Reflecting on success

Gary Oxenham and Andrew Hubbard report on the project management event of the year.

In the Association for Project Management's (APM) 40th year, the great and good of the profession travelled to central London for the Association's annual project management awards.

The event, hosted at the Riverside Park Plaza on the banks of the River Thames, provided the ideal backdrop for an evening of glamour and celebration.

Television personality Chris Hollins, known for his work on BBC News and winning appearance in the 2009 series of Strictly Come Dancing, hosted the event.

Mike Nichols and Dr Martin Barnes both gave impassioned speeches congratulating the audience and the wider project community on a year to remember. Dr Barnes, who will now stand down as the president of APM, gave an 'off-the-cuff' talk in his famed witty style. Tom Taylor will step into the shoes of the outgoing president.

The biggest winner of the night was the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA). Members of the ODA in attendance included chief executive Dennis Hone, deputy director of venue and infrastructure Kenna Kintrea, former programme assurance executive Karen Elson and director of venues and infrastructure Simon Wright. The team collected the Programme of the Year Award and the BNFL accolade. On winning the awards Dennis said: "The success of the Games was recognition in itself in some ways, but it is tremendous to win and to get recognition for everything that has been happening at the ODA.

Dennis believes that the programmes biggest success was the exemplary and record-breaking health and safety record. He added: We have been working on the construction for six years and have had 46,000 workers on site. We have had no fatalities and a health and safety record that is second to none.

Special Award

ODA members were called up for a third time at the end of the evening so that they could receive a specially created accolade, the Special Olympic Award.

Richard Bacon MP was on hand to praise the achievements of the team and the learning legacy left by the Olympic programmes. On receiving the specially designed trophy, Kenna Kintrea said: The programme has boosted the general publics opinion of project management, and its capability of helping projects succeed. It has done wonders for the project management professions reputation.

Another big winner from the ODA was the authority's chairman Sir John Armitt, who received the Sir Monty Finniston Award.

Sir John wasn't able to attend the ceremony and instead was presented with the award by Martin Barnes, which was filmed and played back to those in attendance.

Sir John said: It is an honour to receive any award but the Sir Monty Finniston is very special and I am honoured that the APM has selected me this year.

I have been fortunate to be involved in many major projects in the UK and overseas. All have been team efforts and I have had the support of many excellent people. That the 2012 Games has been so successful in every respect and such a great advert for the UK is very special. Five APM Honorary Fellowships were awarded on the night. Tim Banfield, John Bartlett, Sir Leigh Lewis, Steven Norris, and Richard Pharro, were all called up on stage to receive the Fellowships for their respective contributions to the Association and profession.

An evening of celebration

More than 450 practitioners attended the Awards and were greeted with a drinks reception before moving on to the main event and meal.

Other award winners included Transport for London Project of the Year Allen Construction Consultancy Community Project of the Year and EC Harris International Overseas Project of the Year.

Elsewhere the Shell HSSE Award, a new category for 2012, was awarded to AstraZeneca Global Engineering. Brian Street is the firms global construction safety manager. He told Project: It feels fantastic to win. It hasn't been easy to take what we have done in the UK, Europe and US abroad, but we are very proud of our efforts.

Network Rail also had much to celebrate as both the Young Project Manager of the Year Christian Irwin and Project Manager of the Year Richard Walker claimed top prizes on the night.

Both had lead very different, but equally challenging, projects to a successful completion. Christian, 26, is a product of Network Rails internal graduate scheme. He told Project that the key to success early on in your career is to learn from those around you. As long as you have the confidence, intelligence and the will to learn you can succeed in project management. You need to learn from your managers. When I joined Network Rail I worked under six different project managers and learned something from each of them. I have adapted my own style from what I picked up in that time, he said.

After the conclusion of the ceremony, the attendees were invited to dance the night away with colleagues and fellow professionals in a specially organised after party on a separate level of the hotel.

The winners

Geoffrey Trimble Award - Carl Dutton

BT Brian Willis Award - Sarah Scott

Atos Consulting Sir Monty Finniston Award - Sir John Armitt

Shell HSSE - AstraZeneca Global Engineering

Project of the Year - Green Park Station Step-Free Access - Transport for London

Programme of the Year - Olympic Delivery Authority

Community Project of the Year - Allen Construction Company

Overseas Project of the Year - EC Harris International

BNFL Award - Olympic Delivery Authority

Young Project Manager of the Year - Christian Irwin

Project Management Company of the Year - Arup

Project Manager of the Year - Richard Walker

Special Olympic Award - Olympic Delivery Authority

Honorary fellows

Tim Banfield, for his dedication to the promotion of lessons learned through the National Audit Office.

John Bartlett, for his pioneering work in both risk and programme management.

Sir Leigh Lewis, for a career driving project management professionalism within UK government.

Steven Norris, for his contribution to transport projects in the UK from the Jubilee Line Extension to the National Cycling Strategy.

Richard Pharro, for his tireless advocacy of the profession through APM and also the highly successful promotion of the Prince2 accreditation.

Read about all of this years winners in the APM Awards Winners special included in this month's issue of Project.