Managing a 'Dangerous Opportunity' Project

I call projects like this "a dangerous opportunity". I inherited a troubled initiative, which not only did not know what they were really trying to deliver, but they were delivering badly.

My client contact was under severe pressure from the parent company to fall in line and develop a multifunctional enterprise computer system from scratch. Application software packages wouldn't do because they "already looked at them". And of course the project was "to be completed yesterday" To make matters worse, my client boss was an exceedingly intelligent and charismatic individual who lacked experience, yet had the dominating, strong-willed and demanding presence to prolong the project damage.

Why did I take on this "death wish" project? Suffice it to say that once upon a time I skydived while these days I go out of my way to find challenging, turnaround initiatives. Here are some of the things I did.

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