The Seven Keys to a Successful Project

But other projects were really difficult. Some were absolute disasters, with issues coming out of the blue as unpleasant surprises.

I’d look around the boardroom at the first meeting of a well-publicized project and see a well-known, experienced developer and architects, engineers and consultants at the peak of their careers and armed with really impressive credentials. I’d think to myself, ‘there’s no way we’re going to have any major issues on this project given how good how team is.’

In most cases, that couldn’t have been further from the truth.

Back then I didn’t understand why projects wouldn’t go smoothly despite having the best experts on the project when on the other hand, I’d work on projects with a team who were less experienced and credentialled—and they’d outperform all other projects I was managing.

Key characteristics of a great project

There are so many key characteristics of a great project, especially when you have a project team which is talented across many different disciplines. Important parts and elements are much deeper than the technical knowledge or abilities of a project team.  These are the seven keys to a successful project:

Clearly defined strategy with a clear direction

This comes when you identify not just why the project is being done, but how it will be done. Understanding those two key questions clearly defines your strategy, and when things get tough it also defines why you need to keep going. Having the purpose and vision along with the knowhow combines the why and the how. The why is powerful but you also need the why to deliver the project.

Harnessing the best abilities of your team

By harnessing the best abilities of all team members, you allow them to express the best of themselves through their work. It’s empowering people to play to their strengths. If an architect is a real visionary it’s important for them to play that role. Then you pair them with an engineer who can help make that vision a reality or tailor the vision to make it practical.

If you have an engineer who is very skillful, give them the hardest problems to solve and let them focus on that while the rest of the team is focusing on other areas. It’s about understanding  who is strong in which areas and deploying your team to capitalise on that. It doesn’t make sense having a project manager advise on design when you have a high-calibre architect. Let him express himself through design and harness his ability 100%.

Also think about it from a client perspective—the client may be good at bringing the project together and steering it at a high level so the team needs to support them in doing that by managing the details and small stuff. If you draw someone away from their strength, how is that a positive? The team needs to identify acknowledge where their strengths and weaknesses lie.

Productivity and efficiency

Having a project that feels effortless and in flow for anyone involved. So again by focusing on people’s strengths and harnessing them, they end up working on elements of the project’s aspects that they really enjoy. Because it crystallises everyone’s role in the team, it really sets responsibilities clearly and that allows for people to be super productive and super efficient. Nobody is doing double the work and everyone knows their boundaries. By deploying people’s strengths in the right areas, it allows the best person on the team to deal with that solution uninterrupted and solves problems faster.

Communication

Once everyone is clear on their responsibilities and boundaries, then you know how far to take any aspects of work and can share it with everyone else on the team via open and clear communication channels. An architect would come up with the conceptual design then before that goes further would share it with the engineer to say, ‘is this possible?’ There’s a respect for everyone on the team and clarity about roles, which can open the communication channels.

A different spin on time, cost and quality

This is about managing time, cost and quality of the project in a conscious and considered way.  It’s a big one! Very difficult to get right. The traditional way of doing a project is to say, ‘this is your scope of work’ and when that’s finished, you stop. My way is to take the intrinsic value of everyone’s scope of work a step further by holistically looking at the project and saying, ‘what is the best solution for the project?’ It might be to do some of the scope of work now in consultation with the architect and engineer, or park that while you’re working with another group of consultants.

The main crux is knowing how to acknowledge everyone’s scope of work and deliver the process in the best possible way for the project, not as individuals. A holistic view avoids you having to redesign or redo work, and it stops conflict. It’s cost effective because by looking at the whole picture you’re looking at budgets, everything is considered and that’s how you save on time, costs and quality.

Well Rounded

It’s important to have well-rounded experience across all areas of a property development. I’ve worked with clients who are absolute geniuses when it comes to finance and project funding, and as a result they put together exceptional funding structures for their project. However, their knowledge and understanding of the other stages in a property development are not as good. All the emphasis gets put on the funding.

Trust and Mutual Respect

You should aim to turn talent into results and framework. So trusting the different consultants allows everyone to push themselves and push boundaries on certain things to achieve a better result because they know their counterparts are up for the challenge. An architect may push a design trusting the town planner has the ability to help achieve the council approval. A client may have very big aspirations for the project and he trusts the architect can find a way to deliver the vision and bring things to fruition.

Matt Grbcic, Founder MG Group