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Published on the 15th of every month
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Are you a first time major project manager?
It is January. New budgets have been approved and it is likely that there are some new capital project managers taking on their first large projects in this new year. Let's hope that you had a few years working for a seasoned and successful project manager. If you did not, let me give you a few quick tips to start your new year off with a chance of success.
1. Your innovative idea of how to do your project has likely been tried before. We are at the point now that there is little in the way of radically new ideas. Does that mean we do every project the way we have been doing them for the last fifty years? No. But changes are small and incremental.
2. Your approved budget, which may be the largest monetary amount for which you have ever been responsible, will evaporate before your eyes. Husband your resources from the beginning.
3. What looks like a lot of time in the schedule for you to complete your project will also evaporate before your very eyes.
4. Your team is not a team. Perhaps all of you who work for your employer can develop a team-like camaraderie, but I can assure you that all those from who you buy goods and services are accountable to their organizations to (a) make a profit and (b) protect their companies from liabilities. They may exhibit team-like behavior, but when the rubber meets the road, they will be looking out for the entities that sign their paychecks.
5. Operations and management: if they have not already done so, will make unreasonable demands on you and set unreasonable expectations for your outcomes. Live with it. Every other project manager in the history of projects has lived with the same things.
6. Make a plan. Write it down.
7. Keep records--meticulous records. Take lots of photos--with the date embedded in them.
Back in December, my wife and I visited Hoover Dam. It came in two years ahead of schedule. Hard hats were invented on this project. Scheduling systems (Critical Path Charting) had not been invented yet. The slide rule was high tech. The dam came in two years ahead of schedule and under budget. That's your benchmark, with no whining or feeling sorry for yourself.
Engineering Manager of the Year, call for nominations
We are looking for an individual who has done an extraordinary project, one that almost defies belief. Its extraordinary features can be schedule, technology, cost or all three.
We have often gotten nominees that go something like this, "I nominate Joe because he has done a great job of running our engineering department for the last fifteen years." Quite frankly, we are not interested in such nominees.
However, if you know someone who has led a very exceptional project in the recent past (the last two or three years), we want to know about it. We want to honor them and hold them up as an example for Engineering Managers in every pulp and paper mill around the world.
Just send your nomination, with as much details as you can provide, to jthompson@taii.com. We will seriously consider it.
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Current Patent Activity is available here.
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Capital Arguments Engineering Manager of the Year
Hall of Fame
 Since its inception, Capital Arguments has believed extraordinary projects are possible. They can be done safely, responsibly and offer a great advantage to their mills with lower capital costs and saved downtime. We established this award in 2008 to recognize those people and companies that follow this philosophy. This award is given once per year somewhere in the world. We honor our inductees permanently here.________
Ed Kersey--Engineering Manager of the Year 2011
Jim presents Ed with the Engineering Manager of the Year for 2011. (L - R) Matt Nilsen, Jim Thompson, Ed Kersey and Wayne South. Nilsen is Account Manager and South is Business Development Manager for Kadant Black Clawson, underwriter of this year's award. Ed Managed the construction of the Pratt Industries mill in Shreveport, Louisiana which took 13 months from piling to paper on the reel. His reward? They made him mill manager!
Kadant Black Clawson was a major sponsor of the 2011 Award. Here, on the left, Peter Flynn, President of Kadant Black Clawson, receives the company's duplicate of Ed's Award from Steve Roush, Publisher and Editor, Paperitalo Publications.
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Not Awarded 2010You have to be really good to get this award. We did not receive any qualifying nominations in 2010.________
Dean Abrams--Engineering Manager of the Year 2009
Now retired, Dean was an engineer at Corrugated Services, Forney, Texas, USA in the summer of 2009 when he completed his award winning project. Dean managed a team that installed a secondary headbox in 11 hours, 30 minutes, paper-to-paper. The experts had said it would take at least 3 days. In April 2010, we presented the award to Dean in the presence of a number of his colleagues.
 Here is the award we presented to Dean:
Mike Ahcan--Engineering Manager of the Year 2008
Mike works at the UPM Blandin Mill in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, USA. In 2008, the mill's sole effluent pipe, running outside a building, almost in the Mississippi River, was determined to be in a state of imminent collapse. The experts said it would take a week of total mill downtime to replace it. Additionally, there was a danger of leakage into the river. Mike and his team went to work and replaced the pipe without any downtime and with no spillage. We had a banquet in Grand Rapids for him in July 2009.
And here is Mike's award:
We normally accept nominations in the November-December time frame. They can be sent to jthompson@taii.com with "EMOY Nomination" in the subject line.
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Please write when we tickle your brain cells! Email jthompson@taii.com
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