This week in the UK, members of parliament (MPs) have been in the public eye more often than not.
The reason is that now the 'public' can see how MPs have spent taxpayers money. We hear stories of claiming money to pay for pools, manure, furniture, and even the cleaning of a 'moat' (in ancient times, castles defences included a moat which is a deep hole surrounding the castle and filled with water).
Fantastic stories I would say, and the public seem to be outraged if not dissapointed, calling for MPs resignation and even to a radical restructuring of administrative and autiding systems. But this contrasts with what I hear normally when we talk about public projects.
When we look at examples of projects like the millenium dome (now the O2 arena), Wembley stadium, Heathrow terminal 5 and the London Olympics village, they are being regarded as a kind of 'inevitable loss', in which money has been overspent. Public interest here takes a different form: it is not outrage, it is some sadness that complements a kind of pride being taken that these projects (will) provide something else: A good feeling, a sense that the public, country and nation are being served. That also happens in projects being undertaken by local councils (e.g. regenerations).
In the case of MPs expenses, we talk about thousands of pounds, maybe a few millions. But in the case of many projects, we are talking about many millions.
I really hope that this feeling of 'outrage' will be transferred in a positive way to project management. Not to say that we need to look after every penny spent in projects, but to be able to set the alarms and think of transforming the 'systems' in which we operate.
It may be the case that we need to think of other ways of enabling people to look after their invested money in projects.
Or maybe we also need to make project managers political figures, so that the public has an eye on them. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh. I may have said something politically incorrect now. Not sure if bodies like the project management institute, or methodologies like Prince 2 would allow room for this. Project managers are supposed to be 'neutral', objective and cold blooded when it comes to deliver projects. But wait a minute. They are also supposed to exert their leadership skills and manage stakeholders. Mmmm. Is the public a stakeholder group? Or just a curious group that gets fed news...?
There is more to say about 'outrage' that meets the eye!
