Playing With A Lead

Posted by Rich Crowley in Project Management, teams

Early last month, the Canadian National Junior Hockey team lost the gold medal game 5-3 to Russia at the annual world junior championship tournament held in Buffalo. There was much anguish across the land not so much because they lost, but because they had it won and then gave it away. You see, the Canuck lads led 3-0 at the end of the second period. That’s a decent lead and it was a lead they had built up by playing very well to that point in the game. The Russians scored twice in a span of about 11 seconds early in the third and it was all down hill from there.

Interestingly, the Canadians were not favoured to win the tournament this year. The US was. However, the Canadian team, built very much to offset the American’s strengths, knocked off the Americans in the semi-finals after losing to them in the gold medal game last year in overtime. While the pain of last year’s final game was huge, especially given that we were considered by many to be the top seed, this year’s loss in the finals seemed worse.

So why did it seem worse? If we had been beaten by the Americans in the semi’s this year, perhaps it wouldn’t have felt as bad because, after all, they were the top seed and not many expected us to beat them. No, what made it worse was the expectations the team created when they knocked off the Americans in the semi’s and the 3-0 lead they build up in the final game. In short, success breeds expectations of continued success. I don’t believe for a minute the Canadian team let down their guard in the third period because they thought they had it won. They just played differently because they were ahead.

I was thinking about this as I was planning out a project I’m working on currently. Expectations are always important to set early in a project with the various project stakeholders but expectations need to be constantly managed throughout the life of a project as well.

I’m not sure what the equivalent of a 3-0 lead is late in a project but my guess is that it’s the team taking its foot off the gas pedal and not bearing down to finish the job when the end is in sight. Milestones get missed, work gets sloppy, warning signs of problems aren’t taken as serious as they should, etc. and before long a project that was close to completing successfully has blown its budget, missed its deadlines or developed problems in meeting the business objectives it was supposed to.

Diligent project management can help projects avoid these setbacks. As PM’s, we need to constantly assess the collective morale, confidence level and operating ethic of our teams at all points in a project and guard against those team emotions that can cause such problems. Playing with a lead is preferable to having to come from behind but as that old adage goes, it ain’t over til it’s over.