Effective Preplanning: A-Team against MacGyver

22. Jun, 2008 5 Comments

A while ago I was talking about the importance of preplanning your project:

“The idea about preplanning is to equip yourself in such a way that you can adapt to circumstances. That you create an start situation that is as good as you possibly can. If you go to the arctic, you take warm cloths, if you go to the tropics you pack T-shirts. If you don’t know, you pack several shirts you can wear over each other, depending on the temperature.”

Although I like this description, I need a stronger image. I need to bring across the fact that you have “preplanning” and “preplanning”.

You have The A-Team Way of preplanning. Every episode Hannibal was creating his cunning plan. It always involved welding metal plates onto a car of truck. They could handle every situation. A family in distress? The A-Team looked around in their hideout, and made use of whatever welding gear and car they happened to find.



But then again, you also have The MacGyver Way of preplanning. MacGyver just had his Swiss army knife. His solutions were not sophisticated as those of the A-Team. But they worked.

Wouldn’t that be great: A-Team against MacGyver? Try to imagine who would adapt to more diverse situations.

I wonder if people still know A-Team and MacGyver.

Do you?

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5 Responses to “Effective Preplanning: A-Team against MacGyver”

  1. Josh Nankivel 01. Jul, 2008 at 6:47 am

    Are you kidding? Of course we know about the A-Team and MacGyver!

    I think they’d end up working together, so perhaps the moral of the story is that good planning and teams coupled with ingenuity win the day.

    Josh Nankivel
    http://www.PMStudent.com

  2. Bas 02. Jul, 2008 at 5:39 am

    hi Josh, yeah I guess you are right :) (just loved to create a post in which i could use them pictures :) )

  3. Dan Ward 18. Jul, 2009 at 11:10 pm

    I LOVE this post – very cool to use the A-Team versus Mac as an example of planning versus improvisation. Both were resourceful, but clearly the A-Team’s “I love it when a plan comes together” approach is 180 degrees away from Mac’s “figure it out when I get there” method.

    Given the economic, technological and social environment we find ourselves in these days, I’m going to say the MacGyver approach is probably best suited for project leaders these days…

  4. Bas de Baar 26. Jul, 2009 at 10:19 am

    I agree, Dan. And the more I think about it, our Swiss Knife of Project Leadership is our own personality, reputation, communication skillset and emotional intelligence. No more, no less.

Trackbacks/Pingbacks

  1. 25 Ways Project People Can Train Their Mental Flexibility — Project Shrink - 22. Nov, 2008

    [...] 10. Inspirations do not always come from real life successes. Situations can compare very favorably to television shows as well. Relate project scenes / scenarios to your favorite television shows. Mental flexibility granted through an active imagination will lead you to some unconventional yet implementable ideas, not to mention PM metaphors. The A-Team’s resourcefulness comes to mind and you start believing you do not need to be Superman, nor do you need super machines to get to your goals, it is all in the mind and how you adapt your environment to suit your project needs. [more] [...]