Unchecked optimism leads to project failure

In How Big Things Get Done, the authors note that key heuristic for managing optimism on projects is “You want the flight attendant, not the pilot, to be an optimist.” They continue:

What you need from your pilot, and must insist on, is hard-nosed analysis that sees reality as clearly as possible. The same holds for optimism about budgets and schedules on big projects, which are their “fuel readings.” Unchecked, optimism leads to unrealistic forecasts, poorly defined goals, better options ignored, problems not spotted and dealt with, and no contingencies to counteract the inevitable surprises. Yet … optimism routinely displaces hard-nosed analysis in big projects, as in so much else people do.^[1]

#cognition #leadership

See also:

• Perseverance balances faith and honesty
• Intuition delivers overly extreme predictions