I went with my wife to an immersive theatre interpretation of ‘A Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy’. It was bad. Really bad.

The promo promised you needed no prior knowledge of the story, which was me going in. I still have no idea - and my more informed wife also left confused.

Time Out’s savage review: “Bafflingly dreadful…”

Walking back and analysing, I found myself feeling sorry for the actors who’d clearly worked hard and gave it their best effort.

With any project there is a risk that it’s going to fail. Of course, if no one takes their inspiration and makes something new happen, life would be very boring indeed. But having decided to pursue something, how can you avert a disaster?

‘Fail fast’ is the catchphrase for this problem. The idea is that it’s better to test early and often, with a trusted group of your target audience, privately, before being exposed by the national press. Facing feedback can be really uncomfortable. Often instead of regular check-ins the project driver just pushes ahead.

When someone wants something and is willing to pay you to do it, people tend to put their heads down and trudge up hill.

I wonder how many failures could be avoided, or better products made, if we got better at seeking, listening to and giving feedback?

Here are three observations on what makes exchanging feedback hard:

1. No clear and agreed ‘Why?’.

If the project is initiated based on intuition and with no definition of success, then there are no measures to refer back to when giving feedback.

2. The ID in Ideas.

Often we find it hard to distinguish between an idea and the identity of the originator. Ideas are free and easy, and must be fair game for criticism. You can celebrate the intent behind the idea and the boldness to voice and work on it AND reflect back to them the issues you see. Maybe the idea is solid but the articulation could be improved, if that’s an outcome from the conversation then that’s a win too.

3. Impending deadlines.

Once you’re on the train it’s hard to stop. Taking time away from driving the train to evaluate, especially as the deadline gets closer, becomes less of an option because you’re going to fail to reach the destination.

Ultimately if the sponsor is committed, and you’re prepared to take the reputational risk, then you commit and aim to make the most of it like our actors in Hitch Hikers. There have been plenty of successes that surprised the experts.

Project Health checks

As a PM here are some health checks to reflect on before initiation and at regular intervals:

1. Do I understand the purpose of this project?

2. Am I working with enthusiasm?

3. Has the pitch landed with the target audience? Is it a no brainer for them?

4. Are the team making steady progress? Or are they trudging through treacle?

5. Do the numbers stack up? Is there a decent chance of a multiple return on the investment?

I find it only takes 15mins every week or two to step out of the detail and reflect. Doing this individually and as a team will highlight areas to address to make sure we are on course to deliver a 5 star product.

Aidan.