Dynamic Project Planning at Vlerick Business School

Showing the importance of risk management!

The Project Scheduling Game (PSG) is a well-known game that is used at various universities, business schools and company trainings in order to let participants feel what project control really means. The game is used almost everywhere, from Ghent to London, from China to Suriname, from North to South Europe, and today, at Vlerick Business School.

I have the pleasure to teach dynamic project planning in an elective course to a group of 10 smart and enthusiastic MBA students, and it's nice to see that I always learn a lot when teaching the PSG. One of the most important lessons to learn from the game is that risk analysis is beneficial to your project. That means that more knowledge about unexpected events that might occur during the life of the project results in lower project costs, and possibly in a higher degree of success. That's why the game is played without knowledge of risk, to let the students feel that they really need risk management. And the next session is then devoted to the importance of risk management. It's a logical sequence...

Today, there were two smart students who played the game twice (beyond my knowledge, but I liked the idea). The first time, they ended up pretty well, with a final project cost that is somewhat in line with what the other students had. But the second time, with more knowledge about the risk of the project, they managed to reduce their total costs with more than 2000 euro, only by knowing a little more about the potential risk. I couldn't image a more beautiful example to show the importance of risk management. 

To all the students: Well done! Thanks for the interesting discussions and good results. Vlerick MBA rules! As I told them in the beginning of today's session: Project Management is awesome!