How to Crash and Burn: 8 Methods for Project Failure

If you're hellbent on guaranteeing a spectacular project failure, here are eight surefire steps to get you there:

1. Embrace Ambiguity and Ditch Planning:
   Who needs clear goals or a roadmap? Vague objectives and a half-baked plan are the perfect ingredients to keep your team guessing and failing. Start to think about the results you seek halfway through execution and be sure that your prior actions were mostly a waste.

2. Champion Muffled Communication:
   Keep everyone in their own little silos. Why bother sharing ideas or updates when confusion is a much better catalyst for disaster?

3. Welcome Scope Creep with Open Arms:
   Stick to a well-developed plan? No way. Constantly add random features and requirements without any proper vetting. After all, chaos keeps things interesting. Above all, make sure NOT to communicate what impact these changes will have on cost and schedule. You can measure that at the end.

4. Disregard Risk Management:
   Identify potential pitfalls? Overreact to issues? Not your style. Pretend risks don’t exist, and if something goes wrong, just shrug it off. If you ignore the problem, it will eventually go away, right?

5. Practice Weak Leadership and Scatter Resources:
   Decisive leadership and proper resource allocation are overrated. Keep decision-making ambiguous and your team under-resourced. Nothing says “failure” like a leader who can’t steer the ship. Shake the Magic 8 Ball when tough decisions need to be made.

6. Ignore Your Budget – Money Grows on Trees:
   Who needs financial discipline? Just throw numbers together, ignore cost overruns, and assume there will always be more funding magically available when things go sideways.

7. Micromanage Every Little Detail – Trust is Overrated:
   Instead of empowering your team, hover over their shoulders, second-guess every decision, and make sure no one feels trusted or motivated. Nothing speeds up failure like a demoralized workforce drowning in pointless oversight.

8. Set Unrealistic Deadlines – Faster is Always Better:
   Promise impossible timelines, ignore resource constraints, and act shocked when everything falls apart. After all, who needs proper scheduling when wishful thinking will do?

Follow these eight steps religiously, and you’re well on your way to turning a promising project into a legendary flop.