Politicians?
Politics? Yuck! We hate politics!
No,
we don’t. We don’t hate politics. We hate sleazy politics, and because of that
we avoid politics, and because of that we’ll never be very good at project
management.
We don’t understand that ALL human relationships are
run by politics, and the best relationships are managed by topflight
politicians.
Great marriages, for instance, succeed so well because the couple
has mastered, not only continuing true love, but the negotiated matters of
effective partnership in managing children, solving finances and taking out the
garbage.
Marriage
is a project, the most profoundly important project most of us ever get to star
in. It has all the elements – complexity, dependencies, uncertainty, risk,
diverse participants, resource management, disruptive variances and limitations
on individual freedom of action. Etc.
The
people who find themselves in these grand experiments never understand all that
until they’re committed, responsible . . . and stuck. Not in a bad way, you
understand, but very openly stuck.
Our
current public politics, narrowly defined, are at first look an example of
disgracefully bad project management. The major matters at the national and
state levels are neglected, distorted or subverted in favor of what appear to
be narrow and destructive ends.
This
public politics business actually is a side issue in the context of our
discussion, but two quick observations could be useful.
One is that some mayors and other local leaders are doing yeoman
work in finding ways to do the best possible in their grim realities while the
more-insulated big players hurl their thunder, mess with vital resources and
screw the end user. The hometown heroes are managing their projects, not
bewailing their situations.
The other point for thought is that the bitter collisions in the
public arenas of Washington and state capitals
actually are political projects in process. Like sausage in mid-manufacture,
the making of public-policy outcomes is nothing for the faint of heart to
witness close up.
Each of the parties in contention has its eye on a goal, and has
chosen a set of actions to achieve that goal. Elections are the close of
project phases, as are the terms of administrations, but the final outcome of
those collected projects won’t be achieved (or known) in our lifetimes.
In short, what goes on in politics as customarily defined does
indeed illuminate aspects of our projects, but does not define our management
of them.
The truth is that project management requires its practitioners to
practice politics to succeed. Gather your information, organize your people,
plan your process, prepare for your unpleasant surprises, convince your
stakeholders, persuade your end users and go for it.
Project management. It’s the politics. OK, you’re not stupid. You
knew that.
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