Planning a Web-based project management system

Project management can be difficult, no matter the size of the project. But managing a project involving hundreds of thousands of documents that must be shared by teams stationed around the globe is a significant challenge. Here's how one of my clients identified and met the challenge through a Web-based project management system.

Two years ago, an international construction company that is among the top 20 firms worldwide won a two-year contract worth US$1.5 billion, presenting the company with a fast-track construction project and numerous challenges:

• My client had to manage more than 700,000 documents, including drawings, memos, specifications, quality manuals, purchase orders, invoices, tenders, contracts, site instructions, variations, standards, etc. These documents needed to be stored, distributed, and updated rapidly.
• Comprehensive tracking of time-sensitive items, such as requests for information (RFIs) and submittals, was essential. Team members were accountable for content and timely response.
• An audit trail that verified a communication took place (was sent/received) was a mandatory contractual requirement.
• Secure and fast document delivery (much faster than overnight courier) was essential.
• A major challenge was to achieve a faster cycle time by eliminating lag time as information moved from one organisation to another.
• The project had a fully distributed team. The engineers were in Europe, the client was in the Middle East, vendors/subcontractors were across the globe, and the construction site was more than 600 km into the desert, with major logistical difficulties.

What we needed
We needed reliable, inexpensive, and almost instantaneous worldwide access available 24/7 to a centralised repository of project management information. In summary, we needed the ability to manage the project across time and space, to "work side-by-side worldwide." This ability was impossible to achieve without shared storage and concurrency control.

Critical characteristics
To achieve our objectives, we identified three critical characteristics for the proposed solution. It would have to be:

• Coherently structured
• Integrated
• Scalable

Minimum functional requirements
We used several workshops, discussion forums, and surveys to gather, document, analyze, and prioritise the minimum functional requirements of a Web-based project management system. The requirements included the ability to:

• Provide the right information at the right time and place to the right team members.
• Accomplish the first task electronically to reduce or eliminate costly and time-consuming manual distribution.
• Provide continuous information-sharing with individuals from other firms.
• Integrate information from external applications or databases, such as CAD programs, accounting programs, etc.
• Deliver information in its native format so that an authorised user can manipulate/modify it.
• Allow team members to view information in all forms without having to install the related applications on their computer; they should be able to view and annotate documents from within the tool.
• Be easy to use and navigate; be compatible with Windows 2000 GUI.
• Be accessible to all team members with minimal or no changes to their computers.
• Automatically track and record user activity and archive previous versions of any changed document. This record holds team members accountable for changes and errors during design and construction. It supports/refutes claims for additional charges.
• Track and link discussions with the related documents.
• Manage access rights, make associations between team members and relevant data, and notify appropriate team members about new, pertinent information when it becomes available. This protects the data and speeds up the communications process.
• Generate requests for information (RFIs), track them (RFI log), and resolve them.
• Track proposed change orders (PCOs), construction change directives (CCDs), and change orders (COs). This reduces the number of steps and the time it takes for the submittal and review processes. It thus shortens the overall project design and construction schedule and reduces non-responsiveness on the part of the design professionals involved.
• Provide online review and coordination of design documents, progress photographs, reports, drawings, etc.
• Allow drag-and-drop updating of information.
• Support the use of hyperlinks and allow all teams to use standard business software right away for creating and collaborating on a wide range of document types.
• Be compatible with the information technology infrastructure that already exists in the company.

Our options
Once we identified the minimum requirements of the Web-based solution, there were three options available to acquire it:

• Build the tool from scratch.
• Sign up for a subscription service.
• Purchase an off-the-shelf server application designed to fulfill specific requirements.

Developing a Web-based project management strategy
To effectively and efficiently implement the tool, we needed to develop a Web-based project management strategy, which included the following steps:

1. Measure the effectiveness of the current project management process.
2. Define the new project management process incorporating the new tools available.
3. Pilot test the process and modify it accordingly using manual simulation.
4. Refine the process based on the results of the pilot test.
5. Complete system installation and training.
6. Identify projects that will use standardised project templates.
7. Define roles and responsibilities of team members and project managers on accessing and updating the repository.
8. Identify the team that will monitor and support the new project management process.
9. Identify projects that will continue to use the old project management process.
10. Prepare managerial procedures for handling multiple projects, resolving resource conflicts, etc.
11. Time the migration to the new strategy.
12. Monitor and support the new installation.
13. Measure the effectiveness of the new process and compare it to the old one.
14. Refine the new process according to the results of step 13.