# Running the programme

Field notes / 06

Most programmes do not fail on technology. They fail on a decision nobody took, a stakeholder nobody asked, or a risk that everybody saw and nobody wrote down. These are the habits I rely on. None of them is clever, and all of them were learned the hard way.

## What I learned the hard way

1. **Schedule the calls early.** The people whose decision you will need in six weeks have full calendars today. Book the steering meetings, the reviews and the go-live rehearsal at the start, and cancel later if you can.
2. **Align every stakeholder, then align them again.** Agreement decays. Repeat the goal, the scope and the date at the start of every meeting, until people finish the sentence for you.
3. **Follow up in writing, the same day.** Decisions, owners, dates. Three lines are enough. What is not written down was not decided.
4. **Keep the budget in front of you every week.** Compare what has been spent with what has been delivered, not with the calendar. A budget that is checked once a month is already out of control.
5. **Look for risks while they are still cheap.** Ask every week what could stop us, and write the answers down with an owner. A risk raised early is a plan. Raised late, it is an excuse.
6. **Uncertainty is the only certain thing.** An estimate is a range and a plan is a guess with dates. Leave room, decide late what can be decided late, and tell people early when the picture changes.
7. **First, ship the part that moves the needle.** Find the fifth of the scope that delivers most of the value and put it live. Feedback from real use is worth more than another workshop.
8. **Bad news travels up fast, and it comes from you.** Sponsors forgive problems. They do not forgive surprises.

Diagram: A timeline from start to go-live. What is not known yet is a wide range at the start and narrows towards go-live. The calls are booked at the start, the first fifth goes live early, the go-live is rehearsed near the end, and budget, risks and follow-up are checked every week.

## Tips and tricks

- Send the agenda the day before and the notes the same day.
- Keep one list of decisions, with dates.
- Never leave a meeting without an owner for each action.
- Ask the quiet person what they think.
- Track budget and scope on the same page.
- Rehearse the go-live, including the way back.
- Say “I do not know yet”, and say when you will.

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This site was generated with AI. Claude wrote the code and drafted the text from Tudor’s own career records. Tudor reviewed it ... briefly ;)