This axiom often attributed to Albert Einstein about the definition of insanity.
As it turns out, insanity might be crediting this quote to Einstein over and over again. He never said it.
While the tongue-in-cheek definition may or may not have originated with the German physicist, it is clearly applicable to several processes encountered in the management of other people's money, to produce a tangible outcome, for a planned cost, at a planned time, resulting in a planned Value in exchange for that time and money.
Let's supposed Einstein was on to something, what does this really mean in our Project Performance Management world, using either traditional or agile methods for delivering that Value?
Let's start with an Immutable Principle of all success in the presence of uncertainty.
- When something (a process, a piece of equipment, a tool, even people) is not working as needed, first find the Root Cause of this failing entity before every suggesting a solution:
- Find the conditions that create the dysfunction or malfunction.
- Find the actions, in the presence of the condition, that creates the dysfunction or malfunction.
- Here are some resources for applying Root Cause Analysis to the observed problem. Here are some comments on that notion Dysfunction and Dysfunction.
This approach to problem-solving (removing the dysfunction) is evidence-based.
When we hear a suggested fix in the absence of a principle by which to test the fix, we're just listening to an uninformed opinion.
Of course, my favorite example is No Estimates advocates claim that estimates are the smell of dysfunction - with no principles and no evidence other than personal anecdotes - that decisions can be made in the presence of uncertainty while spending other peoples money - without estimating the outcome of those decisions.
