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12 Notorious Failed Projects & What We Can Learn from Them

Failure is an unavoidable part of any project process: it’s the degree of failure that makes the difference. If a task fails, there are ways to reallocate resources and get back on track. But a systemic collapse will derail the whole project.

Why Is It Important to Analyze Failed Projects?

What good can come from failure? A lot, actually. Sometimes a project reaches too far beyond its means and fails, which is unfortunate but can also serve as a teaching moment. If project managers don’t learn from their mistakes, then they’re not growing professionally and will revisit the same problem in future projects.

Project managers can learn as much, if not more, from failed projects as they can from successful ones. A post-mortem analysis should be part of any project plan, and especially so when a project crashes and burns. There are valuable lessons in those ashes.

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12 Top Failed Projects from History

Let’s look at the most notorious failed projects, not to gloat, but to see what they can tell us about project management .

1. Sony Betamax

The word Betamax has become almost synonymous with failure. But when it was first released, Betamax was supposed to become the leader in the cassette recording industry. Developed by Sony, Betamax was introduced in the mid-1970s but was unable to get traction in the market, where JVC’s VHS technology was king.

Surprisingly, Sony continued to produce Betamax all the way into 2016. Long before it discontinued the technology, Betamax was already irrelevant.

Betamax was an innovative product, and it even got to market before VHS. But soon the market had options that were cheaper and better than Betamax, making it a failed project. Sony’s mistake was thinking that the project was complete once the product went to market . Project managers need to always follow up on their work, analyze the data and make an evaluation about what needs to be done to keep the project relevant.

2. New Coke

Coca-Cola is one of the most iconic brands in the world. It’d take a lot to tarnish that reputation. But that’s just what happened when New Coke was introduced in 1985. People didn’t know why the Coke they loved and drank regularly was being replaced.

The company knew why. They were looking to improve quality and make a splash in the marketplace. The fact is, New Coke sunk like a stone. It wasn’t like New Coke was just released without doing market research , though it might seem that way. In fact, the new recipe was tested on 200,000 people, who preferred it to the older version.

But after spending $4 million in development and losing another $30 million in backstocked products, the taste for New Coke evaporated. Consumers can be very loyal to a product, and once they get into a habit, it can be very difficult to break them off it in favor of something different.

It’s not that Coca-Cola neglected market research to see if there was a need to develop a new product, but they were blind to their own customers’ motivations. New Coke was a failed project because the researchers needed to do more than a mere taste test.

They needed to understand how people would react when the familiar Coke they loved would be discontinued and replaced by a shiny new upstart. Market research must be handled like a science and an art—and worked into the project plan accordingly.

One lesson is that project management software decreases the chance of a failed project. ProjectManager is award-winning project management software that allows you to monitor your work in real time to make more insightful decisions that can keep failure at bay. Use our real-time dashboards to track the health of your project, including such important key performance indicators (KPIs) as time, cost and more. There’s no time-consuming setup required as with lightweight software. Our dashboard is ready when you are. Get started with ProjectManager today for free.

3. Pepsi Crystal

In 1992, Pepsi launched Pepsi Crystal. It was a unique soft drink in that there was no color. It was as clear as water. Pepsi hoped to take advantage of the growing trend for purity and health. Pepsi marketed the new drink as pure, caffeine-free and an alternative to the unhealthy traditional colas.

At first, sales looked good. The first year saw about $470 million in sales. Consumers were curious to find out if the taste was the same as Pepsi, which it was. Other colorless soft drinks started to introduce themselves to the market, such as 7Up and Sprite. But what Pepsi and the copycats didn’t take into account was how much sight influences flavor. Consumers found the product bland and sales tanked.

Pepsi Crystal was mocked on Saturday Night Live and Time Magazine listed it in its top-10 marketing failures of the 20th century.

Pepsi made the mistake of ignoring all the senses that are involved in the consummation of their product. They should have done more testing. If so, they would have realized the importance of the look of the product. Pepsi Crystal thought that a clear-looking liquid would indicate a healthy one, but what was registered by the majority of users was a bland one.

4. Ford Edsel

Ford released its Edsel model in 1957. Since then, the name has become synonymous with project planning failure. That’s an accomplishment, but not the type that Ford was hoping for. This was supposed to be the car for the middle class and Ford invested $250 million into the Edsel.

Ford ended up losing $350 million on the gas-guzzler that the public found an unattractive alternative to other cars on the market. Part of the problem was that the first Edsels had oil leaks, hoods that stuck, trunks that wouldn’t open and more issues that soured consumer confidence in the product.

The Ford was a lesson in egos at the company ignoring what the research was telling them. Ford conducted many polls to find out what Americans wanted in a car, including a name. But executives went with Edsel. The design of the car didn’t even consult the polls.

If you’re going to do polling on what the public wants, it is a poor decision to ignore that data . So much time and effort went into coming up with the name, even hiring modernist poet Marianne Moore (who came up with nothing marketable), that Ford neglected to determine if there was even a market for this new car.

To better analyzed your own projects, try our free lessons learned template for Excel . Use it to identify what worked, what didn’t work, various impacts and what you can do better next time. Download yours for free today.

5. Airbus A380

Boeing’s Airbus A380 was viewed as a way for the company to outdo the 747. It spent more than $30 billion on product development in the belief that the industry would embrace a bigger plane that could hold more passengers and increase revenue.

In fact, the Airbus A380 has sold well short of its predicted 1200 units. The plane was headed for the scrap heap as it faced obstacles such as airports having to build special infrastructure and gates to accommodate that massive plane. Those project costs would be handed back to the airlines. That’s going to sour the deal and it did.

Then there were the technical issues. Qantas had to ground its entire A380 fleet after an engine blew up. You’d think that engineers would have thought beyond having more passengers seated on a bigger plane. But they didn’t.

The biggest lesson is that just because you build it doesn’t mean that anyone is going to want it. There wasn’t the demand Boeing believed there to be. Industries and markets are fickle. Just because airlines say they want something today doesn’t mean they’ll want it tomorrow. Boeing should have hedged its bets.

6. World Athletics Championships 2019

Doha is the capital of Qatar and the site of the World Athletics Championships in 2019. The world’s best athletes went there to compete against one another, but the big event turned out to be an even bigger dud.

The problem was that the host nation was unable to sell most of the tickets to the event. Some of the greatest athletes in the world were forced to compete in stadiums that were nearly empty. It was a failure and an embarrassment.

Money is needed to plan for an event , but that investment is no guarantee that people will show up. The mistake was thinking there was a large enough fanbase to sell all the tickets. We keep coming back to this, but it deserves to be mentioned again: research is critical. It wouldn’t have taken much to determine if there were enough interested people to bring a return on the investment.

7. Garden Bridge

Vanity projects tend not to care about success or failure. They’re driven by ego and such was the case with the Garden Bridge. It was the brainchild of Boris Johnson when he was Mayor of London.

This construction project cost 53 million pounds, which is a lot of money, especially when considering it was never even built. The idea of a bridge made of gardens for city dwellers to enjoy is fine, but the over-optimistic fundraising targets and the ballooning costs led to its spectacular failure.

Projects must be realistic. It’s good to remember SMART goals , which is an acronym for specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound. If the project followed those constraints it might have been built or passed on before all that money was spent.

8. Apple Lisa

Before Apple became synonymous with the personal computer (and long before popular products such as the iPhone), it released Lisa. It costs $10,000 with a processor of 5 MHz and 1 MB of RAM. The first model sold only 10,000 units.

Lisa was fated to fail because it was really a prototype. It was marketed as a game-changer in 1983 from its popular, but command-line-based Apple II. The price is certainly one reason why this was not a realistic personal computer, but there were technical issues. It had an operating system that could run multiple programs but was too powerful for its processor. Lisa ran sluggishly.

The truth is Lisa was less a failure than an expensive lesson. Lisa led to the Macintosh, which was basically a less expensive and more effective version of Lisa. The lesson here is that one can learn from failure if it doesn’t bankrupt the company, that is.

9. Dyson Electric Car

After four years and millions of dollars, James Dyson canceled his electric car project. It took that long to realize it wasn’t commercially viable. There is certainly a growing market for electric cars as the industry is motivated by consumers and government regulations to move from fossil fuels to more energy-efficient and sustainable alternatives.

There’s a boom in the production of electric cars, from major manufacturers such as Chrysler and Ford to startups such as Tesla. But sometimes the time isn’t right and no matter how good the idea is, it’s just not meant to be.

Timing is everything. But it’s also important to note how difficult it is to penetrate a market with established players. It takes a lot of capital and manufacturing expertise to start a car company and be competitive.

Related: 10 Free Manufacturing Excel Templates

10. Stretch Project

The Stretch project was initiated in 1956 by a group of computer scientists at IBM who wanted to build the world’s fastest supercomputer. The result of this five-year project was the IBM 7030, also known as Stretch. It was the company’s first transistorized supercomputer.

Though Stretch could handle a half-million instructions per second and was the fastest computer in the world up to 1964, the project was deemed a failure. Why? The project’s goal was to create a computer 100 times faster than what it was built to replace. Stretch was only about 30-40 times faster.

The planned budget was $13.5 million, but the price dropped to $7.8 million; so the computer was at least completed below cost. Only nine supercomputers were built.

While the project was a failure in that it never achieved the goal it set, there was much IBM could salvage from the project. Stretch introduced pipelining, memory protection, memory interleaving and other technologies that helped with the development of future computers.

Creative work is rooted in failure specifically because of the serendipitous discovery that occurs. This was a creative project, which might not have met its paper objective, but created a slew of useful technologies. So, aim for your goal, and who knows what good things you’ll discover along the way.

11. Challenger Space Shuttle

The worst failure is one that results in the loss of life. When you’re dealing with highly complex and dangerous projects like NASA, there’s always a tremendous risk that needs to be tracked . On January 28, 1986, that risk became a horrible reality as the space shuttle Challenger exploded 73 seconds after launch.

The cause was a leak in one of the two solid rocket boosters that set off the main liquid fuel tank. The NASA investigation that followed said the failure was due to a faulty designed O-ring seal and the cold weather at launch, which allowed for the leak.

But it was not only a technical error that NASA discovered but human error. NASA officials went ahead with the launch even though engineers were concerned about the safety of the project. The engineers noted the risk of the O-ring, but their communications never traveled up to managers who could have delayed the launch to ensure the safety of the mission and its astronauts.

Managers are only as well-informed as their team. If they’re not opening lines of communication to access the data on the frontlines of a project, mistakes will be made, and in this case, fatal ones.

12. Computerized DMV

No one loves the DMV. If they were a brand, their reputation would be more than tarnished, it’d be buried. But everyone who drives a vehicle is going to have some interaction with this government agency. Unfortunately, they didn’t help their case in the 1990s when the states of California and Washington attempted to computerize their Departments of Motor Vehicles.

In California, the project began in 1987 as a five-year, $27 million plan to track its 31 million drivers’ licenses and 38 million vehicle registrations. Problems started at the beginning when the state solicited only one bid for the contract, Tandem Computers, locking the state into buying their hardware.

Then, to make things worse, tests showed that the new computers were even slower than the ones they were to replace. But the state moved forward with the project until 1994 when it had to admit failure and end the project. The San Francisco Chronicle reported that the project cost the state $49 million, and a state audit found that the DMV violated contracting laws and regulations.

The problem here is a project that isn’t following regulations. All projects must go through a process of due diligence, and legal and regulatory constraints must be part of that process. If the state had done that and the contract bidding process invited more than one firm to the table, then a costly mess could have been avoided, and our wait at the DMV might actually have become shorter.

How ProjectManager Prevents Failed Projects

ProjectManager keeps your projects from failing with a suite of project management tools that shepherd your project from initiation to a successful close. Plan, schedule and track work, while managing teams, with our online software.

Plan Every Last Detail

Successful projects begin with a strong plan. But it can be hard to keep all those tasks and due dates working together on a realistic schedule. What if some tasks are dependent? It gets complicated. But ProjectManager has an online Gantt chart that plots your tasks across a project timeline, linking dependencies and breaking projects into digestible milestones.

Track Progress as It Happens

ProjectManager keeps you on track with high-level monitoring via its real-time dashboard and more detailed data with one-click reporting . Now when projects start to veer off-track, you can get them back on course quickly.

While we didn’t have an example, there are many projects that fail because they’re not equipped with the right tools for the job. ProjectManager is online project management software that gives project managers and their teams everything they need to plan, monitor and report on their project. Don’t let your next project fail; try ProjectManager with this free 30-day trial .

Deliver your projects on time and on budget

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Project Management Nerd

Project Management and Productivity

10 Project Failures That Stunned the World

The world has witnessed its fair share of project failures in the ever-evolving landscape of innovation and ambition. These grand endeavors, often pursued with the utmost determination, have sometimes crumbled in the face of unforeseen challenges.

Let’s embark on a journey to explore the stories of these failures. From the iconic Sydney Opera House, a modern architectural masterpiece fraught with budget overruns and structural challenges, to the Betamax, Sony’s once-revolutionary but ultimately defeated video format. And then, consider the bold decision by Coca-Cola to change its sacred recipe.

These projects have left an indelible mark in the annals of history. Join us as we delve into the riveting tales of these and more, examining the lessons they impart in the volatile world of innovation, ambition, and, sometimes, spectacular project failure.

1. Sydney Opera House

the Sydney Opera House is one of the icon architecture pieces in the world however it also one of the biggest project failures in history.

 In project management there are three significant constraints to any project that need to be considered. They are the triple constraints of time or scheduling, the cost of the project and the scope. The time and cost constraints are self-explanatory, however what is meant by the scope of a project are the deliverables required to make the project come to life. Essentially it provides the vision for the project. What is important to remember is that changes in one constraint will have a ripple effect on one or both of the other constraints.

Unfortunately, in the case of the Sydney Opera House there was no defined scope. No clear deliverables in place led to a massive blow out in both time and cost. In fact the cost of the project ended up being 15 times more than was originally budgeted and took 10 years longer. It serves as one of history’s greatest project failures.

The Betamax device was an analogue video recording device that was first brought to the United States in 1975. It enjoyed a first to market advantage for around 12 months before the Japanese Company JVC introduced the VHS version. It was the VHS version that began to take the market share due to its cheaper pricing. In fact, by 1980 JVC had 60% market share in the U.S. which enabled economies of scale that allowed VHS units to flood the European market at greatly reduced pricing.

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The Betamax project is a great example of a project that didn’t know when to close. In fact it was still producing consoles in 2002 and only stopped making cassettes in 2016. The unwillingness to let go of this product was one of the reasons for Sony losing overall market share to its competitors.

Further Reading| PMBOK Principle 8 -BUILDING QUALITY |

3. New Coke

In an effort to turn around the declining sales of Coca Cola, and a series of blind taste tests indicating that consumers preferred Pepsi, the decision was made to change the coke recipe.

The project was very secret and was code named ‘Project Kansas’. A significant red flag that was ignored during the testing phase was that 10-12% of survey respondents said they would be angry if Coke changed their recipe and that they may stop drinking the brand all together.

It was also the decision by management who didn’t want to release the product as alternative to Coke rather replacing the original all together.

Their was some initial success as consumers wanted to try the new recipe. This was quickly replaced by resentment particularly in the Southern states of the U.S. It was viewed by many in those regional areas as part of their identity and there was a feeling of surrendering to the enemy.

It took just 79 days after the New Coke was introduced for the old recipe to be re-instated. Less than 6 months later the original formula Coke was increasing its sales by more than twice as much as its main competitor Pepsi. In terms of project failures, the change of the Coke recipe served as one its greatest lessons.

Further Reading | Project Quality Management |

4. Delhi Commonwealth Games Bridge Collapse

The XIX Commonwealth Games were to be held in Delhi India in 2010. The lead up to the event saw major concerns from officials and competing countries regarding the slow pace of work. Problems such as corruption from Games Organising Committee officials, infrastructure compromise, the threat of terrorist attack and poor ticket sales. A significant concern were the delays in the construction of the main Games venues.

The response from the Organising Committee six weeks out from the opening of the games was to increase the workforce significantly. This resulted in a huge increase in tasks completed but also with a lack of training mistakes were bound to occur.

The concerns regarding the poor workmanship materialised on September 21, 2010 when a footbridge joining the Athletes village with the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium collapsed injuring 23 people. This provides a classic case study of a project management scheduling strategy called fast tracking. Essentially to get tasks completed quickly the amount of labour is increased significantly. The problem is that quality reduces and disasters like the Delhi Bridge collapse can occur.

Further Reading | How to manage a saboteur in your team |

5. Waterworld

The Water World movie is a post-apocalyptic film starring Kevin Costner and distributed by Universal Pictures.

The most expensive movie ever made at the time, Waterworld is a great case study on how scope creep can impact time and cost on a project.

At the time the film was due to begin a completed script had not been authorised. This gave rise to many re-writes and changes which continued to raise costs and extend the timeline. Universal had initially authorised a budget of $100 million however the final cost of the film was pushed out to $175 million.

Unfortunately the film was not well received at the box office and ticket sales were not enough to recoup expenses.

Further Reading | How to Promote Team Collaboration in Your Organisation |

6. European Super League

In one of the biggest blunders in football administration history twelve of the top European football clubs announced they were breaking away to form a new competition. The competition was announced on April 18, 2021 and was withdrawn just two days later due to a huge outcry from the club’s biggest stakeholders its fans.

One of the immediate concerns from the football community was that in the new league relegation would not take place. This would remove one of the key elements in European leagues. Concerns came from fans, governing bodies and even European government leaders.

The project failed miserably because the owners of the clubs missed a key component of any project – stakeholder consultation. Engaging with the stakeholders early would have prevented the embarrassment that came with this decision and the cringeworthy apologies that came afterwards. Notably it was the German clubs that did not opt in to the new competition and underscores the close relationship they have with their most important stakeholders.

Club owners still have not learned from one of the most significant sporting project failures as rumours of a new model continue to swirl.

Further Reading | What is the difference between a leader and a project manager? |

7. The Delorean DMC-12

Made famous in the Back to the Future movie franchise the Delorean is still an iconic car today.

The Delorean company was in trouble even before the first car rolled off the construction line. After the company was given a great deal to setup their manufacturing plan in Belfast, a Northern Ireland consulting company gave Delorean a 1 in 10 chance of surviving.  

Design issues were the first problems to surface with the original rotary being replaced by a Peugeot V6. The larger engine couldn’t fit into the tiny space and significant changes were required.

With an inexperienced factory workforce, increasingly delayed production schedules and a CEO that has been arrested on drug charges the car stopped production after 9,000 units were made. This may seem like a large number however it wasn’t enough to save the company and it was wound up in the early 1980s.

Further Reading | The importance of setting goals |

8. IBM’s Stretch Project

The IBM 7030 which was also known as stretch was the world’s first fully transistorized supercomputer.

At the design stage the thought was to make a computer that was 100-200 times faster than its nearest competitor. Unfortunately the complexity of the project and delays in production meant it was only 30 times faster than its competitors. This was seen as project fail at IBM.

The lessons learned were absorbed into IBM and this project fail helped launch other successful products such as the IBM System/360 which were shipped to customers in 1964.

9 The Dyson Electric Car

A team of around 400 people were working on a very secretive electric car project that was due to be released in 2021. Seen as a possible competitor to Tesla the project was pulled before a unit had even been constructed.

The Dyson company is famous for producing a range of high end good value home appliances. The company is privately owned by James Dyson and he took a different approach to the project development.

Building cars is quite different to building vacuum cleaners and a lot of due diligence is required to move into this completely new challenge. This was lacking and an email to all his staff – numbering in the range of 7,000 were informed then that the project wouldn’t be going ahead.

Although close to getting it mass-produced, the cost of the inputs would have meant a price that made the car commercially unviable. It is understood that James Dyson personally absorbed the cost of the project failure and would continue to work on the battery technology developed through the development phase. This shows that lessons learned from project failures can be incredibly valuable.

Further Reading | PMBOK Principle 9 – NAVIGATING PROJECT COMPLEXITY |

10. London City – Garden Bridge

A design originally submitted by Joanne Lumley from Absolutely Fabulous fame, the Garden bridge was designed to be an elevated garden footbridge crossing the Thames joining Lambeth in the South and Victoria embankment in the North.

The project gained traction when Mayor and later Prime Minister Boris Johnson took some interest in it. However, when Boris Johnson’s successor Sadiq Khan replaced him as Mayor the true nature of the fragile financial foundation funding the bridge became clear.

The project was stopped before even a piling had been driven into the ground. One of the problems with this project was the unclear vision for what the bridge was for. Everyone agreed it would look nice but nice wouldn’t cut it when millions of pounds were at stake.

The lack of clarity of the project meant that stakeholder consultation was minimal and there was no real clear business case or consideration of ongoing maintenance of the bridge.

Before the project was quashed by the Mayor costs were already rising significantly with 1.7 million pounds being paid to a board and also significant website costs.

Another project where due diligence and clarity of scope were missing.

Further Reading | PMBOK Principle 8 -BUILDING QUALITY |

In the end, these project failures serve as more than just cautionary tales; they are invaluable sources of insight and wisdom. They remind us that even the most audacious dreams can falter when faced with unexpected challenges. The Sydney Opera House, Betamax, and Coca-Cola’s recipe change all echo the resounding message that innovation carries both the promise of greatness and the potential for missteps.

As we conclude our exploration of these project failures, we’re left with a profound appreciation for the resilience of the human spirit. We learn from these setbacks, adapt, and move forward, ever more determined to push the boundaries of what is possible. In the world of projects and initiatives, project failures, though stunning, are stepping stones to future success.

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Why Good Projects Fail Anyway

• Nadim Matta
• Ron Ashkenas

When a promising project doesn’t deliver, chances are the problem wasn’t the idea but how it was carried out. Here’s a way to design projects that guards against unnecessary failure.

Reprint: R0309H

Big projects fail at an astonishing rate—more than half the time, by some estimates. It’s not hard to understand why. Complicated long-term projects are customarily developed by a series of teams working along parallel tracks. If managers fail to anticipate everything that might fall through the cracks, those tracks will not converge successfully at the end to reach the goal.

Take a companywide CRM project. Traditionally, one team might analyze customers, another select the software, a third develop training programs, and so forth. When the project’s finally complete, though, it may turn out that the salespeople won’t enter in the requisite data because they don’t understand why they need to. This very problem has, in fact, derailed many CRM programs at major organizations.

There is a way to uncover unanticipated problems while the project is still in development. The key is to inject into the overall plan a series of miniprojects, or “rapid-results initiatives,” which each have as their goal a miniature version of the overall goal. In the CRM project, a single team might be charged with increasing the revenues of one sales group in one region by 25% within four months. To reach that goal, team members would have to draw on the work of all the parallel teams. But in just four months, they would discover the salespeople’s resistance and probably other unforeseen issues, such as, perhaps, the need to divvy up commissions for joint-selling efforts.

The World Bank has used rapid-results initiatives to great effect to keep a sweeping 16-year project on track and deliver visible results years ahead of schedule. In taking an in-depth look at this project, and others, the authors show why this approach is so effective and how the initiatives are managed in conjunction with more traditional project activities.

The Idea in Brief

Big projects fail at an astonishing rate—well over half, by some estimates. Why are efforts involving many people working over extended periods of time so problematic? Traditional project planning carries three serious risks:

• streams Planners leave gaps in the project plan by failing to anticipate all the project’s required activities and work .
• properly Project team members fail to carry out designated activities .
• results Team members execute all tasks flawlessly—on time and within budget—but don’t knit all the project pieces together at the end. The project doesn’t deliver the intended .

Manage these risks with rapid-results initiatives : small projects designed to quickly deliver mini-versions of the big project’s end results. Through rapid-results initiatives, project team members iron out kinks early and on a small scale. Rapid-results teams serve as models for subsequent teams who can roll out the initiative on a larger scale with greater confidence. The teams feel the satisfaction of delivering real value, and their company gets early payback on its investments.

The Idea in Practice

Rapid-results initiatives have several defining characteristics:

• scale—The initiatives produce measurable payoffs on a small .

Example: 

The World Bank wanted to improve the productivity of 120,000 small-scale farmers in Nicaragua by 30% in 16 years. Its rapid-results initiatives included “increase pig weight on 30 farms by 30% in 100 days using enhanced corn seed.”

• activities—The initiatives include people from different parts of the organization—or even different organizations—who work in tandem within a very short time frame to implement slices of several horizontal—or parallel-track—activities. The traditional emphasis on disintegrated, horizontal, long-term activities gives way to the integrated, vertical, and short-term. The teams uncover activities falling in the white space between horizontal project streams, and properly integrate the .

Take a companywide CRM project. Traditionally, one team might analyze customers, another select the software, a third develop training programs. When the project’s finally complete, though, it may turn out that the salespeople won’t enter the requisite data because they don’t understand why they need to. Using rapid-results initiatives, a single team might be charged with increasing the revenues of one sales group in one region within four months. To reach that goal, team members would have to draw on the work of all the parallel teams. And they would quickly discover the salespeople’s resistance and other unforeseen issues.

• results—The initiatives strive for results and lessons in less than 100 days. Designed to deliver quick wins, they more importantly change the way teams work. How? The short time frame establishes a sense of urgency from the start, poses personal challenges, and leaves no time to waste on interorganizational bickering. It also stimulates creativity and encourages team members to experiment with new ideas that deliver concrete .

Balancing Vertical and Horizontal Activities

Vertical, rapid-results initiatives offer many benefits. But that doesn’t mean you should eliminate all horizontal activities. Such activities offer cost-effective economies of scale. The key is to balance vertical and horizontal, spread insights among teams, and blend all activities into an overall implementation strategy. Example: 

Dissatisfied with its 8% revenue increase in two years, office-products company Avery Dennison launched 15 rapid-results teams in three North American divisions. After only three months, the teams were meeting their goals—e.g., securing one new order for an enhanced product with one large customer within 100 days. Top management extended the rapid-results process throughout the company, reinforcing it with an extensive employee communication program. As horizontal activities continued, dozens more teams started rapid-results initiatives. Results? $8 million+ in new sales, and $50 million in sales forecast by year-end.

Big projects fail at an astonishing rate. Whether major technology installations, postmerger integrations, or new growth strategies, these efforts consume tremendous resources over months or even years. Yet as study after study has shown, they frequently deliver disappointing returns—by some estimates, in fact, well over half the time. And the toll they take is not just financial. These failures demoralize employees who have labored diligently to complete their share of the work. One middle manager at a top pharmaceutical company told us, “I’ve been on dozens of task teams in my career, and I’ve never actually seen one that produced a result.”

• NM Nadim Matta is Head Catalyst and founding Board member of the Rapid Results Institute , a non-profit organization that pioneered the use of 100-Day Challenges to help communities and government agencies around the world make breakthroughs and accelerate progress on tough social issues.
• Ron Ashkenas is a coauthor of the Harvard Business Review Leader’s Handbook  and a Partner Emeritus at Schaffer Consulting . His previous books include The Boundaryless Organization , The GE Work-Out , and Simply Effective .

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IT’s biggest project failures — and what we can learn from them

Think your project's off track and over budget learn a lesson or two from the tech sector's most infamous project flameouts..

Every year, the Improbable Research organization hands out Ig Nobel prizes to research projects that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.”

For example, this year’s Ig Nobel winners , announced last week, include a prize in nutrition to researchers who electronically modified the sound of a potato chip to make it appear crisper and fresher than it really is and a biology prize to researchers who determined that fleas that live on a dog jump higher than fleas that live on a cat. Last year, a team won for studying how sheets become wrinkled.

That got us thinking: Though the Ig Nobels haven’t given many awards to information technology (see No Prize for IT for reasons why), the history of information technology is littered with projects that have made people laugh — if you’re the type to find humor in other people’s expensive failures. But have they made us think? Maybe not so much. “IT projects have terrible track records. I just don’t get why people don’t learn,” says Mark Kozak-Holland, author of Titanic Lessons for IT Projects (that’s Titanic as in the ship, by the way).

When you look at the reasons for project failure, “it’s like a top 10 list that just repeats itself over and over again,” says Holland, who is also a senior business architect and consultant with HP Services . Feature creep? Insufficient training? Overlooking essential stakeholders? They’re all on the list — time and time again.

A popular management concept these days is “failing forward” — the idea that it’s OK to fail so long as you learn from your failures. In the spirit of that motto and of the Ig Nobel awards, Computerworld presents 11 IT projects that may have “failed” — in some cases, failed spectacularly — but from which the people involved were able to draw useful lessons.

You’ll notice that many of them are government projects. That’s not necessarily because government fails more often than the private sector, but because regulations and oversight make it harder for governments to cover up their mistakes. Private enterprise, on the other hand, is a bit better at making sure fewer people know of its failures.

So here, in chronological order, are Computerworld ‘s favorite IT boondoggles, our own Ig Nobels. Feel free to laugh at them — but try and learn something too.

IBM’s Stretch project

In 1956, a group of computer scientists at IBM set out to build the world’s fastest supercomputer. Five years later, they produced the IBM 7030 — a.k.a. Stretch — the company’s first transistorized supercomputer, and delivered the first unit to the Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1961. Capable of handling a half-million instructions per second, Stretch was the fastest computer in the world and would remain so through 1964.

Nevertheless, the 7030 was considered a failure. IBM’s original bid to Los Alamos was to develop a computer 100 times faster than the system it was meant to replace, and the Stretch came in only 30 to 40 times faster. Because it failed to meet its goal, IBM had to drop Stretch’s price to $7.8 million from the planned $13.5 million, which meant the system was priced below cost. The company stopped offering the 7030 for sale, and only nine were ever built.

That wasn’t the end of the story, however. “A lot of what went into that effort was later helpful to the rest of the industry,” said Turing Award winner and Stretch team member Fran Allen at a recent event marking the project’s 50th anniversary. Stretch introduced pipelining, memory protection, memory interleaving and other technologies that have shaped the development of computers as we know them.

Lesson learned

Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Even if you don’t meet your project’s main goals, you may be able to salvage something of lasting value from the wreckage.

Knight-Ridder’s Viewtron service

The Knight-Ridder media giant was right to think that the future of home information delivery would be via computer. Unfortunately, this insight came in the early 1980s, and the computer they had in mind was an expensive dedicated terminal.

Knight-Ridder launched its Viewtron version of videotex — the in-home information-retrieval service — in Florida in 1983 and extended it to other U.S. cities by 1985. The service offered banking, shopping, news and ads delivered over a custom terminal with color graphics capabilities beyond those of the typical PC of the time. But Viewtron never took off: It was meant to be the the “McDonald’s of videotex” and at the same time cater to upmarket consumers, according to a Knight-Ridder representative at the time who apparently didn’t notice the contradictions in that goal.

A Viewtron terminal cost $900 initially (the price was later dropped to $600 in an attempt to stimulate demand); by the time the company made the service available to anyone with a standard PC, videotex’s moment had passed.

Viewtron only attracted 20,000 subscribers, and by 1986, it had been canceled. But not before it cost Knight-Ridder $50 million. The New York Times business section wrote, with admirable understatement, that Viewtron “tried to offer too much to too many people who were not overly interested.”

Nevertheless, BusinessWeek concluded at the time, “Some of the nation’s largest media, technology and financial services companies … remain convinced that some day, everyday life will center on computer screens in the home.” Can you imagine?

Sometimes you can be so far ahead of the curve that you fall right off the edge.

DMV projects — California and Washington

Two Western states spent the 1990s attempting to computerize their departments of motor vehicles, only to abandon the projects after spending millions of dollars. First was California, which in 1987 embarked on a five-year, $27 million plan to develop a system for keeping track of the state’s 31 million drivers’ licenses and 38 million vehicle registrations. But the state solicited a bid from just one company and awarded the contract to Tandem Computers. With Tandem supplying the software, the state was locked into buying Tandem hardware as well, and in 1990, it purchased six computers at a cost of $11.9 million.

That same year, however, tests showed that the new system was slower than the one it was designed to replace. The state forged ahead, but in 1994, it was finally forced to abandon what the San Francisco Chronicle described as “an unworkable system that could not be fixed without the expenditure of millions more.” In that May 1994 article, the Chronicle described it as a “failed $44 million computer project.” In an August article, it was described as a $49 million project, suggesting that the project continued to cost money even after it was shut down. A state audit later concluded that the DMV had “violated numerous contracting laws and regulations.”

Regulations are there for a reason, especially ones that keep you from doing things like placing your future in the hands of one supplier.

Meanwhile, the state of Washington was going through its own nightmare with its License Application Mitigation Project (LAMP). Begun in 1990, LAMP was supposed to cost $16 million over five years and automate the state’s vehicle registration and license renewal processes. By 1992, the projected cost had grown to $41.8 million; a year later, $51 million; by 1997, $67.5 million. Finally, it became apparent that not only was the cost of installing the system out of control, but it would also cost six times as much to run every year as the system it was replacing. Result: plug pulled, with $40 million spent for nothing.

When a project is obviously doomed to failure, get out sooner rather than later.

FoxMeyer ERP program

In 1993, FoxMeyer Drugs was the fourth largest distributor of pharmaceuticals in the U.S., worth $5 billion. In an attempt to increase efficiency, FoxMeyer purchased an SAP system and a warehouse automation system and hired Andersen Consulting to integrate and implement the two in what was supposed to be a $35 million project. By 1996, the company was bankrupt; it was eventually sold to a competitor for a mere $80 million.

The reasons for the failure are familiar. First, FoxMeyer set up an unrealistically aggressive time line — the entire system was supposed to be implemented in 18 months. Second, the warehouse employees whose jobs were affected — more accurately, threatened — by the automated system were not supportive of the project, to say the least. After three existing warehouses were closed, the first warehouse to be automated was plagued by sabotage, with inventory damaged by workers and orders going unfilled.

Finally, the new system turned out to be less capable than the one it replaced: By 1994, the SAP system was processing only 10,000 orders a night, compared with 420,000 orders under the old mainframe. FoxMeyer also alleged that both Andersen and SAP used the automation project as a training tool for junior employees, rather than assigning their best workers to it.

In 1998, two years after filing for bankruptcy , FoxMeyer sued Andersen and SAP for $500 million each, claiming it had paid twice the estimate to get the system in a quarter of the intended sites. The suits were settled and/or dismissed in 2004.

No one plans to fail, but even so, make sure your operation can survive the failure of a project.

Apple’s Copland operating system

It’s easy to forget these days just how desperate Apple Computer was during the 1990s. When Microsoft Windows 95 came out, it arrived with multitasking and dynamic memory allocation, neither of which was available in the existing Mac System 7. Copland was Apple’s attempt to develop a new operating system in-house; actually begun in 1994, the new OS was intended to be released as System 8 in 1996.

Copland’s development could be the poster child for feature creep. As the new OS came to dominate resource allocation within Apple, project managers began protecting their fiefdoms by pushing for their products to be incorporated into System 8. Apple did manage to get one developers’ release out in late 1996, but it was wildly unstable and did little to increase anyone’s confidence in the company.

Before another developer release could come out, Apple made the decision to cancel Copland and look outside for its new operating system; the outcome, of course, was the purchase of NeXT, which supplied the technology that became OS X.

Copland did not die in vain. Some of the technology seen in demos eventually turned up in OS X. And even before that, some Copland features wound up in System 8 and 9, including a multithreaded Finder that provided something like true preemptive multitasking.

Project creep is a killer. Keep your project’s goals focused.

Sainsbury’s warehouse automation

Sainsbury’s, the British supermarket giant, was determined to install an automated fulfillment system in its Waltham Point distribution center in Essex. Waltham Point was the distribution center for much of London and southeast England, and the barcode-based fulfillment system would increase efficiency and streamline operations. If it worked, that is.

Installed in 2003, the system promptly ran into what were then described as “horrendous” barcode-reading errors. Regardless, in 2005 the company claimed the system was operating as intended. Two years later, the entire project was scrapped, and Sainsbury’s wrote off £150 million in IT costs. (That’s $265,335,000 calculated by today’s exchange rate, enough to buy a lot of groceries.)

A square peg in a round hole won’t fit any better as time goes on. Put another way — problems that go unaddressed at rollout will only get worse, not better, over time.

Canada’s gun registration system

In June 1997, Electronic Data Systems and U.K.-based SHL Systemhouse started work on a Canadian national firearm registration system. The original plan was for a modest IT project that would cost taxpayers only $2 million — $119 million for implementation, offset by $117 million in licensing fees.

But then politics got in the way. Pressure from the gun lobby and other interest groups resulted in more than 1,000 change orders in just the first two years. The changes involved having to interface with the computer systems of more than 50 agencies, and since that integration wasn’t part of the original contract, the government had to pay for all the extra work. By 2001, the costs had ballooned to $688 million, including $300 million for support.

But that wasn’t the worst part. By 2001, the annual maintenance costs alone were running $75 million a year. A 2002 audit estimated that the program would wind up costing more than $1 billion by 2004 while generating revenue of only $140 million, giving rise to its nickname: “the billion-dollar boondoggle.”

The registry is still in operation and still a political football. Both the Canadian Police Association and the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police have spoken in favor of it, while opponents argue that the money would be better spent otherwise.

Define your project scope and freeze specifications before the requests for changes get out of hand.

Three current projects in danger

At least Canada managed to get its project up and running. Our final three projects, courtesy of the U.S. government, are still in development — they have failed in many ways already, but can still fail more. Will anyone learn anything from them? After reading these other stories, we know how we’d bet.

FBI Virtual Case File

In 2000, the FBI finally decided to get serious about automating its case management and forms processing, and in September of that year, Congress approved $379.8 million for the Information Technology Upgrade Project. What started as an attempt to upgrade the existing Automated Case Support system became, in 2001, a project to develop an entirely new system, the Virtual Case File (VCS), with a contract awarded to Science Applications International Corp.

That sounds reasonable until you read about the development time allotted (a mere 22 months), the rollout plans (a “flash cutover,” in which the new system would come online and the old one would go offline over a single weekend), and the system requirements (an 800-page document specifying details down to the layout of each page).

By late 2002, the FBI needed another $123.2 million for the project. And change requests started to take a toll: According to SAIC, those totaled about 400 by the end of 2003. In April 2005, SAIC delivered 700,000 lines of code that the FBI considered so bug-ridden and useless that the agency decided to scrap the entire VCS project. A later audit blamed factors such as poorly defined design requirements, an overly ambitious schedule and the lack of an overall plan for purchases and deployment.

The FBI did use some of what it learned from the VCF disaster in its current Sentinel project. Sentinel, now scheduled for completion in 2012, should do what VCF was supposed to do using off-the-shelf, Web-based software.

Homeland Security’s virtual fence

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is bolstering the U.S. Border Patrol with a network of radar, satellites, sensors and communication links — what’s commonly referred to as a “virtual fence.” In September 2006, a contract for this Secure Border Initiative Network (SBInet, not to be confused with Skynet) was awarded to Boeing, which was given $20 million to construct a 28-mile pilot section along the Arizona-Mexico border.

But early this year, Congress learned that the pilot project was being delayed because users had been excluded from the process and the complexity of the project had been underestimated. (Sound familiar?) In February 2008, the Government Accountability Office reported that the radar meant to detect aliens coming across the border could be set off by rain and other weather, and the cameras mean to zoom in on subjects sent back images of uselessly low resolution for objects beyond 3.1 miles. Also, the pilot’s communications system interfered with local residents’ WiFi networks — not good PR.

In April, DHS announced that the surveillance towers of the pilot fence did not meet the Border Patrol’s goals and were being replaced — a story picked up by the Associated Press and widely reported in the mainstream media. But the story behind the story is less clear. The DHS and Boeing maintain the original towers were only temporary installations for demonstration purposes. Even so, the project is already experiencing delays and cost overruns, and in April, SBInet program manager Kirk Evans resigned , citing lack of a system design as just one specific concern. Not an auspicious beginning.

Census Bureau’s handheld units

Back in 2006, the U.S. Census Bureau made a plan to use 500,000 handheld devices — purchased from Harris Corp. under a $600 million contract — to help automate the 2010 census. Now, though, the cost has more than doubled, and their use is going to be curtailed in 2010 — but the Census Bureau is moving ahead with the project anyway.

During a rehearsal for the census conducted in the fall of 2007, according to the GAO, field staff found that the handheld devices froze or failed to retrieve mapping coordinates (see Hard questions needed to save projects for details). Furthermore, multiple devices had the same identification number, which meant they would overwrite one another’s data.

After the rehearsal, a representative of Mitre Corp. , which advises the bureau on IT matters, brought notes to a meeting with the bureau’s representative that read, “It is not clear that the system will meet Census’ operational needs and quality goals. The final cost is unpredictable. Immediate, significant changes are required to rescue the program. However, the risks are so large considering the available time that we recommend immediate development of contingency plans to revert to paper operations.”

There you have it, a true list of IT Ig Nobels: handheld computers that don’t work as well as pencil and paper, new systems that are slower and less capable than the old ones they’re meant to replace. Perhaps the overarching lesson is one that project managers should have learned at their mothers’ knees: Don’t bite off more than you can chew.

San Francisco-based Widman is a frequent contributor to Computerworld .

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Jake Widman is a freelance writer in San Francisco and a regular contributor to Computerworld , PCWorld , and TechHive .

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Failed projects: 7 examples and lessons learned

A project can fail for any number of reasons. From missed deadlines to improper resource management , there are countless potential pitfalls. Fortunately, you can learn from others’ mistakes, so you don’t have to make your own. 

Let’s peel back the layers and explore the causes behind some high-profile failed projects. You’ll discover insights to help you avoid these missteps in your own work.

Why do projects fail?

Initiatives can fall short for countless reasons. Still, common patterns emerge when examining failed projects. Here are some reasons for common project flops:

Insufficient preparation: Some project managers overlook essential project management principles, such as goal setting and project planning. Nebulous or unrealistic goals set a project up for failure from the start. Without clear definitions and prioritization of personal, departmental, and organizational objectives, a team may miss targets.

Disorganization and miscommunication: Even team members who possess the necessary skills and expertise can’t fulfill their potential without organization. If the project manager doesn’t foster effective communication among team members and stakeholders, misunderstandings and missed deadlines will ensue. Additionally, uncertainty in project team roles and responsibilities leads to conflict and gaps in accountability.

External interference: Sometimes, problems originate outside the team. Upper management may interfere, imposing scope creep or delaying essential tasks. Regulations and unforeseen policy changes may halt progress. Shifts in the market and consumer preferences can also threaten project success, especially when a team hasn’t conducted comprehensive market research.

7 examples of failed projects

Examining historic project failures can illuminate the most common pitfalls between you and success. These project failure case studies offer valuable lessons, highlighting the importance of proper project planning .

1. The Concorde supersonic passenger jet

The airline industry has seen its share of failed projects, often due to overambitious plans and inadequate market research. A prominent example is the now-defunct Concorde supersonic airliner.

The Concorde was a supersonic passenger airplane developed in the 1960s as a joint venture between the United Kingdom and France. It was designed to revolutionize air travel by reducing flight times, allowing passengers to cross the Atlantic in just a few hours. However, only 14 Concorde aircraft entered service before the line was retired in 2003.

What went wrong? 

Although it was a marvel of engineering, the Concorde faced multiple challenges preventing long-term commercial success.

The aircraft’s operation was prohibitively expensive due to high fuel consumption and maintenance needs, leading to high fares. With only around 100 seats, it could not compete with larger jets that had better economies of scale. The Concorde was also very noisy, leading to operational restrictions and limited routes. The final blow came with a catastrophic crash in 2000, which raised significant safety concerns and likely hastened its retirement. 

Project management lessons

Concorde’s failure teaches us that you must balance a project’s scope with its potential benefits. Project managers underestimated the costs and overestimated how much people would pay for faster travel. Lofty goals without realistic market assessments led to project failure.

2. The Y2K Problem

The Y2K problem, also known as the Millennium Bug, was a software glitch that garnered widespread attention as the year 2000 approached. Many computer systems were programmed to store the year as two digits (e.g., “99” for 1999). This led to concerns that these systems would interpret the year 2000 (“00”) as 1900, causing malfunctions.

An ambitious project aimed to update and fix these systems to prevent potential failures in critical infrastructure, including banking, utilities, and government operations. 

Organizations spent billions of dollars upgrading and patching systems worldwide to address the Y2K issue. The anticipated catastrophic failures largely did not occur – even in countries that didn’t invest in fixes – leading some to view the extensive efforts as an overreaction.

The Y2K problem demonstrates that better foresight can prevent chaos and save money. This case study highlights the importance of anticipating issues and keeping a level head during crises. Poor risk management and system design were big problems.

3. Sony Betamax

Sony launched its Betamax cassette recorder in 1975, confident that its superior quality would lead to market dominance. However, because of their high quality, the first Betamax tapes only offered a one-hour recording time. In addition, the technology was proprietary, limiting which companies could produce compatible devices and raising its price.

In contrast, JVC, another electronics giant, launched the VHS format in the late 1970s and licensed it widely, enabling greater market penetration. VHS tapes initially offered two-hour recording times, enough to record a feature-length film on one cassette. 

What went wrong?

Despite Betamax’s superior technology and earlier market entry, it lost to VHS, which was cheaper, easier to use, and offered longer recording times. Sony’s decision to keep Betamax exclusive limited its accessibility and appeal to consumers. Additionally, JVC’s strategic partnership with American motion picture companies helped establish VHS as the go-to format for home video recording and rental. 

Betamax’s failure shows that superior technology doesn’t guarantee success. To capture the market, products must be affordable and user-friendly. Team members must understand and address customer needs and preferences to ensure the long-term success of any project.

4. Crystal Pepsi

Crystal Pepsi, a clear cola, was launched in 1992 with great fanfare. The project team was hopeful Crystal Pepsi would outshine the competition, specifically Coca-Cola. It was marketed as a “healthier” soda option that removed the caramel coloring from the classic cola recipe, resulting in a clear, slightly less sweet beverage with fewer calories.

Although initially met with curiosity and interest, Crystal Pepsi struggled to maintain a lasting market share. Despite its innovative appearance, its taste was often described as bland and watery. 

David Novak, the executive responsible for the initiative, admitted to rushing the drink to launch and ignoring stakeholders’ concerns about taste and shelf-life. Coca-Cola also launched its own colorless cola, Tab Clear, diluting the novelty of clear colas. Due to poor sales and intense competition, PepsiCo discontinued Crystal Pepsi in early 1994, just two years after its launch. 

The Crystal Pepsi case study shows the importance of listening to feedback. It highlights the risks of poor project management and insufficient planning. Designers need adequate time to ensure product quality and satisfy customer preferences.

5. New Coke

Crystal Pepsi wasn’t the only soft drink to fall flat. Coca-Cola faced its own disaster with the introduction of  “New Coke” in 1985.

Despite being the world’s best-selling soft drink, Coca-Cola faced increasing competition from Pepsi-Cola, which was gaining market share through its aggressive “Pepsi Challenge” campaign. In blind taste tests, consumers often preferred the sweeter taste of Pepsi, leading Coca-Cola to believe its flavor needed an update.

When New Coke was introduced, the negative consumer reaction was swift and overwhelming. The backlash was so intense that the Coca-Cola Company reintroduced the original formula just 79 days later under the brand name “Coca-Cola Classic.” This move acknowledged the public’s strong preference for the original taste and highlighted customers’ emotional attachment to the brand.

The New Coke fiasco proves customers become emotionally attached to a brand. Good market research shouldn’t ignore brand loyalty when surveying consumer preferences. Even well-intentioned changes can fail if they disregard the deep-seated loyalty of the customer base.

6. McDonald’s Arch Deluxe Burger

In 1996, McDonald’s launched the Arch Deluxe Burger to attract a more sophisticated adult audience. Marketed as “The Burger with the Grown Up Taste,” the campaign featured children rejecting the gourmet burger to emphasize its appeal to adults. This was part of an effort to expand McDonald’s customer base beyond its traditional focus on kids and families.

What went wrong? Despite spending over $200 million on advertising, the campaign failed to resonate with McDonald’s core customers – kids and families. The Arch Deluxe was also more expensive than other menu items, which didn’t align with McDonald’s reputation for affordable options. After poor sales, the Arch Deluxe was completely removed from menus in 2000.

The Arch Deluxe Burger case study shows the importance of developing a product strategy that stays true to one’s customer base. Understanding and using customer data to guide decisions can save money and prevent product failures.

7. The Ford Edsel

In 1957, the Ford Motor Company debuted Edsel, a new division and brand of cars named after Henry Ford’s son. With high expectations, Ford invested over $250 million in developing a seven-model product line. Edsel targeted middle-class Americans, aiming to capture an untapped market for mid-priced cars. 

Edsel cars were too expensive to meet the needs of their intended market. Ford’s market research failed to recognize a shift in consumer preference toward compact, fuel-efficient vehicles by the time Edsel launched. Consequently, Edsel failed to achieve its sales goals and was discontinued shortly after its debut. 

The failure of Ford’s Edsel line provides a perfect example of misreading the market. Like McDonald’s Arch Deluxe burger, Ford targeted the wrong audience.

Additionally, this business case study proves product teams must balance innovation with cost consideration to meet the pricing needs of their target market.

How do we prevent projects from failing?

Successful project execution requires hard work, attention to detail, and successful project management. Here are some tips to help your projects succeed:

Set clear goals: Define what success looks like and ensure all team members understand the project’s objectives.

Avoid scope creep: Outline realistic limits and manage project changes to prevent uncontrolled growth.

Conduct thorough market research: Understand your market, customers, and competition to make informed decisions.

Facilitate effective communication: Maintain open communication among team members and stakeholders to address concerns and promote clarity.

Plan initiatives thoroughly: Create a comprehensive project plan that includes timelines, resources, and milestones. Conduct regular reviews and adjust the plan as needed.

Assign clear roles and responsibilities: Ensure everyone knows their tasks to avoid confusion and gaps in responsibility.

Monitor and manage risks: Proactively identify risks and develop mitigation strategies.

Use agile methodologies: Maintain an agile mindset in your organization. Break down projects into smaller tasks and deliver in cycles.

Remain flexible: Adjust your plans in response to new information or changing circumstances.

Conduct quality control: Review and test your product or service to ensure it meets quality standards.

Perform post-project review: After completing a project, conduct a review to identify successes and make improvements for future projects.

Final words

Projects fail for many reasons, but lessons from past mistakes can guide us toward success. Set clear goals, implement proper planning, and do your market research. By following these strategies, you can turn potential failures into triumphs. 

And you don’t need to do it alone. Tempo offers various project management tools that can streamline product development and rollout. Structure PPM helps you track and manage multiple projects and portfolios from one Jira-integrated dashboard. Strategic Roadmaps enables you to communicate your project priorities .

Explore the full suite of Tempo products and take your project management to the next level.

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Epic fail: Exploring project failure’s reasons, outcomes and indicators

• Original Paper
• Published: 19 June 2021
• Volume 16 , pages 1169–1193, ( 2022 )

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• Marc Herz   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1463-2725 1 &
• Nicco Krezdorn 2  

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Understanding the complex phenomenon of project failure can facilitate improved project management and lower the risk of future project failure. Using a qualitative pre-study combined with a quantitative survey conducted with project managers, the study assesses the reasons for, as well as the outcomes and indicators of, project failure. The study (1) identifies planning as well as people factors as significant reasons for project failure, (2) explores outcomes of project failure, and (3) identifies key indicators and early warning signs of project failure. The results provide multifaceted insights into the phenomenon of project failure, and the authors provide specific theoretical, methodological, and managerial implications.

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Failure in Projects

IS/IT Project Failures: A Review of the Extant Literature for Deriving a Taxonomy of Failure Factors

Rethinking Success in Software Projects: Looking Beyond the Failure Factors

Notably, more detailed perspectives focus on antecedents and drivers, the event and subsequent direct effects, indirect effects, and long-term outcomes (for a more detailed overview, see Khelil 2016 ; Klimas et al. 2020 ).

We included respondents from different regions of the world in the qualitative study to assess whether there were cultural differences in the approach to dealing with project failure. However, we found no evidence for any cultural differences and thus analyzed the interviews without further focusing on any regional factors.

The greatest proportion of respondents came from Germany (N = 71), the United States (N = 60), China (N = 22), and the United Kingdom (N = 14).

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Herz, M., Krezdorn, N. Epic fail: Exploring project failure’s reasons, outcomes and indicators. Rev Manag Sci 16 , 1169–1193 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11846-021-00479-4

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Received : 10 September 2020

Accepted : 08 June 2021

Published : 19 June 2021

Issue Date : May 2022

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11846-021-00479-4

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10 failed projects and the lessons learned

By ilx team | 19 august 2019.

Every project teaches lessons with its successes and failures. Best practice courses highlight the importance of developing a mind-set of continuous learning from the outset of the project. In this blog we’ll look at 10 major public project failures and the lessons learnt from these mistakes.

Why should we analyse projects that failed?

Failed projects provide valuable lessons. Analysing failures can help to pinpoint weaknesses in project planning, execution, or team dynamics. By dissecting what went wrong, project teams can gain insights into the mistakes that were made and avoid repeating the same errors in the future.

Embracing failure as a learning opportunity fosters a culture of continuous improvement, which leads project teams to become more resilient, adaptable, and innovative.

10 projects that failed:

1. apple lisa.

In the early days of Apple, Lisa was the first GUI computer marketed at personal business users. It was supposed to be the first desktop computer that incorporated the now famous mouse, and a 5 MHz, 1MB RAM processor – the fastest of its kind back in 1983.

However, the project was a big failure. Only 10,000 computers were sold. It was such as failure that Steve Jobs was taken off the project and allocated to another project, the Macintosh. Apple Lisa overpromised and under-delivered, with a price-performance ratio that was significantly worse than had been expected.

Lesson learned:

The importance of stakeholder collaboration and transparency.

2. Crystal Pepsi

The early 1990s saw the trend for ‘light’ drinks emerge. In 1992, Pepsi launched Crystal Pepsi , a soft drink that tasted similar to regular Pepsi but was clear-coloured. Initially sales were good, mainly due to the curiosity factor, but soon dropped away to the point where Crystal Pepsi was withdrawn from the market just 2 years later.

The mistake of David Novak, creator of Cystal Pepsi — and Pepsi itself — was making too many assumptions about the product and market demand. Novak was even told by the bottlers that the drink needed to taste more like Pepsi. Unfortunately, he didn’t listen.

Don’t make assumptions about your audience. Leverage everyone’s expertise and verify statements before considering them fact.

3. Ford Edsel

It’s not often that Ford gets it wrong, but in the case of the Edsel , they failed on a big scale. Ford wanted to close the gap with General Motors and Chrysler. Having spent $250 million and 10 years developing the Edsel, by the time it came to the market the trend was for more compact cars.

Launched in 1957, the Edsel was considered overpriced, over-hyped, too big, and unattractive. By 1959, production was ceased.

Update a project’s business case and schedule during its lifecycle.

4. Computerised DMV

In the 1990s, the DMV tried to computerise their department to track drivers’ licences and vehicle registrations.

But after 6 years and $44 million, as well as ‘putting all their eggs into one basket’ with Tandem Computers, they discovered their computers were actually slower than the ones they replaced. On top of that, a state audit found that the DMV was violating contracting laws and regulations.

Processes should be followed, and any legal or regulatory constraints must be included in the project plan.

5. J.C. Penney’s 2011 rebrand

To wean customers away from their reliance on coupons, J.C. Penney introduced simpler price points and colour-coded price tags, and ran a marketing campaign to promote this strategy.

Customers found the new pricing structure confusing, and many items advertised never went on sale. Revenues dropped significantly and J.C. Penney had to admit failure.

The impact a lack of stakeholder and market research can have on a project.

6. Airbus A380

When the Airbus A380 was launched in 2007, much was expected of the airplane, but just 10 years later, they were being sold for no more than spare parts. The expected game-changer led to Airbus struggling to secure deals with airlines.

The A380 was expensive to produce, and Airbus’s production teams didn’t communicate and used different CAD programs. That mistake alone cost $6.1 billion . Furthermore, the second-hand market was non-existent because the planes were simply too big for any airline to make back their invested money.

The impact of poor internal communication and a business case that was built on initial sales, taking the second-hand market for granted.

7. Montreal’s Highway 15 overpass

In 2016, Montreal city officials found that an overpass for Highway 15 didn’t align with the design for the new Champlain Bridge nearby, which was also undergoing redevelopment.

So just a year after being built, the $11 million overpass was torn down . While changing design criteria can have expensive knock-on effects, there was an apparent lack of communication between projects here.

A lack of programme management meant the bridge and the overpass for the same highway were being constructed without the other being considered. The long-term planning and internal communication suffered as a result.

8. Knight Capital

The company’s stock market algorithm released in 2012 with code from an earlier build. It took just 30 minutes for a software glitch to see the company lose a massive $440 million and be forced into a merger a year later.

Although their CEO, Thomas Joyce, implied that the software bug could have happened to anyone, it is very likely that poor software development and inadequate testing models are more to blame for the defect in their trading algorithm.

Project targets and deadlines must be realistic to be achievable. Rushing a product can cause mistakes to be made.

9. Target’s failed entry into Canada

When Target said they were expanding into Canada, 81% of Canadian shoppers expressed interest in visiting them. It should have been a resounding success, but it wasn’t. Less than 2 years later, Target’s Chairman and CEO announced they were pulling out of Canada , closing all 133 stores.

Target misjudged the Canadian customer. Their stores did not feature the same low prices as the US stores, there were serious supply and distribution problems, and they opened too many stores too quickly.

The need for better resource and supply planning, as well as the impact of ineffectively managing stakeholder expectations.

10. Afghan forest camo pattern

Afghanistan’s landscape features around 2% woodland, yet this didn’t stop the US government from spending $28 million of taxpayers’ money on ‘forest’ pattern uniforms for the Afghan National Army. It was only chosen because the Afghan Defence Minister liked the design.

Ultimately, these were never used, so the money and uniforms were completely wasted. That particular forest pattern required a paid licence, while many patterns already owned by the army were more suitable for Afghanistan’s landscape.

Poor management led to a serious oversight, which stakeholder engagement and quality control would have prevented.

Common warning signs of a failing project

Throughout the 10 failed projects we’ve highlighted above, there are a number of common themes. Identifying and being mindful of these warning signs can help you avoid making the same mistakes.

Lack of interest

One warning sign may be stakeholder not attending meetings or providing feedback, as well as allocated tasks not being completed on time. It’s the project managers role to track assignments and ensure a high level of communication at all times. If you believe stakeholders are losing interest, call a meeting to reiterate the value of the project.

Learn more about how support (or lack of) from internal and external stakeholders can make or break a project.

Poor communication

It’s easy for members of the project team to become ‘lost’ and out of the loop with project progress, decisions, and reviews. Project managers should have a communication plan and automate as much as they can. This ensures everyone involved in the project is kept up-to-date constantly.

Discover how effective communication is essential to the success of projects, programmes and portfolios.

Lack of transparency

The more you try to cover up a problem or issue, the less transparency you have and the greater the problem becomes. Be honest. Issues do arise and the best way forward is to identify them as early as possible, notify stakeholders, including sponsors and customers, and work closely with them to resolve the issue.

Scope and budget creep

Don’t start the project until all the stakeholders are on the same page. Always ensure everyone has the scope statement to work from.

Find out how you can ensure your project budgets are based on reliable projections to avoid scope and budget creep .

Poor management oversight

Ensure everyone’s roles and responsibilities are well-defined. The project manager is accountable to other stakeholders.

How ILX can help train project managers

There will always be project failures. The key is to identify them as early as possible and work to resolve them before it’s too late, allowing you to minimise the damage.

It is a project manager’s responsibility to lead by example, and learn from other people’s mistakes. Training in one of our project management courses such as PRINCE2® , AgilePM® or APM PMQ , is a great way to help you develop these skills and improve your leadership qualities.

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4 Project Management Failures and Examples: Key Learnings

July 7, 2021 | by greg bailey.

To download the “4 Project Management Failures and Examples: Key Learnings” whitepaper, simply click the button below.

Did you know that 55% of businesses experience failed projects? Unsurprisingly, most are due to mistakes, communications break downs, and deadline and budget changes.

Worse yet, nearly 1 in 5 large-scale IT projects fails so badly that it can actually threaten the future of the company!

But if every project begins with good intentions and a goal in mind, what exactly leads to their failure? How can a project get so far off track that it can put a company’s future in jeopardy?

In this whitepaper, 4 Famous Project Management Failures and What to Learn from Them, we will identify the root cause of these project failures. Then, we’ll explore how project managers can avoid making the same fatal mistakes.

These examples each involved a vast sea of moving parts and required a high level of coordination between many people and teams. The right resource management solution can provide what each of these major project failures lacked: insight for project managers into every step of the process for greater control over the timeline and final product.

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Top 15+ Project Management Case Studies with Examples 2024

Home Blog Project Management Top 15+ Project Management Case Studies with Examples 2024

Having worked for more than 9 years in the dynamic field of project management, I would strongly refer to real-world case studies as invaluable resources for both budding and experienced professionals. These case studies provide critical insights into the challenges and triumphs encountered in various industries, illustrating the application of project management principles in practical scenarios.   I have curated the project management case studies as a part of this article in such a way that it delves into a selection of compelling case studies, ranging from the healthcare sector to infrastructure and technology. Each case study is a testament to the strategic planning, adaptability, and innovative problem-solving skills necessary in today's fast-paced business environment. These narratives not only highlight past successes but also offer guidance for future projects, making them essential tools for anyone eager to excel in project management.

What is Case Study?

A case study refers to an in-depth examination of a specific case within the real-world context. It is a piece of content that sheds light on the challenges faced, solutions adopted, and the overall outcomes of a project. To understand project management case studies, it is important to first define what a project is . A project is a temporary endeavor with a defined beginning and end, aimed at achieving a specific goal or objective. Case studies are generally used by businesses during the proposal phase. However, they are also displayed on the websites of companies to provide prospects with a glance at the capabilities of the brands. It can even serve as an effective tool for lead generation. In simple words, case studies are stories that tell the target audience about the measures and strategies that the organization adopted to become successful.

What is Project Management Case Study?

A project management case study is a piece of content that highlights a project successfully managed by the organization. It showcases the challenges that the organization faced, the solutions adopted, and the final results. Keep reading in order to explore examples of successful project management case studies.

Top 15 Project Management Case Studies and Examples 

Are you looking for some project management case study examples? If yes, here are some of the best examples you can explore. Let’s dive in! Before diving in, here is the list of top 15 project management case studies: 

• Mavenlink Helps Improve Utilization Rates by 15% for BTM Global
• Boncom Reduces Billing Rate Errors by 100%
• whyaye! Reaches 80% Billable Utilization
• Metova Increases Billable Utilization by 10%
• Appetize Doubles Length of Forecasting Outlook
• RSM Improves Client Satisfaction and Global Business Processes
• CORE Business Technologies Increases Billable Utilization by 35%
• Health Catalyst Improves Business Processes and Increases Consistency in Project Delivery
• Optimus SBR Improves Forecasting Horizon by 50%
• PlainJoe Studios Increases Projects Closing Within Budget by 50%
• RPI Consultants Decreases Admin Time by 20%
• CBI's PMO Increases Billable Utilization By 30%
• Butterfly Increases Billable Time by 20%
• TeleTracking Increases Billable Utilization by 37%
• Taylors Improves Utilization Rates by 15%
• Hospital El Pilar improves Patient Care With implementing Disciplined Agile
• British Columbia’s Ministry of Technology and Infrastructure (MoTI)

1. Mavenlink Helps Improve Utilization Rates by 15% for BTM Global

The case study is all about how Mavenlink helped BTM Global Consulting to save hours of work and enhance utilization with resource management technology. BTM Global Consulting offers system development and integration services to diverse clients. The challenges that the company faced were that tools like Netsuite OpenAir and Excel spreadsheets were not able to meet the customization needs as the company grew. It impacted their overall productivity.

BTM Global saw the following benefits: 

• 15% increase in utilization for project managers
• 10% increase in companywide utilization
• 4-hour resource allocation work reduced to 10 minutes
• 100% Company-wide time tracking adoption

In order to overcome the challenge, the solution they adopted was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was that it increased the utilization of the company by 10% and enhanced project manager utilization by 15%. It also reduced resource allocation work from 4 hours to just 10 minutes.

2. Boncom Reduces Billing Rate Errors by 100% With Mavenlink

Boncom is an advertising agency that collaborates with different purpose driven brands to create goods worldwide. The challenge was that the company relied on several-point solutions for delivering client-facing projects. However, the solutions failed to offer the required operational functionality. An ideal solution for Boncom was to adopt Mavenlink. The result was that the billing rate error got reduced by 100%. Accurate forecasting became possible for Boncom, and the company could generate reports in much less time.

3. whyaye! Reaches 80% Billable Utilization with Mavenlink

Here are the top benefits whyaye got: 

• 6% increase in utilization
• Tripled company size
• Doubled in number of new clients every quarter
• Support through constant business scaling

whyaye is a digital transformation consultancy delivering IT transformation solutions to businesses operating in diverse sectors. The challenge was that whyaye used to manage resources and projects using tools such as emails, PowerPoint, and Microsoft Excel. However, with the growth of the company, they were not able to access project data or gain insights for effective management of the projects . The ultimate solution to this challenge was to make a switch to Mavenlink. The result was an increase in the utilization by 6%, doubling of new clients, tripling of the company size, and seamless support through business growth.

4. Metova Increases Billable Utilization by 10% With Mavenlink

If you are looking for a project planning case study, Metova can be the right example. Metova is a technology firm, a Gold Partner of Microsoft, and an advanced consulting partner of AWS. The challenge was that the company handled several projects at a time. However, its heavy dependence on tools like Google Sheets limited the growth capabilities of the organization. So, the company looked for a solution and switched to Mavenlink. The result was that it was able to increase its billable utilization by 10%, increase its portfolio visibility, and standardize its project management process.

5. Hospital El Pilar improves Patient Care With implementing Disciplined Agile

If you are looking for an example of one of the best hospital related project management case studies, then Hospital El Pilar can be the ideal one. Hospital El Pilar is a private hospital in Guatemala City, Guatemala, that provides comprehensive care to patients in various medical specialties. The challenge was that the hospital’s application development team faced several obstacles in managing and delivering projects, such as unclear priorities, a lack of visibility, little interaction with users, and competing demands. The solution that the team adopted was to use Disciplined Agile® (DA™), a flexible and pragmatic approach to project management that optimizes the way of working (WoW). The result was improved project outcomes, increased user satisfaction, greater transparency, and more trust from stakeholders and customers.

6. British Columbia’s Ministry of Technology and Infrastructure (MoTI) gets its principal corridor for transportation up in 35 days

Reconnecting Roads After Massive Flooding (2022) is a case study of how the British Columbia Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure (MoTI) used a project management approach based on the PMBOK® Guide to restore critical routes after a catastrophic weather event. It is one of the examples of successful project management case studies you can look into. The challenge was that an atmospheric river caused severe flooding, landslides, and bridge collapses, cutting off the lower mainland from the rest of Canada2. The solution was to prioritize the reopening of Highway 5, the principal corridor for transportation of goods and people, by creating scopes, work breakdown structures, and schedules for each site3. The result was that Highway 5 was reopened to commercial traffic in 35 days, despite additional weather challenges and risks4. The construction project management case study we discussed demonstrated the benefits of flexibility, collaboration, and communication in emergency response.

7. Appetize Doubles Length of Forecasting Outlook with Mavenlink

Here the the benefits Appetize got with Mavenlink: 

• Forecasting horizon increases to 12 weeks
• Management of 40+ major projects per quarter
• Support for rapid companywide scaling
• Salesforce integration supports project implementation

Appetize is one of the leading cloud-based points of sale (POS), enterprise management, and digital ordering platform that is trusted by a number of businesses. The challenge of the company was that its legacy project tracking systems were not able to meet the growing needs of the company. They experienced growth and manual data analysis challenges. The solution they found was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was an increase in the forecast horizon to 12 weeks, support for effective companywide scaling, easy management of over 40 major projects, and Salesforce integration for project implementation.

8. RSM Improves Client Satisfaction and Global Business Processes with Mavenlink

RSM is a tax, audit, and consulting company that provides a wide array of professional services to clients in Canada and the United States. The challenge of the company was that its legacy system lacked the necessary features required to support their work- and time-intensive projects and delivered insights relating to the project trends. An ideal solution to this challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better to risk mitigation in tax compliance, improved client-team communication, templatized project creation, and better use of the KPIs and project status.

9. CORE Business Technologies Increases Billable Utilization by 35% with Mavenlink

Here are the top benefits CORE Business Technologies got with Mavenlink: 

• Simultaneous in-progress projects doubled
• 100% company-wide time entry compliance
• 35% Increase in Billable Utilization
• 50% Increase in Team Productivity

Another top project management case study is the Core Business Technologies. CORE Business Technologies is a reputed single-source vendor self-service, in-person, and back-office processing to the clients. It offers SaaS-based payment solutions to clients. The challenge faced by the company was that its tools like spreadsheets, Zoho, and Microsoft Project led to a hectic work schedule owing to a huge number of disconnected systems. The solution to the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was the enhancement of team productivity by 50%, time entry compliance by 100%, and enhancement of the billable utilization rate by 35%.

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10. Client Success: Health Catalyst Improves Business Processes and Increases Consistency in Project Delivery with Mavenlink

Here are the top benefits Health Catalyst saw with Mavenlink:   

• Consistency in Successful Project Delivery 
• Improved Interdepartmental Communication 
• Deeper Resource Data Insights 
• Stronger Resource Forecasting

Health Catalyst is a company that delivers data and analytics services and technology to different healthcare organizations. The firm provides assistance to technicians and clinicians in the healthcare sector. The challenge of the company was that the tools like Intacct and spreadsheets that is used for project management were not able to provide the required data insights and clarity for better project management. It also limited effective resource management. The solution was to embrace Mavenlink. The result was better resource forecasting, enhanced interdepartmental communication, consistency in project delivery, and better resource data insights .

11. Client Success: Optimus SBR Improves Forecasting Horizon by 50% with Mavenlink

Optimus SBR is a leading professional service provider in North America. It offers the best results to companies operating in diverse sectors, including healthcare, energy, transportation, financial services, and more. The challenge was that legacy software tools that the firm used gave rise to project management issues. The company was not able to get a real-time revenue forecast or gain insights into its future financial performance. The solution that the company adopted was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better data-driven hiring decisions, efficient delivery of remote work, and enhancement of the forecasting horizon by 50%.

12. Client Success: PlainJoe Studios Increases Projects Closing Within Budget by 50% With Mavenlink

Here are the benefits how Mavenlink helped PlainJoe: 

• Improved data insights for project success
• Enablement of fast shift to remote work
• Improved budgeting
• Increased rates in billing

PlainJoe Studios is an experimental design studio that focuses on digitally immersive and strategic storytelling. The company has a team of strategists, architects, and problem solvers to create value for the clients. The challenge of the company was that the manual processing of the company affected its ability to grow and manage the diverse project effectively. They lacked clarity about their project needs and profitability. The solution to deal with the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was an enhancement in the billing rates by 15%, better project closing within budget by 50%, better data insights for the success of different projects, and a faster shift to remote work.

13. Client Success: RPI Consultants Decreases Admin Time by 20% With Mavenlink

If you are looking for an example of one of the best software project management case studies, then RPI Consultants can be the ideal one. RPI Consultants offer expert project leadership and software consulting services for enterprise-level implementation of solutions and products. The challenge was that the task management solutions adopted by the company gave rise to a number of complications. It resulted in poor interdepartmental transparency and time-consuming data entry. The ultimate solution that the company embraced was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was a rise in the utilization rate by 5%, lowing of admin time by 20%, better forecasting and resource management, and a single source for gaining insights into the project data.

14. Client Success: CBI's PMO Increases Billable Utilization By 30% With Mavenlink

CBI is a company that is focused on protecting the reputations, data, and brands of its clients. The challenge that the company faced was that the solutions used were unable to meet the growing needs of the organization. The systems were outdated, data sharing was not possible, and time tracking was inconsistent. The solution to the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better interdepartmental alignment, enhancement of time tracking to support business growth, an increase in the billable utilization rate by 30%, and detailed insights for a greater success of the projects.

15. Client Success: Butterfly Increases Billable Time by 20% with Mavenlink

Butterfly is a leading digital agency that provides digital strategy, website design and development services, and ongoing support to businesses across Australia. The challenge was that the different legacy systems used by the agency limited its capability of effective project management and reporting. The systems were time consuming and cumbersome. In order to deal with the challenge, the solution was to make a switch to Mavenlink. The result was the enhancement of billable time by 20%, fast reporting insights, enhancement of productive utilization by 16%, and better Jira integration.

16. Client Success: TeleTracking Increases Billable Utilization by 37% With Mavenlink

TeleTracking Technologies is a leading provider of patient flow automation solutions to various hospitals in the healthcare sector. The challenge of the company was that it used different systems such as Microsoft Excel, Sharepoint, MS Project, Jira, and Netsuite. The use of a variety of solutions created a number of challenges for the company. It had poor forecasting capability, an insufficient time tracking process, and unclear resource utilization. The solution was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was the enhancement of time tracking compliance by 100%, rise in hours to date by 18%, and enhancement of billable utilization by 37%.

17. Client Success: Taylors Improves Utilization Rates by 15% with Mavenlink

This is a perfect example of a construction project management case study. Taylor Development Strategists is a leading civil engineering and urban planning organization in Australia. The challenge that the company faced was that the systems that it used were not able to support the growth of the business. There were a lot of inefficiencies and limitations. The solution to the challenge was to switch to Mavenlink. The result was better global collaboration, an increase in the utilization rate by 15%, consistency of timesheet entry, and in-depth insights relating to utilization and project targets.

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Start Creating Your Project Management Case Study

Not that you have a detailed idea about project management case studies, it is time to prepare your own. When doing the project management case study exercise, make sure to focus on covering all the important elements. Clearly stating the challenges and the solutions adopted by the company is important. If you want to get better at project management, getting a PMP Certification can be beneficial.

Case Study Best Practices and Tips 

• Involve your clients in the preparation of the case study. 
• Make use of graphs and data. 
• Mix images, texts, graphs, and whitespace effectively.

Project Management Case Study Template 

To create a well-crafted and highly informative case study template in the realms of project management, you should start by providing a brief overview of the client's company, focusing on its industry, scale, and specific challenges. Follow with a detailed section on the challenge, emphasizing the unique aspects of the project and obstacles faced. Next, you might want to describe the solution implemented, detailing the strategies, methodologies, and tools used. Then, you would need to present the results, quantifying improvements and highlighting objectives achieved. Finally, please conclude the case study with a summary, encapsulating key takeaways and emphasizing the project's success and its implications for future endeavors. By following this structure, you can present a comprehensive yet concise analysis that is ideal for showcasing project management expertise and insights. You can also refer to the template for crafting a better case study on project management – Template for writing case studies .

By now, you must have gained a comprehensive knowledge of preparing a project management case study. This article elaborately explains the significance of real life project management case studies as vital tools for demonstrating a company's expertise in handling complex projects. These case studies, showcasing real-world scenarios, serve as compelling evidence of a firm's capability to navigate challenges and implement effective solutions, thereby boosting confidence in potential clients and partners. They are not only a reflection of past successes but also a lighthouse guiding future project endeavors in the discipline of project management within the fields of construction, pharmacy, technology and finance, highlighting the importance of strategic planning, innovation, and adaptability in project management. If you are aspiring to excel in this field, understanding these case studies is invaluable. However, you would also need to learn from project management failures case studies which would provide a roadmap to mastering the art of project management in today's dynamic business landscape.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

In order to write a project management case study, keep everything brief but mention everything in detail. Make sure to write it with clarity and include graphs and images. 

A project study must include information about the client, how your company helped the client in resolving a problem, and the results.

The best-case studies on project management have been listed above. It includes BTM Global, Butterfly, Boncom, and more.

Kevin D.Davis

Kevin D. Davis is a seasoned and results-driven Program/Project Management Professional with a Master's Certificate in Advanced Project Management. With expertise in leading multi-million dollar projects, strategic planning, and sales operations, Kevin excels in maximizing solutions and building business cases. He possesses a deep understanding of methodologies such as PMBOK, Lean Six Sigma, and TQM to achieve business/technology alignment. With over 100 instructional training sessions and extensive experience as a PMP Exam Prep Instructor at KnowledgeHut, Kevin has a proven track record in project management training and consulting. His expertise has helped in driving successful project outcomes and fostering organizational growth.

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Project Failure Case Studies and Suggestion

2014, International Journal of Computer Applications

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