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Speciale Ipma Italy

project. The contractors and suppliers always one magic chip: just doing those simple basics
wanted to solve the same problems in ways that were put down in the philosophy of NEC”
which were best for them and did not increase ( ).
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their costs. Never the same objective. Now The military provides useful parallels and
we know that we need imaginative and co- contrasts with other project management.
ordinated decision making on a project from Every war is a major project with the object of
beginning to the end. We know that this beating the enemy. Every campaign in the war
means we need to use reformed contracts is a project and every battle in the campaign is
which motivate people to make collective a project. Unlike ordinary projects, in a battle
decisions at every interface instead of the or a campaign, there is an experienced and
traditional confict between buyer and seller at well resourced team working against you to
every interface. stop you achieving you objective - the enemy.
This was the motive behind the development Ordinary projects are not exactly like that but
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of the New Engineering Contract (NEC) ( ) in they are not very different either. The great
the UK which I led. Its objective was to design nineteenth century German army general von
a legal contract which motivated every buyer Moltke said near the end of his army career
and seller in a project to collaborate in making “I have never known a battle plan to survive
every decision affecting project outcome to the frst contact with the enemy”. We project
the beneft of the promoter and the affected managers do not have an enemy but we could
contractors and suppliers. all say that “I have never known a project plan
The evidence is that this really works. It also to survive the frst few weeks of working to it”.
makes work on projects more rewarding for the On most well managed projects, the plan is
managers involved in a number of ways. Not being improved all the time as knowledge of
just better outcomes but working together to what remains to be done is improved.
solve problems is more rewarding than fghting We project managers would do well to copy the
over them. Many lawyers do not seem to like good soldiers’ skill in managing in uncertainty.
the new contract. Perhaps this is because it is Note that its success depends on the willingness
not written in the lawyers’ own language and it of the team to carry out decisions made higher
leads to very few legal disputes. up the management tree. In business we do
The contract stimulates joint decision not have military discipline to rely on to achieve
making around the project which also this. We have to delegate much more and make
boosts the usefulness of the traditional collective good decisions, not all emanating
project management techniques such as from the commander in chief. He or she does
scheduling and cost control. It is the frst not know what we know and could not make
project management based contract. The all the decisions for us and those we command.
agreement between buyer and seller can
be summarized as “We agree to manage
what happens on our project like this”. The Project Managers are now
published contract contains procedure for empowered
every aspect of managing control of time,
cost and performance of the completed For every project to be a success is an
project. The NEC contract is used throughout unattainable standard. It would only be
the supply chain from prime client through achievable if we could deal satisfactorily with
main contractors and suppliers to all minor all unexpected circumstances. This will never
subcontractors and their suppliers. It enables happen and it would be really wasteful to set up
project managers at all levels to do their jobs. all project objectives with so much space in their
The NEC contract is now used for most publicly standards that failure would never occur.
funded projects in the U.K. and was used on We shall move the performance of our profession
all the construction projects for the London forward very much faster if the standards we
2012 Olympic Games. The whole programme work to are those of good management of
was fnished on time and within budget and uncertainty and the unexpected. We have
was a great project management success. some way to go in getting those standards as
The commercial director of the organization high and as widely applied as they could be.
which managed the Olympic projects, Ken As we are all project managers, perhaps we
Owen, said recently: “The use of the NEC should see this task as a project. That would
contract was absolutely crucial” and “the NEC be exciting. Why don’t we decide here, today,
is the unsung hero of the Olympic Games - a together on the island of Crete, to set up a
bit like the spine or the heartbeat in the human project to improve how project managers deal
body” and “if you focus on nothing else - focus with uncertainty? That would really integrate
on the basics of the NEC” and “there’s only a lot of standards. And it would be a real shift

58 58 Impiantistica Italiana - Maggio-Giugno 2014