Execution Management Minute


Issue: December 11, 2007

Dear Managers,

Every other week we bring you one tip from our most successful implementations. This issue of Execution Management Minute is about a key rule for estimating and managing tasks. If you find it useful, please feel free to forward it to your colleagues.

The Realization Team

 

Less Means More

Having many projects in execution does not increase resource utilization. Au contraire, it creates artificial resource shortages, thus creating delays and reducing throughput. Moreover, the quality of work suffers from rampant multitasking caused by contention for resources.

When there are resource shortages all around, it is time to temporarily freeze some projects. (A 25% reduction in projects is a good thumb rule.) Not only will projects finish faster, but you will also be able to do more projects with the same resources. And don't worry-the frozen projects will be put back into execution as existing projects finish.

And that's the Execution Management Minute for this week.