6 Managing projects as investments: Earned value to business value
themost mature PM disciplines such as large construction projects and
US Department of Defense (DoD) contracting. And even in such indus-
tries, the data selected as “similar” are often infected by wishful thinking.
And more often than not, deadlines and budgets are plucked from
thin air, with little or no methodology more complex than what can be
termed “whim.”
Procrustean bed of deadlines
Add an s to “saltines” and you get saltiness.
Add an s to “timelines” and you get timeliness.
Add an s to “deadlines” and you get deadliness.
And that indicates what deadlines often do to projects: instead of an active
and animated team, striving to create the maximum value from their work
i