mythbusters ran a pirate episode once where they tried to see if you could escape from being burried to your neck in sand.  as they found out, it’s impossible to escape from wet sand because as you move some sand away to clear space to move, more water and sand will fill up that space.  it provides you with no wiggle room to free your limbs and your body from the sand.

perhaps the most important part of project management when creating schedules for work is the inclusion of wiggle room.  there are issues that occur when working on projects — large or small.  some of these issues are known, and some are unknown, and some are even known to be unknown in that you know the issue will occur, but not when or what impact it would have on the project.  as much as we’d like to — the fact of the matter is that we cannot fully remove all risks and issues from a project.  what we can do, however, is to study those risks and issues and minimize their effects.  one of the best ways to do this is by scheduling wiggle room. Read the rest of this entry »