Programme and Project Portfolio Management Blog (PPM)

Dear Reader, Lets start the week with a bit of fun. Found this cartoon that I would like to share with you from Raven’s Brain called Project Management Humor: Getting the requirements right!. Anyone that has ever worked on a “project” will quickly chuckle at the relevance. It’s quite humorous and one to consider printing/posting.Also readers the orginal source Humor in Systems Analysis. has some excellent cartoons on all sorts of IT / Project Management issues.

Dear Readers, how many of these quotes ring true… – “A badly planned project will take three times longer than expected – a well planned project only twice as long as expected.”- “A change freeze is like the abominable snowman: it is a myth and would anyway melt when heat is applied.”

• “A little risk management saves a lot of fan cleaning.”

• “A minute saved at the start is just as effective as one saved at the end.”

• “A problem shared is a buck passed.”

• “A project ain’t over until the fat cheque is cashed.”

• “A project gets a year late one day at a time.”

• “A project is one small step for the project sponsor, one giant leap for the project manager.”

• “A two year project will take three years, a three year project will never finish ”

• “A user is somebody who tells you what they want the day you give them what they asked for.”

• “A user will tell you anything you ask about, but nothing more.”

• “A verbal contract isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.”

• “Activity is not achievement.”

• “All project managers face problems on Monday mornings – good project managers are working on next Monday’s problems.”

• “Any project can be estimated accurately (once it’s completed).”

• “Anything that can be changed will be changed until there is no time left to change anything.”

• “At the heart of every large project is a small project trying to get out.”

• “Everyone asks for a strong project manager – when they get him they don’t want him.”

• “Feather and down are padding – changes and contingencies will be real events.”

• “For a project manager overruns are as certain as death and taxes.”

• “Furious activity does not necessarily equate to progress and is no substitute for understanding.”

• “Good project managers admit mistakes: that’s why you so rarely meet a good project manager.”

• “Good project managers know when not to manage a project.”

• “I know that you believe that you understand what you think I said but I am not sure you realise that what you heard is not what I meant.”

• “If an IT project works the first time, it is wrong.”

• “If at first you don’t succeed, remove all evidence you ever tried.”

• “If everything is going exactly to plan, something somewhere is going massively wrong.”

• “If it can’t possibly go wrong, it will – O’Malley’s corollary to Murphy’s law.”

• “If it can go wrong it will – Murphy’s law.”

• “If it happens once it’s ignorance, if it happens twice it’s neglect, if it happens three times it’s policy.”

• “If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it probably is a duck.”

To read full list of quotes click here