Project Recovery & Claims Management - Pipelines

I have just completed an assignment as a Construction Expert Witness for a leading firm of lawyers specialising in construction disputes. This particular dispute was related to a major onshore pipeline project in Queensland, Australia and involved significant construction claims. Furthermore, it was a prime example of ineffectual project management implementation from both owner and contractor management teams who totally lost control of their objectives as a consequence of mistrust, decision-making, and deficient execution planning that was derisory to say the least. In short the project was a complete disaster. Clearly, this state of affairs should never have transpired. Had both teams agreed to the concept of project recovery management and appoint an independent and experienced recovery project manager to develop practical strategies for project recovery. Then the project may have been put back on an agreed course with a realistic schedule end date and without resorting to arbitration.

For whatever reason, and there are many, projects get into difficulties and as a consequence suffer major schedule slippage and cost overruns. Typically, the necessary coordination and controls are not in place. Because had they been employed effectively the warning signs would have been obvious, and the project team would have had time to implement measures to remedy the situation. 

However, this seldom happens in my experience because the project team is not performing as a team and inclined not to communicate. They work in isolation focused on their assigned activities often with optimism and confidence in their own abilities and the belief that even supposing the activity is late everything will be alright in the end. That is not how it works, events conspire against them. The causes are not properly understood or the impact and worst still not shared with the team. See below an extract from a document on “avoiding major project failure” published by KPMG. In my experience their analysis could not be more valid.

“While team optimism and confidence are great attributes, we have found that troubled projects almost never recover without dramatic intervention. If management is not aware of project issues until they are catastrophic, it is almost impossible for management to take any action that will rescue the project and avoid failure. This is why it is important for management, the project team, and stakeholders to avoid isolating themselves. They must not rely only on internally generated project information but also on independent information prepared by stakeholders with unbiased information and perspectives”.¹

PCM Ltd provides project recovery management services and practitioners in the role of recovery project manager. We have the capability to accomplish critical improvements and complete your project with the least overall negative affect.

In addition, as a claims management specialist, we have considerable experience in processing construction claims for delay and disruption or a change in the works.  Our professional services provide the required determination and application to achieve outstanding results under exceptionally challenging commercial environments. Furthermore, we have a first class reputation for claims settlement within the onshore pipeline construction industry.