We have a habit of getting in our own way, don’t we? David Courtney Boyle, author and economist, writes, “[T]he human factor is regarded as a pernicious source of error. People mess things up. They get ill, have tantrums, and they make the most humungous mistakes.” You simply can’t quantify people. There will always be uncertainty; we don’t know how they understand, how they interpret, what their levels of fear or comfort are. People are a project’s biggest obstacle. But as Boyle adds, “human beings are also the only real source of success and the only source of genuine change.” Project reviews allow us to continually check on teams, to take their pulse – and hopefully prevent a few tantrums all around.

When you run a marathon, success is finishing, whether first or last place. When you climb Everest, success is making it back home in more or less one piece. When you raise children, success is… well, it depends on the day.

The definition of success varies with our goals. Oftentimes, we think of a project as a success when it comes in on time and on budget (or under in one or both categories). But that is only one indicator of success and, as it turns out, it’s not necessarily the best one either. When do we know if a project is really “successful”? What does that mean?

There’s an old joke that goes, “What’s an auditor? Someone who arrives after the battle and bayonets all the wounded.” Whether we are being audited by a tax agent or by an internal or external auditor at work, it can be a thoroughly nerve-wracking experience. We think this bayonet-wielding – or checklist-wielding – auditor has come in for just one reason: to find noncompliance. The only way to survive is to be perfect – so we’re all doomed! “Audit” certainly is a four-letter word in our parlance, but if we can shift that paradigm, we can start to reap some benefits beyond compliance.

The thing about grocery shopping, exercising, laundry, cleaning, or risk management is that you’re never done. You never get to a point where you say, “Well, I did it. I finished shopping for ever. Glad that’s done!” Managing risk in business is an iterative process. Think of it as your albatross, or, if you are an optimist and would like to stay in business, your chance to minimize threat and maximize opportunity.

Accenture’s 2009 Global Risk Management Study highlighted some deficiencies in how businesses approach risk management. It should be noted, though, that the research also revealed a strong interest in and motivation to improve in this critical area.

Have you ever heard the saying, “Never bring a knife to a gunfight?” That’s a little like how it feels to show up to a project management situation with Excel instead of Project or Word instead of Primavera. Many times, clients focus on the software or the technology: we want SharePoint, or we want Basecamp. What they bypass is the project itself; what will work best for our needs? What will facilitate this project and allow us to accomplish our goals? Sometimes a knife works just fine.

In large projects, a software program like Microsoft Project is a necessity. Even for smaller projects, SharePoint can be a lifesaver because it allows you to share documents, keep them in a central, accessible location, and coordinate dispersed team members. But there are other tools that are essential, and here’s where the knife/gunfight analogy comes in. These tools include: