A single overlooked risk on a construction site can turn into months of delay and a budget that spirals out of control — which is exactly why construction projects cannot be run on instinct alone. Construction work is unusually exposed to factors that are hard to predict in advance, so tight oversight throughout the build, backed by real project management practice, is what keeps a project finishing on time, within budget and to the required quality.

This Arab British Fellowship Training Academy course looks at construction project management as part of the wider discipline of engineering management. Beyond schedules and budgets, it also covers how to direct workers and teams toward strong productivity, since complex construction projects only succeed with innovation, leadership, precision and the ability to improvise solutions on site.

What You Will Be Able to Do

• Run engineering planning for construction projects end to end — from the planning table through implementation follow-up to overall project supervision.
• Coordinate effectively across different departments to raise administrative efficiency on site.
• Apply technology to the engineering leasing side of construction projects in a way that makes communication with work teams noticeably easier.
• Deepen your grasp of engineering management as it applies specifically to construction projects and their real-world applications.

Who Should Attend?

• Construction and architecture engineers looking to build a career path into engineering management.
• Engineering project managers and their deputies.
• Anyone who wants to strengthen their capabilities in this field.

Module 1: Understanding the Construction Industry and Project Lifecycle

• Overview of the construction industry and its key stakeholders and players.
• The project lifecycle: feasibility studies, design and planning, construction and execution, and operations and maintenance.
• The role of the construction manager across each of these phases.

Module 2: Planning, Scheduling and Getting the Project Off the Ground

• Project initiation, stakeholders and their interests, and building the project charter.
• Breaking the project down with a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) and using it in planning.
• Scheduling tools: Critical Path Method (CPM), Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT), Gantt charts and dedicated scheduling software.
• Resource allocation and levelling across the schedule.

Module 3: Estimating Costs and Building the Budget

• Cost estimation techniques, including parametric and analogous estimation.
• Types of costs: direct, indirect, fixed and variable.
• Developing and managing the budget, plus the budgeting process itself.
• Cost control, earned value analysis, forecasting and variance analysis.

Module 4: Managing Risk on Construction Sites

• Identifying and assessing risk before it becomes a real problem.
• The risks that come up most often on construction projects.
• Building response strategies for each type of risk.

Module 5: Procurement, Contracts and Quality

• Types of contracts and procurement methods, from competitive bidding to direct negotiation.
• Contract administration and enforcement.
• Quality standards, specifications and quality management plans, including Six Sigma principles.
• Safety and environmental management on site.

Module 6: Documentation, Reporting and Closeout

• Project communication plans, and how often and in what format reports go out.
• Project documentation and document control systems.
• Change orders, variation orders, and as-built drawings and records.