Project Planning and Management: Lessons Learned from Successful and Failed Football Stadium Projects

In this assignment we will discuss about project planning management and below are the summaries point:- The report compares two construction projects, Wembley Stadium and Emirates Stadium, to analyze project management areas. The Emirates Stadium project was successful, completed on time and within budget, while the Wembley Stadium project faced delays and failure due to mismanagement of risks and changes in scope. Proper planning, sufficient time and resources, clear structure, goals, deliverables, risk assessment and management are crucial for successful project management. Recommendations are made based on the analysis.

Contents
Executive Summary...............................................................................................................................2
Introduction..............................................................................................................................................3
Project Scope..........................................................................................................................................3
WBS...........................................................................................................................................................4
Methodology............................................................................................................................................5
Budget.......................................................................................................................................................7
Project Life Cycle....................................................................................................................................9
Constraints...............................................................................................................................................9
Stakeholder Analysis...........................................................................................................................10
Causes of Project Failure...................................................................................................................10
Limitations..............................................................................................................................................11
Recommendations...............................................................................................................................11
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................11
References.............................................................................................................................................13
Project Planning and Management

Executive Summary
This report is based on project management in which comparison of two projects of
same nature is done under the areas of project management. Projects of discussion of
this report are from construction industry and these are two football stadium; one is
Wembley stadium and other is Emirates Stadium. Reason of comparing these two
projects is one project was successful and other was not successful. Emirates project
was successful as it project management areas were properly used so it was completed
in time within estimated budget without facing any big constraint but project of Wembley
stadium faced many issues which results in its failure and it was delayed due to change
in scope, conflicts between subcontractor of steel and main contractor. There was also
lack of communication and problem in information flow as well. Stakeholders were not
informed properly and on time so these all issues along with accident of health and
safety results in project delay.
Recommendations are made after the analysis of projects in different perspectives and
it is concluded that it is important to have proper planning of any project and there
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should be sufficient time and resources as well needed to achieve the objectives of
project. Limitations of the study are also discussed.
Introduction
Project management can be defined as management of different set of activities while
managing a projects to achieve desired objectives of that project. It involves planning,
coordination and control from start to end of the project (Gido.et al, 2014). It is important
for any project to have clear structure, goals, deliverables, transparency, risk
assessment and its management. This report based on project management areas by
doing comparison of two projects of same nature. Projects discussed in this report are
to football stadiums and industry is construction so construction of Wembley and
Emirates stadium will be critically analysed under the areas of project management.
Wembley project was failed and unable to meet the project deliverables in certain time
due to mismanagement of risks (Basu, 2014). The Emirates stadium is located in
London and it is the home of Arsenal FC.
There are certain reasons of failure of Wembley stadium was identified which are
critically analysed in this report and conclusion is made on the basis of project
management areas and recommendations are made by keeping in view the factors
involved in success or failure of projects.
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Project Scope
Project scope is crucial and important step in the successful execution of project (IPM,
2022). It is comprised of plan scope management, collection of requirement, defining
the scope, creating WBS (Work breakdown structure) validity of scope and control (IPM,
2022).
Project scope of Emirates stadium was according to its deliverables and planning while
scope of Wembley stadium was changed again and again during the project as its
design was changed from the design which was initially selected and one of the key
reason of delay in project was change in scope of the project (Swmoore, 2011). It is
important to have clear project scope from the start to complete the project objectives
and milestone on time.
Image source: (IMP, 2022)
WBS
WBS (Work breakdown structure) can be defined as breaking down project into smaller
components. Benefit of breaking down project into smaller sections helps to achieve the
objectives of project and it becomes easy to manage projects at each level. It is
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basically a hierarchical division of projects into phases and in the image below work
breakdown structure of Wembley stadium is attached which is divided into different
tasks and sub tasks.
Methodology
Project Methodology can be referred as combination of practices, rules, techniques,
methods and procedures used to plan, execute and manage the projects (Cote,
2022) .Project management methodology is used to complete and deliver the
completed projects to customer (Koggalahewa and Abeysekara, 2022). Methodology
used in both projects Emirates and Wembley is Waterfall methodology as both are from
construction industry. Waterfall methodology Design contract was signed by Sir Robert
Alpine for worth of £220m and conception stage spanning was 5 years. Entire estimated
cost of project was £390m (Arsenal, 2007) and 2500 legal documents were signed.
Methodology in Wembley was also waterfall and faced implications due to this method
but there was lack of review in different stages and project also faced issues like delay.
Wembley stadium took more time than its estimated time and cost was also double than
initial estimation (Swmoore, 2011). There were also problem of information flow
(Swmoore, 2011) so this was also one of the reason of failures and this is the reason
structure of organisation and flow of information within the organisation matters because
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when right information is shared through right channel it become easy to understand
and manage things. An Australian construction company Multiplex has blamed that
there were many problems in projects that lead to delay. Problems highlighted by them
were shortage of steel due to rise in prices of steel. Original cost of project was 757
million and contract was fixed but project ended up with 100 million loss (Ladika, 2007).
Image Source: (Waseem, 2022)
Waterfall methodology has three basic principles and it divides operations into phases
so they can be easily achieved, there is minimum involvement of customers in this
methodology and in involves robust documentation of all processes (Waseem, 2022).
There are five stages of waterfall methodology, first one is requirement in which
requirement of project is checked and what are the things required for the project,
second stage is design and in this stage architectural work is done that what would be
the design of stadium or any other project and in this report at this stage designs of
Emirates stadium and Wembley stadium were finalized which later on changed the
scope of Wembley and it resulted in delay of project. Third stage is implementation in
which work is implemented and tasks are divided with proper briefing and execution of
tasks and after that there is stage of verification in which different achieved objectives or
deliverables are verified and final step is of maintenance which is important to keep the
project active and in working condition.
Emirates stadiums project also used waterfall methodology and it was planned
executed and delivered on time. Most important factors in success of any project are its
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operations and way to manage those operation by improving the efficiency (OGC,
2009).
Risk assessment is also one of the main factor in any project and in a life cycle of
project risks should be assessed and managed on time so further delays or
cancellations can be avoided. Risks are part of the project and they can come at any
stage but the important thing here for project manager is to manage and handle those
risk before any issue any it is seen in Wembley stadium’s construction and incident was
happened and a person was killed when 303Kg section fell on him (IPM, 2020), so here
comes another factor of health and safety that project managers should assure the
health and safety of their labor force and all people working in project. Major problems
identified in Wembley stadium construction are time, cost, scope, quality and
stakeholder’s engagement (Carter, 2002).
Image Source: (Wilks, 2015)
Budget
Budget or cost is estimated and then approved that how much cost is required at each
level or stage to complete the projects within certain time. As it can see in the graphical
representation and values of Wembley project that cost was increased too much from
estimated value so it resulted in loss.
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Image Source: (PMO, 2022)
Cost management comprised of four stages and these are cost management plan setup
and it starts while project works begins. It clearly shows how cost of project will be
managed (PMO, 2022). It involves different types of costs used in project Second stage
is cost estimation and budgeting in which a cost is estimated for the project and it is not
the final as in real process may fluctuate but it is a forecast which should be near to
reality. Cost is divided into different stages and budget is allocated for different activities
at different levels. There are different methods to estimate cost for projects and these
are matrix method, bottom-up estimate, top down estimate and analogous estimate.
Third stage is cost control which is quite important as real cost differs from estimated as
in case of Wembley stadium there was a huge difference in estimated cost and real cost
(Wilks, 2015). It is important to check where cost differs and it is even more important to
know manage those deviation in cost in correct way (PMO, 2022). Last stage is cost
reporting because it provides tracking of cost allocated and utilized on each stage and
activity (Cronier & Dard, 2022).
Cost of Wembley
Stadium
Cost of Emirates Stadium
Commenced 2002 2004
Planned Completion 2006 2006
Opened 2007 2006
Delay 1 year No delay
Estimated Cost £757m £390m approx.
Final Cost £1bn £390m
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Increased Cost 32%
As shown in above table date of project commencement was 2002 and completion was
planned on 2006 while it is completed in 2007 with the delay of 1 year. There was a
huge difference of estimated cost and actual cost an actual cost was 32% more than
estimated cost. Increase in cost and delay in project was due to constraints discussed.
Cost of Emirates stadium was almost the same as approximated and project was
completed with given time frame with all its deliverables and objectives so this is the
huge difference in both projects as one was delayed due to many reason and one was
completed on time without facing any issue and methodology of both projects was
same, so the point here is to have a clear and concise estimation of budget.
Project Life Cycle
Project life cycle can be referred as phases for delivering the successful project. It is
important to keep in view the stages of project cycle to avoid the wastage of money and
resources. These five stages helps project managers to avoid these risk and proper and
right allocation of money and resources. PMI has identified five key stages of project
management life cycle and these are project initiation, project planning, and project
execution project monitoring and control and project closure.
In this research project initiation was started at the level when it was decided to work on
Wembley stadium and Emirates stadium. After plan was made that how this result will
be conducted and how helping material will be used inform of articles, journals, case
studies and others. In panning basically things which are focused are what is going to
do in project, how it is going to do, when it will be done and how to know whether it is
done. Third stage is project execution in which tasks are created by team leaders and
communicated to stakeholder and all those people involved in tasks and briefing of
tasks is done at all level and everyone is clear about planning of project. In case of
Wembley planning was not done properly as flow of information was missing there but
in case of Emirates stadium proper communication was made. Fourth stage is
monitoring and controlling of project to know whether project is on right track or not.
Project managers make sure that project is according to plan and if it is not then what
are the issues. For this data is recorded and factsheets are created to track the
progress at each level and to monitor the performance. Last stage is project closure in
which job of project manager comes to an end.
Constraints
In case of Emirates stadium most of objectives were delivered on time but in mega
projects it is not always failure when project get little bit delayed due to certain real
reasons but in case of Emirates delivery of projects was very important as different
sessions and meeting was taken place (Harrison and Lock, 2004). In case of Wembley
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stadium there were issues of time, cost, scope, quality and stakeholder’s engagement
(Carter, 2002) as project was not executed and delivered on time as it cost was also
changed. There can be various factors that can cause change in cost as cost of
construction project in Gaza was over run (Enhassi et al., 2009) and other reasons can
be design change which we have seen in Wembley stadium construction (Harrison and
Lock, 2004).
There are three main constraints in any project and these are cost, time and quality.
These are known are triple constraints of project management. In the analysis of
Wembley stadium and Emirates stadium it can be noticed that major constraints faced
in Wembley stadium projects were cost and time. Actual cost was more than estimated
cost and time to complete the project was also more than estimated as it faced many
delays and problems. Time was also a big constraint here because of change in scope
of the project and it played a role in project delay as design of stadium was changed
again and again and stakeholders were also not communicated properly (Carter, 2002).
Stakeholder Analysis
Construction of Emirates stadium was started in 2004 and stakeholders involved in this
project were HOL sport, Buro Happold, Prater Ltd, local community and supporters as
well. There were many issue of stakeholder’s management in Wembley stadium as
there was no proper communication with stakeholders during changes in design.
Stakeholders’ management strategies are important in any project (Atkin & Brooks,
2003) and in Emirates stadium the one of the best thing was their engagement which
also helped the project in total quality management (TQM)
Causes of Project Failure
There are several reasons involved in the failure of Wembley stadium as
mismanagement of time, cost, scope and quality there are many other several reasons
like poor planning, poor leadership, and poor communication. For a project to be
successful it is important to do proper planning of its activities from start and it is also
important to give enough time and resources to planned activities to make it successful.
After the planning when projects starts it is important to track the activities to identify its
progress and to highlight issues if any (Finnerty, 2013). It helps to know the reason of
delay in projects and also helps in risk assessment in initial stages (Finnerty, 2013). It is
important for project managers to engage with stakeholders of projects to meet their
expectations. These all things found missing in Wembley stadium construction so it was
delayed. Other reasons of failure that can be analysed through discussion are lack of
change management because it is important to do change when there is need for
change according to situation. Methods, techniques and policies can be changed if one
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is not working so change is mandatory. Dispute between Multiplex and subcontractor
also lead to delay in project
Limitations
As both project are real time mega projects from the construction industry and while
searching data of these two projects enough resources were studies like case studies,
articles and blogs and have found adequate data as well but still there is much more
authentic data like cost budgeting was required in more details in the structure of CBS
(Cost breakdown structure). It is also important and can be more helpful if projects in
which we were personally involved are discussed so more detail can be interpret as we
know the exact situation.
Recommendations
After the analysis of two projects it can be recommended that it is important to have
right people in the project team. Based on the failure of Wembley stadium project
construction it is recommended to have clear instructions from the phase of initiation,
planning and execution. It is also recommended to involve stakeholders in the
discussion on different stages as it is seen in this project there was lack of stakeholder’s
engagement. Flow of information was also a big reason of reason of failure of this
project.
As project scope of Wembley stadium was changed again and again due to change in
design so it result in delay of project so it is recommended to have clear and concise
project scope while initiating project in its planning to avoid delays.
It is recommended to have proper planning, clear scope, and effective communication in
project management so projects can be successfully completed within given time frame.
It is also recommended to implement quality control systems to save time, cost and
ensure the quality of project. There should be a proper cost estimation techniques to
avoid such huge difference in actual and estimated cost which can result in loss. Costs
can be estimated and controlled by taking preventive measures.
These all recommendations are based on lacking project management areas. By
adopting these points in future it can be improved.
Conclusion
Project management gives proper direction and vision to managers which help them to
manage the projects (Newton, 2015). Success or failure of any project depends on the
projects managers, the way how they manage their projects so it is important for them
to plan properly before the initiation of any project. As it is analysed in this report that
how Wembley stadium project was failed due to lack of project management areas so it
can be analysed here for the success of project it is important to have proper planning
of any project and there should be sufficient time and resources as well needed to
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achieve the objectives of project. As it is witnessed there was lack of communication or
flow of information was also not efficient so it is important to have proper communication
and flow of information in departments so right information can be shared at right time
with right people.
It is important for project managers to take into account of all measures of projects like
planning, scheduling, execution, cost management and controlling, risk assessment,
and proper coordination and communication with all key stakeholders involved directly
in projects. This can help to complete the project within given time frame in allocated
budget by accomplishing all its objectives.
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References
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Swmoore (2011) “Project failure- Wembley Stadium”. Available from
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