The volume of critical enterprise transformation initiatives has surged since 2020. Yet, it’s become dramatically more challenging to successfully execute those projects. One-third of executives we surveyed said it’s become more difficult—with only 15% of companies achieving key goals. Read the report to learn what project execution leaders are doing differently—and how your organization can join their ranks.
scope of research
Research Overview
To understand the challenges large companies face in executing mission-critical projects, we surveyed 404 senior executives, with $1 billion or more in revenue, in September 2022 across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific, and in four global industries.
companies
404
Companies surveyed
industries
4
Key industry sectors
revenue
$1B+
Annual revenue per company
our research
15
Only 15% of companies achieved all of their critical project goals
15%
our research
Only 15% of companies achieved all of their critical project goals and 24% say less than half of their projects were successful.
top challenges
Managing Hybrid Project Teams From Different Organizations
Pandemic-driven staffing shortages gave rise to a dynamic workforce model comprising both employees and outside consultants as well as hybrid teams working both at home and in the office.
Managing these complex dynamics made it very difficult to successfully complete projects and deliver the expected outcomes.
Top project execution challenges center around teams and talent:
54%
Coordinating people working at home and from offices
52%
Managing organizationally diverse teams
41%
Lack of capable project leaders
40%
Lack of capable talent in other key roles
Key factors increasing post-pandemic critical project difficulty include:
38%
Unrealistic project goals
36%
Poor tools for project collaboration
36%
Lack of adequate budget
35%
Abrupt changes in project goals
79%
what we’ve heard
79% of leaders say the ability to manager team members from multiple firms is an important or very important fact to project execution success.
Outside Consultants Are Expected To Comprise 48% of the Average Project Execution Team by 2024
0% Outside team members
2020
2021
2022
Key Insight
Managing teams with people from multiple firms is one of the biggest challenges but also one of the biggest contributors to successful project execution. In other words, it may not be easy — but it’s worth it.
scope of research
What Does It Take To Overcome the Challenges?
Strong project leadership, including the ability to manage hybrid and organizationally diverse teams, and great collaboration tools top the list of key success factors. Other factors include strong talent in other key project roles, realistic project goals at the outset, and the ability to handle abrupt changes in those goals.
3X
Project execution leaders are three times more likely than laggards to say their project managers have strong or extremely strong skills vs. weak or moderate skills
The impact of successful project execution goes beyond the benefits of any one initiative. Companies that deftly orchestrate organizationally diverse and hybrid teams have outperformed the competition since the pandemic began. Project execution leaders dramatically outperformed laggards in the market, increasing average market capitalization by 63% between 2017 and 2022, while the market cap of laggards declined 24% over that period.
3:4
Almost three-quarters of project execution leaders believe highly effective project managers give them a very strong competitive advantage
The biggest challenges today, by far, are managing the hybrid team with both remote and office workers and managing organizationally diverse teams. But if you get them right, they’re also the greatest competitive advantages.”
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