Tales from the Project Management Jungle(tm): The Three Letter Agency Story

When I had been a Program Manager for only a couple of years I was assigned an interesting project as part of a corporate joint venture which brought together capabilities from different parts of the corporation to create a solution requested by a major three letter agency (not the one you think).

We were given a contract, after much discussion between the agency and corporate VPs, always with the admonishment from the customer that “there isn’t anymore money, don’t ask for more money.” I was brought in only after the contract was awarded (first warning flag) and told to “hit schedule, budget and maintain scope.”

As I was new to being a Program Manager, I was very motivated. I weekly charted to the hour the tasks each person was working on, and did other things trying to see how the project was really going. We kept the headcount down and the people motivated by a variety of positive mechanisms. The two key designers were junior engineers and they could get some OT pay--they didn’t really have anything else to do--so they were happy enough.

But, with several months to go, I could see we were going to run out of money before we finished the agreed-to scope. My personal analysis was beyond that of the standard contractual reports. The standard reports showed everything was ok. This is not at all unusual. Engineering task managers tend to be overly optimistic and the last 15% is notoriously hard to predict in development work.

Some of my conclusion was based on intuition, some from knowledge gained by working on these kinds of development jobs for several years, and from knowing about that last 15% of a project. I talked with my management, convinced them this was the reality.

Development work brings high risk. As the contract was a cost plus fee agreement, my corporation would not ask for fee on any overrun but also would not “eat” the overrun itself. I knew the customer would be concerned but thought they would at least appreciate being told the truth early enough to do something about it. After all, they could cut scope or would have the time to find more money. I thought the worst thing to do was to wait until the end when it would be obvious and then they would not have time to react or make any decisions. As they were the customer, I felt they had the right to know “now” and to make decisions.

So I called up the contract manager and told him. Thus “detonation” number one occurred, i.e., he turned the telephone line blue with his frustration. Within a few days I found myself in their headquarters building in Washington, DC.

Let me set the stage. There were at least 10 three-letter-agency people at the table. And there was me, the only representative of my corporation at the table. There were two account representatives from my corporation sitting in the back of the conference room--not at the conference table—distancing themselves from the “mess” but still there to support their customer. I would turn around and wave occasionally for support, and if they couldn’t divert their eyes quickly enough they might wave or smile tight encouragement back at me.

Then I started. “We have done everything we can to hit the target number,” I told the room, then explaining what measures we had taken to control costs and manage smartly. General wary nods. “I thought you would want to know the following as soon as possible. Here is the data.” I explained what I had been doing and how I formed my conclusion. “I am sorry. We are going to run out of money before we finish…”

An explosion of voices interrupted. “Detonation” number 2. “Your VP said… Unacceptable… What about your monthly cost reports, none of them showed a problem. Your company can pay. I am going to talk to...” This went on for what seemed like a really long time but was probably only a few minutes.

I waited. I was solid in my belief that what I was doing was right. I was sharing with them the truth as I saw it.

When they finally ran down I started again, without emotion. “We are going to run out of money. Cannot change that. Thought you would want to know so you could something about it.” “Detonation” number 3. Even meaner and nastier than the previous time.

This continued on for a couple of hours. They would dive into the details of the data I had. They would bring up my VP’s name. They would accuse me of being a poor manager, not driving the team hard enough. They would frequently mention how important the project was to their mission. They even brought up our CEO’s name once or twice.

This went on for several more rounds. They continued to release their not unreasonable frustrations. I believe they were testing me for any weakness, any wavering of my story, and trying to see if I would commit my company to pay for any overrun.

I just stayed on the same points: “Here is the data. We are going to run out of money. What would you like us to do?”
It may have been at detonation 4 or 5 that one of the key three letter managers jumped up, cursed, and left the room. He had been key to the original contract agreement and felt the most ownership of the agency managers.

Only half jokingly I asked, “He’s not going for his gun, is he?” Some of these folks, including that gentleman, did have guns.

Only half-jokingly as well, they replied, “We’re not sure.”

Finally this concluded and I left. “Bloodied but unbowed,” as they say. The sales representatives even took me to lunch, patted me on the back and said I had “done about as well as could be expected.”

I left convinced I had done the right thing in telling the truth as I saw it. I knew we had run a good project. The budget was just too tight for what was being done, and the development task too difficult. I felt telling them the truth this early would give them the time to truly decide what was best for them.

I flew back home and after a few weeks the agency came up with the requested dollars. We finished the job for the amount requested, to the agreed scope and schedule.

About a week after the job concluded I went to my VP and said “Well, that was fun! Really learned a lot. How about a new challenge and customer?” He agreed and I moved on to a new contract.

A few days after that I got a phone call from the agency contract manager, “Doug, we hear a nasty rumor!”

“Yes, Joe (I’ll call him Joe, because I honestly can’t remember his name--blanked it out most likely--it might even have been Joe) it’s true. I am going on to another customer.”

“Well, gosh Doug. That’s disappointing. Was it something we said? Because honestly you’re the best PM we ever had at your company.”

I paused for a few seconds, nonplussed. Then I said, “Wow, Joe. I can’t imagine how you treated the bad ones!”

This story may seem humorous now, but it surely wasn't humorous in the least at the time.

The point is this. It is best to tell people what they need to hear even if they act like--at that moment--that they don’t want to hear it. This increases trust in the overall relationship and helps people feel better about the work experience. After all, when the project above was successful, the customer seemingly appreciated being told the truth. They would have been much angrier had I stayed silent until we ran out of money and then a mad scramble ensued.

Sadly in my experience people often don’t tell the truth. Instead they often tell others only what they are contractually obligated to say or tell people what they think they want to hear, or only enough to lead them to the conclusion they want them to arrive at in such a way that they can't be accused of lying later. Many corporate leaders who have fallen into trouble in the past few years try to toe this line. Maybe there are often very good reasons why people do these things.

But to me, integrity based decisions are solid (logical?) and allow me to sleep at night.

Was I naïve? What if things hadn’t worked out “well”? Did I risk my nascent career for “ethics”?

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