In conclusion, I would like to explore a few of the areas where Programme Management can go wrong. To an extent this may be opinionated, however, experience indicates certain factors have a tendency to repeat themselves. In conclusion, if you obtain the right combination of events Programme Management is a powerful ally. Method and techniques have been developed and powerful software support tools are already in development. The human content will always be the deciding factor and the importance of group dynamics will play a major contribution in this field.
Significant challenges lie ahead in both academic and practical terms.
The ability to conceptualise improved methods of treatment and refinement of techniques, together with implementing such ideas over a diversified range of business challenges will be crucial. Information technology will be stretched to provide more demanding applications to meet the need for items such as integrated decision support and risk management, the ability to accomplish modelling over a wide number of plans and to perform 'what if' scenarios. These are just a few of the wider thought processes being applied to this area. We in the APM SIG group look forward to sharing our experiences as our interests develop in the coming year.