In the UK, and around the world,
major projects continue to face challenges caused
by decisions made in the early stages of their life cycle.
The poor initiation of major projects is in
part due to the highly publicised nature of their development.
But also, due to a lack of appreciation of how to manage these complex systems.
Understanding what is involved in the initiation of major projects,
and what this means for project managers in helping the project move into
delivery is important in order to set up major projects with the best chance of success.
Project initiation is generally
considered to be the first stage of the project life cycle.
This stage involves defining the project's objectives and outputs.
Sometimes referred to as the concept stage,
project initiation generally refers to
the activities prior to final approval for delivery,
but this is dependent on the project's context.
The project context influences the scope and scale
of the decisions to be made during project initiation.
If the project is part of an ongoing strategy,
it is likely that delivery approval has already been granted.
If the project forms part of a company's 'business as usual',
then the financial investment for the project may already be in place.
A lot depends on the differing processes and practices of the organisation.
For instance, how they assess and assure the business need,
the benefit of a project,
and how it should be delivered.
Major project initiation is different.
As you have learned, major projects are defined not only by their scale,
but also by their level of complexity.
What's more, major projects also have
high expectations of the benefits arising from their delivery.
This can include expected outcomes such as the upskilling of a workforce,
or the shaping of a market,
but also includes longer-term benefits.
For example, an infrastructure project might involve constructing a bridge over a river.
However, it might be expected that
the project does not only deliver a way to cross that river,
but also produces changes in the commuter behaviour,
and future population redistribution.
Because of this, and the fact that major projects are led by,
or have public sector involvement,
the traditional idea of project initiation
often forms part of a lengthy project development phase.
This is because those who are involved in managing the project,
need to carefully consider the project's affordability,
its investment value, and the benefits it should deliver.
This information is then used to inform decisions about the project's scope,
and the delivery strategy.
If this initial assessment is not thorough and robust,
then it is highly likely that we see cost overruns,
delay, and uncertain realisation of benefit.
Often, this occurs on a disastrous scale,
and unsurprisingly, the media is often keen to highlight this!
Surprisingly, the number of
failed major projects still vastly outweighs the number of successful ones.
Part of this is because major projects don't fail on a small scale.
Because the projects are complex systems,
they are either highly successful as everything perfectly comes together,
or complete failures across the board.
This does not happen by accident.
How a major project is initiated is predictive of its future performance.