The One Thing That Can Make or Break Your Capital Project

At Re:Build Optimation we execute hundreds of these types of projects every year, and have been doing so for over three decades. What we have learned, and what we practice, is that communicating early, often, and effectively optimizes our chances for success, and for clients’ satisfaction and success. Ignoring, or at least not leveraging, the opportunities afforded by effective communication puts the relationship, the project, and perhaps the entire business initiative at risk. Paying attention to these things reaps huge benefits.

Capital projects are staffed on both sides by teams, generally representing relevant disciplines who have a stake in the project success, and are usually charged with responsibility for their areas of expertise. Generally, each team is led by a project manager, who is the coordinator and often the decision-maker for project-level choices. At Re:Build Optimation, our project managers are students of team coordination, and are themselves generally a senior leader from one of the disciplines represented in our automation, integration, and industrial services business.

There are several key components to this process of wringing out the maximum value from a capital project beyond simply achieving the objectives of the technical functions.

Update frequency is critical. Meeting at just the right cadence throughout the lifecycle of the project, which can mean changing the pace depending on the decision-making needs and workload at the time, is essential. These updates can happen in person (that is face-to-face) or through teleconferencing or Skype-style communications or simply through written exchanges. However it occurs, it is important to keep the dialog current, continuous, and clear. These features are most often enhanced by having them at the right frequency so that important information can be exchanged in time to make decisions, and in order to keep the teams connected, especially their leadership.

The most obvious topics for these updates include the status of the activities’ scope, schedule, and budget. Reviewing each of these at the outset and subsequently making sure that all parties are aware of progress or problems related to these items will keep everyone on task and the communications effective. Avoiding the specifics within these three categories risks significant damage to not only the project, but also to the confidence in leadership and the trust and value in the relationships. Addressing these topics head-on is most productive and enables engagement and decision-making whereas procrastination or avoidance will not.

An often overlooked element of status updates is risk management. Identifying and dealing with risks early and often puts the team in the best position to anticipate and then deal with challenges as they arise, or preferably beforehand. Identifying the probability and severity of various risks allows the team to deal with them in many cases before they surface, and provide lower stress opportunities to plan for and mitigate them. While many project managers may prefer to wait until challenges arise and not introduce a laundry list of prospective risks, it is the wise project manager who expects the unexpected and is able to quantify and qualify the consequences of dealing or not dealing with them.

Our clients give us feedback on the effectiveness of our project activities including these types of updates. High marks go to those project teams that conduct these types of effective communications at the right frequency, and provide the type of timely documentation, communication, and action that creates trust as well as provides the type of audit trail that can be shared with additional stakeholders, management and posterity. Having documented results of these meetings to use for tracking progress and providing accountability by sharing this information and people acknowledging their roles and responsibilities, makes for not only the successful projects we all seek but also the type of relationship-building that enables that success as well as future potential collaborations.