Last week I attended an APM event in Manchester organised in conjunction with the Contracts and Procurement SIG. Entitled ‘Top 10 most common and Costly Contract Management Mistakes’, the lead presentation was delivered by David Beere, a key member of the APM and a Contract Management expert with Corguv.
The main premise for the presentation was that within Project Management, and in particular Project Management of a commercial nature, good Contract Management and Procurement strategies are essential components of successful project delivery.
The presentation was a sometimes entertaining and at other times worrying journey through David’s own experiences of costly mistakes that he has come across in this arena as a Project Auditor. One particular example that stood out involved a client being charged £25 for a packet of Cigarettes. Not a big deal you might think in the context of a multi-million pound contract, but then when you consider that the company concerned sold 250,000 packs at this price, it tends to put a different complexion on things.
David then looked at ways of preventing such mistakes from happening, from making sure that contract scope is clearly defined to conducting vigorous checks on all invoices.
David made it clear that a lot of what he was going to discuss would seem like common sense, and he delivered it in such a way that it did It. This is to his credit, I should add. It is only when you begin to think in terms of project context that you can see why this is often such a muddled and grey area, and why so many projects go off track because of it.
All in all a very entertaining and informative session, and a good turn out for a rainy Monday evening in Manchester. If you get chance to see this presentation over the coming months I’d certainly recommend it.
