Public infrastructure projects drive a country’s economic success – providing the ability to grow and become more viable and competitive in world markets. Constructions such as roads, airports, bridges, buildings, complexes, and the delivery of essential services, also improve the quality of life for citizens.

As much as public infrastructure projects create positive impact on societies, influence cultures, and affect lives, when they fail the negative impact is far-reaching. It is estimated that for every US$1 billion spent on a failed project, US$135 million is lost forever… unrecoverable. The cost of failure, however, can be more than purely financial. When projects involving billions of dollars’ worth of investment overrun on budget or time the result can hurt the tax-payer, delay essential improvements, and even trigger civil unrest. The results can topple governments.

For companies that don’t want merely to succeed in their industries but to lead them, continual business transformation is a must. With 93% of U.S. companies in some phase of changing their business model, according to recent research by consulting firm KPMG, businesses that aren’t thinking about transformation are all but irrelevant. Business transformation can mean everything from a major shift in IT systems to a large-scale innovative construction project or changes to business models and product designs. Similarly, the drivers of transformation vary widely, ranging from the increased globalization of markets in all industries to shifting energy prices to consumer expectations of constant innovation.

In a perfect world, everyone involved in a construction project works from the same playbook. They all use the same tools and processes to share critical information with each other in real time. Project managers in the field keep the accounting team in the office continually apprised of the project’s status and immediately alert them when any necessary changes or issues arise. Meanwhile, the accounting team has a full view and understanding of the project from pre-bid to closeout. They assist the project managers by reviewing bids for accuracy, conducting background checks on vendors and subcontractors, adjusting financial data where needed and more. The result is a project that is completed on time and under budget, with few disruptions.

Spectrum Workflow allows you to define and enforce specific rules on your Spectrum processes. Not only can the user easily see all steps that are currently assigned to them, they can quickly approve, reject or mark that the step has been completed. The full history of each transaction processed through workflow is always available.

We’ve seen the rapid rise of the project management office (PMO) over the last two decades. An annual survey of more than 400 companies worldwide pegs adoption at 80% and 90% among larger organizations[1]. The 2014 results, however, yielded an interesting blip – a slight decline over 2012 findings. Is this an anomaly or might it be the start of a next generation transformation?

Governance: Ensure alignment of strategy, execution and results.

Resource Management: Support top-down and bottom-up resource requests and staffing processes and make it easy for project and resource managers to communicate their requirements and decisions throughout a project’s lifecycle. Provide a graphical analysis of resource and role utilization in order to help project teams manage resources in a dynamic environment and allow managers to see where resources are being used across all programs and projects, as well as their forecasted future use.

The Employee Kiosk and Subcontract Kiosk allow all authorized users, including subcontractors, easy and secure Spectrum access to payroll and subcontract data—without the need for additional user licenses.

It all starts with good intentions; your good intentions to make a positive impact on the business, your good intentions to help the business become organized, and your good intentions to improve efficiencies and effectiveness. You’re thinking creatively, you’re excited about making positive changes and you’re full of optimistic energy. Yet with all these good intentions, your attempt to deploy a Project Management Office (PMO) is met with resistance from colleagues and fraught with difficulties in implementation.

You can use Spectrum’s customizable Dashboard to expand access to all of your employees without the need to purchase additional licenses.

The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) recent report, Building in change: project construction in asset-intensive industries, found that over one-third of asset-intensive companies miss their budget (39%) and schedule (34%) targets on major projects at least one-quarter of the time; and more than 60% of respondents blame unexpected change for at least one-half of all project overruns. While they frequently acknowledge that some change is inevitable on large-scale projects, E&C firms and owners admit that they could vastly improve how they deal with these changes.