The Iron Triangle

In Project Management circles, the Iron Triangle is seen as both a driving and as a restraining force in management the successful completion of project on time and within budget with the anticipated and expected level of quality that was promised.

However, as anyone knows who has worked on a project, this is a balancing act at best and at worst, it can easily become a nightmare.

So, what is it that I am talking about here?

I am talking about what is referred to as The Iron Triangle. The Iron Triangle refers to the variables of Time, Cost, and Quality in equal measures hence the triangle. But, some project mangers put Time, Cost, and Scope at the points of the triangle with Quality hovering in the center.

Let's take a look at each one of these to get a better understanding of what I am trying to get across.

Ok... so, we have this project that let's say can only last 3 months. We then refer to this 3 month period as our Time variable. During those 3 months, we have weeks, days, and hours with which to play and can assume that daily time is 8 hours for 5 days each week, and weekly time is 40 hours and that we have 4 weeks each moth so we are working with an overall amount of time of:

• 12 weeks
• 60 days
• 480 hours

If we then look at our Cost variable, we can derive our total cost from our Scope Statement which calculate the overall costs and the detailed costs along each step of the way. These costs would have included:

• salaries & benefits
• labor wages & benefits
• equipment leased
• maintenance
• raw materials
• transportation (gasoline)
• utilities
• phone
• office supplies

Each one of these budget items is inflated about 10-20% to cover “just in case” expenses not anticipated. The project, if performed by an outside contractor will have a profit margin built into the costs as well of 10% or more, all of which is typically agreed upon before the project even begins.

The quality variable while seemingly obvious can be very detailed in its requirement and specifications if dealing with a project of creating new computer software or a new competitive product that must perform a certain way under certain situations and conditions.

If the output of the project is a restaurant meal for a customer, then if poses different types of quality restraints than if the output of the project was an automotive vehicle or a military weapon or even a bridge connection 2 land masses with a quarter mile of water in between them.

However, if the output of the project is a backyard deck or a utility building then obviously the quality requirements are going to be or could be a little more relaxed

As I mentioned earlier, some project managers put Scope at one of the corners instead of Quality. Project Scope can be defined as how the project is going to get from point A to point B in a certain amount of time (in this case 12 weeks).

Now... let's play around with our Iron Triangle.

Suppose half way through the project, the owner of the project comes up to you and indicates that there needs to be 2 more stops between point A and point B.

What would you do?

Simple... everything immediately gets renegotiated... and, a clause to this effect has been included in the original project contract.

If 2 more stops are being added, then that could impact our Time variable, our Cost variable, as well as our Quality variable.

Is the project owner willing to pay more money or accept more time or a reduction in quality? If the answer is no to all of these, the project continues as planned... but, if the project owner is willing to accept some slight changes, then a new scope arrangement has to be made.

This may not seem like a big problem but if the equipment is leased, the project may not be able to hold on to it past the deadline for its return. The labor might be promised for some other project that must start on time as well; and, if that is the case then overtime will be required. And, the project may have completed so many crucial milestones (measures of completion) that its course can no longer be altered.

A change in each one of these variables will cause increases or decreases in the other two and it is up to the project manager or leader to be able to see and identify all theses complications or be able to absorb the costs if he doesn't.

A project manager's reputation can be made or broken by The Iron Triangle.

A Project By Any Other Name

In 1981, I graduate from the Babcock School of Management at Wake Forest University located in Winston-Salem, NC with an MBA degree. 

It was a difficult course of study for me because my undergraduate degree was English. 

My pursuit of this degree was brought about by my position as Executive Director of a Non-Profit and not having any management skills or training.

My MBA course focused on Small Business Management and Strategic Planning, all of which was wrapped around a concept referred to as “Product Management.” Simply put, I was being trained to enter the workforce of a large company and manage a product line.

In those days, if you were a trained Product Manager then you were on a fast track to upper management within a few short years, positioning you to possibly be groomed to become CEO one day in the near future.

But alas, that was not my desire... I just wanted to manage my little non-profit and what I did not realize at the time was that I had been trained to be a “professional manager,” and had the skill sets to manage any organization at all.

Over the years, Product Management changed to Project Management and I soon realized that my previous employments had provided me with over 13,000 hours of actual project management experience as a leader of projects.

Shortly thereafter, I joined the faculty of ITT Technical Institute and was selected because of my education and experience to be a course writer in the area of Technical Project Management and began working with Pearson and Wiley Publishing along with NIIT in New Delhi, India to write these online and onsite courses.

I also became a member of the local PMI (Project Management Institute) group and soon learned about the PMP (Project Management Professional) Certification. It was simply part of what I had learned in my MBA program years earlier and it was then that I made the connection.

The more I looked in project management being a course writer, the more I realized as well that EVERYTHING that goes on in business as well as in our personal lives can be seen and managed like a project.

Planning and preparing for Thanksgiving or Christmas is a project.

• Getting married is a project.
• Going on vacation is a project.
• A semester at College is a project.
• Teaching a course is a project.
• Playing a game in any professional sport is a project.
• Military Boot Camp is a project.
• Deploying troops overseas is a project.
• A political election is a project.

And, this list goes on and on and on.

So, what is a project?

It is an activity that has a beginning and an end with processes and systems that operate so that the right output, result, or conclusion is achieved in a timely, effective, and efficient manner.

Projects can have Charters and Sponsors.

Some projects can be on-going, incorporating sub-projects within its boundaries like the publishing of a monthly magazine or daily newspaper.

Projects could be designed to look at other projects and reduce the amount of time it takes for those projects to reach completion. For instance, a new product development project that in the past might have 12 months to complete, now only takes 6-9 months to complete because another project team was Chartered to improve the process.

All projects have life cycles, even those that last for a day as well as those that may last over a year.

• projects are initiated where the need for that project has been realized.
• projects have periods of upfront planning.
• projects commence or roll out as some might say.
• projects are monitored and controlled by a Project Leader
• projects conclude, end, or are turned over to a maintaining team.

As you can now imagine, there are many activities going on in your life that are operating as a project that you had no idea were in fact a project. And, all these projects will continue to operated the way they have always operated even though you have this new knowledge.

PMP Certifications are valuable but not always necessary in managing a project. In order to be eligible to sit for the PMP certification exam, you must so many hours of previous project management experience as a team leader. The exam itself tests one's ability at understanding and of course memorizing the PMBOK which is Project Management Body of Knowledge.

The PMP Certification is a good ticket to have and will certainly put you in a position to qualify for receiving a substantial salary increase, but it is not necessary to actually manage or learn to manage a project ALL WORK takes place in the form of a project.

And, while that sounds simple and it really is, there are some other pieces of knowledge that will be helpful for you to know when managing projects that I will share with you in future articles.