Meet the APM Project Management Awards 2022 winners

Change and transformation are the name of the game for this year’s impressive winners. Fearless innovators, the project professionals behind each award deserve congratulations for going the extra mile under extremely challenging circumstances. From defence projects to post‑disaster recovery, and retail to technology, the winning projects and professionals demonstrate just how critical their work is to all of us. Congratulations! And thanks to headline sponsor RPC.

Engineering, Construction and Infrastructure Project of the Year & Overall Project of the Year

Firemain Replacement Project, Heathrow Airport

Heathrow Airport has an extensive firemain system with 115km of pipework across the airport. Its purpose is to provide firefighting water to the runway, terminals and the businesses/facilities surrounding the airfield. Installed in the 1950s, some of the pipes and components had life‑expired. As a result, the resilience of the firemain was reduced and caused disruptions to the operations.

The replacement project was allowed an eight-week firemain isolation during which all the works required had to be completed. Meticulous planning on work activities and sequences was carried out among the teams. This was the first time in 70 years Heathrow had to carry out a full isolation on the firemain system. Coordinating with over 30 internal and external senior business colleagues to execute the contingency plans was a major achievement. The success of this complex and high-risk project is the outcome of effective governance, strong project leadership and the ‘can do’ attitude of the project team.

Risk management played a key role in the success of the project. The team was proud of the level of undertaking in the planning, mobilisation and deployment of the many contingencies across the multiple facilities to allow the firemain to be isolated. The project team and operational team worked together to collect information and identify all the affected parties. A contingency working group was set up with over 30 internal and external contingency leads to coordinate the individual contingency plans for eight months. Each individual plan was reviewed on its suitability and some of them had to be tested and proved before the execution.

The judges commented that “the focus on risk/contingency planning was excellent” and that “it is clear that the very challenging project stressed project management to its limit”.

Contribution to Project Management: Company or Consultancy

Project Delivery Directorate, Sellafield Ltd

Managing the UK’s nuclear legacy underpins the future of the industry, providing employment opportunities for generations to come. Project delivery is vital for Sellafield – ensuring new assets are available on time, fit for purpose and represent value for money, while maintaining nuclear safety and security. Sellafield’s project professionals comprise some 1,800 people internally and a further 4,000 in the supply chain. Sellafield continually strives to improve project performance. From individual professional development to client capability, it is raising standards and growing the next two generations of project professionals to come.

Sellafield provides a pathway from HNC to PhD through courses, professional qualifications, mentoring, professional accreditation and chartership. It has also been awarded APM Chartered Project Professional (ChPP) ‘Accredited Assessor’ status, meaning it is among a select few businesses able to deliver high‑level training and experience in project management. With the establishment of The Project Academy, with the support of APM and the University of Cumbria, this landmark achievement means Sellafield can now develop its project professionals, from entry-level apprentices through the APM Project Management Qualification and APM Accredited PM Level 1 Certification, all the way through to chartership. Sellafield currently has 68 ChPPs, and this is set to increase by 10 people a year.

The judges commented that there is a “well-structured development of the project profession in Sellafield. It covers the whole life cycle with career paths and with the supply chain. There is great training with internal staff and the supply chain to maximise the value and ensure the retention of good, well‑educated and professional staff.”

Contribution to Project Management: Small to Medium Enterprise

3PM

Sponsored by DE&S

Project and programme management consultancy 3PM manages the life cycle of projects of varied complexities across all stages and many sectors. It operates a flat structure that encourages every member of staff to become a trusted adviser to clients and enhance the value on its commissions through combined experience. The firm says that it is proud to have delivered many projects and change initiatives that have actively contributed to make the world a better place, including vaccines and cancer drug development facilities, world-class health facilities and two of the Green Building Council’s top greenest buildings in the world.

Its project managers have responsibility for the day-to-day management and accountability for their projects and are empowered to make decisions. “We are all accountable to each other and run regular project reviews and lessons learnt to ensure that this is done successfully,” it says. 3PM has created its Leadership Development Programme for its future project leaders and sponsors. Through training, mentoring and internal business projects, this programme rewards the stars of its business and helps it develop talent. The programme not only develops the talent of the individuals engaged in the process, the ‘ripple effect’ improves the organisation as they put lessons they have learned into practice. Project leadership at 3PM is outstanding because every team member is entrusted and encouraged to lead projects. Rather than assuming a single hierarchical structure, its circular approach means it is continually supporting and developing its talent and getting the most from its teams.

The judges were impressed by 3PM’s commitment to developing its people, right from apprentices up to supporting APM’s chartered status, and for “sharing their insights that contribute to academic research”.

Contribution to Project Management: Not-for-Profit

Defence Equipment & Support

Sponsored by PA

Defence Equipment & Support (DE&S) equips and supports the UK Armed Forces, managing an annual programme of work worth around £11bn and employing 3,000 people in project delivery. DE&S is accountable for delivering 36 projects in the Government Major Projects Portfolio. These include complex projects such as the delivery of the Queen Elizabeth‑class aircraft carriers, delivery of the P-8A Poseidon aircraft and spearheading the ventilator programme during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, DE&S working with its industry partners delivered £5.8bn in savings in the equipment plan 2015–2020, releasing much‑needed funding to support wider government challenges.

DE&S also reacts with agility and pace to new and emerging priorities. This has been demonstrated with DE&S’s response in the fight against COVID-19, where it delivered over four million items to the NHS, including personal protective equipment, 6,000 ventilators and 215 staff members to support other government departments and the NHS. DE&S has been able to respond to these priorities due to the maturity and talent of the organisation in its project delivery; and having the right people in the right place at the right time, with robust tools and project techniques. For example, in just 12 weeks, it delivered £170m of military capability to Ukraine alone.

The judges found that DE&S is “well established from a project delivery perspective and worthy of an APM Award”. They were impressed by the “sound vision of the importance of green issues, digitisation and social consciousness in project management”.

PMO of the Year

Openreach Fibre and Network Delivery PMO

Fibre and Network Delivery (FND) is Openreach’s largest business unit and aims to connect 25 million UK homes with fibre broadband by 2026. The FND Transformation team is responsible for transforming its processes, people and systems to enable the business’s key objectives of improved service, reduced cost to serve, and improved customer and colleague experience. In 2020, FND mobilised a business critical transformation programme with the key objective of reducing the business cost base by £500m. To ensure its success, it developed a brand-new PMO capability.

Its 18-strong PMO has six programmes and over 200 projects in delivery. Over the past two years, it has been on a transformation of its own, mobilising a minimal viable product service offering for one programme and, once established and proven, evolving its maturity, increasing both its service offering and widening its coverage. A priority action for the PMO was to mature its delivery life cycle, resulting in the Projects & Change Execution (PACE) framework for delivering transformation in a professional and standardised way. It defined the key stages, gates, deliverables and team engagement and codified Openreach knowledge and lessons. Each project requires up to 15 matrix teams to work together, and PACE ensures this consistently happens.

The judges commented on the “great journey” the PMO has been on, while “taking the change community with them as well”. The PMO was praised for how it “tackled the challenges of bringing more process by working on relationships and on accessible ways to bring benefits” and “finding the right team and generating joy in the work itself through bringing value and improving the organisation’s projects.”

Programme of the Year

Partners in Transformation: Openreach and Accenture

Openreach, part of BT, is rolling out fibre-optic broadband across the UK. Its goal is to connect 25 million homes by 2026 – and Openreach’s 12,000‑strong Fibre and Network Delivery (FND) unit is responsible for making it happen. To help meet this target, and reduce costs, FND and Accenture forged a unique collaboration in 2020 to create Rubix, a two-year, organisation-wide digital transformation.

Though implemented at the height of the pandemic, Rubix led to a doubling of connected homes, without needing extra engineers. It reduced costs by over £140m annually. Employee satisfaction increased, while complaints went down 90%.

The first objective of Rubix was to reduce costs to serve, including reducing failure points, streamlining processes and redesigning support functions. Its second objective was to create greater certainty for customers through smarter and more consistent ways of working to minimise the lulls between each stage in the ordering process; and by providing tools to enable a smarter field force able to resolve issues in the moment. Underpinning Rubix was a common set of enabling capabilities, including data science and visualisation, engineering, programme management, governance and change management. A value creation office was devised, charged with assessing and quantifying the anticipated benefits at every stage.

The judges found the programme to be “very well structured with great controls and measures to deliver the required benefits”. There was also a “novel use of a combination of waterfall and agile methods” and “uplift in productivity, business continuity and efficiency were clearly demonstrated”. Overall, this was “a highly successful digital infrastructure programme which will serve multiple stakeholders for a long time”.

Social Project of the Year

Anguilla Health Recovery – Post Hurricane Irma, Health Authority Anguilla

Sponsored by CITI

Anguilla has faced two formidable challenges within the past five years: the catastrophic category 5 hurricane Irma and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. By May 2018, the UK and Anguilla governments had signed a memorandum of understanding that established a £60m grant to ‘build back better’ over three years. Known as the Anguilla Programme, its aim was to deliver 24 projects by April 2021. The ministries of health, education and infrastructure identified projects to be funded, including the major refurbishment of Princess Alexandra Hospital’s main building.

Conlloyd Gumbs, Local Project Manager, Health Authority of Anguilla, explained that “the adoption of new practices that were inspired by APM was instrumental in guiding our project management team… Its methodological approach to guide funding bodies, project managers, health professionals, customers, the public, contributing departments, etc, was a crash course for an entire nation on the importance of project management. As a result of the benefits derived from the knowledge and skills obtained from the Anguilla Programme, our team now uses procedures to develop mini projects around the organisation. This includes the clear outlining of a project’s scope of works, financial forecasting, early warnings, project manager’s instructions, the use of educational resources (supplied by APM), and the adaptation of lessons learned from previous projects to carry forward and ensure the success of the projects and their sustainability within the organisation.” The health project was delivered on time and within budget.

The judges said that the “establishment of the project board and committees was very well done”, and that “great methodologies” were used to achieve the goals.

Technology Project of the Year

Heathrow Airport Terminal Drop-Off Charge, Heathrow Airport

Sponsored by BAE Systems

In 2021, Heathrow Airport launched its Terminal Drop-Off Charge (TDOC), a charge for drivers using the forecourts outside the terminal buildings to drop passengers off. Its purpose was to support Heathrow’s environmental objectives, encourage a shift towards sustainable forms of transport, improve air quality and contribute to decarbonisation. The TDOC was delivered from concept to launch over a 12-month programme. With technology at its core, the project required the installation and integration of multiple systems, including roadside infrastructure, back-office data processing systems, and digital tools to support operations and customers.

The TDOC was designed to maximise the use of technology, automation and data across the vehicle detection, customer channels, payment reconciliation and enforcement systems. Its aim was to improve the customer experience while minimising manual operation. As the project influenced a diverse range of external entities, the team had to engage with them and ensure all stakeholders involved were aware of potential impacts TDOC might have on their business and operations. It organised monthly workshop sessions and prepared bespoke engagement materials to key external stakeholders. Extensive internal stakeholder management was also conducted.

The judges commented that there was a “clear understanding of project management methodologies in a challenging set of circumstances” and that it was a “strong example of stakeholder management”.

Project Professional of the Year

Alexander Darvill, Integrated Project Team Leader, Project Orpheus, Rolls-Royce

Project Orpheus was a two-year collaborative experiment between Rolls‑Royce and the Ministry of Defence with the aim of demonstrating a radically transformative approach to the delivery of complex technology programmes. The project was launched in 2020 and delivered by Rolls-Royce Defence. To prove a totally novel approach to product development, the team was challenged to deliver a real project in half the time and half the cost of a typical programme. Two years on and Orpheus exceeded its original goals with key programmatic innovations being shared across Rolls‑Royce and UK industry.

Darvill was responsible for line management and programme management of the team, as well as leading the development of the ‘Orpheus Agile Operating Model’. “Orpheus was set up as an independent project team consisting of 50 members selected from across the business. I selected all team members and sought out individuals with diverse backgrounds, experiences and personalities. The result was a small, motivated and inherently creative team,” he explains. The project was co-led by Darvill, a Programme Executive and a Chief Design Engineer, who ran it as “an internal start-up”.

“A mindset change towards ‘agile’ ways of working was the most important factor in the success of the project… Everyone was able to have their voice heard and trusted they would be listened to,” says Darvill. “The outcome I am most proud of is proving to the team that we could overcome any challenge. Whether it be national COVID-19 lockdowns, supply-chain issues or organisational headwinds, we beat them as a team.”

The judges found “good evidence of personal growth and development, and bringing in new ways of working”.

Transformation Project of the Year

Project Orpheus, Rolls-Royce

Sponsored by Qinetiq

As the MOD and UK industry starts development of the sixth‑generation Tempest fighter aircraft, the MOD is challenging industry to find new ways of working to deliver substantially reduced costs and timescales. Project Orpheus was set up to answer this challenge – a two-year collaborative experiment between Rolls-Royce and the MOD with the aim of demonstrating a radically transformative approach to the delivery of complex technology programmes. The team was challenged to deliver a real project in half the time and at half the cost of previous performance. The project was the delivery of a working demonstrator for a new gas turbine that offers the best efficiency in its market segment. Orpheus exceeded its original goals with key programmatic innovations being shared across Rolls‑Royce and UK industry.

The team was treated as an “internal start-up”, empowered to define its own processes. Roles were redefined to match the needs of the project rather than legacy assumptions, and the team was allowed to cross-skill and upskill to solve problems. A mindset change towards more agile ways of working was the most important factor in the success of the project. An adaptation of Scrum Agile was deployed from the start of the project. This resulted in the Orpheus Agile operating model, which combined Rolls‑Royce best practice and adaptations of Scrum@Scale, Scaled Agile Framework and Rapid Learning Cycles. Orpheus was successful in validating not only engineering design methods, but also that agile methods could be applied and adapted to the development of a complex hardware system.

Comments from the judges included: “A terrific explanation of how Rolls‑Royce tore up the rule book… freeing their team to think differently and deliver amazing results.” It created “a clear legacy of a new way of working across the organisation”.

Young Project Professional of the Year

Rose Young, No7 Beauty Company

Sponsored by QA

As Portfolio Delivery Manager, Gift, Rose Young is responsible for the No7 Beauty Company Holiday Programme, which encompasses nine individual projects, spanning global markets and comprising 50 million unit components. The programme is renowned internally for its complexity and siloed processes. Young shows tenacity and enthusiasm in her leadership of the programme, driving for simplification, challenging norms and engaging the full team.

The ‘Golden Quarter’ of retail for Christmas falls between September and December, and the 2021 programme was the most challenging yet, impacted by Brexit and the pandemic. Issues included logistics challenges, labour shortages, double-digit cost inflations, extended raw material and component lead times and continued lockdowns, compounded by manufacturing capacity challenges. The objective was to deliver over three million finished gift items. For 2021 the programme successfully delivered $3.4m over-target revenue and $5m over-target profit, and Young was key in keeping the programme on track.

Young joined the company via the graduate scheme in 2019, eventually becoming a Project Delivery Manager before quickly progressing to Portfolio Delivery Manager within less than a year. At only 24, she gained her own team to lead, stepping up to bridge communications between the operational, commercial and customer teams at a pivotal point in the programme.

The judges found that Young demonstrated “a thorough understanding of project management methodology” and praised her “understanding of the challenges faced as part of the programme, mitigation strategies adopted to overcome them and good awareness of lessons learned”.

Safe Project Management Award

Greater Tortue Ahmeyim Quarters and Utilities Platform, BP

Sponsored by Shell

GTA Quarters and Utilities Platform was designed and built by Yantai CIMC Raffles Offshore, the first time BP had awarded an engineering, procurement, construction and commissioning contract directly to a Chinese contractor for an offshore facility. Greater Tortue Ahmeyim Phase 1 megaproject is a multibillion‑dollar integrated gas development hub off Mauritania and Senegal, consisting of deep‑water wells, subsea infrastructure, a floating liquefied natural gas production facility and more.

The project was used as a demonstrator for new ways of working to elevate safety standards on‑site. The project team nurtured a safety culture that evolved from an initially pathological to a truly generative one that delivered the project without any lost time incidents. BP formed an integrated project management team with KBR to manage the project and, following contract award, it became apparent that achieving the zero harm goal would require significant collaboration.

The BP Project Delivery Manager, based on‑site, was also the designated Site Safety Leader, accountable for safety performance for the project. Focusing first on transforming compliance and enforcement of safety rules, a process of contractor self-verification and client oversight was established to ensure the project safety procedures were being implemented by everyone on the project. During three years, there were no lost time injuries and no uncontained environmental releases. The project achieved a total recordable injury rate of 0.09, making the project result an exceptional achievement in a Chinese shipyard.

The judges commented that the project showed an “excellent result in a challenging environment” and “courage to do the right thing”.

Innovation in Project Management

Cyber Resilience Programme, Atkins, a member of the SNC‑Lavalin Group

Sponsored by Rider Levett Bucknall

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) established the Cyber Resilience Programme (CRP) to reduce cybersecurity risk, protect critical assets and systems, and improve cyber culture and awareness across defence. Atkins secured an 18-month contract to help establish the 10-year programme.

Encouraging agility, each project was empowered to adopt ways of working to suit the nature of their topic – with overall coherence provided though programme controls. Using innovative methodologies including behavioural science techniques, the team delivered effective quick wins. Working closely with governance areas, the team developed an efficient and tailored approvals strategy which ultimately achieved a delegated strategy to enable the programme to progress rapidly and achieve incremental risk reduction in parallel. CRP governance was formalised to guide performance management practices, including change control processes, board/review meetings and escalation routes.

Creating blended teams with different backgrounds and skill sets not only within Atkins, but across the supply chain, the CRP encouraged an innovative culture resulting in the development of a variety of creative and high-profile initiatives. Individuals were given the freedom and support to think outside the box and take ownership of projects. In a first for the MOD, the CRP implemented a 30-day bug bounty programme to expose vulnerabilities in one of its applications before they could be exploited by UK adversaries. Although just two years into the 10-year programme, key outputs and results have been delivered on time, on budget and to the required standard.

The judges said that: “The need for this programme is very high, and not just in the special areas of the MOD, but in all society. This was a great example of how a response to this threat can be mobilised and organised.”

APM Outstanding Achievement Award

Nick Smallwood

There are no formal criteria for this award, but the expectation is clearly that the individual needs to have delivered something extra special for the profession. The winner of this highly prized accolade is debated and decided by the APM Board of Trustees. This year, they recommended Nick Smallwood, Chief Executive Officer of the Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) and head of the government’s Project Delivery Function, who has worked tirelessly to enhance the role and understanding of projects at the highest levels of UK government, and who exemplifies the power of projects to benefit society.

In his role at the IPA, Smallwood has overseen the launch of its ‘Transforming Infrastructure Performance: Roadmap to 2030’ strategy, as well as the launch of the Government Projects Academy, which is dedicated to improving project delivery skills for professionals across government, to increase the capacity and capability to improve the delivery of public projects. These measures and more are helping to create a world where government projects succeed and those delivering them can be at their best. Smallwood’s work at the IPA has also seen its biggest ever Government Major Projects Portfolio, while simultaneously improving on deliverability, with more amber and green projects.