Are we any good at Project Controls – what are the cross-sector challenges for the future?

Project Management has been around for as long as there has been a necessity to complete tasks, generally of known scope or eventual outcome, in a systematic way to a cost generally specified by the promoter. How that has been controlled to a greater or lesser extent is less obvious. From Shakespeare’s Globe to the Sydney Opera House, from the Colosseum Rome to the Olympic Park London and from the Trans-Continental Railways and Undergrounds around the world to HS1, HS2 and Crossrail, major projects, over time, have and are being successfully delivered and controlled, some more effectively than others.

This event challenges seasoned practitioners from cross-sectorial business and project areas who work in the project controls environment to share their ‘modus operandi’ from a number of standpoints. Firstly, to share how they have carried out business within the constraints of promoters that they have been involved with in the past and present. Secondly, what would they have done or do if the promoter’s constraints were relaxed and the practitioner allowed freedom to control and report in their own way. Thirdly, how they see project control developing in the future and what vision have they of the methodologies and processes over the next 5 – 10 years. It is not set in stone that practitioners will all work in the same way, some may have responsibilities that others do not and that will reflect in their span of control. There will be adequate time for open discussion and for members to share their own experiences and to input to the practitioners.

The collective outputs from this event are crucial and will be a vital input to the event later in 2013 where we will examine in detail and discuss organizational project management and governance and how control and reporting of projects has a major affect on business outcomes.