Industry experts, Bob Prieto, veteran executive with Fluor and Parsons Brinckerhoff, and Hans Hoppe with Parsons, share valuable information on the failure points of Mega Projects and proven methods of managing these projects to beat the odds and succeed. It is estimated that 9 out of 10 projects that cost $1 billion dollars or more, go over budget. Learn how we as an industry can change those numbers and improve the way the world builds.

1. Mega Projects not Mega Problems
With

2. Intro
The rise of the Gigaproject
Customer success –Parsons
Aconex demo
Q&A
Agenda
Janet Poses
Bob Prieto
Hans Hoppe
David Shearon

3. Bob Prieto
Chairman & CEO - Strategic Program Management
Author – The GIGA Factor Program
Veteran executive of Fluor and Parsons Brinckerhoff
rpstrategic@Comcast.net
Strategic Program Management LLC

4. 2/3 FAIL

5. WHY?
Recovering to the
Baseline
Corrections may act to increase
inefficiency of execution as
resources are “jerked” from one
task to another

6. PMTHEORY MUST CHANGE
 Management endeavors to introduce regularity in a world that
will never allow that to happen.
 Fayol’s plan, organize, direct, coordinate, and control are now
expanded to include confirming, monitoring, engaging,
influencing, and evolving.
 Project management must create context, capacities, and
capabilities.
“It’s not about perfecting an imperfect
model, it is about creating a new one.”

7. EXTENDED FOCUS OF LARGE COMPLEX PROJECTS
Classical Focus Extended Focus
Project readiness Owner readiness
Output focus Emergent outcomes (Multi-finality)
Tasks and transformative
flows
Flows including emergent
influencing and induced flows
Stakeholder management Stakeholder engagement (partners
in success)
Organize, direct, coordinate,
and control
Confirm, monitor, engage,
influence, evolve

8. IMPLICATIONS OF SCALE & COMPLEXITY
In a Nutshell
• Expanded/Strengthened
Foundations
• Transformational Process
(Traditional)View Not Enough
• Focus on Flows
• Semi-Permeable Boundary
 Simple Risk Relationships
 Complex Risk Relationships

9. STRENGTHENED FOUNDATIONS
 Owner’s readiness
Probability of the Improbable
Normal Cauchy
5 sigma
event
1 in 3.5 million 1 in 16
30 sigma
event
1 in 2.0 x 10 197 1 in 94

10. MEGAPROJECTS DO NOT FOLLOW
CLASSICALTRANSFORMATION

11. MEGAPROJECTS REQUIRE CHANGED LEADERSHIP
BEHAVIORS
Traditional Leadership Behaviors New Leadership Behaviors
Individual leadership vs. Group Cross Project Leadership
Control and order vs. Motivation and movement
Scientific management vs. Transformative leadership
Outputs focus vs. Shared outcomes focus
Assignment and directive vs. Agreement and acceptance of goals
Hierarchical and siloed vs. Project-wide flat communication and information
structures
Acceptance of normative vs. Questioning (assumption, process, outputs)
Adversarial or transactional approach vs. Collaboration and information sharing with
stakeholders
Management of tasks vs. Management of flows
Centralized decision making vs. Engaged and decentralized decision making

12. MEGAPROJECT CHALLENGES
Baselines are not accurate
Preliminary work not complete; risks not understood or
provided for
Time not valued
$$$ not understood

13. MEGAPROJECT CHALLENGES CONTINUED
Basis of design too narrow
Weak change management processes
Project management theory does not serve
Megaprojects
Inadequate owner experience/capabilities
Frameworks for life cycle analysis are inadequate

14. MEGAPROJECT ADVICE (1) –
STRENGTHEN FOUNDATIONS
Strategic Business Outcomes are #1 reason projects fail
Owner’s organizations are not ready
Baseline schedules and estimate are optimistic
Scope baselines must be “fit for purpose” and fixed
Low frequency, high impact risks are prematurely screened
out

15. MEGAPROJECT ADVICE (1) –
STRENGTHEN FOUNDATIONS (CONTINUED)
Track assumptions –
they migrate
Expand risk focus
Recognize risk profiles
change over time

16. MEGAPROJECT ADVICE (2)
USE NEW GOVERNANCE STRUCTURES
Top level RACI at outset of
program
Continuing focus on
program and organizational
alignment
Megaproject Dashboards
Will NeedToTrack
Outcomes Oriented
Parameters

17. MEGAPROJECT ADVICE (2)
USE NEW GOVERNANCE STRUCTURES (CONTINUED)
Formal readiness assessments
Performance based contracting, compensation and
management
Recognition of organizational change management role
Programs consist of “beginnings, middles and ends”

18. MEGAPROJECT ADVICE (3)
FOCUS ON FLOWS
Manage the arrows not just the tasks
Manage the “white space”
Ensure packaging and phasing enhances project schedule
Create supply chain opportunities through packaging
Drive program logistics plan
Project management must strengthen its focus on flow
management

19. MEGAPROJECT ADVICE (4)
RECOGNIZE MEGAPROJECT IS NOT BOUNDED
We Need to Improve Performance Assessment
Weaknesses
1.We do not “see” leading indicators well
(They get lost in the volumes of data)
2.We do not see the complexity of challenges embedded
in the project plan
Opportunity – Big Analytics
(We already have Big Data, now we need to be able to use it)

20. NEW PARADIGM FOR PROJECT CONTROL
•Attention to flows arising from outside the project
•Increased use of big analytics not only on project
performance data but also on a myriad of external data
sources.
•Project controls must be outward and forward
looking

21. CONCLUSION - MEGATHOUGHTS
1. Expand and Strengthen Foundations
2. Transformational ProcessView Not
Enough
3. Focus on Flows
4. Plan for Semi-Permeable Boundary
5. Stakeholder engagement is essential

22. Hans Hoppe
Principal Program Controls Manager
Parsons
“Parsons is committed to the
highest standards of integrity in
everything we do and to
transparency in all of our
processes...”

23. 13,000+ employees - 70 years of experience
Project Roles:
– Program Management Consultant (PMC)
– Designer
– Program Management / Construction
Management (PMCM)
– Construction Manager (CM)
– APD
– Design-Build (DB)
– Public Private Partnership (PPP)
Industries:
– Infrastructure: Aviation, Rail,
Transportation, Bridge & Tunnel
– Industrial: Water/Wastewater,
Environmental, Telecom, O&G/Energy
– U.S. Federal: Environmental, Infrastructure,
Security, Defense
“Integrity. Ethics. Innovation. Parsons named as a
World’s Most Ethical Company for Eighth Year in a
Row.”

24. 3 points of potential failure to watch for
1. Project start without the necessary scope, roles and systems in place
2. Lack of a collaborative mindset across the shared leadership team
3. Contracts terms and language which do not support the overall goal of
project success

25. Keys to mega project success
1. Take the time to set up and kick off the project correctly
2. Identify key challenges/risks
3. Implement proven structure and strategies
4. Use appropriate tools and systems that can accommodate your project
processes and needs
5. Use modern technology to manage volume and provide intelligence to data

26. Benefits of anticipating key challenges / risks
• Eliminate potential Error & Omissions (E&O) claims
• Design Consultant on a highly technical / complex rail project
• Many owner driven changes during design
• Virtually eliminated the chance of E&O claims
• Implementing requirements traceability tool with robust
change management processes
• Expedite change management processes
• Mega aviation program with many Contractors
• Forecasted the need for comprehensive
document/information management
• Able to invalidate Contractor’s claim within 48 hours

27. Cross organizational leadership
• Challenges of shared responsibility and risk
• Importance of leading by example to set the culture
• New tools needed to manage this type of structure
• project tools not company tools
Evolution from cross organizational collaboration
to cross organizational leadership

28. Cross organizational leadership example
• Project: Large aviation terminal expansion
• Challenges: Stakeholder management rather than engagement
• Cross organizational leadership team
• Mix of client and PM consulting firms to form an Enterprise Program Management (EPM) Team
• Set up for success
• Contracting style and language
• Accountability
• Project administration
• Process management

29. Establishing Enterprise Governance
Many Disparate Projects versus a Single Integrated Program
Common processes and cadence
• Across organizations
• Across disciplines
• Across contracts

30. What to look for in project-wide systems and tools
• Security (neutrality)
• Visibility / Transparency
• Configurability
• Insights (forward looking)
• Proven
Client
Contractor
PM
Subcontractor

31. Results on Interstate 405
• Improved submittal process reduces errors, rework and claims, helping
reduce contingency by US$1.375M
• 33% reduction on technical documents review cycles. With 35 reviewers, this
is an estimated savings of $5.5M over the project life.
• Automated utility tracking to reallocate three full time engineering resources.
“Aconex enabled project team members to manage
each of their specific processes using easily
configurable workflows.”

32. Mega Projects not Mega Problems
David Shearon
Solutions Consultant
Aconex

33. 33
Time Lapse Video of Denver International Airport

34. Field
Inspections
Connecting teams project-wide
OperateConstructDesignBidPlan
Document
Control
RFIs &
Change Orders
Bidding &
Tenders
Workflows &
Approvals
BIM
Collaboration
Submittals Handover to
Operations
Cost
Management
Dashboards
& Reporting
In projects executed
on the platform
$1+
trillion
Documents managed
with complete auditability
1.2+
billion
User organizations
Interfacing efficiently
60+
thousand

35. Foresight and visibility to prevent surprises
Portfolio
Project
Process
Tasks

36. Every project member on a connected
platform with a single view
Enterprise-wide Collaboration
Line-of-sight into issues
Early Warnings & Predictive Insights
Unified project controls for a single
view of project performance
Integrated Project Controls
Connected Cost: Integrated, Configurable, Enterprise-wide
A modern collaborative project controls solution integrating cost, schedule, contracts & project information

37. Packages: Improved efficiency, productivity and quality
• Allow documentation and correspondence to be broken
down into discrete controlled sections, or ‘packages.’
• Better manage the many project processes through
design, construction and completion of the project.
Design Management
Configuration Management
Work Packaging

38. Demo: Mega Projects not Mega Problems
• Overview
• Insights
• Project controls
• BIM
• Packages
• Configurable workflows
We presented a live Aconex demo. Please view your demo at aconex.com/Demo.

39. Recap: Mega Projects not Mega Problems
• Implement tools and processes
that support collaborative
leadership.
• Use flexible systems that support
your project team and structure.
• Ensure project-wide insights so
you get advanced warning into
any project impacts.

40. Mega Projects not Mega Problems
Our thanks to Parsons and Strategic Program Management LLC
and to you for attending
Learn more at
aconex.com/Demo