Diagnostic framework and health check tool for engineering and technology projects

Abstract

Purpose: Development of a practitioner oriented diagnostic framework and health check tool to support the robust assessment of engineering and technology projects. Design/methodology/approach: The research is based on a literature review that draws together insights on project assessment and critical success factors to establish an integrated systems view of projects. This is extended to allow a comprehensive diagnostic framework to be developed along with a high-level health check tool that can be readily deployed on projects. The utility of the diagnostic framework and health check tool are explored through three illustrative case studies, with two from Canada and one from the United Kingdom. Findings and Originality/value: The performance of engineering and technology projects can be viewed through a systems perspective and being a function of six contributing subsystems that are: process, technology, resources, impact, knowledge and culture. The diagnostic framework that is developed through this research integrates these subsystems to provide a robust assessment methodology for projects, which is linked to existing best practice for project reviews, performance management and maturity models. The case studies provide managerial insights that are related to the diagnostic framework but crucially also position the approach in the context of industrial applications for construction engineering and technology management.

The Role of Project Health Check Reports in Identifying Indicative Factors of a Troubled Project

“…The purpose of the Periodic project health check reports (PHC) tool is to systematically specify how project variables are handled to ascertain whether a project is managed systemically (as in a healthy project) or randomly (in the case of a troubled project). The health check tool offers an illustrative view of the situation faced by the project manager in the troubling case and highlights how corrective steps were taken in focused areas to support the recovery of the projects (Jaafari, 2007;Philbin and Kennedy, 2014). Project health reports help project managers to identify the root causes of any issues early in the project delivery process and to enable managers to maintain overall project performance better (Almahmoud et al, 2012).…”

Understanding the communication and collaboration challenges encountered by technology managers

“…While this figure was later challenged by Glass (2006), recent survey data still paints a gloomy picture; unfortunately, 45% of all large IT projects (with an initial budget exceeding US $15 million) experience budget overruns, 7% run overtime, and deliver 56% less value than envisaged (Bloch et al, 2012). Various approaches have been explored in order to help improve project success, such as the adoption of a broader (i.e., systemic) perspective of project outcomes (Shenhar and Dvir, 2007) as well as the development of a diagnostic framework and health check tool for engineering and technology project (Philbin and Kennedy, 2014).…”

Systematic literature review of project manager's leadership competencies

“…Researchers have explored this area from a theoretical perspective, for instance, investigating the relationship between construction project management theory and transaction cost economics (Walker and Kwong Wing, 1999). Other researchers have assessed how to improve the performance of the earned value analysis technique as a construction project management tool (Howes, 2000) and the development of a diagnostic framework and health check tool for engineering and technology projects (Philbin and Kennedy, 2014). Although it has also been reported that this sector faces a number of major challenges associated with managing projects as identified by Wilkinson (2001), where many of the fundamental problems associated with managing construction projects were found to be relationship-based.…”