How To Deliver On The Promise of MegaProjects
Due to the large scale and outlook attached to them, mega-projects have a large opportunity for failure. Typically, the failure begins at the outset of the project, whether that be due to poor justification for the project, misalignment among stakeholders, insufficient planning, or inability to find and use appropriate capabilities.
Underestimated costs and overestimated benefits often offset the baseline for assessing overall project performance. This is why it is important for organizations to first establish social and economic priorities before even considering what projects will answer their needs. Once social and economic priorities are established, only then can a project be considered. Selecting projects must be fact-based and transparent in order to ensure accountability with stakeholders and the public.
Successful Megaprojects Must Have Robust Risk-analysis or Risk-management Protocols
It’s also important to maintain adequate controls. Successful megaprojects must have robust risk-analysis or risk-management protocols and provide timely reports on progress relative to budgets and deadlines. Typically, progress is measured on the basis of cash flow, which is less than ideal as data could be out of date and payments to contractors do not correlate construction progress. Instead, project managers should deliver real-time data to measure activity in the field. For example, cubic meters of concrete poured relative to work plans and budgets.
Overall, improving project performance requires better planning and preparation in three areas: doing engineering and risk analysis before construction, streamlining permitting and land acquisition, and building a project team with the appropriate mix of abilities.
Project developers and sponsors should put more focus into pre-planning such as engineering and risk analysis before the construction phase. Unfortunately, most organizations and sponsors are reluctant to spend a significant amount of money on early-stage planning because they often lack the necessary funds, they are eager to break ground and they worry the design will be modified after construction is underway, making up-front designs pointless.
However, it’s proven that if developers spend three to five percent of capital cost on early-stage engineering and design, results are far better in terms of delivering the project on-time and on-budget. This is because through the design process, challenges will be addressed and resolved before they occur during the construction phase, saving both time and money.
It’s not unusual for permits and approvals to take longer than the building of a megaproject. However, if developers look to streamline permitting and land acquisition, that would significantly improve project performance. Best practices in issuing permits involve prioritizing projects, defining clear roles and responsibilities and establishing deadlines.
In England and Wales, developers applied these approaches to cut the time needed to approve power-industry infrastructure from 12 months to only nine months. On average, timelines for approval spanned four years throughout the rest of Europe. Likewise, the state of Virginia’s plan to widen Interstate 495 in 2012 was able to cut costs and save hundreds of homes thanks to land acquisition planning by a private design company.
Investors and Owners Must Take an Active Role in Creating the Project Team
When it’s all said and done, projects cannot deliver the best possible return on investment without a well-resourced and qualified network of project managers, advisers and controllers. Investors and owners must take an active role in creating the project team.
It’s not enough to have a vague overview of what the project might look like in the end. Instead, it’s necessary to review risks and costs and draft a detailed, practical approach to tackle various issues. An experienced project manager cannot do it all alone. The project team must include individuals with the appropriate skills, such as legal and technical expertise, contract management, project reporting, stakeholder management, and government and community relations among others.
Failure to Properly Plan for These Projects Could Have a Negative Impact on Society
While mega-projects are important in filling economic and social needs, failure to properly plan for these projects could have a negative impact on society. Take Centro Financiero Confinanzas (Venezuela), the eighth tallest building in Latin America at 45 stories, located in the financial district of Venezuela’s capital, Caracas for example.
To those unaware of its history, the Centro Financiero Confinanzas is actually home to over 700 families, a “vertical slum” that is a truly fascinating example of reappropriation of space in an urban environment. An ironic symbol of financial failure that was intended to represent the unstoppable march of Venezuela’s booming economy.
It’s much more than an unbuilt building, bridge or tunnel, failed mega-projects are a blow to the economic growth and social improvements of communities around the world.
Playing God: Swedish Train operator uses Big Data to ‘avoid train delays that haven’t happened yet’
Welcome to the world of “Big Data.” We have more information at our fingertips than any generation in history. We live in the world of “Big Data.” That is the new way people are trying to describe this sea of digital facts, figures, products, books, music, video, and much more. Twitter, apps, Facebook–they’re each giving science new ways to look at what people do and why.
“Hopes, fears, and ethical concerns relating to technology are as old as technology itself.”
We actually welcome some aspect of Big Data. These mysterious data successes (or accidental successes) are easy to see as a kind of Big Brother future, where technology can track your every move and report back to ”¦ someone. However, StockholmstÃ¥g, the train operator is using new technology that employs big data to predict train delays before they happen.
“The Commuter Prognosis – A Social Scientist’s Dream Come True.”
The mathematic algorithm, called “The commuter prognosis” was developed in Stockholm, Sweden.
When a train is not on time the algorithm forecasts disruptions in the entire network by using historic big data to prevent the ripple effects that actually causes most delays.
Wilhelm Landerholm the mathematician who has developed the algorithm said:
“We have built a prediction model, using big data, that lets us visualize the entire commuter train system two hours into the future. We can now forecast disruptions in our service and our traffic control center can prevent the ripple effects that actually cause most delays.”
The algorithm has been tested but is not currently being used by traffic controllers.
How does it work?
The key to the model is a large amount of historical data. The model works similar to a seismograph, an instrument that measures and records details of earthquakes, such as force and duration, but instead identifies late train arrivals. When this happens, the system uses historical data from previous occurrences to forecast the likely impact on the entire train network.
Real-time public transportation information is already used around the globe, however, traffic control centers still typically assess delays manually to try and prevent further problems in a network. The commuter prognosis system, on the other hand, will forecast these delay effects instantaneously and provide a prediction of how a single or multiple disturbance might affect the whole train network. The commuter prognosis system could change how traffic control centers operate all over the world.
“The Effects of One Delayed Train Can Quickly Multiply Within a Train Network”
Imagine that “The commuter prognosis” forecasts that a train will be 10 minutes late to station C in two hours. To deal with this the traffic control center issues a new train from station A that will arrive on time at station C. As soon as the new train has been put in motion the algorithm re-calculates and gives the traffic control center a new forecast for the entire train network within minutes.”
The most important benefit of “The commuter prognosis” is that it provides for a more punctual public transportation.
Big Data, Ethics, and Religion
These stories remind us that even though companies and governments are doing amazing things with data, it’s at best imperfect. The algorithms and programs they use to filter and respond to data are at least as fallible as the human beings who designed them. We can also see its complexity and failures as evidence of the amazing omnipotence of our God – who doesn’t make errors and who knows right where to find us, even inside a great fish or the depths of hell.
The arrival of big data has already brought with it numerous questions that have yet to be properly addressed. These questions are methodological, epistemological, and ethical, and they concern (inter alia) the ways in which data is collected, stored, interpreted, represented, and traded. A further complication is a speed with which data science is advancing, which means that (for example) the application of legal and ethical restrictions to the practice of that science will always risk being several steps behind the point that it has currently reached. There are indications that we are currently sleepwalking towards a situation in which the commercial exploitation of big data routinely increases social division, and renders privacy a thing of the past.
Ket factors
- A mathematical model interprets big data to forecasts for each train in the train network.
- The commuter prognosis can warn about delays two hours before the departure or arrival actually takes place.
- The commuter prognosis calculates how the delay affects other trains in the system.
- The purpose of “the commuter prognosis” is to make life easier for traffic control centers and to give passengers a better service.
- In the future, the algorithm will be potentially adaptable for more types of public transportations and cities.
Professional Consultancy Responds to Health and Social Care Challenges
As people in the UK live longer, demand for residential care and nursing homes is growing, as are our expectations of the standard of living they will provide. Dean Jones offers insights about the value a professional consultancy has for overcoming the challenge and driving value for patients.
The current state of affairs
As a result of some well-broadcasted care scandals that attracted extensive, and in some cases, damaging media attention, the government has responded with cuts that are impacting local authority (LA) fees and resulting in far tougher Care Quality Commission (CQC) policies.
Office for National Statistics (ONS) Projects That by 2035 There Will Be 3.5 Million Uk Residents Aged 85 and Older, Compared to Only 1.4 Million Currently
In spite of this, the “extra-care” – or Residential Elderly Care (REC) sector – continues to overcome these challenges, attracting new investments, particularly into new-build care homes. These are specially designed, owner-occupied, self-contained housing, often with round-the-clock support and meals and sometimes with nursing assistance.
A typical pattern is for owner-founded care home operators to reach a growth limit, based on the founder’s management capacity, access to capital and appetite for risk. They cease to invest in new capacity and don’t benefit from economies of scale which can be passed on to commissioners. Public markets typically do not fulfil their function as a supplier of capital in the case of healthcare services, because they generally demand relatively modest gearing.
There’s a widely recognised need across all health and social care market segments for innovation and system change, as well as capital investment in new services. A private equity investor is well placed to leverage technical services to strategically programme and project-manage Residential Elderly Care (REC) public real estate schemes across their entire lifecycle.
Supply and demand challenges
Today, professional healthcare businesses and registered social landlords (RSLs) are the main providers of new capacity, period. Since 2008, private and voluntary status providers, who service 92 percent of all Residential Elderly Care, have reported an upswing in demand and occupancy. Paradoxically, as adult social care budgets are decreasing and the provision of residential care by the NHS and local authorities has shrunk, the number of UK people who require help and support is rapidly increasing.
The Increasingly Ageing Population of the Uk Appears to Be Underpinning the Overall Rise in Rec Capacity and Occupancy
While Local Authorities (Las) are seeking to divert placements to inexpensive non-residential/domiciliary-based alternatives, the increasingly ageing population of the UK appears to be underpinning the overall rise in REC capacity and occupancy. Britons are living longer than ever. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) projects that by 2035 there will be 3.5 million UK residents aged 85 and older, compared to only 1.4 million currently. The cost of caring for these residents is also forecasted to increase. For example, caring for a person with dementia will increase to $1,142,677 by 2025 and $2,092,945 by 2051. In total the government estimates that 1.7 million more adults will require some type of care and support over the coming decades.
As a result, the current number of nursing and residential care homes in the UK (over 381,000) will need to almost double over the next 20 years to cope with rising numbers of people aged 85 or more.
A bright future?
The demand for care will continue to rise as a result of life expectancy increasing and ageing. A robust REC independent sector arises primarily from the net increase in residential demand, and more recently, improved occupancy. These are the result of a number of competing forces:
- Demographics, with the ageing population expected to drive the demand for health and social care.
- Outsourcing, the long-term transfer of residents from LA homes to independent care homes.
- Severe financial constraints, at least over the next five years, as the government – which pays for the bulk of health, social care and special education – seeks to eradicate the public expenditure deficit and restrict new builds.
- Outdated assets, or older care homes that no longer meet needs.
- Consolidation, a trend within segments of the independent sector.
- Maturity, against a currently immature healthcare market.
- Efficiency, highlighted by the “Nicholson challenge” for the NHS to make £15 to £20 billion in efficiency savings between 2011 and 2014. (It costs the NHS approximately £3,000 a week to care for elderly patients with no clinical need to be in a hospital ward. By contrast, it comes to about £1,000 per week for a residential care home provider.)
- Demand and Occupancy. Unless the supply of new builds increases (currently by approx. 7,500 beds p.a.), it’s possible that some regions may see bed shortages, driving up LA fees.
- New Technology. Progressive management capabilities in leveraging technology and strategic collaboration will constitute the formula for success and sustainability in the new healthcare business environment.
While a longer life is welcome news for millions of Britons, it could ironically trigger a public service meltdown as our national health system is stretched to its breaking point. Local authorities and NHS trusts retain a significant role in delivering services, with 75 percent of nursing home places funded by the public sector. There exist ever-increasing opportunities for private care providers to take some of the strain from NHS and ease bed-blocking by caring for patients, mostly elderly, in a residential setting when there is no clinical need to be in a hospital ward.
The REC Sector Could Potentially save the Nhs Billions of Pounds.
A combined approach to health and social care and some innovation is required for this savings to become a reality. In addition, Care Home Operators have a unique opportunity to grow their businesses and benefit from economies of scale, leveraging the expertise and resources of a professional consultancy. In doing so, they’ll have necessary resources and systems to bid for significant re-provision of services tendered by local authorities.
About Dean Jones
Dean is an Associate in AECOM’s Programme Leadership Practice. Dean joined AECOM from Care UK, the UK’s largest independent provider of health and social care, where he was a Programme Manager and delivered a £250m investment growth programme over 2012/15 which increased Care Uk’s number of homes circa 33%. Dean was also Programme Manager for a £60m Suffolk programme to build ten new care homes and ten day clubs, bringing much needed additional nursing and specialist dementia care to the Suffolk community.
