How Big Things Get Done: The Surprising Factors Behind Every Successful Project, from Home Renovations to Space Exploration

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Adam Boddison, APM chief executive, meets Mark Thurston, CEO of Europe’s largest infrastructure project, HS2. The pair discuss the evolution of the project profession, areas for growth and the pressures associated with managing an era-defining megaproject. Flyvbjerg’s study of big projects worldwide has led him to formulate the iron law of megaprojects: over budget, over time, under benefits, over and over again. His deep understanding of why big projects fail—and occasionally succeed—makes this book a truly fascinating read. There’s a practical payoff, too: a toolbox with eleven smart heuristics for better project leadership that every planner who wants to succeed should know.” This book is mercifully free of goofy business management acronyms. If I had to invent one, based on its most salient themes, I’d call it T.I.M.E. for Teamwork, Iteration, Modularity, and Experience.

Nothing is more inspiring than a big vision that becomes a triumphant, new reality. Think of how the Empire State Building went from a sketch to the jewel of New York’s skyline in twenty-one months, or how Apple’s iPod went from a project with a single employee to a product launch in eleven months. Nothing is more inspiring than a big vision that becomes a triumphant, new reality. Think of how the Empire State Building went from a sketch to the jewel of New York’s skyline in twenty-one months, or how Apple’s iPod went from a project with a single employee to a product launch in eleven months. Understanding what distinguishes the triumphs from the failures has been the life’s work of Oxford professor Bent Flyvbjerg, dubbed “the world’s leading megaproject expert.” In How Big Things Get Done , he identifies the errors in judgment and decision-making that lead projects, both big and small, to fail, and the research-based principles that will make you succeed with yours. For There is an excellent section on using the cost of similar projects to get a base rate cost and also to see what proportion of similar projects go over budget by and how much they go over budget by. Stories of gigantic and costly failures, from the Sydney Opera House to successive editions of the Olympic Games, are entertaining and chastening in equal measure. But Flyvbjerg and Gardner also manage to extract valuable lessons about how to plan, forecast and execute any size of project, be it a kitchen remodelling or a high-speed trainlink.” —Financial Times, Best Summer Books of 2023: BusinessReference class forecasting”: forecast costs using actual ex post data on similar projects rather than just projecting costs based on ex ante assumptions. Our Crisis Talks series explores how project managers are adapting and pivoting to meet the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. Change the plan you will roll onto at any time during your trial by visiting the “Settings & Account” section. What happens at the end of my trial?

Entertaining . . . compelling . . . there are lessons here for managers of all stripes' – The Economist The variety of case studies from the Sydney Opera House to Pixar Studios make for an engaging and highly readable book and provide fine examples to support the arguments presented for How Big Things Get Done. An example of a house restoration project gone awry brings the thesis to a human level (although not exactly relatable, the renovation goes over budget by the price of about five average houses in the UK). In this episode, Emma De Vita asks what mentoring means, what benefits it brings for people and organisations and how to do it well. No spoilers here for anyone who follows Professor Flyvbjerg's work, his main argument is for a data focused approach to projects using similar shaped projects as a basis for planning, and a repeatable modular approach to design rather than building huge one offs. This book is a neat and easily readable presentation of that thesis with easily understood examples. Hopefully it will feature in the bedside reading of policy makers and ultimately lead to a wider acceptance of the ideas within.Project managers do not spend enough time on the planning phase. A real plan should ideally utilize models, whether physical or virtual. Frank Gehry epitomizes this approach. The project should begin with a clearly thought out objective, detailing the benefits expected. Successful plans usually rely on iteration, incorporating responses to critiques at each stage.

Meeting project professionals who are working on cutting-edge projects, and academics whose research is at the forefront of project management techniques.The book starts by describing how the record of big projects is worse than people think. Flyvbjerg has built up a database of 16,000 projects that details how projects typically end up. The incredible result is : This is where the iron law of megaprojects comes in. It explains that huge, complex endeavors like building a new airport or a high-speed rail line almost always go over budget, over schedule, or both. It turns out that only 8.5 percent of the 16,000 projects studied by the authors hit their targets for both cost and time. That's a staggering statistic! Daniel Kahneman, winner of the Nobel Prize in economics and author of Thinking, Fast and Slow A wise, vivid and unforgettable combination of inspiring storytelling with decades of practical research and experience Finally the book sums up the lessons from the book and the value that would be obtained if big projects were run better. This book is important, timely, instructive, and entertaining. What more could you ask for?”—Daniel Kahneman, Nobel Prize–winning author of Thinking, Fast and Slow