Opera and Project Management
I have been working with projects and programs for many years—hands-on in everyday life and in my professional role; and in theory, through training and continuing education. Along the way, one question kept returning: how can we make complex management dynamics simple enough to grasp at a glance?
As an opera enthusiast, it hit me some time ago: projects are really just dramas after all. Grand visions, a motley crew of contributors, expectations that shoot through the roof—and then the inevitable chaos backstage. That is precisely why the world of opera is such a perfect set of metaphors for projects and their wonderfully unpredictable twists.
But why opera in particular? Why not theatre or film? Quite simply: nowhere else do timing, collaboration, and nerves of steel matter quite so much.
Project management is a staging
Every opera production is a gigantic project—with a fixed deadline (opening night), a limited budget (that never stretches far enough), and a team of specialists who each live in their own universe. Sound familiar? You bet.
- The artistic director—the executive sponsor—has a grand vision, but little appetite for the details.
- The conductor—the project manager—keeps everyone in the same tempo.
- The singers—the subject-matter experts—do the real work… but not always exactly as planned.
- The sponsors—the funders—want a spectacular show, preferably at no additional cost.
- The audience—the stakeholders—has expectations, but no two expectations are the same.
And then reality arrives: delays, budget cuts, cast changes, last-minute creative epiphanies— in short, exactly what happens in projects all the time.
Why this analogy works so well.
I wanted a metaphorical world that’s instantly relatable. Because let’s be honest: scope creep sounds abstract. But when I say, “The director decided—right before the performance—that Don Giovanni needs a sci-fi setting,” everyone instantly understands what I mean.
- Change management? Switching the orchestra to period instruments—just before opening night.
- Risk management? Keeping an understudy tenor ready, in case the overexcited star has a buffet-related meltdown.
- Problem management? Improvising on the spot when the soprano forgets her lines in the final scene.
The parallels are simply too perfect to ignore.
Conclusion: Projects are stagings—with or without applause
The opera world helps me explain project management vividly—with a wink. And it makes one thing unmistakably clear: no matter how chaotic it is backstage, in the end, all that matters is that the show is a success.
Because in projects, as in opera, the curtain rises—ready or not.