There’s increasing awareness about digital technology in project management, about how the features of a project management information system impact project controls and performance and how a digital project management system can enhance EPC project delivery from design to handoff. In other words, a PMIS in project management is gaining acceptance as the most effective way to digitze project controls and performance management. However, there are also some concerns EPC organisations face.

Two oft-cited concerns, which are quite justified, are scalability and integration. Not all project management information systems available on the market are scalable or easily integrated into the existing systems. Before you get carried away by the features of a PMIS, pay attention to how that system can scale up, or down. Using it on one small project may be fine, but can it be used on a complex project portfolio across locations and/or verticals? Will it be able to handle multicultural teams across geographies? What about the opposite: is it too unwieldy for use on a single small project? And when it comes to integrating the PMIS with other enterprise systems/applications/tools, be prepared for significant roadblocks including the manual transfer of legacy data. In larger organisations this alone can be a deal-breaker.  The good news is that most PMIS developers are well aware of these bottlenecks, and with increased attention on PMIS in project management (and on digital project management systems in general), we can hope to see solutions that will resolve these concerns once and for all.

In the meantime EPC companies should educate themselves about the current technology trends and how they pertain to PMIS. There is no point investing in a PMIS which becomes outdated in a couple of years.

For example, nowadays there’s great deal of buzz around AI and Machine Learning. Some of the more advanced PMIS have started incorporating this into their base architecture. What that means is: project controls and performance management will in the future be powered by AI and ML and not just human intelligence. Companies will be able to leverage predictive analytics and intelligent automation to optimise various aspects of their project management process, including how they plan and allocate project resources, how they monitor and forecast project outcomes, risk management, and so on. AI-powered PMIS and digital project management systems will without doubt help project managers, by increasing the opportunities for data-driven decision-making at the task, project, and even enterprise level. And of course this will greatly improve the overall performance and influence successful project deliveries.

Another trend that’s slowly gaining traction is integrated eco-systems for project management. This is due to the rise of integrated approaches to PMIS itself, with developers streamlining data transfers between hitherto silo-ed applications  throughout the project lifecycle, hoping to enhance collaboration between internal departments and between internal and external teams. Such eco-systems are most likely the future of project management, as they offer huge benefits in the way of profitable resource management and informed decision-making as well as leading to increased organisational efficiency and productivity at every phase of a project.

Other trends to keep an eye out for are Blockchain Technology, which is an advanced database mechanism/methodology. In simple words, a blockchain database stores its data within ‘blocks’ and those blocks are linked into a ‘chain’ ie blockchain. A block cannot be deleted or modified without affecting the entire chain, making the data chronologically consistent. This makes it very useful in time-sensitive applications like order management, payments/invoice tracking, and other transactional or procurement-related tasks. A PMIS system that uses blockchain technology would naturally be far more trustworthy and reliable, and streamline the way the organisation approaches project controls and performance management.

Some include Virtual Reality as a trend, and although its footprint in PMIS so far is debatable, it cannot be denied that if VR and AR technologies were  indeed to be incorporated into PMIS, they would no doubt revolutionize the way an organisation visualised its projects, project controls, and performance management. Consider how effective an immersive project experience or the ability to simulate project scenarios would be – not just within the organisation but for clients and other stakeholders. It would revolutionise project collaboration as well, and this would in turn change project outcomes for the better.

There is also the trend of Natural Language Processing (NLP), which in a PMIS context would lend itself to extremely intuitive interactions for users trying to access and manage project data. By using natural language commands and queries in search functions, for example, the user experience would become practically effortless, which is a far cry from what it was a few years ago when data was stored in individual non-linked spreadsheets and word documents, or in some cases is so even today.  Advanced PMIS are also heading towards a paradigm where NLP-powered chatbots and virtual assistants replace the tedious and time-consuming tasks that go into data analysis, and this will allow stakeholders to ask questions and answer questions comfortably in real time, as well as generate reports, receive and transmit updates and notifications and so on much more intuitively. As such, the impact of NLP on project controls and performance management cannot be overstated.

There are other trends of course, in data privacy and cyber security, and in aspects of project management related to the environment and sustainability, but these are large topics and cannot be covered in a single post.  Suffice it to say that it would be wise for EPC organisations to acquaint themselves with all the current trends in digital technology and learn to gauge how it will affect their specific PMIS and their specific organisations.