Client: A government division overseeing multiple concurrent transport mega-infrastructure builds.
Challenge: Each project director had a proven personal delivery style, but the absence of common practices made it hard for the organisation and its external partners to compare progress, share resources or roll up risk at the portfolio level.
Goal: Introduce a unifying delivery framework that:
- Keeps seasoned directors fast and autonomous.
- Provides portfolio-wide visibility of schedule, cost, risk and resources.
- Aligns with external stakeholders’ commercial obligations.

Five project directors, responsible for road, motorway and tunnel programs valued in the billions.
A central portfolio office seeking clear, apples-to-apples reporting.
Engineering and commercial support teams want lighter interfaces, not extra paperwork.
A top-10 ASX asset custodian and several multi-billion-dollar design & construction contractors, all of whom needed contractual alignment on data, metrics and decision-rights.

Our Three-Phase Approach

Listening sessions with every project director to capture must-keep practices.
Process mapping of design, procurement, build and commissioning workflows, highlighting common steps and unique quirks.
Consistency deep dive into:
- Financial tracking and earned-value tools.
- Resource sharing and capacity planning in SAP.
- Metric definitions for schedule, cost, risk and safety.
Pain-point analysis to expose where inconsistent tools or codes hamper cross-project insight.
Executive working group formed with the state agency, asset custodian and tier-one contractors to agree on success criteria: simplicity, agility, traceability, zero double-handling.

Core & elective model
- Core elements (stage gates, risk matrix, cost codes, monthly dashboard, safety KPIs, SAP resource-sharing rules).
- Electives directors can tailor (detailed schedules, subcontractor engagement, digital-tool mix).
Plain-English guidance: short, action-oriented checklists replacing dense manuals.
Common data spine: standard codes for scope, cost, EVM and resource units so head-office and partners speak one language.
Two-round feedback loop with directors, finance leads and contractor reps; contentious items resolved live to keep momentum.

Pilot projects: Directors trialled the framework for one quarter, logging friction points and quick wins.
Director-led training: peer-to-peer walk-throughs that built credibility and buy-in.
90-day check-ins: light-touch reviews to tweak thresholds, dashboards and language without stopping work.
Digital toolkit alignment: integrated the common data spine with existing P6 schedules, SAP cost/resource modules and Power BI boards, avoiding wholesale system change.
Contractual updates: executive working group endorsed minor deed amendments to lock in data-sharing and reporting obligations across the state agency, the asset custodian and major D&C contractors.

Results Delivered

Portfolio visibility: A single four-page dashboard (schedule, cost, risk, EVM, resource utilisation) now lands three business days after month-end.
Time saved: Project directors report up to twelve hours less per month on bespoke reporting admin.
Risk clarity: Consistent RAG (Red, Amber, Green) thresholds surface issues weeks earlier; two major schedule and cost overruns were averted within six months.
Resource efficiency: Common SAP codes and sharing rules enabled the reallocation of critical specialists across projects with negotiation mechanisms, resulting in zero dispute.
Cultural win: 9 of 10 directors rated the framework “useful without being restrictive” in the pulse survey.
Scalability: Two new projects were onboarded in under a fortnight with minimal hand-holding.

Harmony beats uniformity: set the minimum viable standard; let experts fine-tune the rest.
Speak one data language: standard codes for cost, schedule, EVM, and resources unlock instant insight.
Peer advocacy trumps mandates: directors learn fastest from directors, not rule books.
Iterate in live traffic: pilot, adapt and improve while delivery continues; avoid “big-bang” stoppages.
Align contracts early: negotiating data and reporting obligations up-front prevents headaches downstream.