Hidden agendas in Project Management are common among stakeholders, and they have negative effects including:

• Hindering the progress of the project: Hidden agendas are not there to serve the project, they are there to serve narrow and selfish interests. Many times hidden agendas conflict with parts or the whole project, ensuing delays, cost overruns, etc…
• Lowering team morale: Project Managers usually get frustrated by unjustified decisions made by stakeholders with hidden agendas, this frustration is passed to the team, whose morale diminishes. The team will be demotivated, confused, and its productivity will decrease.

Why do we have hidden agendas?

The main reason why stakeholders adopt hidden agendas in Project Management is selfish interests. A stakeholder might go as far as secretly working towards the failure of a project to serve his own interests (A failed project, for example, would result in the allocation of future funds to one of that stakeholder’s own projects). Stakeholders more likely to have hidden agendas are those who hold executive positions in multiple companies and/or those who are corrupt (e.g. taking bribes from external organizations to either force or block a decision). Projects more likely to suffer from hidden agendas are public projects because of the sheer amount of government and company politics involved. Projects with lots of stakeholders (where each stakeholder is serving on multiple projects) are exposed to this problem as well.

Examples of hidden agendas

• A stakeholder refusing to go on board for a release of funds for an urgent project. Hidden Agenda: Maybe the stakeholder is aware of the limited cash flow in the organization and does not want to affect his own “pet” project?
• A stakeholder pushing very hard to finish a public project (even with a reduced scope and quality) before the elections. Hidden Agenda: Maybe the stakeholder is supporting a politician who’s taking credit for this project?
• A stakeholder fiercely vouching for a specific vendor although prices from other vendors are much cheaper. The stakeholder cites “reliability” as a basis for his decision while the quality is almost the same. Hidden Agenda: Maybe the stakeholder has an under-the-table deal with the vendor?)

How Can a Project Manager Detect a Hidden Agenda?

There are a couple of clear signs of hidden agendas:

• “Because I think it’s best for the company not to do it” (or vice versa): A stakeholder opposing (or supporting) a project or a project functionality cannot clearly and objectively justify his decision.
• Never-ending delaying of feedback/decision: A stakeholder does not get back to the Project Manager on a key issue that requires a decision or feedback, even after being approached several times by the Project Manager.

How to deal with hidden agendas?

As stated in the previous section, hidden agendas are not that hard to uncover, on the other hand, they are very hard to address. The problem is that the people with hidden agendas causing a lot of harm to the project are usually key stakeholders from upper management. The Project Manager does not have any authority over them nor can he simply accuse them of having “hidden agendas” without suffering very negative consequences at the career level. The best thing a Project Manager can do is to accept hidden agendas as part of his project, and hoping he doesn’t end up being the scapegoat of a failed project. The worst thing a Project Manager can do is “joining the dance”, e.g. adopting a stakeholder’s hidden agenda himself, this will never work as the Project Manager will soon find himself facing major conflicts with other stakeholders, not to mention that any hidden agenda can change at any time, leaving the Project Manager vulnerable after adopting an agenda that nobody is supporting anymore.

© 2010 Project Management Learning – Reproduction of this material is strictly prohibited without the written consent of Project Management Learning.

Many Project Managers wonder if it’s possible to become a PMP without Project Management experience. The short answer is “No”, PMI is very clear in its requirements for the PMP credential: the Project Manager has to gather at least 4,500 hours of real Project Management Experience.

Unfortunately, PMI only audits a small percentage of PMP applications, which allows some unethical applicants to fake the required Project Management experience (and sometimes the education) in hope that they will not get audited. Deceptive techniques used to faking the Project Management Experience include (but of course, are not restricted to, as unethical people are usually creative in finding ways to trick the process):

• Claiming fake Project Management experience either as an employee or as a contractor from disreputable companies/organizations that went bankrupt, ceased to exist, or are owned by a friend or a family member.
• Inflating the experience acquired with the current company/organization, many times even informing management about this deceptive technique, so that management is able to confirm the validity of the applicant’s claim in case of an audit.

Sadly, because of the very small percentage of applications being audited, quite a few people are able to become PMPs by using the above (again deceptive) techniques.

This, of course, has some negative consequences, including:

• An influx of bad “Project Managers” in the job market: Most companies assume that being a PMP (because of the traditional respect for this certification) equates being a Project Manager. While this is true in most cases, it certainly is not for anyone unethically becoming a PMP.
• Diminishing prestige of the PMP accreditation: Those landing a Project Management job after unethically acquiring the PMP accreditation through faking their experience will send the wrong message to companies about the real value of the PMP because of their clear incompetency.
• Reduced salary for PMP certified Project Managers: The diminishing prestige of the PMP as well as the abundance of (bad) Project Managers will have a direct and negative effect on the PMP salary.
• Less respect for Project Management in general: The reduced quality of those working in Project Management will send the wrong message about the worthiness of Project Management as a profession and as a process to get projects done. This will hinder the evolvement of Project Management and will push companies to seek alternatives for managing their projects.

What PMI Should Do

For better or for worse, PMI has a huge say in the Project Management world, and as we can see from the negative consequences above, the somehow lax standards of auditing PMP applicants for their experience can affect the profession of Project Management as a whole.

Here are some thoughts on what PMI should do to avoid this:

• Drop the random PMP audit mentality: PMI claims that it randomly audits applicants for their experience. This, of course, results in efforts being spent in the wrong place. Many times, it is very obvious to differentiate between someone with real Project Management experience and someone with no experience at all. What’s the point of “randomly” auditing the former and not auditing the second? It is better that PMI adopts a more targeted approach as stated in the next point below.
• Adopt targeted auditing: Candidates documenting Project Management experience from unknown companies/organizations or those applying immediately after acquiring the minimum required Project Management experience to be eligible (for example exactly 4,500 hours) should have their application looked at with scrutiny.
• Increase the percentage of the audits: According to PMI, only a small percentage of PMP applications gets audited. Most probably this is done because PMI is understaffed. Perhaps PMI should consider hiring more resources to perform audits. By hiring more auditors, audits can then be more proactive, such as contacting involved companies/individuals to verify that the Project Management experience is definitely “real”.
• Enforce a lifetime ban for those faking the Project Management experience: Anyone claiming a fake Project Management experience is clearly not doing it with “good faith”. Those doing so should be banned for life from taking any PMI certification. Of course, some people make genuine mistakes in their application and should be excluded from this punishment.

PMI has to assume its responsibility of protecting Project Management and its future as a profession from fraudsters posing themselves as Project Managers. Otherwise, as stated earlier, companies will seek an alternative, and Project Management, as we know it right now, will perish.

Note: To its credit, PMI reserves the right to audit applications even after the certification is bestowed, but this is rarely (if ever) done.

© 2010 Project Management Learning – Reproduction of this material is strictly prohibited without the written consent of Project Management Learning.