Meme #2: The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions ...

Meme #2: The Road to Hell is Paved with
Good Intentions

Project Management Ethics: A Discourse
on Fairness, Honesty and Reality

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
All Rights Reserved

PMI’s Code of Ethics and Professional
Conduct

The code of conduct imposes an ethical obligation upon the
project manager to adhere to:

• Responsibility
• Respect
• Fairness
• Honesty

•These are necessary but not sufficient activities for achieving
successful project outcomes consistently.
•Much of the code is targeted to contractors.
•In game theory simulations “ethical actors” often lose out to the
“unethical actors” when one party cheats.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
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Dilemma: if everyone claims to consistently act in good
faith and follow good PM practices, why do projects
perform poorly so often?

The answer is embedded in our title…”the road to hell is
paved with good intentions”. People acting in good faith
can make progressively poor decisions because their
processes are flawed. Sometimes “cheaters” don’t
believe that they really are cheaters, and almost never
will they admit to being cheaters.

Project Management is intended to mitigate these risks,
but specific PM tools are secondary to a strong
foundation built on ethics and philosophy. In this meme
we explore these concepts.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
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To get the discussion started let’s first review:
PMI’s Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct

•PMI’s Code contains many essential points, but it is so
general that most Project Managers of failed projects could
argue that they complied with the Code.
•Experience has shown that the “Honesty and Truth”
components are key yet the complexity of technology can
make objectivity difficult to achieve. We need to add a 5th
dimension to the code---Reality.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
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•A discussion of ethics must begin with reality in the commitment making
process and managing the expectations of the project owner/sponsor. This
begins during the Initiating and Planning phases.

•Not even the best project management process can rescue a project that is
anchored in an unrealistic but firm commitment to a fixed CSSQ bundle.
Challenging but achievable plans are required.

Activities •Business Case •Detailed Product Progressive Detailing of Plan •Product is
(Scope) Requirements stable
Resources •Charter Design
•Detailed Project Build •Steady state
Budget •Approvals Plan Test operations
Deploy
Quality •First Cut •Recalibrate •Value
Schedule Expectations Expectations Product attainment
Release steps underway
•Ready for •Commitments
planning made subject to •Lessons
understanding of learned
•Scope scope and risks
Statement •Redeploy
•Change control in resources or
place Interim Deliverables prepare for next
release

m/d/y Refers to major milestone © 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc. m/d/y
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•Two Cases in Point
Your instructor walked into two SAP implementations as a
contract project manager with scope of $20+Mil. in which
management had an expectation of $ 7-$8 Mil budget
communicated by the vendor.
Plenty of other similar examples exist.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
All Rights Reserved

Project Management and Reality

The discipline of project management is anchored in 
a cybernetic process grounded in the assumption 
that actual project performance is a mind‐
independent reality.

It assumes that project stakeholders are in contact 
with this reality through sensory perception; that 
project stakeholders gain objective knowledge by 
measurement.

Things are what they are regardless of our wishes or 
hopes ‐ our role is to measure it accurately.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
All Rights Reserved

Two Philosophical Worldviews in
Western Civilization as Described

by Ayn Rand

Reality is Mind Man Can Be Science,
Independent
Aristotle Objective, Progress

Emphasis on the through Self-
Interest,/Capitalism
Individual

Existence
Exists

Plato Reality is a Man is Incapable Impoverishment of
Hegel Collective Hunch of Being Objective, Man Through
Kant Emphasis on the Altruism/Socialism

Collectivity

Wishing

Makes it so

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
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Project Management’s Cybernetic Process

Define Scope, Change Order The Vision of the Project
Goals Deliverable Begins Here
Change
and Objectives Control Commitments to a CSSQ
Process bundle should include
Plan the work a statement of risks
and assign No
resources Effective?

Team Corrective Challenge: How to
Executes Action Measure Reality Under

Tasks Complexity

Measure Report Create
Work Publicly Remedies To

Performance Issues Shortfalls
and risks
Assess

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
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Project Management and Reality

The cybernetic cycle fails as a management   tool if:
• the perception of reality becomes completely 
subjective and left to one's feelings, desires, 
intuitions, or whims. 
• measurement is obfuscated, selective or 
slanted to support a pre‐determined point of 
view.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
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Reality as Perceived By the Inexperienced Person

Iceberg
Snow Ocean Cold

Reality as Perceived By the             Experienced 
Person

unobservable

Iceberg Risks

Accidents

Snow Ocean Cold Fire Collision Electrical

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Limitations of Perceived Reality by an Individual

Mountain‐like Shape

Reality as perceived by the group                  
due to variations in sensory input      and 

experiences

Mountain‐like Shape

Iceberg Mountain

Ocean Cold Snow Land

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Reality as Perceived By a Person with Orientation A

Objects
Milk Flower Iceberg

Reality as Perceived By the Person with Orientation B who 
happens to be in the business of selling Colorado vacations

Objects
Milk Iceberg Mountain

Sales
The context of Ocean vs Land is
critical here.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
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Boyd’s OODA “Loop” Has Proven to be a Useful
Construct For Describing the Importance of Orientation

Observe Orient Decide Act

Unfolding Implicit Cultural Implicit
Circumstances Guidance Traditions Guidance
& Control & Control

Heritage

Observations Feed Analyses & Feed Decision Feed Action
Forward Synthesis Forward (Hypothesis) Forward (Test)

New Previous
Information Experience

Outside Feedback Unfolding
Information Feedback Interaction

Unfolding With
Interaction Environment

With
Environment

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To Mitigate Different Interpretations of Reality Measures 
Must Be Shown In Context

For Example……global warming

Newspapers and politicians tend to make statements 
without showing context. Comments like…”Since 1980
the earth’s temperature has been rising, we have only

10 years to do something about it”.

Wouldn’t the conversation be more meaningful if we
showed data within context…such as…

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Example of Showing Context:
Estimated Global Temperatures Since 1 AD

Example only….It should be noted that numerous studies have
been performed on this subject showing varying results.

Cumulative On Technology Projects the Results Can
Resources $$
Be Disastrous
decision
How early anchoring
can effect downstream
decisions

Actions taken to
secure decision

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc. Time
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Checks and Balances

•To understand the concept of checks and balances, we need look
no further than the constitution of the U.S. The founding fathers
understood the potential treachery of human nature. Thus, our
government is divided into executive, legislative and judiciary
branches that “check and balance” each other.

•A wise project manager sets up a similar mechanism to mitigate
conflicts of interest on his/her project.

•Nature helps us a bit here as all organic adaptive systems (from
bacteria to human groups) perform roles for survival:

• Conformity enforcers
• Diversity generators
• Utility sorters
• Resource shifters
• Inter-group tournaments
•In a group different people tend to fit these roles. These can help or
hinder the project management process.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
All Rights Reserved

Summary of Key Concepts

How does one make these values operational:
• Adhere to the Code of Conduct in good faith.
• Adopt an unwavering philosophy that reality is mind
independent at least for your project.
• Proactively manage commitment making to CSSQ
• Establish a system of natural checks and balances
between parties (team members) that includes issue
management.
• Make risks visible; trust your instincts.
• Establish a Performance Measurement based upon

criteria that accommodates complexity.

• Create good contracts with performance milestones for
trustworthy vendors.

• Embed the PMBOK into your PM process.

….and this is our segue to introduce project management tools
and PMBOK concepts.

© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.
All Rights Reserved

PMI’s Body of Knowledge

Consists of multiple resources:
• PMBOK Guide
• Library, journals and other documents
• Membership and meetings to share information

To an extent we might consider the PMBOK a framework somewhat like the
constitution. It contains the collective wisdom of past and present enabling us to
learn from history without having to repeat it.

On the down side:
• the PMBOK consists of what the PM committees can agree upon, and it
may suffer from “regression toward the mean” effect potentially leading
to mediocrity.
• There is a certain level of inbreeding in the process of generating
standards. PMI certified committee members are more likely to suggest
the need for PMI based practices because they are “safe”.
• Software and IT are relatively new fields. Is there really a universal
model to project management that holds for engineering, construction,
IT, R&D, etc?

We will adopt the PMBOK structure in our discussions but add nuances based
upon experience and variations of project type.© 2008 Milestone Planning & Research, Inc.

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