The fundamental elements of managing any project, from building a house to cleaning up an environmentally polluted factory, are the same: What is the Scope of the project (ie, what needs to be done?); what is the Schedule (or, how much time do you have to do this job?); and what is the Budget (how much money is there to spend on this job?).
As a project manager, you rarely set Scope. The project owners, clients or agencies, who are paying for the work or commissioning the work, will define this. In the case of a cleanup project, often associated with a Brownfields project, ultimate cleanup goals are established by law, regulations, and agency-issued guidance, end use of the site, and requirements to protect the human health and the environment. . However, the Scope can vary even under that primary goal, and that Scope is determined by the tasks you are required to perform. Do you dig? or water pump? or install wells for evaluation? Defining a scope obviously demands a finished product at the end: either a “clean” location, or the removal of drums or piles of material, or the definition of where something can be found (such as contamination). Projects without a good Scope definition are like trying to knit without knowing what you’re aiming for in the end: you don’t want to end up with sleeves for a sweater when your goal was a pair of socks.
The tasks within a Scope definition will, of course, vary. As a simple example, if your Scope is defined as a subsurface assessment, you’ll need to find out where and how deep to install the wells, whether you need access from neighbors, which driller has the proper drilling equipment and skills, what hazards to what your people will be exposed to and how to protect them, whether or not you can bring the physical equipment to the locations where you want to drill, how you will collect your data and compile it, and whether or not you need to draw conclusions from the job. Each of those tasks will require specialists to form your project team, and their input will also be used to define the list of tasks to achieve that Scope.
Regulatory and guidance requirements will also add tasks. Site health and safety plans will need to be written and approved, and then implemented, just like task-based work plans. Reporting of progress, data and conclusions are often made according to a defined schedule and, in the case of a project carried out under an order to do work, penalties may be imposed if that schedule is not met.
The schedule is often the bane of the project. Those who spend money want the minimum amount of work, done quickly, to minimize expenses. Geologists, chemists, and other scientists who will study and draw conclusions about the data will always want more data, which means more field time, and will often want or need more time to develop conclusions. As a project manager, you are an important part of the group that finds the middle ground between these two positions. Weather is often a limiting factor in the program, as the snows and cold of the winter and the heat of the summer can be dangerous for field staff or make data collection very difficult (as an example, consider the difficulty of taking samples of minus 10 degree water in Minnesota January day). Gaining off-site access can take considerable time when neighbors and their attorneys are difficult to deal with. Review, modification, and approval of interim and final reports always take longer than ideal.
And the Budget looms over everything. None of us work for free, and equipment and downtime are expensive. Clients resist spending increases, but change orders always come up, despite your planning efforts. The crass interest in keeping costs down is often at odds with a self-righteous approach to exactly defining and correcting an environmental impact. But even in agency-led cleanups, budget is paramount. Agency budgets are not limitless, especially in these tough economic times, and every project, not just yours, is a priority for those affected by it. So you need to be able to analyze and forecast spending and trends and be aware of contingencies, because they always come up, and someone will want to know where the money has been and is going, and what they get for the money spent.
Keeping track of all of this requires skills not often taught in school. Project management tools will help, but as a project manager, you need to balance these important elements with both strong people skills and engineering experience, because, after all, the ultimate goal of a project is to satisfy people. concerned parties.
