REGIONAL REPORT:

UK Project Management Round Up

By Miles Shepherd
Regional Editor - UK

Salisbury, England

 

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Introduction

January is traditionally a month when everyone starts a new chapter in their occupational life and so there are usually a number of reports on the year past.  We reported some of these last month but there remain a number of mainly Government reports that criticise project performance.  We will be looking at some of these shortly but first, it is perhaps appropriate to consider both what is being reported and how it is reported.

Most of the reports that follow are critical of progress, cost overruns and delays; all traditional areas of the Barnes triangle – and how many can now remember the Horizon TV programme series in which Dr Martin Barnes CBE, President of the Association for Project Management, succinctly introduced the nation to the basics of project management – but is life so straightforward that any deviation from a plan is held up to ridicule?  In the Government case, many of the press reports are coloured by political views and almost all are taken out of context, so it is very difficult to judge whether there actually is a problem or whether the issue is simply part of a natural variation that has been caused by deliberate scope change.

However you look at Government projects, they excite emotion as it is ‘our money’ they are either wasting or investing – depending on your point of view.  So here are a few more reports that you can decide for yourself whether it is investment or waste; more importantly, we can reflect on the way these reports reflect the real world of projects.

Ministry of Defence

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC), one of the major financial watchdogs of the House of Parliament, has lambasted the Ministry of Defence (MoD) for its performance in procuring armoured vehicles.  This is an easy target for the PAC as modern armoured fighting vehicles are very high tech, packed with electronic that need to be rugged to survive the pounding of off road use and able to handle temperature extremes from -20⁰C to 35⁰C and wide humidity ranges too.  Equipped to fight a European war, MoD were caught out by the Iraq War and had few of the specialist light vehicles needed in what developed into an urban war marked by the use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs).  So urgent action needed to be taken to reduce casualties and improve operational efficiency.

More…

To read entire report (click here)