There is no question that issue management is a critical process for project management and for any organization, for that matter. And, of course, doing it right is just as important. After all, if it doesn’t serve your needs, doesn’t provide meaningful reporting, and doesn’t all for the proper identification, oversight and ongoing management of issues then it isn’t going to provide much value to your organization and it won’t get used.
You could plan forever
So should we take months designing the right issue management platform to make sure it’s right the first time and usable forever? No….absolutely not. It’s like couples who decide to wait till they have enough money to start a family, or a big enough house or just the right jobs. Their youth passes them by and they end up with no children at all, no family and no grandchildren and so on. And they get bored looking at each other 20 years later.
Don’t wait for perfection
They key is, you have to start somewhere. No one gets it right the first time. Projects ‘fail’ more than 50% of the time, but that doesn’t mean a usable solution hasn’t been implemented. It means they went over budget, or over the timeframe for implementation, or something was out of whack at deployment that was probably fixed later. A majority of projects aren’t a complete success at deployment…but most get the job done and with some post deployment tweaking they are successful or at least basically delivered the anticipated outcome.
The same is true for an issue management platform. Issues need tracked…period. It’s imperative that you don’t miss critical windows of issue management and issue tracking on key projects just because you’re trying to build or select the perfect tracking system. The key is to hold some planning meetings to identify what the major issue elements are that need to be tracked and reported on for your organization and develop or buy something that will meet those requirements – at least as much as possible. You can tweak it later because it’s highly unlikely that you’ll get it completely right the first time. Despite what my first manager told me about his first software application, no code was ever written error-free the first time, no project was implemented issue-free from beginning to end, and no tracking platform has ever been developed that will do everything you need it to do right out of the gate. Design it to capture what you think you need today and in the near future, and plan to revisit those needs along the way. Assume that it will need to grow and flex with your organization’s needs. Don’t wait to start with perfection – or you will never get started and you’ll miss tracking critical issues on your early projects.
For issue management and project tracking on your ongoing engagements, check out Gemini. Gemini uses understandable and consistent industry-specific terminology to facilitate the most collaborative situation possible for everyone involved on the project. Gemini can meet all of your task management needs for your organization.
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