Most people own some land and they, and many projects, need to accurately locate the position of their property lines and facilities, but achieving this is far from straightforward.

One reasonably well-known example of this challenge is the Prime Meridian at Greenwich. This historic meridian is a geographical reference line that is marked on the ground, and passes through the Royal Observatory, in Greenwich, London (the dashed line above). But, the Prime Meridian used by your GPS is the solid line 102 meters to the east. The objective of our latest article is to explain why these are different! It is a long story starting in the third century BCE, that intertwines astronomy, map making, navigation, and time keeping.

Scientific understanding of the shape of the earth has changed from the Ancient Greek assumption it was a sphere, to the modern understanding the earth is a shape-shifting mass that approximates an oblate spheroid. This shift in understanding does not change the relationship between latitude, longitude, and time, but the relentless changes in the earths surfaces do continue to affect map making and surveying. Sometimes the change can be catastrophic – this tree was split in two by the Türkiye Earthquake*. But fortunately, most of the time both the magnitude and rate of change are quite small, but for many applications cannot be ignored.

So, answering the question ‘where in the world are you?’ accurately can be remarkably difficult and will change over time. To find out why download our article: Knowing (exactly) where you are is not that simple!

For more on The Origins of Numbers, Calendars and Calculations see: https://mosaicprojects.com.au/PMKI-ZSY-010.php#Overview  

*To do something to help your career, and the Türkiye Earthquake victims, join PM 4 The World for a 24 hour ‘talk around the clock’ webinar bringing together many leading project management practitioners. All donations go straight to UNICEF: https://talk-around-the-clock.com/event-schedule  

#1 PGCS Canberra 22nd to 24th August – Registrations are now open and the call for papers still open, For more see: https://www.pgcsymposium.org.au/

#2 Talk Around The Clock. Contribute to help raise money for earthquake victims, see: https://talk-around-the-clock.com/event-schedule

#3 PM College of Scheduling, 23rd to 26th April, see: https://pmcos.org/events/pmcos-annual-conference-las-vegas-2023/

Last year, Project Managers 4 The World ran a 24-hours Talk-around-the-Clock in support for children and families from Ukraine. This year the PMI Ukraine Chapter and some of the world’s finest project management speakers are coming together for the second Talk-around-the-Clock virtual conference to crowdfund money and help charity organizations and show our support to the victims of the Turkish earthquake.

All of the international line up of speakers are working pro-bono meaning all of the revenue from this event goes to the UNICEF appeal. The virtual conference begins April 14, 10 AM UTC and will run for 24 hours until April 15, 10 AM UTC and includes 21 presenters, a panel discussion, and an opening and closing ceremony.

To do your part, review the speaker line-up then donate to register at https://talk-around-the-clock.com/

PGCS in collaboration with the developer of Earned Schedule, Walt Lipke, and seven other international experts will be running a free webinar on 8th March to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of Earned Schedule in the EVM marketplace. The webinar will run twice to make the sessions accessible to everyone, regardless of where you are in the world.

The presenters are:
Walt Lipke:  Earned Schedule, 20 years of innovation, past – present and future  
Kym Henderson:  Validating Earned Schedule, the research and studies  
Keith Heitzman & Patrick Weaver:  Interview with Keith Heitzman (NASA Contractor) 
Robert Van de Velde:  Act Fast, Think Fast: Agile Schedule Performance
Paulo André de Andrade:  Research on a categoriser to enhance expected project duration forecasting performance using ES
Mario Vanhoucke:  A 20-year academic research journey summarized in one presentation
Michael Higgins:   Telling the time in the UK
Yancy Qualls:   Do You Trust Your IMS? (Earned Schedule vs. Traditional IECDs in a forecasting accuracy showdown) 

Registration is free, and each of the presentations will be made available to webinar participants for review after the event.

For more information, including detailed timing of the sessions, and a link to register see: https://www.pgcs.org.au/library1/2023-es-special-event/

If you are planning to attend don’t forget the 10% discount – see the code in the image below:

For the 10th year Mosaic will be supporting the PGCS Symposium to be held in Canberra on the 22nd and 23rd August, followed by three international masterclasses on the 24th.

Built around the theme Competent people craft project success! The Symposium program features six Australian and international keynote speakers plus three streams:

1. Delivering complex projects and programs. This stream focuses on the challenges of delivering major projects and programs in a complex environment.

2. Controlling projects and programs. This stream focuses on the tools, techniques and technology needed to deliver successful projects and programs.

3. Governance and stakeholders. This stream focuses on designing and governing organizations to deliver the broader aspects of project and program success, including benefits realization, sustainability, and social and economic responsibility.

For more details on the event and the call for papers, plus invited and accepted speakers (on acceptance), and to plan your involvement, visit the Symposium website at: https://www.pgcsymposium.org.au/

We are starting work on the program for PGCS 2023 to be held in Canberra in mid-August. If you are interested in more information (or want to participate) feel free to contact me. 2023 will be our 10th Symposium and we are planning to make this one even better!!

My next challenge is preparing for PC Expo in November. The papers were outlined in my last post: Project Controls Expo Australia 2022

The good news is that as a speaker, friends and contacts are entitled to a 10% discount to attend the Expo – details in the flyer below…

I’m looking forward to November (but have some writing to do first).

Project Controls Expo Australia 2022 will run in Melbourne from 29^th to 30^th November and has a packed program totally focused on project controls.  I will be busy on both days:

On the 29^th in the ‘back to basic’s zone’ my session is: EVM – it’s not as hard as you think! This session will look at establishing and operating and running an EVMS, based on Australian Standard AS4817:2019 (the Australian adoption of ISO 21508), using simple tools. The session will briefly cover:
–  Understanding EVM, what it is, and what it is not.
–  Define the key elements and objectives of EVM
–  Demonstrate the creation, and use of EVM on a small bridge project.

 If you cannot make the session most of the information is available from: https://mosaicprojects.com.au/PMKI-SCH-040.php#Overview 

Then on the 30^th I will be looking at a major challenge to traditional CPM and forensic assessment in: Scheduling Challenges in Horizontally Distributed Projects

The challenges of scheduling, managing, and claiming delays in, ‘horizontally distributed projects’ are not well supported by traditional project controls paradigms.

Horizontally distributed projects have two dominant characteristics, the majority of the work is comprised of a series of physically separated units that are similar or identical in design, and the logical dependencies between the different units are either non-existent or minimal (think of an off-shore wind farm).

In this type of project, most of the components are identical and can be used anywhere, which means the work can be planned in almost any sequence, and that sequence can be easily changed at almost any time. This type of project is not well supported by either traditional CPM, or ‘line of balance’ scheduling.

The primary consideration in planning is optimizing resource flows, and the consequences of re-sequencing are not based around traditional CPM logic, rather the loss in resource efficiency which is much more difficult to assess and measure. Particularly when you need to separate productive efficiencies under the control of the contractor from disruption caused by re-sequencing.

This presentation will define the concept of a ‘horizontally distributed project’, and then based on some practical examples, highlight the challenges of assessing delay and disruption based on traditional paradigms of CPM scheduling.  It will conclude by offering suggested ways to adapt project controls and contractual requirements to provide a sensible assessment of project delays. As soon as PGCS is over, finishing the research and writing this presentation is my next challenge.

More to follow on this.

Project Managers 4 The World, Charity Event on April 27 & 28, 2022: 24 hours talk around the clock in support of children and families from Ukraine is over.  The event was a great success thanks to Patric Eid, Oliver F. Lehmann, and a panel of 24 speakers from around the world:  https://charity-conference.com/speaker-list-april-27-2022/

I am proud to have been a part of this unique, 100% volunteer event.

My presentation was: Governing and Leading Projects using Earned Value Management (EVM). Good management and good governance require good information. When implemented effectively EVM is a robust, practical system focused on assessing and supporting the managers of a project. Based on the framework in ISO 21508, this presentation will provide an overview of the 11 steps needed to implement EVM effectively.

The presentation (PDF) can be downloaded from: https://mosaicprojects.com.au/PMKI-SCH-040.php#Overview

There’s no fee or registration to download the paper, but please take a minute and donate to UNICEF’s work with children in Ukraine:  https://www.unicef.org/emergencies/war-ukraine-pose-immediate-threat-children

PGCS 2021 will run on-site at the Rex Hotel Canberra, & Virtually from 10-12 August 2021.

PGCS is the only annual conference, run in Canberra, that is focused on improving project outcomes in the public and private sectors by helping organisations select the right projects and programs and then manage them to deliver the right outcomes.

The PGCS call for papers is now open

The PGCS 2021 program already has 7 keynote and invited speakers plus 2 master classes locked in, with more to be announced soon. Visit www.pgcsymposium.org.au for further details. We are now also calling for industry and academic papers for presentation in the:

• Defence and Major Projects stream – case studies are always welcome.
• Project governance and controls stream – presented in association with the International Cost Estimating and Analysis Association (ICEAA).
• Academic program.

For further information or to submit your paper please click here for more details. Accepted papers are eligible for the Walt Lipke award and $1000 cash prize.

The call for papers closes Monday, 24 May 2021 at 5:00pm.

Program Highlights:

Keynote Speaker: Oliver Baker, UK.

Suppliers – Harmonising the Relationship

Based on his experience working on the Astute Class Submarine Programme delivering a fleet of 7 nuclear-powered attack submarines to the Royal Navy, one of the most complex engineering projects within the United Kingdom. Oliver will describe the One Team approach to operating a joint project controls model and how these lessons can be applied to a different types of project, across a range of sectors.

Click here for more details on our other speakers

Masterclass: Prof. Chuck Keating,  Old Dominion University Virginia, USA.

A Practical Guide to implementing Complex Systems Governance Concepts on Projects

The purpose of this masterclass is to provide a hands-on experience for Project Management (PM) professionals for the application of Complex System Governance (CSG) concepts. CSG is a new and novel approach to improve performance through purposeful design, execution, and evolution of essential system functions to sustain project performance in the midst of external turbulence and internal flux.

Click here for more details on our other Masterclasses.