|
|
|
by: Tony Rollo
A generally accepted truism in project management, and other areas, is that it's a good idea to capture any lessons from our endeavours and learn from them.
I recently spoke to a group of about twenty project managers in a company undertaking process improvement. Only one had ever submitted anything to the lessons learned database, about five had looked at it, and then only out of interest when it was set up. None had looked for any lessons that might apply to their projects. So, if you are to gain any benefit from having a lessons learned database, there are two major issues that must be resolved:
- How do you get people to enter data?
- How do you get people to read the thing?
To do this, you must incorporate the use of lessons learned into your project management process. This means that before project plans are signed off, evidence is presented to show that the database has been looked at and any applicable lessons have influenced the project plan. Project managers should maintain some form of project diary - in which they record any occurrence that has, or might have impacted, on the project whether for good or ill. The diary is then used to identify lessons to be included in the database. Thus, maintaining and using a lessons learned database is incorporated within the project management process. For example:
| Learning From Errors |
| Unfortunately many of the errors made during a project do not get reported. People do not like admitting their mistakes for fear they will be held against them. Why not adopt a method common in the aircraft business, the confidential Special Occurrence Report, which has contributed a lot to aircraft safety. The idea is that any member of a project team who makes an error can report it anonymously. This would be added to the lessons learned. It should also be sent to the Process Improvement Group or Project Office to spot any problems that can be solved by some process improvement or training activity.
|
|
|
