PROJECT PORTFOLIO

DIGITAL TWIn

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Are you losing sleep on whether your team will be able to meet the time and budget commitments on your growing project portfolio?

If yes, we get it.

Research shows that, depending on the industry, 70-90% of all projects are late and/or over budget. And despite major advances in Project Management Methods and Software, this statistic has not improved significantly over the past 40 years. 

Why is that?

Managing projects in the real world is challenging because of all the VUCCA – Variability, Uncertainties, Complexities, Constraints, and Ambiguity of competing objectives we face in managing projects. Unfortunately, most Project Management Software simply cannot consider all these VUCCA elements. 

And yet, as Project Managers, we are expected to make reliable commitments and decide how to plan and execute projects to minimize costs but still have sufficient buffer to protect commitments against task variability and unplanned events. 
No wonder most Project managers have sleepless nights. And if they don’t, they probably should.

But we have good news.
Recent advances in Digital Twin technologies mean that, for the first time, it is possible to consider all the VUCCA elements. We’ve capitalized on these advances and incorporated the latest best practices in PM to develop a new digital twin platform that’s a first of its kind. It isn’t simply an improvement on existing technologies. It’s a totally new way to overcome the challenge of making reliable commitments and deciding how best to manage projects in
the real world.

We call it the

Project Portfolio Digital Twin (PPDT)

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What is the Project Portfolio Digital Twin (PPDT)?

The Project Portfolio Digital Twin (PPDT) is an award-winning self-configurable Project Portfolio Management Simulator platform developed by a passionate team of Simulation, Project Management, and Theory of Constraints experts at Goldratt Research Labs.

The PPDT combines the power of human intuition, simulation, best Project Management practices, and AI; all into one simple-to-use platform.

For the first time, it allows users to consider ALL critical Variabilities, Uncertainties, Complexities, Constraints, and the Ambiguity of competing objectives so you can make reliable commitments and decisions with confidence.
How does the PPDT Simulator platform work?

We (the team at Goldratt Research Labs) have designed the PPDT to have a simple 5-step user interface and created a data template that is easy to populate from Excel that captures all the data needed for the PPDT to answer the most important questions Project Companies have.

Our PPDT allows you to import data directly from your Project Management software which builds a virtual model of your entire project portfolio within seconds. And then, using the power of simulation, it shows the impact of known VUCCA on existing time and budget commitments.

It can accurately simulate the impact of random variability of task durations, unplanned events, and capacity constraints. And it comes with an extensive library of Project Management best practices like Critical Chain and Agile so you can determine which planning and execution rules will give your company the best overall project performance.

Organizations that have used Goldratt Research Labs' Digital Twins

What are the benefits of using PPDT to organizations and teams?
  • It will help you make reliable operational and financial commitments without compromising on performance
  • It will help you feel confident that you are using the best strategies and tactics for your unique circumstances
  • ​It will help you to quickly determine the impact of unplanned events and how best to respond.
  • It will help you to improve your productivity … and sleep better at night.
We have created a calculator where you can calculate the likely Return Of Investment (ROI) that the PPDT can bring to your organization and team! 

What questions can the PPDT help answer?

PPDT will help you and your team confidently and quickly answer the following three questions:

1. Will we achieve the commitments we’ve made, and if not, why?
2. Can we do better by just changing the rules we use to plan and execute projects?
3. How much better can we do if we always have enough of each type of resource - not too few, but also not too many?

What makes our Project Portfolio Digital Twin unique?
  • It is self-configurable from data already in your IT systems which drastically reduces development and setup time
  • It can be deployed as Java apps or as a cloud-based web app and can be safely & securely executed behind a firewall
  • ​It has very fast simulation execution speed allowing 100’s of replications to be done in minutes.
  • ​Most best practices are included like Waterfall, Critical Chain and Agile to do direct comparisons of which is best for your environment
  • ​It is available on an affordable SaaS subscription model, so you only pay for the time period & functionality needed.
  • It is fast and cost-effective to customize

Will PPDT be able to cope with our project complexity?

PPDT has been stress tested by some of the largest and most complex organizations like Siemens, Daiwa House, Tata Steel, and other fortune 500 companies.

Testimonials

“We were facing difficulty in deciding how best to improve our company's productivity. We knew we couldn’t afford the risk of making changes without knowing what the likely total impact would be. We reached out to Goldratt Research Labs. They helped us build 4 simulation models. We can even connect these to our live data feed to create accurate digital twins of our operations. These Digital Twins provide us with a safe way to learn how much better we can do and what the impact of planned changes or decisions will be on our total business and supply chain partners. We gained many critical insights from using these digital twins and they now form a key part of our digital transformation - an integral element of industry 4.0.”
~ Bimlendra Jha, CEO, Tata Steel UK
“About a year and a half ago, we were faced with increasing supply chain complexity, rising inventory levels, increased number of markdowns, and a lot of demand variability, especially as we introduced new product categories. We reached out to Goldratt Research Labs to help us think through some of the nuances of the problem. Through that work we were able to implement a new Theory of Constraints based simulation and planning model in our existing Execution and Supply Chain system. The outcome has been nothing short of remarkable. In that time, we’ve seen our service levels to our customers rise by a little over 5%. At the same time, we’ve seen our inventory levels drop by a quarter of a billion dollars across the board. This has led to reduced markdowns and reduced excess and obsolescence of about $100 million.”
~ Robert Meshew, CTO, Microsoft Supply Chain

Book a demo with us, and we will show you how the PPDT can help your organization!

Case Studies

Client: Gas Turbine Manufacturer (Europe)
Project description: One of the largest turbine manufacturers in the world had a very promising five-year portfolio of gas turbines to produce. However, some of the projects quickly faced significant delays. Considering these delays, and the fact that the sales team kept promising standard lead times on new programs, even though there was a growing backlog, the company was concerned about whether they would be able to meet client and shareholder commitments. And if not, was it possible to recover and how.

Project Benefits: GRL used the PPDT to model the company’s 5-year project portfolio. It showed, to the horror of the management team, that the company would likely be late by over two years resulting in a loss of $181 million.. But it also showed that adopting Critical Chain and Agile WIP control best practices, it could recover and still have a net profit of $104 million. Moreover, since not all programs had penalties and bonuses, it was possible to get even better financial results by running scenarios to identify the optimal prioritizing rules in order to ensure those programs with the biggest late completion penalties and early completion bonuses were given the highest priority.

Client: Mining Company (Singapore)
Project description: Within the 1st year of a 5 year multi-billion dollar SAP implementation, it was clear the project was going to be late and over-budget. Goldratt Research Labs was requested to help by using their Project Portfolio Digital Twin to identify the avoidable causes of delays and cost-overruns, and identify whether Critical chain and other best practices could help to get the project delivered on time and budget.

Project Benefits: The PPDT was successful in identifying what the main causes of delays were and allowed the management team to test which Critical Chain best practices would be effective in avoiding and recovering from delays. The ambitious SAP go-live date was achieved on-time and on-budget despite falling 6 months behind within the first 12 months of a 5-year project.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What is the Architecture of the Data Inputs and Outputs from PPDT?
The graphic below shows the key input and output data elements of PPDT.
 Input Data can be imported from existing IT systems into a PPDT Excel-based data template. Results Data can be exported to other IT systems. Both importing and exporting can be automated.
2. What Licensing options are available for PPDT?
PPDT is available on a SaaS basis as either a “Done-with-You” or “Done-for-You” option. We are currently offering quarterly and annual. 
Note: There are significant discounted options available for Universities, Government Agencies and NGOs.
3. Where can I download a Case Study of PPDT?
One of the largest turbine manufacturers in the world had a very promising five-year portfolio that consisted of over 100 programs and 1000’s of projects.

A year into that five-year portfolio, many projects faced significant delays. Management needed to evaluate the impact of these on the time and budget commitments made and identify the best corrective actions.

Our PPDT offered the management team a simple and quick deploy solution to overcome their challenge. The white paper of this case study can be downloaded with the link below. It also has the keynote presented by Dr. Alan Barnard embedded in the article.

Access the case study here

Book a demo with us, and we will show you how the PPDT can help your organization!

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