Achieving Successful and Sustainable Project Delivery in Africa
How to Implement Effective and Efficient Project Management Practices and Policies
- 252 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
Achieving Successful and Sustainable Project Delivery in Africa
How to Implement Effective and Efficient Project Management Practices and Policies
About This Book
African nations have an underdeveloped industrial and economic base such as their water supply, electrical systems, roads, railways, etc. Massive funding is required to build each of these basic services to the levels of developed nations ā funding which they do not have. Many African companies rely on assistance from the government and global companies looking to invest or facilitate projects in the region. And for a variety of reasons, many of these projects fail to fulfil the needs of the nation. In order to facilitate their own economic development, African nations need to cultivate efficient project management practices and policies that will help them achieve their goal of sustainability.
This book by a multidisciplinary project management consultant, contributes to the body of knowledge that each African country can attain and sustain economic development by suggesting how to eliminate and correct most causes of failures of projects in construction, water treatment, electricity and renewable energy. It suggests that they should also be able to obtain the sustainable harvesting of the benefits of project deliverables which have been planned for in order to implement the various aspects of their economic development. The suggestions in this book will make a difference in project delivery and are comprehensive enough to create a root-and-branch change which will affect the people involved in making decision on projects and their delivery. Thus, project management teams and their managers, organization decision makers, companies looking to invest in the region, and politicians who plan the economy have to understand the causes of unhelpful practices and what needs to be done in order to produce productive and effective delivery of long-term sustainable project.
The principal goal of this book is to advise public and private companies, and international organizations conducting projects in Africa on how to prepare themselves, their businesses and enterprises to solve the problems that cause failure of projects and abandonment of project deliverables. The book also recommends the necessity for a commercial enterprise or government entity to prepare and develop its vision, mission, and strategic objects to constitute the basis of a business plan which should be implemented for successful operations. After first identifying various failed and abandoned projects in Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa, the author provides an analysis of why these projects failed or were abandoned. By using methodologies of Organizational Project Management (OPM), Project Portfolio Management (PPM) and project management techniques, he suggests a framework for project delivery which could be used as a foundational structure and platform that will address the problem and provide solutions for the achievement of successful and sustainable project delivery in Africa.
Frequently asked questions
Information
chapter 1
Introduction
- ā¾ In one country, a government commissioned audit revealed that 11,886 government projects failed in a period of 40 years up to 2011 (this translates to about 300 failed projects each year) [1].
- ā¾ In October 2016, a former director-general of a government procurement unit in an African country stated that there were 19,000 government projects in various stages of abandonment [2].
- ā¾ On 30 December 2011, citizens of a large African city were shocked when the government announced the failure and abandonment of a $10-billion housing project between the Government and a foreign company [3].
- ā¾ It is sad that strategic industrial and scientific projects worth billions of dollars which were conceived with the best vision for the industrialisation of a country, were abandoned; some remain uncompleted after over ten years with much money sunk into the projects. The invested nationās resources and future industrialisation vision in the sector remained in tatters [4, 5, ].
- ā¾ It has been the experience that new public enterprises appear to be generally implemented without any planned forecast of income generation from the project deliverables. These deliverables could be a government electricity generation plant, a steel production plant, a petroleum refinery, or any other government industrial plant, each of whose project is planned, completed, commissioned and put into operation. Yet, there is no arrangement to ensure that the revenue generated will be adequate to fund the operations of the plant. Such revenue is required for salaries, cost of raw materials, cost of spare parts, cost of maintenance and replacement, etc. For example, in an African country, between 2010 and 2017, the Federal Government budgeted $66 million for a government owned steel company, out of which $62 million was used to pay salaries. The government kept allocating budget to pay workersā salaries to such companies which should have been able to generate funds for their operations but could not do so. The large industrial plants failed and were abandoned for many years. Some of the steel plants were being reactivated in 2018 and 2019 after over ten years of abandonment [6].
Definition of Terms: Project Failure and Abandonment, Successful and Sustainable Project Delivery
Main Objective of the Book
- ā¾ New projects should be completed on time and on budget.
- ā¾ Project deliverables should be operated competitively in the market. They should earn income to fund their operations and should be profitable throughout their planned lifetime.
- ā¾ At the planning stage, there should be resources arrangement for the operation of the deliverable after it has been commissioned into service or production.
- ā¾ There should be estimates of how much income the deliverable will generate during its lifetime operations including the benefits.
- ā¾ There should be a timeline for the income to be produced.
- ā¾ The income so generated should be such that the product becomes financially self-sustaining and competitive throughout its lifetime.
- ā¾ Consultants and contractors
- ā¾ Project planners, project managers, project team members
- ā¾ Maintenance and operations managers
- ā¾ National and foreign governments and international organisations
- ā¾ Non-governmental organisations: for-profit and not-for-profit
- ā¾ Private companies and businesses
- ā¾ Educational institutions and universities
- ā¾ United Nations agencies
- ā¾ Other professionals and professional bodies
Table of contents
- Cover
- Half-Title
- Title
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- Preface
- Foreword
- Acknowledgements
- About the Author
- 1 Introduction
- SECTION 1 SOME FAILED PROJECTS AND PROJECT DELIVERABLES
- SECTION 2 FAILURES IN SOME INDUSTRIES
- SECTION 3 DEFINITION OF PROBLEMS, REVIEW AND SUGGESTIONS FOR SOLUTIONS
- SECTION 4 A FRAMEWORK FOR SUCCESSFUL MANAGEMENT OF PROJECTS, PROGRAMMES, AND PORTFOLIOS USING OPM, PPM LIFECYCLE & PMO
- SECTION 5 SUMMARY OF SUGGESTIONS FOR THE ACHIEVEMENT OF SUCCESS AND SUSTAINABILITY IN PROJECT DELIVERY
- APPENDICES
- Index