Do you ever wish you could erase your mistakes and start over? It’s been almost 15 years working in the public sector for me, and I’ve certainly seen (and made) many mistakes. Of course, at that moment it feels terrible… but, the lessons you learn are invaluable. This is why I want to share with you some of them. In this blog, I talk about 3 mistakes you want to avoid in project implementation in the public sector. Use it as a checklist to stay away, or at least learn faster, from them. You’ll also find 3 questions you can ask yourself that will help you get back on track.
Mistake # 1: Jumping to a conclusion
It’s easier said than done, isn’t it? When you’re working under pressure and you need to get things done fast, it’s hard to resist the urgency to act. Our brain is wired to solve problems. Naturally, we want to jump into fixing things, without necessarily taking the time to understand the problem in the first place.
When I was Minister of Tourism, my team identified that paying the annual license to the Ministry was manual and inefficient. First, people had to go to the Ministry (in person) to ask how much they needed to pay, then they had to go to the bank and pay, and finally, they had to go back to the Ministry to show proof of payment to get the document that certified they’d paid and authorized them to operate. Even telling you about it sounds cumbersome. We moved everything online and eliminated the old procedure. We were proud of the result. But some of the Ministry’s offices were requesting to have it back. I instantly opposed it, we were going digital and I thought it was just an excuse.
A couple of months later, when I was visiting one of the towns, I found out that our expedited procedure was actually causing a lot of trouble to the small hotels and tourism facilities in rural areas. The problem was that the solution worked well when there was a reliable internet connection and if people had computers, which wasn’t always the case, particularly in rural areas. We ended up allowing back the old procedure for rural areas. It made everyone’s life easier and the ministry far more efficient.
Next time you find yourself jumping to a conclusion like you’re running into fresh water on a summer day, ask yourself: if the system were working, what purpose will it serve? That way instead of trying to fix the system, you’ll find yourself trying to understand it first.
Mistake # 2: Avoiding politics
Development is a political process. No matter how technical we think our position is, or wish it’d be, politics is part of the game. It’s just there, and there’s no way to avoid it. Take it from someone that for years tried to avoid politics.
As a friend of mine said, there is Politics with “a capital P” and politics with “a little p”. So, no matter what you do, you would have politics, either way, the more local politics (with “p”) regarding the power dynamics of your organization, or the more complex Politics (with “P”) regarding power and how resources are contested at a country or even international level.
I’ve learned that instead of avoiding politics, you need to embrace it. In other words, instead of thinking it works against you, make it work for you. You could start in a simple way and ask who is interested (or not) in my project, what is their position about it, and how could I make it more interesting for them?
Mistake # 3: Assuming things will get done
Going from a notion into action seems like a utopia at times. The truth is, thinking and doing are two very different things. In an interview with a former President of Ecuador, Rodrigo Borja, the reporter asked him what was his biggest regret while in office. And he said all the orders I gave that were not implemented. What happened to President Borja happens to all of us, at a different scale of course.
Let’s start at a personal level. Think of all the things you want to do, some of the ones you even said you would but somehow didn’t. The classic example in behavioural economics is the gym membership you paid for in January that you didn’t use or the alarm clock that hit a snooze on more times than you can count. There’s an inconsistency between what you prefer your future self to do and what your future self prefers to do. Companies have created mechanisms to prevent this, like Clocky, the running clock to help you avoid staying in bed, or a lockbox for your phone to reduce dependence on it.
Now, some of that time inconsistency continues at a group level. Plus, overstretched teams handling too many priorities means, in practice, that some things don’t get done. The problem is that if you only assume they will, it’s more an act of faith than proper project management. You have to create the mechanisms to follow up on projects and anticipate the things that could go wrong.
So a question for you is, if something needs to get done, what would be your “clocky” alternative to make sure it happens?
To sum it up
Project implementation is not easy. But, the challenges and complexity of what you do every day are precisely what makes it such a fascinating job. Plus, by solving those issues you’re impacting people’s lives. Remember, resist the urgency to act and take some time to understand the problem first. Development is a political process, instead of avoiding politics, try embracing it. And, don’t assume things will get done, you have to make it happen. Make sure to create the mechanisms to follow up on the decisions you make.
