National Academy of Construction
Recognizing Industry Leaders in Engineering and Construction Since 1999
We are seeing dramatic growth in the scale and complexity of capital construction programs. Like all programs, these consist of a series of discrete but closely coupled projects that when taken in their entirety enable an owner to meet a set of well-defined strategic objectives.
This Executive Insight looks at the utilization of “outcomes” aligned, shared incentive teams for the delivery of large complex projects.
This Executive Insight focuses on complex projects and complements Executive Insight: Modeling and Mitigating Project Complexity.
Today’s infrastructure and facilities are “smart.” These “smart” facilities transcend any given sector and bring new challenges to the engineering and construction industry.
Large complex programs require more expansive stakeholder programs than what might be traditionally experienced even on the largest single projects.
One of the most important steps in the implementation of a program management approach is the selection of the projects that will comprise the program.
This Executive Insight examines the special case of decision-making under uncertainty.
There is a tendency to think of the essential difference between mega/giga projects and more traditional sized projects as one of scale.
Large complex projects require a degree of management and granularity not often found in more traditionally sized projects.
Program management is about managing the challenges of scale and complexity.
The history of large complex projects is strewn with significant cost overruns and schedule delays. Using basic cost and schedule criteria, benchmark data indicate nominally two-thirds of such projects significantly fail.
This Executive Insight is intended to provide an introduction to the area of large complex projects.
The relationship between complexity and modularity of “systems” mirrors that of nature, where complex systems reward modularity and its ability to limit the effects of perturbations while at the same time recognizing that excessive modularity exposes the system negatively to the effects of even stronger, more systemic perturbations. The same is true for large complex projects.
This Executive Insight looks at some of these elements and suggests that formal evaluation and scoring by owners may prove to be a useful tool to assess their progress in moving toward project execution.
Importance of risk management in project execution is laid out in a ten-step process.
This Executive Insight focuses on the “flows” present in all projects. The emphasis here is on flows that large complex projects experience. We will briefly review the “theory of projects,” define the concept of “flows,” and provide examples.
Joint venture (JV) success in many ways rests on how strong the foundations for success have been made.
Large complex projects require strong foundations if they are to be successful. Arguably, these are the same foundations any project would require, but experience suggests otherwise.
This Executive Insight looks at large complex programs from a systems perspective, recognizing that such programs are not as well-bounded as classical project management (PM) theory (as espoused by Taylor, Gantt, and Fayol ) would have us believe.
The underlying philosophy in this Executive Insight is one of a vertical kick-off built on strong foundations.
Large complex projects require an increase focus on “flows,” those tiny arrows we see on various charts connecting the 50-100,000 activities typical for such projects.
In November 2005, the Environmental Protection Agency enacted the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) Program in part to reshape the Department of Defense’s infrastructure.
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