The secrets to successfully planning and delivering projects on any
scale--from home renovation to space exploration--by the world's leading
expert on megaprojects
"This book is important, timely, instructive, and entertaining. What
more could you ask for?"--Daniel Kahneman, Nobel Prize-winning author of
Thinking, Fast and Slow
"Over-budget and over-schedule is an inevitability. Incompetence and
grift is outrageous. Bent Flyvbjerg, with this terrific data-driven
book, has shown that there is another way."--Frank Gehry
Nothing is more inspiring than a big vision that becomes a triumphant,
new reality. Think of how the Empire State Building went from a sketch
to the jewel of New York's skyline in twenty-one months, or how Apple's
iPod went from a project with a single employee to a product launch in
eleven months.
These are wonderful stories. But most of the time big visions turn into
nightmares. Remember Boston's "Big Dig"? Almost every sizeable city in
the world has such a fiasco in its backyard. In fact, no less than 92%
of megaprojects come in over budget or over schedule, or both. The cost
of California's high-speed rail project soared from $33 billion to $100
billon--and won't even go where promised. More modest endeavors, whether
launching a small business, organizing a conference, or just finishing a
work project on time, also commonly fail. Why?
Understanding what distinguishes the triumphs from the failures has been
the life's work of Oxford professor Bent Flyvbjerg, dubbed "the world's
leading megaproject expert." In How Big Things Get Done, he identifies
the errors in judgment and decision-making that lead projects, both big
and small, to fail, and the research-based principles that will make you
succeed with yours. For example:
- Understand your odds. If you don't know them, you won't win.
- Plan slow, act fast. Getting to the action quick feels right. But
it's wrong.
- Think right to left*.* Start with your goal, then identify the
steps to get there.
- Find your Lego. Big is best built from small.
- Be a team maker. You won't succeed without an "us."
- Master the unknown unknowns. Most think they can't, so they fail.
Flyvbjerg shows how you can.
- Know that your biggest risk is you.
Full of vivid examples ranging from the building of the Sydney Opera
House, to the making of the latest Pixar blockbusters, to a home
renovation in Brooklyn gone awry, How Big Things Get Done reveals how
to get any ambitious project done--on time and on budget.
