We’re often asked to help prospects make the business case for investing in a project history system to capture historical cost data. For those of us with religion, the reasons seem obvious. Others, however, need to be convinced.
A technical paper written by Todd Pickett and Bruce Elliott, principals at Conquest Consulting Group is as relevant today as it was in 2007 when they wrote it.
“Using historical project data to help make strategic business decisions can play a significant role in providing your company with an advantage – at times a very distinct advantage – over your competitors. Historical data can help you decide what projects are right for the future of your company. And, equally important, it can help you determine what projects are wrong for your company.”
Most people that perform capital projects understand the importance of having and using historical project information. The problem is that very few companies have the methodologies, procedures, and systems in place to effectively use this information to improve their project processes and to support the estimation, scheduling, and control of future capital projects.
This paper will discuss how to collect, normalize, and analyze historical project data to develop practical information that can be used to support estimating and scheduling, provide metrics and benchmarking data, develop conceptual estimating and scheduling tools, support strategic planning, and improve our project processes.”
