Pippa has been involved, through a consortium of Universities, in research the performance of complex public sector projects with particular emphasis on their management and the benefits they deliver. This has involved interviewing project management professionals in the US and the UK and drawing insights from the case studies.

The recent study into how public sector organisations ensure expected benefits are accrued from major projects revealed some interesting and unexpected lessons. We’ll pick on just one of these insights here.   You might expect the success of a project to rest upon its being completed on time and on budget. That is important, of course, but, ultimately, success is dependent upon whether that project has benefitted people in some way.

One of the biggest problems, particularly in transformational projects, such as using new technology to make tasks more efficient, is getting people to adapt to a changing system and to engage with it. You can demonstrate a new system and show how effective it is but there is often a reluctance to change. We discovered one of the keys to overcoming this problem is story telling. We heard a wonderful example from our research with NHS Digital in the UK. Sadly, a young GP had lost her partner in the practice and had to take on his work. Already under pressure she wondered how she could face it. She looked through all the things she could do to alleviate the burden and decided to try the electronic repeat dispensing. The amount of time she saved allowed her to manage a bigger patient workload on her own until she found another partner. This was a powerful example to show other GPs how they could benefit. It was a more compelling means of communicating a benefit and encouraging change than just showing time saving figures.

For more about project research take a look at  https://www.apm.org.uk/news/new-research-urges-project-managers-to-avoid-a-one-size-fits-all-approach-to-governance/