A joint offering by the College of Engineering and the School of Business
Management Skills for Engineering Capital Projects
Capital projects are concerned with the development of long-term investments of capital in facilities or production capacity. Because these up-front investments of funds are recoverable only over an extended life cycle, they have unique project management requirements. Organizations make significant commitments to capital projects even before they are fully defined and fully designed. The management of capital projects must focus on and adhere to original estimates and budget while still meeting project requirements developed over an extended period of time and “drop dead” delivery dates. Ordinarily, capital projects depend extensively on external resources for their completion, and are subject to internal and external review throughout multiple phases of development. Because of extended project delivery times, risk exposures are elevated and must be managed, often through the procurement/contracting process. Due to the extensive outsourced nature of capital projects, scope and change control are critical as is the quality of the final delivered product.
“Management Skills for Engineering Capital Projects” focuses on these unique aspects as well as project management knowledge areas beyond the core skills of our introductory course held earlier in the week. These areas, which have unique applications within this discipline area, include:
- Resource and procurement management
- Communications, drawing and document management
- Project process integration
We will also review procedures and tools in several areas of concern that are critically important on capital projects:
- Multiple project management methods
- Quality and regulatory compliance
- Final project acceptance and closure