Defence Business: Is Defence as complex as we think? | ADM Aug 2009

Bruce Helmsman | Sydney

The result of this analysis confirms that the task of delivering Australia's defence capability is measurably more complex than other related industries such as mining, energy, infrastructure, finance or telecommunications.

Knowing that Defence is capable of delivering Australia's most difficult projects also provides some insight on the project management capability of the Defence sector in comparison to other industry sectors.

Furthermore, understanding complexity is important because understanding what causes project risk gives provides a better understanding about how to manage it.

Helmsman developed its complexity measurement scale to serve the needs of executives who make decisions about proceeding and supporting projects.

It is a comparative measure of complexity between projects across all domains and industries, designed to measure the potential difficulty of a project from conception through to delivery.

In other words, it aims to predict the complexity of a project.

The average project complexity for most organisations is around 5.1 on the Helmsman scale, (or "Normal" for large organisations).

Defence projects average 6.3, which is the level of the most "Complex" projects normally undertaken by large Australian organisations.

This is illustrated in the chart below that compares the likelihood of a project falling in a specific category between the Defence projects reviewed and projects in other sectors.

Helmsman assessed 32 projects within the Defence project portfolio.

These projects were selected to represent a similar profile to those evaluated in other sectors.

Helmsman's database contains several 1,000 project records, however, to match the Defence sample, only those that are at the top end of the project portfolios are measured.

This equates to around 150 of the most complex projects in these companies.

More than 100 factors have been analysed across five broad categories of complexity; Contextual, Sociological, Ambiguity, Technical and Project Management.

Contextual covers the complexity of the environment surrounding the project such as political and similar issues.

The area measures stakeholder complexity, broad expectations of scope (systems of systems delivery) and similar factors.

Sociological factors look at the number of people impacted; the breadth and depth of sociological change required to deliver the project.

Ambiguity looks at how much is unknown by the project.

Areas of uncertainty include approaches, risks, costs and requirement definition.

Technical complexity measures the complexity of technical systems and the complexity of systems integration including system size, number, interface complexity and technology maturity.

Project Management complexity relates to traditional project management roles around contracts, schedules, resources, plans, team sizes and similar issues.

Our research tells us that complexity in Defence projects is predominantly driven by a series of consistent themes.

These themes are largely specific to defence and defence procurement programs.

The existence of any of these themes in a project creates complexity and therefore inherent risk to delivery performance.

The more themes a project has, the higher its complexity score tends to be and this in turn seems to correlate to reduced performance.

For example, ‘Systems of Systems' describes a project that is responsible for delivering an end-state capability but unable to directly control all the inputs required to deliver it.

This is not an uncommon occurrence across multiple industries.

This situation often this occurs where Information Technology is deployed as infrastructure to deliver more strategic organisational capabilities without adequate assessment of the multiple dimensions (eg stakeholder alignment, culture change, portfolio interdependencies etc) actually required to deliver it.

Another theme refers to ‘Maturity of Technology' where project teams can often be mistaken into thinking that technologies are mature simply because of their widespread use, however this can be deceiving.

A more telling sign is to note the number of organisations that are having trouble implementing the technology.

Projects that are required to develop and utilise technology that is developmental, leading edge or bleeding edge do not have the benefit of hindsight or experience to rely upon and because of this need to employ sophisticated risk management mechanisms to maintain cost and schedule as well manage external perceptions of quality as the development process is underway.

External stakeholders however are not the only ones whose expectations need to be carefully managed.

In a highly specialised technical environment, particularly one where safety and compliance is front-of-mind, complexity is often created as a result of projects struggling to get acceptance from the end user.

‘End User acceptance' issues can cause immense strain on project schedules.

The concept of reasonable risk is difficult to define and such debates have a tendency to prevail long after the DMO concludes that the project had achieved its contractual and capability targets.

End User Acceptance issues can also lead to inappropriate use off-the-shelf (OTS) technology.

A large driver of project complexity in Defence is the unplanned need for substantial certification, systems integration, design and modification to technology perceived as being off-the-shelf.

OTS provides a compelling case for action; it's proven, delivered, robust and readily available.

However, the conveniences inevitably come with compromises and procurement teams need to demonstrate rigour in requirements definition and users need to show constrain in their desire to possess all the ‘bells-and-whistles'.

Where to from here?
For most readers of this magazine, the fact that Defence projects are inherently more difficult than other sectors probably does not come as a surprise.

Acquiring, modifying and sustaining high-technology capabilities for the Australian Defence Force, is a complex, high-risk enterprise.

Defence has, however, done a reasonable job of managing complexity against other sectors, particularly around cost management.

The complexity of Defence projects are expected to increase in the next horizon and Helmsman believe that a deeper understanding and consideration of project complexity is needed, especially up-front at project set-up.

Helmsman's experience in other sectors demonstrates that understanding project complexity allows the management team to recognise what the potential risk is and manage it.

It allows project teams to plan ahead of the game and prepare for these complexities rather than react to the circumstances that might otherwise have been considered a ‘surprise'.

Bruce Helmsman is the Chairman of the Helmsman Institute for Project Governance and was part of the DMO study commissioned by the CEO of the DMO.