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Why Most Projects Fail: How to Avoid Scope Creep · Unspoken Career Truths

• 0:00
  Hey Lauren, has this ever happened?
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  Has this ever happened to you where you order a pizza personal
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  size and then it comes out and it's way too big to eat?
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  Because I'm gluten free it usually comes out smaller, but I
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  think there's been other experiences in my life where I
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  thought I was getting something and it was a much bigger size,
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  AKA my dog. Oh yeah, How heavy is Dewey A?
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  105 lbs. He's formidable.
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  But he thinks he's 20. Well, today we are talking about
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  things that get bigger unexpectedly.
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  Not just pizzas, not just puppies, but scope creep when
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  your projects and the uncontrolled expansion of when a
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  project or project requirements and sometimes even job
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  descriptions get larger than you think.
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  Welcome to unspoken career troops.
• 0:56
  I'm Lauren Levette Gilbert. And I'm Cara Wood.
• 1:00
  And we're here to be the Co workers you can trust.
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  In just 10 minutes, we'll cover the strategies you need, the
• 1:06
  mistakes to avoid, and the insider secrets no one tells
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  you. I actually think this happens
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  even more often than we think, and it really is when like the
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  whole team or the client acts like that, that they're holding
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  you to that initial timeline. But everything has gotten
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  bigger. There are more requirements,
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  there's more complexity, or things have just shifted or job
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  description. Suddenly your job's bigger, but
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  your salary and your paycheck are the same size.
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  Well, I like the job description.
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  One that is that's easy to get scope creep in that it's really
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  interesting right now for a couple different reasons.
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  One, because I think people are doing more with less and so
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  there's more expectations on people and there's this
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  assumption that AI is going to supplement a lot of that.
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  And I don't disagree, but I don't know if we're there yet.
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  And then I think the other thing that I've experienced lately in
• 1:59
  a beautiful way is a lot of people are going on maternity
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  leave, but that also means like a lot of their work, if you
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  don't have the additional budget to hire, like temp work goes on
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  the people that are still there. So just two examples I've seen.
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  Yeah. And I think with the AI one,
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  it's so fascinating because even if you've got management telling
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  you AI is going to pick up the slack, you actually get an
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  additional project which is to figure out AI.
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  And. Yeah, so that it can take on
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  your work. And I've had that happen with
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  AI, and I've had that happen with new systems.
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  Anytime you've got something new to learn, you actually have to
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  get up to speed. And you're expected to get up to
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  speed at the same time that you're maintaining the job that
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  you already have, or sometimes doing the new stuff that's been
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  added on the assumption that soon, once you're up to speed,
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  things will get taken off your plate.
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  Oh, and did we add you still have the same number of hours in
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  the day? And you still have the same
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  number of hours in the day. So I want to talk about kind of
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  like two ways to combat this. One is sort of how you start
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  projects and what are some of the things that you can do to
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  keep an eye on this, especially when you are the project manager
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  or if you're just someone who's involved initially in the
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  committee with project management.
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  And for me, that's, you know, spelling out actually the
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  requirements. So what you're going to need to
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  get started because another way that this gets complex sometimes
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  is that you don't have all the information.
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  And so you're assigning timelines or you've been given a
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  deadline and you actually don't have all the information for
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  what the project fully is. And then the other things are
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  things like figuring out what you know the success is going to
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  be, how it's going to be measured.
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  And then the biggest one is writing all of it down, not just
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  for yourself, but in a place that people can keep looking at.
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  In a tracker, I, that's my go to like have a tracker that's very
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  clear. That's like, hey, we are on time
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  or we're off or we are like ahead of schedule or whatever
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  that looks like. Or like, hey, we've achieved
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  this or we need these things. Like I think the key thing here
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  for scope creep is also just communicate, communicate,
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  communicate. Like where are we, what do we
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  need? What else is being added?
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  If you want to add something what comes off that kind of
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  thing, like just be very clear. That's such a great point
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  because I feel like, yeah, writing it down.
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  The point of writing it down is then you're bringing it to every
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  meeting. So whether that's a tracker or
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  whether that's you're over communicating some of the best,
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  if people have used the system of like Agile, those are some of
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  the best projects that I've worked on where you're literally
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  revisiting it constantly in a stand up.
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  And it does feel repetitive, but it's actually a way that then
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  everybody is crystal clear on what's supposed to happen and
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  when. Everybody's on the same page.
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  That's what you need. Exactly.
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  But then I think with the other thing that we talked about is
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  that, OK, that's a great scenario when you're actually in
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  charge and you've gotten to kind of start the project out.
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  But what do you do when you are seeing it happen and you're
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  like, how do I stop this? I'm curious, Lauren, like if you
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  have any examples of kind of when this has happened to you
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  and what you've done? Oh, yeah.
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  I would say when I was earlier in my career, I was less likely
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  to say no. And I was more like, yeah, I'll
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  take it on. Sure, sure, sure.
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  Like because you know, you're early in your career and you're
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  like, yeah, like I want to get ahead and I want to do all these
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  things and there's only a level of that.
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  But I think for me when it comes to scope creep, it's don't be
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  afraid to like to either say hey, like we need to reassess
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  what this looks like because this is what I'm delivering, or
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  just be super clear and say, hey, I'm happy to deliver that.
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  But what comes off for that to come on.
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  And that's actually something that a leader taught me as I got
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  further in my career. And he was great.
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  And he was always very clear. He was like, I am going to
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  always either add things or tell you things or hear about things
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  because I'm in different meetings.
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  But what I need from you is to be super clear, like, hey, I can
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  handle this or I need you to prioritize for me what comes off
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  my plate for this to go on if it's the top priority for all of
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  us. So it would just be for me, like
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  don't be afraid to flag it and have a super transparent
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  conversation that something needs to come off for it to go
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  on. I feel like leaders actually
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  want to hear what those risks are.
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  So for me, I've always had a lot of success when I framed it as a
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  risk of like, we're going to run into either running out of
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  resources, running out of time, you know, not being able to
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  spend as much time on each of the features that we're
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  developing. Whatever it is that could happen
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  if you took all of it on and said yes to everything.
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  And then what you decided like turn around and say, please help
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  me prioritize. It's funny for me, it has it, it
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  definitely did happen early in my career, but it's happened
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  throughout. And I think a lot of the reasons
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  it's happened throughout is because scope creep also happens
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  when something shifts in the reality.
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  So I've worked at fast-paced places where we have new
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  variables. Oh, we've just learned about
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  something competitors doing something shifted in the market.
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  We're getting early signals that something might not work before
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  we launch it. We've gotten feedback and now we
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  want to reassess where we're at. And it's really like exciting to
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  be like, oh, I want to take all that on.
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  But you can't do that without the conversation of what's this
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  going to impact, how long do we want to spend on these changes?
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  Even thinking about changes, you know, what's the cost ratio of
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  like time versus launching something that we had initially
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  planned and then seeing how it results in the market I love.
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  I love that you mentioned the excitement part because I think
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  it's really easy when it's something cool that you want to
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  do and you're like, oh, I'm so excited.
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  I want to work on this, but like, don't let the excitement
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  kind of like overpower and feel like, hey, you need to be a full
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  human and you only have a certain number of hours and you
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  don't want to burn out. And you have to like be cautious
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  of that because I think I struggle with that still.
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  Like I, I get really excited about stuff and I like want to
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  do stuff, but I need to take a step back and be like, hey,
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  like, what do we really need to prioritize?
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  What's actually like important and needs and is going to move
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  the needle And can I actually carve out time for this?
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  Right. And how many projects can I take
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  on and job? Realistically.
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  Right. And I think that gets back to
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  when this impacts your job description because as we all
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  know, there's a million ways that it can affect your job
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  description. And there are some things that
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  are going to come across that are just super, you're like, I
• 8:37
  really want to do that or try that.
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  But then you want to be super clear, hey, this is outside of
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  my scope. And so how do we make room for
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  it? That means I'm not going to get
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  to XYZ. And I love having those
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  conversations with my managers or my clients where I'm like,
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  hey, you know, this is what is on my plate this week.
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  And if I take this other thing on, how are we going to make
• 9:01
  this work in a week's time? Yeah.
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  And it also, it takes time to be comfortable to have that
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  conversation, But we're here to tell you like, it's OK and like
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  the more you practice at it, the better you'll get at it.
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  And I think also like either your boss is going to be happy
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  to hear that, especially if you come at it from a like
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  partnership perspective or you've got a manager who's who's
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  a little bit unreasonable. And that is a tougher position
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  to be in where then you have to sort of hold your own boundaries
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  and say and make your own sort of priorities.
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  I had, you know, Co worker say like, OK, well, which ball's
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  going to drop? And and you sometimes have to
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  make that decision if you don't have a manager who will protect
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  that for you. I.
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  Feel like that might be another podcast so.
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  Lauren, to your point, your people are feeling it more and
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  more right now with all the changes that are happening.
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  Write it, write down your plan and keep sharing it over and
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  over again. Speak up when your project or
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  your or your job description is overwhelmed.
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  And if you can tie it all back to sort of the shared goal and
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  the impact that adding more on might have to the shared goal,
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  the KPI or the end project, you're going to have a more
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  intentive audience for pushing back on scope creep.
• 10:19
  That's a wrap. Thanks for joining us on
• 10:22
  Unspoken Career Truths. Don't forget to follow us on
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