If projects get out of hand and the company achieves unsatisfactory results with the project business, the cause is often inadequate project management. I support you in researching the causes and creating a roadmap to improve your project management system. This includes
- a structured description of optimized project management processes and methods as well as
- a plan for their implementation.
To this end, I will help you select suitable tools and, above all, train the responsible project managers and team members.
1. Create a reliable project status analysis
At the start of every consulting project, the focus should always be on an open and honest analysis of the current status of your projects. A lack of transparency in project reporting is often a major cause of poor performance. In the course of this, you should analyze all available data of the orders with regard to tasks and goals, i.e.
- delivery performance,
- deadline situation,
- Fortschritt,
- costs and revenue as well as
- project cash flow
. You must then verify the findings derived from this through targeted interviews with the project's key people. In other words, talk to the project manager and key project team members to find out how the data should be interpreted in terms of the actual status of the project, for example on the construction site. To round things off, you should then hold discussions with the company's management. As a result, you will receive a reliable and transparent description of the status of your project portfolio.
2. Identify deviations from the project plan
Then compare the description of the current status of the individual projects with the plan drawn up at the start of the project in terms of service provision, deadlines, costs and revenue. With complex, long-term projects, it is usual for deviations to become apparent. If this is the case, you should analyze them to find out the causes in particular. The main aim here is to identify whether it is a one-off incident that may be beyond your control, such as damage to equipment during transportation. However, there may also be a pattern that points to a systematic defect, for example if the same error is repeatedly found in certain engineering documents on the construction site.
The next step is to identify possible measures for each individual project that can be used to avoid or at least minimize negative effects on the project outcome. If a contractual partner has caused a deviation, steps must be taken to compensate for possible negative effects by means of a contract amendment.
In the case of systematic defects and problems, the causes usually lie in the processes and methods used. This provides you with important information on where you need to start when optimizing your project management system.
3. Conduct a realistic project risk analysis
Projects in mechanical and plant engineering are typically characterized by long durations. In environments that are increasingly characterized by VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity), this results in increased uncertainty - for the project manager, the project participants and for the project execution itself. This makes it all the more important not only to develop a clear project execution strategy at the start of the project, but also to continually re-identify the risks and opportunities for the project outcome during the course of project implementation, taking into account the current circumstances.
To this end, it is essential to carry out a realistic risk analysis on the basis of risk workshops and assessments with the relevant specialist departments from your company. In practice, it has proven helpful to work with checklists to ensure that all relevant aspects are addressed during the discussion. In addition, the risks can be clustered according to subject areas, such as technological, imputed or contractual risks, which also allows risk management to be structured. As a result, you receive a risk matrix that forms the basis for proactive risk management for the respective project, including suitable measures to avoid possible negative effects on the project result as far as possible.
This is the biggest risk for your plant engineering projects in practice: Risks that are not "on your radar".
4. Create a project management roadmap with corrective measures
The results of the project status analysis also provide insights into the state of your project management system. From this, you can derive an analysis of the methods, processes and structures used to manage the projects. Here are some examples of questions that should be analyzed in this context:
- How is project selection carried out as part of business initiation?
- How do you ensure realistic planning in terms of costs and deadlines during the proposal preparation phase?
- How are the responsibilities for contract negotiation and approval for signature regulated?
- How do you manage project execution and the risk profile of the project portfolio?
- How are employees selected and assigned to the individual projects?
This analysis then forms the basis for the development of targeted corrective measures aimed at optimizing the management of your project portfolio and improving the results of your projects through state-of-the-art project management. You can then incorporate these into a plan in which you describe the path for the concrete implementation of the individual measures.
5. Formulate guidelines for optimizing project management
Professional project management forms the foundation for successful project execution. At the same time, it is crucial that the methods used are aligned with the needs of your company. This includes at least two things:
- The definition of efficient and standardized processes for the planning and execution of your projects: In practice, it has proven successful to first define the individual phases of a typical project process, and then to describe the processes along these project phases for the individual project management knowledge areas (e.g. deadline management, cost management, document management, communication management, risk management, etc.).
- Developing project management structures for the targeted and successful management of your project portfolio. This includes regulations for structured project selection with clear project governance, e.g. through a stage-gate process with clear approval rules by various management levels based on a risk categorization of the projects. These categories can then also serve as the basis for a regular review cycle of the project portfolio at the various management levels during project execution.
This all flows into a project management handbook with practical guidelines for an optimized project management system.
6. Put together a tailor-made project management toolbox
For successful project work, all project participants need project management tools that are aligned with the defined processes and methods. To put together this toolbox, it can be useful to first select individual solutions for different tasks or tasks during project planning and implementation, with the aim of using suitable tools for your company as quickly as possible, for example MS Project for scheduling or Excel-based project reports. The experience gained from using these tools can then be used later for the implementation of comprehensive project management software that maps the entire project management process holistically.
7. Conduct training
The last and at the same time crucial step in the implementation of an optimized project management system is that your employees use and apply the defined processes and methods together with the appropriate tools in their daily work when planning and implementing projects. To achieve this goal, you should develop a target group-oriented project management curriculum. It includes the description of the learning content and the definition of the teaching methods to be used. This includes classic formats such as
- roadshows,
- Seminare und
- Workshops,
aber auch moderne Kommunikationsmittel wie
- Online-Trainings und
- E-Learning,
as webinars and other online formats have become widely accepted as a result of the pandemic.
Experience has shown that it is worthwhile at this point at the latest to refer to an external consultant, who can help you design the individual elements of the training program defined for you and act as a trainer for the implementation of corresponding seminars.
