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Top six change and big movements elsewhere
Two new comers to the top six; 'Beagle 2' from Interserve come in at 5th place up from 11th and 'AECOMplete Shambles' from AECOM come in at 6th up from 8th. Losing out are 'Arup Infrastructure London Group II' down from 3rd to 8th and 'Construction Brilliant Innovation ' of CB&I down from 6th to 10th. The other four staying in the top six places have shuffled their places 'Singularity' of Atkins India remains 1st, 'Strike while the iron is Mott' from Mott Mac is up to 2nd from 5th 'Ubiquitous' of Atkins India is up to 3rd from 4th and 'Amazing' of Atkins Asia Pacific is down to 4th from 2nd. With the Atkins India and Atkins Asia Pacific having three in the top six the Atkins family is well represented and maintain their recent good record of getting teams to the final.
From memory Interserve and AECOM haven't had a team in the final in recent years so you can see the reason for their motivation. Arup who are currently the best performing MERIT sponsor with 3 Championships and three Sponsors Awards have their highest team at 8th so they still seem intent on defending their record. AURECON who have had three teams into the final have their highest placed team at 16 so we may well see an AURECON finalist.
The game is still on, there are still big movements see 'Savants' of Atkins India, 'AECOM and get some', 'The Brains to Pick' from WSP and 'Chicken DALfrezi from Donaldson Associates as examples. There are some 16 teams with movements of 20 or more places. A couple more surges of that scale and the top order will be challenged.
The ratio of turnover to company capital is an important indicator at a level of 9 times the company capital the questions start to be raised as to whether your company have enough assets to support its work load. But it also indicates that the company capital is working hard. If the ratio is much lower say 5 it indicates that the company capital is not working hard and your Finance Director need to consider how to respond. Grow the company's turnover, invest the capital outside the company or reduce the capital. It is not only the construction side of estimating and competing projects that determine a successful company. The financial side is equally important.
Four more rounds plenty of time.
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More Ups and Downs
Five of the top six remain there. 'Amazing' of Atkins Asia Pacific who were first two periods ago and last period slipped to 11th bounced straight back to 2nd. The shock of slipping probably produced a lot of late nights modelling their response. Atkins Asia Pacific has a great record in MERIT and have had teams in the final several times over recent years but they haven't yet produced a Champion and their eye is on the big prize. 'Singularity' of Atkins India climb from 3rd to 1st whilst their colleagues 'Ubiquitous' of Atkins India slip from 2nd to 4th. Atkins India also have a great record and have had teams in the final too and are keen to produce the first India Champion colleagues. Arup's 'Arup Infrastructure Group II' move up one to 3rd splitting the two Atkins India teams. The Arup team has started us thinking about a prize for the slickest team name! Mott MacDonald's 'Strike whilst the iron is Mott' are down from 1st to 5th. CB&I's 'Construction Brilliant Innovation' are down one at 6th and the former 6th place 'Team 7' of Subsea 7 slip out of the top six to 9th.
The big movements are below the top six see Aurecon's 'CONSTRUCTICONS' and 'CAPITAlized' of Capita Property & Infrastructure as two examples of major movements and with a good number of teams moving more than 20 places there is still a great churning going on and the top six are by no means safe . It becomes increasingly difficult to consolidate in the leading positions, nervousness creeps in and decisions tend to become cautious resulting in more adventurous teams catching and overtaking.
The average improvement this time was 16%
There are many decisions to get right and one is the project manager. A project manager whose experience is well suited to the project will produce a more efficient project with lower costs. A project manager whose experience is not well suited to the project will manage the project less effectively. This can be exaggerated if the project is far from Head Office where there may be less direct contact. So the well experienced project managers should be on the distant projects and the less experienced closer to home.
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Great turbulence
The initial comment on the preliminary results for Period 6 is look at the turbulence. The average improvement is just over 17% with the range being from mid thirties to -14%. The result is that positions have been changed in the rank order by as much as over thirty places. Those that have moved up will be greatly encouraged, they only need to do it again and again and they soon will be competing with the leaders. The comment in Period 5 that no one was out of it still holds for Period 6. But as there are many moving up there are those going the other way and a thirty place slip has occurred as has a thirty place improvement. For those moving in the wrong direction there is no reason why it can't be recovered. But the evidence is clear that the pecking order is far from stable and there are six rounds to go.
The current top six have three teams that weren't in the top six in the last round. It is now UK, India, India, UK, Netherlands and UK with Hong Kong, Australia and Qatar slipping out.
The game is the same but there are many decisions to get right. Make sure that you make enough estimating effort to give an estimate you can have confidence in. If you're not winning your bids it's because you're not competitive, your margins may be too ambitions but these need to be added to a sound estimate. If the estimate isn't sound it may be too high and uncompetitive, it may be too low and unrealistic, so you need adequate estimating effort. Also watch the relationship between turnover and capital. If your turnover is low your capital isn't working hard enough. There may be better things you can do with your capital.
Who'll end up in the top six? It's anyone's guess as it's still wide open.