Setting up a Utilities 8-way JV to improve capital programme delivery
The Situation
This Scottish Utility had terrible capital programme delivery performance, with 20-30% overruns of cost and time. The COO wanted to collaborate with English utilities and suppliers to import a better performance culture, since England had been deregulated for some 10 years already. With the 8 JV organisations signed up in principle, they wanted an independent programme manager to plan and lead the set-up of the 250 person JV delivery organisation, with staff being selected into the JV for 2-3 years initially.
The Task
My role was to lead the planning and creation of the JV organisation, working across all 8 companies, and the programme scope included organisation structure, job roles, facilities, policies, IT systems, branding & marketing, finance, performance reporting and governance. Programme budget was £12m.
The Action / Approach
Created the programme plan, supported the creation of the 12 project plans, and led the 2-weekly status reporting and risk & issue management.
- Ensured that the JV had the right capabilities and capacity to deliver efficiently
- Helped to create a collaborative open risk and commercial culture
- Increased visibility of project delivery performance
- Increased quality of oversight, governance, control and delivery performance.
The Result
New organisation and culture enabled a 25% improvement of the project delivery performance of the £300m annual capital programme.
- Higher proportion of projects fit for purpose, on time and on budget, which lead to increased credibility with and confidence from across the business
- Higher delivery efficiency and effectiveness from clarity around process performance and better progress reporting
- Improved project estimation and delivery capability (right first time), which helped ensure greater financial control and predictability in delivery
- Improved customer and colleague service and satisfaction
- Better support of business directives and the ability to clearly demonstrate value to the business
- Much better project/portfolio pipeline planning and estimation process.
- Still operating succesfully today.
Focus In On: Responsible for Project and Programme Delivery
New Areas of Value:
Higher proportion of projects fit for purpose, on time and on budget
Increased credibility with and confidence from across the business
Higher delivery efficiency and effectiveness from clarity around process performance
Greater financial control and predictability in delivery
Improved project estimation and delivery capability (right first time)
Improved customer and colleague service and satisfaction
Ability to clearly demonstrate value to the business
Better support of business directives
Greater acceptance of change – quicker to implement new changes
Validation of the IT change strategy
Improvements around:
Disruption from business restructure or reprioritisations
Poor project/portfolio pipeline planning and estimation process
Insufficient good data and reporting tools
Lack of subject matter expertise and experience
Lack of clarity or understanding on operational readiness requirements
Weak project prioritisation, approval, compliance and sponsorship
Poor communication of requirements, progress and expectations
