Change – corvative

Changecancellation, claims, closure, planning, social licence

Case study – Project cancellation

How do you respond when your project is suddenly shelved? Here is a short case study. A project in East Africa has been unexpectedly cancelled at short notice following the…

Change, Control, Doingclient, cognitive bias, complexity, contractor, fundamental problems, perceived causes, quality, symptomatic solutions, unexpected side effects

Down the rabbit hole – How cognitive bias leads to failure

The resources industry is going through hard times. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we all pulled together? Sadly, many operators and clients still prefer to blame the contractor for their troubles. But clients…

Change, Control, Doingfirms, innovation, payment, payment terms, power, reduce, terms, trade credit

How extended payment terms hurt innovation

An interesting piece of research on how extended payment terms affect suppliers. The authors find that small firms forced to accept extended payment terms reduce their capex and are less…

Change, Doing, Planning, Teamscompetencies, experience, financial distress, improvisation, intuition, weak signals

“I have a bad feeling about this…” – Why experience matters

Jumping to conclusions is efficient if the conclusions are likely to to be correct and the costs of an occasional mistake acceptable, and if the jump saves much time and…

Change, Doing, Selectioncontractors, financial distress, insolvency, local content, remuneration, risk, social licence to operate

Feeding stray cats: Should you support a contractor in financial distress?

You know what it's like to have a hungry stray cat begging at the back door. You try to ignore it. You hope it will go home. But one day you…

Change, Doing, Initiation, Planning, Scope, Selection, Shaping, Strategybid management, contractors, developing economies, incentives, local content, qualification, remuneration, risk, Strategy, suppliers, work packaging

Creating local content opportunities in major projects

With careful planning and management, you can not only find and grow capable small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), but also give them real opportunities in major projects. And with smart planning…