A Sacraficial Lamb used to take the blame for a mis-managed project that actually has a long history of problems created by people long since promoted and moved elsewhere before the project is inherited by the pawn and hits a catastrophic unrecoverable demise.
Upon realizing the eminent the demise of a project promote everyone tied to it's history out of the department before hiring the Corporate Pawn to take on the projects responsibilities. Leave no former connections to the prior project team before hiring the pawn. Leave the pawn completly in the dark as much as possible while they try to navigate their sinking ship. Tell the pawn that the ship is in great shape, good luck and you are counting on them. The pawn will tell you otherwise eventually. Prepare documentation to fire the pawn as soon as the pawn starts to realize they have no means of sustainability.
by CleverDog August 9, 2009