I think most people would agree that a level of rigour is a necessary evil in many areas across most businesses. I have yet to meet anyone who intentionally endangers their employees so rigour is important when deploying health and safety policy. Also, meeting the regulatory needs of HMRC or Companies House requires rigour in accounting processes. But how does it benefit organisations in other areas?
Well, first of all, I have to admit that it isn’t a favorite subject of those looking for excitement in life. However, I believe that excitement is best enjoyed when it is expected – for instance at the opening of a new site or winning a large bid. I have seen plenty of ‘excitement’ over my career when things have gone wrong through the absence of rigour.
So what do I mean by rigour?
- I mean ensuring business changes are set up properly in the first place to meet the organisation’s objectives
- I mean constant challenge of the programme to ensure it is driving towards those objectives at all times
- I mean maintaining an external perspective so that everyone can see the wood for the trees
And why ‘approporiate’?
- It’s because the right amount of rigour needs to be applied appropriate to the cost, duration, quality and risk of a project
- It’s because unintelligent use of project methodologies can switch off senior managers and project team members
- It’s because unnecessary process, meetings and documentation delivers no benefit and increases cost
And why does it help? It helps because it ensures projects are pointed in the right direction from the beginning. There are few guarantees in the world of projects but ‘appropriate rigour’ reduces the risk that the project over runs, goes over budget or produces the wrong output.
These are the tangible risks mitigated but there are intangible risks to worry about too. ‘Appropriate rigour’ reduces the risk to organisational and personal reputations. It also reduces stress levels within the stakeholders and project teams.
I guess the only drawback I have seen is at the end of a project. It is sometimes easy for people to challenge why we had to do ‘all that boring stuff’ at the beginning when the project was, quite obviously, very easy!