Lessons learned in Project Management
Check and confirm geotechnical reports that are supplied to you in a contract.
The client may supply reports that are old or inaccurate.
Specify in the contract that you are relying on the accuracy of their reports. If that is not acceptable, budget for new testing and reports.
You must learn to say no to some requests from clients
If change requests from the client will make the design unsafe or unusable, you should refuse to change it. Otherwise you could still be sued as the designer for giving misleading information when your company is the expert (accepting a change could be deemed as approving it, even if you gave a warning that it would be unsafe or unusable).
Another instance to say no is if the client asks for changes that will increase the schedule but won’t approve the increased schedule. Get approval from the client for the extended schedule or cost before saying yes to the proposed change.
Tagged with: change • schedule
Filed under: Client • Contract • Cost • Design • Risk • Safety • Scope
Keep a careful watch on external dependencies.
External things such as deliveries, contracts, and approvals that could delay your project if late.
They may not be your direct responsibility and are out of your control, but you need to keep watch that they are getting done and that dates are not slipping.
Deliveries are a big one here. You should make your suppliers aware of your project schedule (or the part relevant to them) to emphasise the importance of the delivery date you require of them.
Don’t say you need it by a certain date if that date is the actual date you will install it. You need to allow time for delivery, unpacking, checking, and moving to the site.
Tagged with: deliveries • suppliers
Filed under: Contract • Contractors • Procurement • Time
When reading a large specification, to avoid inducing sleep, scan it by key words.
If possible, when given a specification by a client, get the it in electronic form. This allows faster scanning and you can easily come back to important parts by a quick search function
If you have it electronically, use the find command to search it by one word to focus on one area at a time.
For example, search for pipes to find all the mentions of pipes areas of specification (colour, size, joints, type, etc).
Tagged with: pipes • scan • specification
Filed under: Contract • Documentation
For contracts longer than 12 months, you should have a clause to allow unknown technologies to be added. Particularly for high tech and IT projects.
Part way through a long contract, the industry best might have superseded some of the items specified in your contract. You need a way to change to these newer technologies. They may perform better, and at a lower cost.
If you don’t have a way to add these, you could be stuck trying to source a specified item that you know is outdated, cannot be supplied, and will be more expensive to maintain because no one supports it anymore. An addition clause will allow you to approach the client with a change/addition proposal that the client can comfortably approve. If no clause exists, they may not be able to allow a change or addition because of their internal organizational procedures.
Tagged with: addition • clause • technology
A contract is a risk allocation and control device.
Remember the importance of the contract.
Tagged with: risk control
Make sure you and your client agree on the deliverables expected for the project.
Sometimes a contract may specify deliverables without enough detail. This could lead to you delivering something quite different than what the client required.
If the scope is not clear, or if deliverables are not clearly listed, you should clarify with the client as early as possible.
Tagged with: deliverable • deliverables
Filed under: Client • Communication • Contract • Scope
Allow for wet weather days.
You should get a list of the average number of wet weather days for the area of your project (if the project can be affected by the weather). This will allow you to put this into your plans.
The contract should allow you to get extensions of time because of wet weather above the average for that area, and also allow you to claim extra costs for that time.
Tagged with: delays • time extension • variation • wet weather
Submit deliverables to the client (if that is required) before invoicing them.
Don’t make the mistake of not submitting deliverables, as it will delay payment.
Tagged with: deliverables • invoice • payment
If a partly completed project is put on hold (deferred project) by the client, when it is restarted it should be treated as a new project.
This includes reviewing and redeveloping the scope, project plan, schedule, and budget.
The original project team may not be available anymore, so new people will take time to get familiar with the project.
The project should be renegotiated with the client.
Make sure language in the original contract does not say that no additional costs are allowed due to delays, as the client may use that clause to refuse to renegotiate the price.
Tagged with: deferred project • delays • renegotiate • restart
Filed under: Client • Contract • Cost • Planning • Scope • Tender • Time
If your company is not involved with construction (but just design or inspection), make sure the contract states that the construction contractor is responsible for site safety, not the “engineer” or your company.
There should also be clauses so your company is also indemnified.
The construction means and methods and related safety should be the responsibility of the construction contractor. This must be in writing in the contract.
Your company should be included as additional insured on the contractor’s general liability insurance.
Liability coverage should define who it specifies as being covered. If it covers the “engineer” your company must document and include that it includes your company as well.
Tagged with: indemnify • insurance • liability
Filed under: Construction • Contract • Contractors • Documentation • Risk • Safety • Scope
If, in your contract, the client instructs you to directly pass on the cost of consultants, it would be better to have the consultants contract directly with the client instead of with your company.
This is especially important when the client specifies which consultant to use.
For example, ground drilling and soils analysis.
If you are not getting paid to manage and review their work, then the client should contract with them themselves.
Tagged with: consultant
Filed under: Client • Contract • Contractors • Cost
In a contract, your company should make sure the document indicates that you will rely on information and materials supplied by the client. E.g. surveys, soil tests, reports.
If the client will not agree to this, you should make sure the contract allows money for adequate review by your company of the client supplied documents.
This is particularly important for old drawings, locations of underground cables or pipes, status of old tanks or equipment.
The client may not be able to guarantee the status of the old plant, so your company should be paid for work involved in reviewing or re-surveying.
Tagged with: review
Filed under: Client • Contract • Cost • Documentation • Scope
If your company is the design contractor but not involved in the construction phase you should instruct the client to notify you for your company’s input for any design discrepancies.
If your company has designed something but the field conditions on site mean a change is needed, the client or their contractor may try to back charge your company for the design changes they had to do on site.
You should include language in the contract that they must first give you the option of giving input before proceeding with changes that may result in back charges to your company.
Tagged with: back charges • Construction • design discrepancies
Filed under: Client • Contract • Contractors • Design
Get sub consultant agreement on tender documents.
When you are bidding for a tender and you are getting prices from sub consultants, make sure the sub gets a copy of the tender documents and agrees with them (or the relevant section) in writing before submitting them and their price to the client.
It is important that the agreement is in writing.
If you don’t get this agreement, the sub consultant may change their prices or conditions once they see the details of the tender.
Tagged with: agreement • sub consultant
Filed under: Contract • Contractors • Tender
Make sure that the contract specifies the length of time allowed for approvals or decisions.
When drawings or documents are sent to the client for approval, you need to know (and specify) when they will be approved.
Allow for this time in your plan, and make sure the client knows this is in the plan.
Be sure that the contract specifies what will happen if approvals are delayed beyond the specified time (extra payments, extensions of time, etc).
Tagged with: approval
Filed under: Client • Communication • Contract • Planning • Time
Make sure that you and your company agree with the contract, if you don’t, change it.
Even if you have worked with the client before or know them well and they have previously been lenient on clauses, don’t count on that in the future.
The client PM may change or they may have a change of staff (who don’t know you).
They may be bought out or have control changed and be told to enforce contracts completely.
Your work should always be conducted as per the contract language.
Assume the client will want to enforce that (even if they don’t or haven’t in the past).
Tagged with: contract language • enforce
Make sure to include a precedence clause in the specifications.
You should define which documents or sections take precedence. That way if there are errors or conflicts, one will take precedent.
Don’t put detail of the same work in more than one place. It is better to not repeat the same information but a precedence clause should still be put in place.
As the project manager, you should also be aware of the precedence in documents you have received from the client.
Tagged with: conflicts • errors • precedence • specifications
Filed under: Contract • Documentation
I find that having liquidated damages in a contract from my client helps me as a project manager.
Companies often want to avoid having liquidated damages in the contract.
However, as a project manager, I find it is a lot easier to get resources within the company to assist with the completion of a project if there are liquidated damages or penalties for late completion in the contract.
This makes senior management take the project more seriously. They are then less likely to reallocate resources away from your project and are more likely to give you resources to your project when requested.
Tagged with: liquidated damages • resources
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