I love watching the evolution of technology and methodologies. They all go through a fairly consistent pattern, especially the adoption phase. Knowing this maturity pattern helps us as managers to offset what is often the inevitable degradation of what are otherwise good approaches.

See The Phases of Change

Technology and methodology use will, in my experience, inevitably degrade in an organization over the course of the technology’s or process’s lifetime. We, as project managers, need to understand this phenomenon so we can get the most out of these implementations.

We should recognize that the effectiveness of techniques will fade in and fade out systematically, based upon no rational logic except that this is what happens with people using tools and methods. Getting the most out of these tools at each point in their cycles will help sustain our success even as they inevitably change for the better or worse over time.

The solution I’ve used most successfully for years is to simply dust off the “old” methodology, often framing it as something new or revised, and renew the focus on doing the job the way it was intended. Most good methodologies work just fine when done with energy and an understanding of what each step is intended to achieve.

For more on how to keep things going well over time, see The One Perfect Project Management Methodology

What techniques or methods in your project are energetic, and which ones are fading and could use a renewed focus?