Construction, real estate, infrastructure and project (CRIP) management
Virtual special issue
Emerging markets case studies
This is a virtual special issue of Emerging Markets Case Studies (EMCS) which brings together a collection of teaching case studies on construction, real estate, infrastructure and project (CRIP) management.
The role of infrastructure in economic development has been widely discussed (Aschauer, 1989; World Bank, 1994; Chakamera & Alagidede, 2018). Infrastructure is a broad term and can be divided into two components: economic infrastructure and social infrastructure. Economic infrastructure, such as roads, airports, etc. influences economic development directly while social infrastructure such as healthcare, education, etc. influences economic development through the spillover effect.
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Post the financial crisis of 2008, global infrastructure spending increased and by 2019, it stabilised at 3% of global GDP. A major part of this investment was committed to developing economies. COVID-19 disrupted this growth trajectory and posed various project risks such as delayed completion due to challenges of labor availability, lockdown restrictions, fund availability, and other constraints. Also, this pandemic forced policymakers of many economies to realise the importance of infrastructure, particularly health infrastructure, in handling such a crisis.
Construction, real estate, infrastructure, and project (CRIP) management includes the management of human and non-human resources of a firm. For successful project completion, managers are required to optimise the utilisation of each resource. Managers encounter numerous challenges including planning, scheduling, cost control, timely delivery, meeting contract obligations, etc. This special issue documents the dilemmas managers face in managing their projects across the construction, real estate, and infrastructure domains.
Guest editor
Dr Rajni Kant Rajhans, Dean- Research & Development, NICMAR University, Pune, India.
Dreaming of profit: case of Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited
Authors: Raja Sekhar Mamillapalli, Hanumantha Rao Pusarla
Subject area: Accounting and Finance
BMRCL has been struggling to perform as per projections made in the initial detailed project report. The situation has further worsened because of the COVID-19 pandemic and its post-impact on the overall economic level of activity. Ramana Rao, the consultant for infrastructure projects, was worried after reading a news article which deemed the project a white elephant. Various articles published in the newspaper also reported that BMRCL was incurring a loss of Rs 45 lakhs every day. The consultant worried about the sustainability of the project. He wanted new ideas and plans which could turn around these losses and convert them into profitable ones. He, however, does not have any immediate plans to execute and is therefore in a dilemma about how a project that was launched with so much fanfare could be made profitable. Because of COVID-19 pandemic, BMRCL’s financial situation, which although improving, had taken a significant hit. It looked like the corporation might need government assistance to cover its losses. The transport utility suffered a loss of Rs 170 crore, as a result of a decline in ridership as well as other revenue sources including parking fees and leasing revenues. This amounted to a daily loss of Rs 1 crore. The pressure on revenues was putting the officials in a tight spot about meeting the company’s debt obligations and market borrowings.
Stakeholder management challenges in a health-care medical device project in India – an SME perspective
Author: Amrinder Kaur
Subject area: Operations and Logistics
The case of ‘Hospedia Medicare,’ a medical device manufacturing company based in India, was started by a family involved in the medical devices business for over two decades. The company began operations in a new avatar and focused on one medical device or product by 2013. The product was designed with quality features to solve customer problems, making the cost relatively high compared to other domestic peers. Creating new product lines or updating the existing product attributes was imperative for the company to attain its growth objectives. The protagonist was dealing with a dilemma involving managing various stakeholders, aligning the project scope to create a growth story for the company in line with its vision and managing the stakeholders by understanding and analyzing their needs, expectations and interest, thus influencing the project outcome. The case can be used by instructors to identify, understand and evaluate the importance of different stakeholders on project outcome or success. Furthermore, it can be used to analyze and critique the impact of stakeholders on project scope, which can affect the long-term sustainability of the company, as different stakeholders have different expectations and needs. The case also details how regular communication, collaboration and awareness became essential for the project's success. Lack of an effective engagement strategy at the project planning stage can have risks concerning cost and achieving the overall vision, which creates a positive outcome for all the stakeholders.
Gren “fuelled” by fire: lessons for project management
Authors: Prashanth Kumar Sreram, Savitha Chilakamarri
Subject area: Built Environment
On 14th June 2017, the Grenfell Tower in North Kensington, West London, UK, caught fire. The fire raged for 60 h and around 72 people lost their lives. Many criticized the response of the London Fire Brigade (LFB) and their lack of preparedness to respond to such an emergency. There were calls for Dany Cotton, the Chief of LFB, to resign. However, there had been a major cladding-related refurbishment at Grenfell, and subsequent investigations revealed that the use of combustible materials, a lack of compliance with the fire-safety norms and a blatant disregard for resident safety had contributed to the fire. The tragedy was a cumulative outcome of failure on two counts: effective project management and stakeholder management during the process of refurbishment, especially in the context of a low-cost housing project. Given this situation, this case considers whether Dany Cotton should own up to her responsibility and resign from her position. In the process, the case considers Grenfell refurbishment from the theoretical lens of project management in the construction management scenario to understand the factors that could have led to an “avoidable” tragedy.
Moresa: confronting risks in a highly uncertain environment
Authors: Juan Ernesto Perez Perez
Subject area: CSS 2: Built Environment
MORESA S.A.S was a family company founded in 1994, whose value proposition focused on construction and permanent advice for the execution of innovative and contemporary projects with more than 27 years of experience in the city of San José de Cucuta, department of Norte de Santander, Colombia. The objective of the case is to Relate risk as one of the 12 principles in project management contemplated in the international standards of the PMBOK Seventh Edition guide; Determine high-level risks by articulating the WBS and RBS of a construction project; Perform a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the probability and impact of risks through the heat map tool and the Expected Monetary Value (EMV) technique and propose the different response strategies contemplated in the risk management through the formulation of a response and contingency plan. The teaching case is designed for academic programs in areas of knowledge of civil engineering, architecture and at postgraduate level such as: Master’s in civil engineering, Master’s in risk management, Master in project management or MBA. For this case, an expert judgment was developed with professionals belonging to different areas of knowledge. Likewise, secondary information was collected from the organization's strategic documents and the analogous estimation through the historical records of the project portfolio developed by the construction company. Finally, the case, classified in the Built Environment, a challenge that project managers must face in VUCA environment through risk management.