How Big Things Get Done

Last week I came across this book How Big Things Get Done by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner, and in between Olympic events, made a start over the weekend.

It was published last year and received numerous accolades including a “best book of the year” as awarded by the Economist, Financial Times, CEO Magazine, and Morningstar. The author identifies the errors in judgment and decision-making that lead projects, both big and small, to fail, and the research-based principles that support project success. He draws on a database of circa 16,000 (and growing) projects from 20+ different fields in 136 countries. A sobering insight was that of all these projects 8.5% delivered in terms of both time and cost, and only 0.5% time, costs and benefits. The probability distribution of outcomes is “fat tailed”.

I’ve read chapter 1, where the principle of “think slow, act fast” is explained. Getting into action quickly feels right, but it’s wrong. And the longer a project goes on for, the greater the opportunity/window for it to go wrong (“the window of doom” as it is referred to).

So far, the content is proving to be very thought provoking, prompting some reflection on the numerous projects both big and small I’ve been involved in over my career – I am looking forward to the insights I have no doubt the rest of the book will provide #projectmanagement, #execution, and #riskmanagement