Olfa Hamdi is the co-founder of Concord^® Project Technologies and the founding executive director of the Institute for Advanced Work Packaging. She was a member of the CII research team that produced IR-272, and is now leading the movement for predictable, integrated, technology-driven capital projects management. Her first book, Advanced Work Packaging: Guide for Life Cycle Implementation is due out this month.

Discover how Concord^® is becoming the most valuable consulting company in the capital project industry

More than a decade ago, I was an analyst at a major benchmarking, research and consulting organization where I spent most of my time auditing capital projects. One day, as I wrapped up a particularly challenging engagement, I sat back, let out a deep sigh and thought: there must be a better way.

After just a few years in our industry, it was already very clear to me that organizations needed something more, something different than what we offered. Companies — their owners, their leaders, their people — needed an empowering, supportive partner with skin in the game, a consulting company driven by innovation and committed to helping them achieve on-time, on-budget project delivery. While it took some time for Concord^® to become a reality, I realize looking back that this was the moment that our company was born.

Today, we have built a strong reputation as a leader in the field and are focused on building the most valuable consulting company in the industry. We’ve made steady progress in uncovering and documenting the formula for delivering capital projects on-time and on-budget, building on the early principles of Advanced Work Packaging to develop a robust suite of concepts, tools, services and training options that empower teams to deliver predictable, construction-driven projects.

From thought leadership and training to practical services like executive coaching, readiness assessments and startup packages, we support companies as they build their own internal capacity to deliver on-time and on-budget. The Concord^® Academy has trained and certified thousands of professionals from some of the biggest capital project organizations in the world, and we aim to certify 25,000 professionals in the next three years. Our dedication to quality and customer service was recently recognized with an ISO9001 certification, and our goal now is to impact $25 Billion in capital project spending by 2025.

Perhaps the greatest challenge we’ve encountered in our business journey is resistance to change — from owners, from leaders, and from the people who build capital projects. Delays and cost overruns are so common it seems we’ve come to accept them as a part of doing business — but they’re not. We have put people on the moon, and we can deliver capital projects on-time and on-budget. There is a better way.

If you believe that too, we’d love to work with you.

Concord^® has invested more than any other company in developing practical, implementable knowledge products that support real change in capital project organizations; we are on a mission to empower your people with the knowledge and skills they need to deliver on-time and on-budget. 

In this edition of Velocity^®, we’ll explore the key ways that Concord^® supports Owner companies and capital project leaders in executing predictable capital projects. I hope you find it enlightening and inspiring.