Changing the mindset in major capital project & infrastructure delivery

As we enter this phase of mass infrastructural development, we must take stock of what it entails. Globally, large-scale infrastructure projects are notorious for cost and time overruns, yet the same mistakes are often made and risks taken on repeat, time and time again.

But is the transformation to better project delivery achievable? Could minor tweaks and adjustments to mindset and culture overhaul the outcomes?

Some basic practice changes and mindset shifts to re-calibrate thinking and behaviour in project delivery could break the cycle and deliver success. These principles may seem obvious, but the basics can often be overlooked in the rush to build and deliver.

• Be realistic in setting objectives, estimating costs and timelines, and assessing risks. Accounting for bias in all project planning and estimating costs, time and risks will bring reality to the planning. If the plan is different from reality, the plan will inevitably be hijacked by reality.

• Avoid the rush to action. Instead, plan ahead by front-loading detail and investing in the project’s early stages. The success or failure of a project is often determined in its early stages. While this speculative approach can be less palatable for public bodies with investment of time, resources and money before funding approval, it will reap rewards later on in certainty through the project lifecycle and streamlined delivery.

• Nurture radical transparency throughout the project. Establishing a culture of sharing and developing a transparency mindset will provide clear paths through projects and avoid delays. A baseline approach of “why not share?” over “cannot share!” will dilute adversarial approaches and conflict. Through radical transparency, the gaps in integration and future obstacles ahead are flagged sooner.

• Be an intelligent client, learn from experience and source the right knowledge by connecting with those on the front line and recognising all sources of knowledge and expertise. Engage with the supply chain and learn lessons from industry—the most up-to-date and informed stakeholders from a delivery viewpoint are found in the supply chain.

• Cultivate a unified and positive stakeholder culture. Prioritising people, behaviour and culture makes it far more straightforward to enable collaboration, transparency and knowledge-sharing, ultimately achieving improved project certainty (costs, risks, time) and ensuring the delivery of project objectives.

• Work as a whole system and imbed collaboration across all stakeholders by sharing goals, objectives and knowledge. Effective communication and transparency on project progress can help avoid an adversarial culture, remove constraints and bottlenecks, and provide a unified focus on the target project deliverables.

• Streamline approval processes. Concurrency of approval processes will greatly reduce timelines, and streamlining statutory approvals, Infrastructure Guidelines approval gates and sectoral approval will ensure your project is “shovel ready” sooner.

Many of these mindset changes would have benefited and counteracted the shortfalls and project failings on some major capital projects, both in Ireland and abroad, in recent years. Applying a simple checklist to the documented failings shows us that, in many cases, the outcomes would have been quite different from a time, cost and quality perspective had these mindset changes been applied.

It is therefore time to fully embrace a more transparent, realistic, collaborative and whole-system project approach.