pm-lotus by Howard Vaughan

Posts Tagged ‘Articles’

When I first started in the project management services business, I was repeatedly led to believe that the construction industry was the beacon of leadership in project management maturity. My own experience over the years tended to question that wisdom and now the truth is out that this is indeed all nonsense. According to a recent survey by the Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB), which represents 42,000 members and sets standards for the management of the total building process, the construction industry has much to learn about project management.

The Shocking Truth

Not a towering force in project management

The survey results are based on data from 73 companies and over 2,000 projects. Its conclusions are available on the CIOB website – you can also watch an interesting video of the CIOB president Keith Pickavance presenting the results at the Project Management Asia Conference 2008. They make for a highly uncomplimentary denunciation of the state of project management practices in the industry- for example:

• less than 15% used a linked network to define the schedule
• more than 50% used only simple bar charts
  • (no chance of a critical path)
• more than 50% used paper (not computerized) records
• less than 15% kept logs of changes
  • (not much good in court)
• 95% did not report delays to progress because they:
  • hoped no-one would notice
  • hoped they could catch up
  • did not want to upset the client
  • thought they could blame someone else.

Its not a pretty picture. Little wonder then, that the industry is dogged by delays, compensation claims and disputes.

The Way Forward

Clearly there is a need for some serious project management skills development. In the words of Mr. Pickavance himself:

We have no standards, we have no training, we have no qualifications.

All of which should be manna from heaven for project management educators, particularly in those regions where construction investment is being pumped up to help resurrect limp economies. Assuming of course that the building firms are open to changing their ways.

RIP project triangle

Its good to see the PMI moving with the times and dispensing with the sacred Triple Constraint. Now we’re advised to balance additional constraints such as quality, risk and resources. So no longer is project success to be measured per the old PMBOK 3, in which we learned that “High quality projects deliver the required product, service or result within scope, on time and within budget”.

This change has been nicely acknowledged by Telstra, Australia’s privatized telecommunications giant. According to itnews.com.au, the telco recently revealed payment of a $2.2 million bonus to its ex-COO for outcomes relating to its IT transformation program despite it running $200m over budget and behind schedule with currently only half of the legacy systems planned for consolidation switched off. The chief exec declared it a ‘good result’ apparently.

I wouldn’t mind trying for just a mediocre result under this new approach – say half the bonus for double the cost overrun… the Triple Constraint has a lot to answer for!