It’s the peers and stakeholders that are the problem; no one knows what they need, and everyone knows what they want, and if they aren’t responsible for the work they’ll always try to include everything and declare it a must-have. And you’ll get those who escalate over nothing, people actively working against you (because they disagree with the project goals and got overridden, or wanted to own it themselves), people who are necessary but apathetic / busy, people who are angry about something else but take it out wherever they get the chance to, changing requirements and sudden timeline shifts/deadlines because of events outside of your control… etc
At least when there’s someone with strict authority involved, these things can be resolved pretty quickly — everyone defaults to authority. But that’s rare; most projects involve multiple domains, each with authority over their dominion, and opinions on what the others need to be doing (and all trying to minimize their own responsibility and risks, by both simplifying the project, but also offloading it onto their peers).
Ultimately coordination between parties is inherently a bitch.
At least when there’s someone with strict authority involved, these things can be resolved pretty quickly — everyone defaults to authority. But that’s rare; most projects involve multiple domains, each with authority over their dominion, and opinions on what the others need to be doing (and all trying to minimize their own responsibility and risks, by both simplifying the project, but also offloading it onto their peers).
Ultimately coordination between parties is inherently a bitch.