The End of Project Overruns


Book Description

Applying the principles in this book unleashes ingenuity that achieves, solidifies and perpetuates a new performance culture of mutual benefit. In this culture, project teams will prepare their work in task packages and enable workflow necessary to leave inefficiency of time and resource, literally, no place to hide. Project examples will help teams implement the principles that shorten cycle times, eliminate error, improve quality and reduce costs to succeed in meeting project commitments. Emerging Lean enterprise relationships between clients, EPC contractors and their entire supply chain will advance what constitutes the new, market-differentiating performance of individuals, project teams and companies - justifying high levels of trust and inter-organizational efforts to improve. Client executives will learn to recognize root causes of risk and sources of excellence to mitigate them. Well-developed strategic improvement is often constrained because the traditional way - current means and methods - fit squarely in everyone's comfort zone. By learning to ask the right questions, top-client leadership will soon render overruns from the best traditional systems as "not-good enough" and strive for a new level of excellence. EPC executives will better engage creative voices from their best resources and stakeholders to resolve all concerns and define a unified vision for how to deliver on clients' expectations without overruns during capital project delivery. Lean methods will effectively assure that vision, principles and best expectations are understood and implemented at the workface. Department, discipline and stakeholder leaders will align and no longer frustrate each other and their clients. They will plan and execute with increased efficiency and effectiveness. Cost reduction will accelerate, retaining only client-valued quality - enabling a nimble response to market opportunities and threats. Project and program managers will confidently accept intense, market-induced cost and schedule-reduction efforts. They will apply new metrics, measure potential and extract, align and pilot improvements. They will make workface progress transparent to simplify resource balancing, full utilization and workface flow during all project phases. The results will differentiate team members and their project's performance on the world stage. Project professionals and the skilled labor force will gain confidence to make and keep increasingly difficult commitments and experience thereby increasing opportunity in an organization known for excellence. They will fully engage heart and mind for leaders who expect excellence and they trust to enable and reward best practice performance while they jointly eliminate root causes of problems before they happen. This book guides readers through each essential role for the transformation to Lean...not just at the lowest levels but of the entire business model and all the supporting processes. Resulting market recognition of sustained excellence of people, their systems and they way they work together will create a market-leading force.




Project Cost Overrun


Book Description

This book offers a new way of thinking about the causes and consequences of cost overrun to firms and society. It is ideal for academic researchers in project management, management accounting and corporate finance, as well as for managers in the private and public sectors.




Productivity in Construction Projects


Book Description

PRODUCTIVITY IN CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS From planning/design to post-construction, this valuable guide provides the construction industry the key to understanding the importance of properly tracking and measuring productivity, resulting in increased efficiency and profitability for contractors, subcontractors, owners, civil and construction engineers, and attorneys. Productivity in Construction Projects anticipates and answers the questions of owners, contractors, sub-contractors, and construction professionals to avoid cost overruns in a specific area of work, or when activities are taking more resources to perform than planned. Packed with real-world case studies, Productivity in Construction Projects’ thirteen chapters move beyond the symptoms and provide a remedy. This book provides a comprehensive look at how to: Complete more projects on time and budget, and earn greater profits and future business. Track and analyze productivity on construction projects, and quantify additional costs resulting from productivity losses. Select the right experts and attorneys should litigation or arbitration occur, and employ credible and reliable methods of analysis. Solve problems on the project instead of incurring lengthy and costly litigation or arbitration.




Industrial Megaprojects


Book Description

Avoid common pitfalls in large-scale projects using these smart strategies Over half of large-scale engineering and construction projects—off-shore oil platforms, chemical plants, metals processing, dams, and similar projects—have miserably poor results. These include billions of dollars in overruns, long delays in design and construction, and poor operability once finally completed. Industrial Megaprojects gives you a clear, nontechnical understanding of why these major projects get into trouble, and how your company can prevent hazardous and costly errors when undertaking such large technical and management challenges. Clearly explains the underlying causes of over-budget, delayed, and unsafe megaprojects Examines effects of poor project management, destructive team behaviors, weak accountability systems, short-term focus, and lack of investment in technical expertise Author is the CEO of the leading consulting firm for evaluating billion-dollar projects Companies worldwide are rethinking their large-scale projects. Industrial Megaprojects is your essential guide for this rethink, offering the tools and principles that are the true foundation of safe, cost-effective, successful megaprojects.




Policy and Planning for Large Infrastructure Projects


Book Description

Abstract: "This paper focuses on problems and their causes and cures in policy and planning for large infrastructure projects. First, it identifies as the main problem in major infrastructure development pervasive misinformation about the costs, benefits, and risks involved. A consequence of misinformation is massive cost overruns, benefit shortfalls, and waste. Second, the paper explores the causes of misinformation and finds that political-economic explanations best account for the available evidence: planners and promoters deliberately misrepresent costs, benefits, and risks in order to increase the likelihood that it is their projects, and not the competition's, that gain approval and funding. This results in the "survival of the unfittest," where often it is not the best projects that are built, but the most misrepresented ones. Finally, the paper presents measures for reforming policy and planning for large infrastructure projects, with a focus on better planning methods and changed governance structures, the latter being more important."--World Bank web site.




Large Infrastructure Projects in Germany


Book Description

This book presents an analysis of why some large infrastructure projects are delayed or compromised and offers important insights into the better delivery of future projects. It provides an important reaction to the ambitious €315 billion investment plan devised by the European Commission, wherein Europe's infrastructure is a key investment target. Germany is adopted as a focus, as Europe's largest economy, and a nation that has seen significant delays and tensions in the delivery of key infrastructure projects. The contributions to this volume demonstrate various patterns for infrastructure assets and illustrate how factors such as poor project governance, early planning mistakes, inappropriate risk management and unforeseen technological challenges influence delivery. The in-depth case studies on the Berlin Brandenburg Airport, the Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, and offshore wind parks show how project delivery can face massive problems, and illuminating solutions are offered to these problems. Overall, the case of Germany also offers the opportunity to assess various new forms of project delivery, such as public-private partnerships (PPP), and the risks and opportunities of ambitious first-mover 'pioneer' projects. The book will be of great interest for scholars and upper-level students of human geography, business and management, as well as policy makers.




Identifying and Managing Project Risk


Book Description

Winner of the Project Management Institute’s David I. Cleland Project Management Literature Award 2010 It’s no wonder that project managers spend so much time focusing their attention on risk identification. Important projects tend to be time constrained, pose huge technical challenges, and suffer from a lack of adequate resources. Identifying and Managing Project Risk, now updated and consistent with the very latest Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK)® Guide, takes readers through every phase of a project, showing them how to consider the possible risks involved at every point in the process. Drawing on real-world situations and hundreds of examples, the book outlines proven methods, demonstrating key ideas for project risk planning and showing how to use high-level risk assessment tools. Analyzing aspects such as available resources, project scope, and scheduling, this new edition also explores the growing area of Enterprise Risk Management. Comprehensive and completely up-to-date, this book helps readers determine risk factors thoroughly and decisively...before a project gets derailed.




A Practical Guide to Earned Value Project Management


Book Description

The Best Resource on Earned Value Management Just Got Better! This completely revised and updated guide to earned value (EV) project management is the go-to choice for both corporate and government professionals. A Practical Guide to Earned Value Project Management, Second Edition, first offers a general overview of basic project management best practices and then delves into detailed information on EV metrics and criteria, EV reporting mechanisms, and the 32 criteria of earned value management systems (EVMS) promulgated by the American National Standards Institute and the Electronic Industries Alliance and adopted by the Department of Defense. This second edition includes new material on: • EV metrics • Implementing EVMS • Government contracts • Time-based earned schedule metrics • Critical chain methodologies




Broken Buildings, Busted Budgets


Book Description

Across the nation, construction projects large and small—from hospitals to schools to simple home improvements—are spiraling out of control. Delays and cost overruns have come to seem “normal,” even as they drain our wallets and send our blood pressure skyrocketing. In Broken Buildings, Busted Budgets, prominent construction attorney Barry B. LePatner builds a powerful case for change in America’s sole remaining “mom and pop” industry—an industry that consumes $1.23 trillion and wastes at least $120 billion each year. With three decades of experience representing clients that include eminent architects and engineers, as well as corporations, institutions, and developers, LePatner has firsthand knowledge of the bad management, ineffective supervision, and insufficient investment in technology that plagues the risk-averse construction industry. In an engaging and direct style, he here pinpoints the issues that underlie the industry’s woes while providing practical tips for anyone in the business of building, including advice on the precise language owners should use during contract negotiations. Armed with Broken Buildings, Busted Budgets, everyone involved in the purchase or renovation of a building or any structure—from homeowners seeking to remodel to civic developers embarking on large-scale projects—has the information they need to change this antiquated industry, one project at a time. “LePatner describes what is wrong with the current system and suggests ways that architects can help—by retaking their rightful place as master builders.”—Fred A. Bernstein, Architect Magazine “Every now and then, a major construction project is completed on time and on budget. Everyone is amazed. . . . Barry LePatner thinks this exception should become the rule. . . . A swift kick to the construction industry.”—James R. Hagerty, Wall Street Journal




Project Cost Overrun


Book Description

Cost overrun is common in public and private sector projects. Costs tend to grow, plans fail and financial problems follow, but how can we approve the right projects if we cannot estimate their true cost? This book, for academics in project management, management accounting and corporate finance, as well as for managers in the public and private sectors, offers a new way of thinking about the causes and consequences of cost overrun for firms and society. It demonstrates that there is a logic behind cost growth and overrun, identifies projects and situations that are more vulnerable, and examines the effects of increased costs. It further identifies the negative and positive consequences of cost overrun, analyses how and why preconditions for cost overrun differ when the logic governing private firms dominates versus the logic of the political sector, and explains why cost can sometimes be of lesser importance to decision makers.




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