Data drive decisions affecting the lifecycle of assets from planning through decommissioning. People then interpret and use data to manage processes established to maintain business objectives.

The integration of people, process and data is the foundation for effective safety-management systems, while simultaneously providing needed insights on the project, the program and operational health.

Today, much of these data sit in disparate sets that are manually integrated—often by more than one management group. There is no “one solution” that will fit every need; therefore, the journey begins with understanding the outcomes that drive business decisions to effectively reduce risk and to manage spend.

Too Late

Financial risk—and its effective management—are critical to increasing reliability and, ultimately, asset return on investment. A common thought in the industry is “I don’t know our budget is exceeded until it’s too late.” Project budgets that require inter-discipline coordination are often managed in parallel by the respective discipline, then rolled up into the overall budget.

To drive key business decisions, more efficient reporting and data accessibility is needed. The result is increased safety and reliability, while also efficiently managing and reducing spending.

Let’s start with a common challenge that exists throughout the industry today: evaluating the constraints/feasibility of a proposed development. All disciplines have a critical part in determining and delivering the successful business outcome, but first they must address if the project is feasible.

Respective budgets are managed in parallel with technical requirements. It is a challenging task to gather all the project data—GIS, financial, engineering, environmental, compliance, operations—efficiently and maintain it for the life of an asset.

Having all the data managed, integrated and visualized in one view is essential. To complete this, it is essential to understand the data that are driving the outcomes/decisions. This connects the data driving the decisions to address the casual factors at the onset.

Breaking Silos

The result is an optimized management of the spend, including large budget items, and planning, repair and maintenance across the network of assets. The picture of your managed, integrated and visualized data breaks down silos and improves collaboration between management and stakeholders and reduces associated financial and technical project risks.

However, the lingering question that needs to be answered throughout projects is outcomes, requiring management across all the disciplines to ensure timely, on-budget completion.

Data driving the questions/outcomes need to be identified so they can be mapped out to understand integration points, drive data management and integration strategies. Complexities are associated with the data driving the project and the ability for stakeholders to understand the status of their respective counterparts.

Defining the elements that are most likely to increase the risk of an unsuccessful outcome, like the project exceeding its budget, is part of the process. A “widget” or dashboard tool that tracks budgets through data provided by the project owner gives awareness to overspend in advance by displaying real-time financial trends.

Monitoring these trends in real time allows action to be taken well in advance to prevent or redirect prior to a spend bust. The “roll up” also provides the foundation for stronger collaboration among the stakeholders so each can see where its piece is in relation to the others.

As indicated earlier, the overall view is critical to understanding the big picture of data, both managed and integrated. The final step is the visualization or dashboard to provide the “view” of the desired outcomes.

The dashboard can then be shared with all stakeholders in a secure manner to enhance communication; reduce risk, including financial, operations and technical; and manage document change, driving accountability.

Sharing for Strength

Since all changes to the project are documented and shared among the entire project team electronically, a stronger management process is achieved.

From the feasibility analysis through construction, operation and decommissioning, all changes and communications are saved for the lifecycle of the asset. This is also of benefit in years to come, when personnel changes and the history of the project needs to be understood.

For fiscal management, having in one place all the data that affect the overall budget is essential. The life of the data begins with the feasibility and planning as project teams understand the challenges and build budgets to assess the financial return on investments. Each discipline is accountable for their respective scope and budget, but the project manager is responsible for the entire budget.

Senior management is provided the visualization to all the metrics that determine project success, so all stakeholders can more effectively communicate to ensure successful outcomes.

Projects vary in size, complexity and scope. With enhanced data management and integration strategies, there will be a reduction in financial and operational risk. Use of these strategies will also positively affect safety-management programs, including the management of change and integrity.

Compliance vs. Integrity

In today’s regulatory climate, the focus on data is making compliance more challenging and traceability, verification and usability are not easy to achieve with deprecated processes. Compliance requires a different view than integrity.

Leveraging asset knowledge, mapping the outcomes to provide the “view” and simultaneously utilizing this information, will lead to a reduction in risk, increased efficiencies and increased reliability to safer operations.

All business decisions, including compliance, are based on asset data. It is a challenging task to gather the data efficiently and maintain them for the life of an asset. Today, much of the data sit in disparate sets that are manually integrated—often by more than one management group. The potential for error is real.

There is no “one solution” that will fit every need. The journey begins with understanding the outcomes and the causal factors driving the risk to improve the business processes and decisions to effectively reduce risk. This process is essential to improving management of change-practices and safety-management programs.

Mary Campos is vice president of strategic programs for EXP Global Inc.