Pity the Poor Project Manager

I have a lot of sympathy for former project manager, Alan Ezzi, and his trials and tribulations over the new gilded elephant for the Scottish Parliament.

He is not alone!

In the late seventies, I wrote Artemis, the project management system used to manage nearly half of all major projects world-wide during the latter years of the last century.

She’s still going strong too! And her users and promoters still provide me with confidential stories that sometimes cheer but more often sadden me.

Alan Ezzi’s tale of political interference is sadly the norm, where politicians everywhere should know better. Only in isolated cases where they stand back, give clear guidelines and objectives, and above all trust engineers to manage do they get the project they want, on time and on budget.

As an example today of how out of touch our politicians are with commercial reality, we have the problem of BAe and the wings for the Airbus A380.

Apparently a suspect environmental issue is more important than worthwhile and sustainable jobs. Especially, ones that help to alleviate our unsustainable trade deficit!