| You beat me to it ;) This is my list: I'm in a similar situation and the pressure is mostly caused by a lack of management. I've been appointed project leader halfway the project and I did my homework by reading the Software Project Survival Guide. We are also supposed to work in a scrum system, but on going business causes scrum to be just an extensive time management tool. We're nearing the deadline and a few things I picked up are: 1) You need to have a hands on approach and come up with solutions yourself. Show a lot of initiative. 2) Have clear roles of who needs to do what. 3) Don't change roles halfway a project, it only causes confusion and someone needs to clean up the mess. 4) Be frank to your business owner about the current reality . You don't want to be the guy, who didn't say anything and pass the deadline. And don't wait too long with saying it. 5) Make it very clear to the business owner, all changes cause a delay. And whatever you do, do not let the business owner decide how long a change will take. 6) Don't fight with the external guys, even if they are trying to run the show. If they start pressing for decisions (framework/system/etc) without a good reason, other than their own comfort, be warned... Get ready for a sticky situation. If you can, stick together with your current team to have some counterbalance. |
This, unfortunately, seems to be a rather large factor when it comes to figuring out why a project failed. Unrealistic expectations are absolute killers.