do an organizational shift, or something like that. A project is conceived of. And what would happen then is there was actually an approach to the executive in charge of the PMO for that area in this case. And then they're like, hey, do you have any project managers that you can assign to this project? Um, and sometimes if it was an important enough project, they would actually, uh, yank that person off of something else that was less of a priority. And so as a project, or add more to their plate, they go on that responsibility. That is a very good point. Yes. Please also keep doing what you were doing before. But the point is, I remember, again, as a project manager at the manager level, being in a situation where, you know, all of a sudden I find out about this thing as it's being handed to me. You are now on this project. Please meet with these stakeholders, these executives and others, and find out more about it and put together a plan as quickly as possible. Oh, and schedule the meetings. Yep. So, uh, I think, yeah, I think that's, that's the, exactly how it has been played out traditionally.

Idris Manley:

Yeah. And so I think when you think about sort of strategic underutilization, it's really the, um, the lack of engagement and, and perceived value that project managers have to contributing to strategic sort of planning and considerations. um, for, for projects and for achieving a business outcome or a set of business goals.

Ross Martin:

Yeah. And as, as, as we've seen, as we moved up in our careers, um, we started to be more involved earlier in that. Um, not necessarily as involved as, as we felt that would have been even more helpful to the company, like back when at, in the early days where the strategy is being conceived. Sure. But as head of PMO, you're brought in at a certain point as the projects are starting to kind of, you know, solidify a little bit, partly because they're wanting you to assign some people to help drive these things forward.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, no, I think when you, if you, if you look at, so, you know, every company has, or tends to have an annual planning sort of event, right? So once a year, usually mid year, they start, you know, strategic planning and execution sort of activities. You know, I have, it has been rare to see anyone from PMO be a part of any of those engagements, any of those discussions, any, to contribute in any kind of meaningful way. And for myself, even though I've been an executive head of PMO, PMO VP, I've rarely been a part of those. And if I've been included, it's been sort of isolated for very specific sort of inputs and contributions. And so I think generally speaking, there is just this perception within corporations in business in terms of what our role is, what our value add is and what it isn't. And so I think when I think about strategic underutilization, it's really the perception of PMO as not being able to offer more than just tactical or very specific sort of project operational sort of capabilities and value contributions.

Ross Martin:

This reminds me. as they all do. Everything reminds you, right? Exactly. Interestingly enough, this reminds me at, in two different companies I've been at, I felt like I actually had a little bit of a foot in the door on that, in that I was brought in early on to help the strategy person drives the annual print planning process. They thought, hey, if we bring in a senior project leader to help drive the process, the strategy person can spend more time worrying about the strategy itself and not how we go about doing that. And in two different companies, this actually happened. And in both cases, uh, I, I felt actually marginalized in that case. Um, and this is for a senior, uh, you know, senior director, uh, level project manager. And the reason was, is that the strategy person really didn't want to give up that kind of control over the process. Um, and again, they were nice about it, but I felt, uh, like I, I kept saying, okay, let me do that. No, no, no, no, no. I feel like you were stepping on their toes. Exactly. And, and that they didn't, you just could kind of tell that they were like, they, they didn't really need me. And, or, or if, or they started to, again, we, we've used the use of marginalized a little bit. They'd say, you know what? here's all the meetings I need you to schedule or please take notes in these meetings, which are, you know, the, the, the very base level of project management contribution, which again goes back to our, what we've talked about, which is that people, um, haven't necessarily seen project managers be strategic in their thinking. So they don't think about allowing us to be strategic in our thing.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, yeah, no, no, I think I think you're spot on. I think as a PMO leader, when I think about there's usually two scenarios that occur when as a leader, I am seeking to, you know, encourage more strategic thinking, or contribution, or encourage my team to write, it's either the stakeholder will embrace it and say, Hey, that's great. You know, yeah, and you can you're making my life easier, or you're adding more strategic value. I'm glad to have you. Glad to have you. Or it's the other, which is what you described, which is, what are you doing? Why are you doing that? I need you to, you know, you guys need to do this, or you're stepping on our toes, or you're trying to change things in a way that they don't need to be changed. Right. And so there's basically there's a change management sort of resistant. I've got this. You don't, you know, thank you. Stay in your lane. Thank you. Yeah, exactly. And I think there certainly are strategies and techniques that can be used to sort of overcome that. But I do think it's important, particularly for more senior PMs, for senior, for PMO leaders, to really sort of recognize those two worlds and to figure out how to navigate it. Because at the end of the day, as a project manager, as a project management leader, it's in your interest to become more strategic. In fact, not only is it in your interest, it's really your success depends upon it. Your sustainability depends upon it because if you are banking on just adding tactical operator value, you're going to find yourself marginalized and you're going to probably shorten the you know, your, your, you know, your opportunity at whichever company that you're at, um, in addition is going to also constrain your, you know, your, um, you know, the ability to be promoted and compensation, et cetera. So there's a lot of reasons, um, that it is in our interest to become more strategic. And we just have to figure out despite the constraints and the external sort of challenges and forces that are sort of counter to that, how do we overcome them?

Ross Martin:

Yeah, no, that's, that's interesting. Yeah, the, I think about it, it's a little bit of a question. It's like, are our project managers not as strategic because we have not been allowed to play in strategic realms by the senior leadership of the company? So is it that there's a ceiling that's holding us back? Or is it more about that the project managers have not displayed the strategic acumen and behaviors that senior executives, if they saw it, would say, I want this person to be in the room when we're talking about this, because I really liked the way they think.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, yeah, it's both. I mean, it's a good question. It's both it is certainly there are perceptions culturally within corporations in terms of what project managers management's function is and contribution is. Yeah, there's biases. Yeah. I mean, certainly work with project managers, but we've probably worked with a lot of project managers that really take a lot of pride in the tactical value adds. And, and so they see us through that lens of, Oh, you're, you're, you know, you guys are tactical contributors. You'll take those meeting notes and schedule those meetings and, you know, and, and, you know, stay in your lane, like do do that. Um, but also, but not everyone, not every executive, not every sponsor has that view. And so on the other side, PMs, you know, it's a mindset. A lot of PMs have embraced the mindset that their value add is really more of it as a tactical or tactician or as an operator. And that's where they tend to focus their energies. And so I think that there are certainly, when you look to how to evolve that, how to shift that, It takes some, you know, we can't, we can't really, we can't expect the stakeholders or the executives to sort of change overnight that point of view. So really we have to figure out how do we begin to educate, inspire a change. And, and we, you know, and so I think those are probably different topics or it makes sense altogether how we do that.

Ross Martin:

It's interesting in a way. I think part of it is people who choose to go into project management, like anyone who chooses any particular profession, the tactical organizational sort of superpowers are the comfort zone. And so, uh, this, and so to be told that you actually have to master that, but then sort of start to fade away from it a bit, you can never completely get rid of it, but, and focus on areas you aren't comfortable in and going into uncomfortable areas is, uh, you know, is, is exciting and opportunistic for some people and scary for others. Yeah. Yeah.

Idris Manley:

No, I think the underlying problem with many PMs is we, we don't necessarily understand the nuances of different sort of audiences that we're trying to support and trying to, um, make sure, you know, gain the right sort of perception of us. Right. And so I think we spend a lot of time on what the stakeholder wants. We try and lock into, you know, the project sponsor. what are their needs, or the key sort of stakeholders in a project, what are their needs? And you may find that a lot of them, not all of them, but a lot of them may really value and appreciate your ability to be a tactician. Yeah, schedule those meetings, take those meeting notes in there, and they're happy. You know, but I think we lose sight of other audiences like that, you know, that VP or that C-level executive that maybe they're not actively involved in the project, but they're watching from afar, and they would like a different type of value from you. And, but you're not, but you're so locked in on the people that are right in front of you, the people that you're working with on a daily basis and what their needs are, that you're not really recognizing that the, you know, key decision makers, you know, and people that can really sort of determine your, your long term success and your ability to be promoted and to really move up the ranks. Those are individuals that may desire to see another sort of capability and value contribution from you.

Ross Martin:

I'm sure you've heard as a parent the you're being watched concept and the idea is... Or in a horror movie. Yes, fair enough, fair enough. But in the context of children, the you're being watched is to try and remember that you may tell them you want them to behave in a certain way, but if you actually act in a very different way, they notice. And I think that's not a bad, hopefully not in a paranoid way, but I think it's not a bad thing to think about as a person in a company in that how you're perceived in small moments, especially by the people that don't work with you a lot, makes a huge difference. And as we moved up in our company, and I remember being in some discussions around possible promotions, And you never know when somebody who doesn't work that often with the person would say, well, I had one experience with them that was really poor, and that'll derail any promotion.

Idris Manley:

Or the opposite, where I had one, you know, I saw, I had a conversation with them, or they did a presentation and they shared some really interesting, compelling insights. And I was like, wow, I don't work with them often, but I happened to be in the meeting, you know, And so it works both ways. Yes, yes, you're right. And first impressions or infrequent impressions really matter. And so again, despite the fact that you don't necessarily work with that particular leader often, the few interactions that they get, they have an opportunity to observe your work or to get a sense of your value are really critical. And if you are already in sort of tactical operator mode, And that person gets a chance to interact with you. And that is the side that you're demonstrating. It may be all they need to see to come with, you know, to reach a conclusion that will influence, you know, promotional decisions.

Ross Martin:

Yeah, absolutely. I remember a situation where I was on a business trip and the CFO of the company, uh, invited me to dinner, just, just one-on-one. Um, and I didn't work with him that often. Um, and, uh, and so, you know, you're aware, like how important it is that you act and behave in a certain way, but also just the conversation itself and the ability to not just be the person who can explain very well what you're working on and the importance of it, but. stepping back and showing them that you think strategically, that you understand the domain of what the company is all about and its goals, and how you are thinking about those in doing your work at all times is really critical.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, yeah. So I think just to sort of to wrap up, I definitely think that we are strategically underutilized, and it will continue to be so. I was chatting with a friend recently, and she mentioned that it was actually pretty dire for our profession, as in if PMO, as a profession, if we don't figure out how to become more strategic, As a profession, we will continue to become more isolated or more marginalized, and how it's really critical that... Why?

Ross Martin:

Why more marginalized than already?

Idris Manley:

Because AI will begin to perform more and more of the tactical work that we hang our hat on. And so as AI continues to sort of erode that sort of value from below, and then we're already being sort of marginalized from the top in terms of executives not allowing us to become or encouraging us to be more strategic. And then, you know, and so basically from the top and from the bottom, we're continuing to sort of be squeezed. And so and then you already have sort of on the side, you have other department leaders that already think that they can perform, they can manage projects themselves, like their team members have an ability to manage a project. You know, and so they don't necessarily always believe that they need a project manager, you know, unless it's, it's a larger project or it's really complex, or they just don't have the resources.

Ross Martin:

I've seen that sometimes they want a project manager, but there's no cost justification for such a thing. So then they just, well, they just do it themselves or they have their team member do it. And then that's okay.

Idris Manley:

Right. Right. But, but the point is just that for sort of 360, I feel like the profession is being sort of, you know, it's, it's, it's being attacked from all directions in a sense. And I think it's important. And I think strategy being more strategic is really, is really sort of the guiding light. It's the beacon, uh, that will allow project management to really begin to offer greater value that really begins to sort of resist, um, sort of the erosion that's happening, um, in, in different directions.

Ross Martin:

Sounds. Yeah. Sounds dire and, and critical.

Segment 2: 70% of Projects Fail to Deliver their Business Outcomes. Why?

Ross Martin:

Our next topic, Idris, is 70% of projects fail to deliver to the strategic outcomes. that as to why they were, you know, the why that they were created for in the first place.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, I mean, I've heard numbers as high as 80, 85%, as low as 65, 60%. But it's as low as though, the point is, it's not even below half. Yeah, it's a significant number of projects that aren't.

Ross Martin:

So the question then becomes, why are we not able to deliver projects to meet the strategic outcomes that are necessary. And again, that doesn't mean that the project might not have actually been delivered, even possibly on time and on budget. But over time, the original strategic goal of doing the project was not met. Or in some of the cases, at least for me, because we would then move and do other things after that, it's possible that there were situations where we didn't even know Because the measurements after the fact as to whether the project delivered what it was supposed to be delivered was never really followed up on.

Idris Manley:

Yeah. I think there's probably, you know, project failure is probably the most misunderstood, you know, aspect of project management. You hear these big numbers regarding project failure all the time. And, you know, within the project management world, oftentimes the assumption is that it relates to some, some risk or some issue with the project itself. However, as you alluded to, uh, you know, I, you know, in my own experience, cause you don't really have a lot of data that really explains exactly why they fail. So you have to really rely on a lot of anecdotal sort of, you know, sort of personal experience, but. You know, I mean, I've managed, you know, between personally and teams that I've managed hundreds of projects. And so I have a pretty, pretty good sample size. Yeah, exactly. And I can draw from in terms of failure. And I would argue that it's failure is related to basically a thirds. Right. So I would say that a third of projects fail because of some issue related to the actual deliverable or the fulfillment of the deliverables in the project. It could be scope related. It could be missing the schedule. It could be quality.

Ross Martin:

Under-resourced. A number of costs.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, but it could be different reasons why the project fails, right? Right, right. So cost, quality, scope, and timeline, et cetera. But another third of reasons why projects fail is because of strategy. Meaning it's, you know, you could have done everything right to execute on the project, but the strategy was in and of itself incorrect and such that, or the strategy, a strategy that led to doing the strategy or the initiatives that were defined. And so it has nothing to do with the project. But as a result of the strategy not being fulfilled, or the goals of the strategy not being fulfilled, then the project was a failure, right? And so people say, oh, the project was a failure, but it wasn't because of the project. It was because they weren't able to actually to achieve the results strategically that they intended. And so there's a third there. And then the last third I've seen is actually because of the business goals. Meaning that the goals, the business goals that were defined by the executives were incorrect. And so it doesn't matter what strategy or initiatives you would have established to achieve those business goals, the goals themselves were not achievable. And it doesn't matter what you could have done on the project side, there's nothing that you could have done to ensure that you achieve the business goals. And just to give a quick example, if a company is in a pick a market that let's say is a billion dollar market, and the company says, we want to establish a goal where over the next year, we are able to generate a billion and a half in revenue out of a market that's only a billion dollars in size. And so then they put a strategy together to go after that billion and a half in revenue, and they put project plans and program plans and set initiatives to go after that revenue. There is nothing they could do strategically or through the projects that they established to achieve a billion and a half in revenue out of a market that's only a billion dollars. And so I think Not a lot of time and energy goes into really sort of evaluating and analyzing where those failures occur outside of projects. I think it's really easy to understand project failure when it's related to the project because it's very black and white. Either you hit your timeline or you didn't. Either you achieved the scope of what was required or you didn't. Either you did it with the level of quality needed or you didn't. But it's much more difficult to be able to identify and analyze strategic sort of failures that relate to the strategy or relate to the business goals not being the right goals.

Ross Martin:

That's an interesting concept in the way that you, you know, your anecdotal evidence mentions the third deliverable, a third strategy and a third business goal, maybe misalignment or the selection of those is interesting because you could almost say then that only a third of failed projects are project managers fault. right or project team or project team's fault um but my experience has been that um it it doesn't matter whether was which one of those it is that usually the project team's uh the one that's pointed at as being not having deliverance So I think of one example we had where there was an intentional merger of two divisions, sales and marketing, into one. And the project was seen afterwards as having been a failure. And I'm sure there were definitely certain things that the project team could have done better on the delivery. There were some miscues and some of the communications and stuff I didn't think were quite up to snuff. But in reality, after a few years of hindsight looking at it, it shouldn't have been done in the first place because the merger of the two created more problems for sales and the ability to drive revenue. It was a bad strategy. It was a bad decision to even do it in the first place. But instead, part of the thing I was thinking about is how projects almost always have code names. And so this project codename was sort of became part of the corporate culture of being something you don't want to talk about because it was a failure. You know, so it's, it's still stuck to the project. Yeah.

Idris Manley:

Yeah. Uh, at one of the companies that I, uh, worked that, uh, there was, uh, they purchased, uh, a, an M or implemented a HR solution. Uh, and it was a multimillion dollar implementation of a very well-known, you know, HR ERP sort of solution. And the project was successful, right? It was an aggressive date, but my team got it done. But within two to three months of it being launched, the CFO asked, who authorized this? Who authorized this? Now, granted, he's a jerk. It was a relatively new CFO. He wasn't there when the decision was made, but he's asking, based on how much we spent with ROI, let's look at the business case. And they were trying to justify and explain. And the reality was, there were certain assumptions that were made at the time that they made the investment. The market was pre-recession. And so it made sense because they thought they were going to continue hiring and continue ramping up and they were going to be able to get more efficiencies. And so it made sense from a business case perspective, but certainly going into a recession, into a declining market where you're not hiring as many people, you're like, why did we why do we spend a million dollars, multiple million, you know, to for this that could have been used somewhere else, you know, and so I think that's a great example of a project failure, not being associated with the project, but being associated again, with some of the strategic decisions that are being made, right. And, and I think oftentimes, executives, they have a bit of amnesia, it's easy to again, to evaluate or to you know, to observe when a project itself is failing. It's pretty binary. You're committing to a very specific deliverable schedule, et cetera. But I think it's, you know, oftentimes executives, certainly stakeholders are on to the next sort of shiny object. And I think, you know, they lose sight of sort of the business case or the ROI. And so it really requires, you know, senior executives and CEO to really continue to ask those questions and to ultimately hold everyone accountable and not just, you know, PMO and the delivery function for not achieving a particular business goal.

Ross Martin:

I remember feeling, especially earlier in my career when I was more junior, probably around the director level, a little bit of the unfairness feeling around, say, executives who ended up wasting millions of dollars on something that ended up not being a good idea, and nobody ever really holding them accountable for that. They just keep moving on, and I keep thinking, I sort of assumed this person was going to get fired. But they got promoted. Yeah, or just nothing, or just complete silence. In the meantime, again, we would have certain projects that were talked about as being failures. And the frustration around that is, again, the sort of the unfairness of it all. And I remember at the time thinking, maybe that's what happens when you get up into the upper ranks of companies, is that sort of the accountability goes away. Now, as I moved up into the upper ranks and saw some of that from, you know, from firsthand, I realized, no, that's not true, but it sometimes takes longer to come to roost.

Idris Manley:

Yeah, it's interesting you mentioned that. One of the things that I teach PMO teams is, you know, because there's this misconception, you know, with stakeholders that the project is the project manager's responsibility to make sure that the project achieves its goals successfully. And that is true, that is our responsibility. However, we cannot, if certain things were not Accounted for plan for it because you can't plan for everything. You can't Assume everything right and so there's inevitably there's inherently risk in the planning and execution process Yeah, and so really what our job is really is to be able to quickly identify risks that could impede the ability to achieve those goals and to be able to ensure that there's transparency and and making sure that the right people are aware and making sure that the right change management or the right sort of negotiations are being performed based on the trade-offs that need to be considered to ensure that we make the most optimal decision at the time to maximize or to optimize the project being able to deliver as close as it can to the original sort of goals and plan that was laid out. And so this notion that the project didn't come in on schedule And so the project manager or the PMO was a failure because of that is, you know, it's, it's grossly unfair, because you really have to dig into the details to understand, um, sort of what actually result caused that to happen. And if did the PM leader, did the PM owner, did they take responsibility for ensuring that there was the right visibility into the issues? Were they being proactive? Did they engage their sponsor and key stakeholders early to be able to discuss and to come to a decision on how to sort of address some unforeseen issue, et cetera. But I think that it's important that particularly some more senior season project managers, they understand the importance of setting the right expectation in terms of what um, what they can and cannot do and make sure that, uh, that stakeholders understand that it's not just about simply bringing the project in based on the goals, but ensuring that they can adapt quickly to unforeseen issues, um, to, to remedy them in a way that isn't in the project's best interest.

Ross Martin:

Well, it makes me think of the absolute criticality of the role of the executive sponsor of the project, right? And, and you as the project manager's relationship with that person. Um, and, uh, in the best situations I've seen, the executive sponsor is, is engaged and guiding and understands their role is to remove blockers that they can remove that you as the project manager, don't have the power to remove or to make certain decisions. They don't have the authority to make decisions and in some ways help you communicate, say rough messages to the right people. So as not to derail the whole thing. Um, and, uh, those are the best ones I've seen. Um, and, uh, also when, when they see me as a project manager, uh, representing their views from a strategic point of view in meetings with the team, uh, that, that they can see that I'm saying what they might have said about something. that gives them a certain amount of comfort that I can understand how they see the strategic imperative of doing this. And I've found that they give me more latitude in that way. But there are times I remember my boss at one point saying, he was also the strategic or the executive on one of them. And he's saying something like, No, I've got this. I have to go give this message to the C suite. Like this, this is above your pay grade. Like, don't, don't take this one. Cause he's like, cause you'll get destroyed and I'll be able to give the bad message.

Idris Manley:

I mean, it's, it's, I mean, it's, it's, it's teamwork, right? Like everyone has a role and responsibility. Their role may be to really, uh, to provide coverage to the executives, to give you cover and to make, you know, and to make sure they're aligned and, and, you know, and working through those in your, your job is to work with the team and, you may have other resources and have other responsibilities. And so it's definitely a, you know, it's teamwork. It's, it's, it's really analogous to what's that sport, hockey, ice hockey, not ice hockey, but where you have to sort of ice bowling where the, I forget what you call it. Oh, curling. Oh, curling. It's just like curling where sweepers. Yeah. Where you're all sort of bowlers. Yeah. Someone is sort of pushing in, you're trying to sort of glide the path and reduce the friction and do it just right to make sure that it's the target. In a sense, a project man is very similar where you have multiple people that are playing different roles, but where everyone's working in unison to ultimately to make sure that, that the, um, is it a curl?

Ross Martin:

Yeah. Yeah. The stone. It's just a stone.

Idris Manley:

Okay. So that the stone actually hits the target. Right. And it is a very nuanced and a lot of things that have to kind of work together to make that happen. But project man is very, is very similar. That's a good anecdote. I like that. Yeah. So, so yeah, but I mean, just just, you know, just to sort of touch on my earlier comment, I do think that it's important that, you know, most executives understand that unforeseen issues are going to occur. And I think all the good ones understand, they understand those seasoned ones, the mature ones. I think, you know, it's project managers that actually need to continue to get better at setting the right expectations. Right. And I think, you know, if we're trying to wear it as a badge of honor, that, you know, we will, you know, a project will achieve all of its all of its requirements successfully, despite unforeseen issues, you're really kind of putting yourself into a corner, and you're being unrealistic. Yeah, you may, you know, there may be a project here, project there, where that happens, but you inevitably, if you've worked long enough, you will work on projects that will not meet all of its intended goals. And it will be for unforeseen issues, maybe some of them foreseen. but you will not be able to, it just won't be realistic. And it's really important that before that happens, that you're setting the right expectations that A, unforeseen issues may happen, but I take responsibility for ensuring that I'm being proactive and identifying when those things happen. My risk register, my issue log, I'm doing all of the right things to make sure that I'm aware of all of the potential sources of issues. And when they do occur, being proactive in trying to resolve it. If I can't resolve it, I will make sure that I engage you as the sponsor to advise, and I will provide you with different trade-offs in ways of looking at the problem that we can solve for it. We'll come to a decision together, and I'll implement the change management to support it, and we'll move on. You may not hit the timeline as expected, or you hit the budget target, but at least the right executives will be informed and aware and they will be a part of the decision making and feel vested in the decisions that we're making and they'll support you.

Ross Martin:

Yep. Makes sense.