OPINION: Concert wine lines' show need for project planning

Back in the late 1970s I saw my first music video, involving a three-piece band singing Walking on the Moon beneath the booster rockets of a Saturn launch module. It was a beat and lyric that never left my head and began more than 30 years of fan worship of the band The Police and its front man Sting. So I was excited last week to be at the Mission Estate winery to see Sting in concert.
A concert of any scale is a massive undertaking and, fortunately, Sting and the outstanding NZSO did not disappoint. The same can't be said of the support act -'80s cover butchers the Revival Corporation from Palmerston North who, complete with a drum machine and synth recordings, murdered some of the greatest songs of all time. During their off-key rendition of Take On Me by Aha I imagined the vintner asking them back around harvest time to scare away birds going after the grapes.
The star of the show was Sting, of course, and it was evident from the first bars of If I Ever Lose My Faith In You that we were in for a special night, which it was. As a devotee of his music I was concerned about the moulding of the many genres which Sting has presented over the years with the sound of a full orchestra. I needn't have worried. The project of merging the genres, Sting's unique singing style and lyrical integrity with the full orchestra was an amazing success.
Projects are a key component of all of our lives in various forms. At its simplest, the small and often insignificant things we achieve in business are in and of themselves little mini-projects. We determine to create something or solve a problem, gather the tools necessary for us to achieve it, set about work with an end in mind and at the end we compare what we did against our plan.
Larger projects require more co-ordination and planning but the old mantra of "on time, on cost, on quality" holds to all projects, no matter whether you are building a widget or a bridge. Add to this the need for effective communication, change management, procurement and risk management.
A focus by the Mission project team on the last point "risk management" would have served to better mitigate a logistical issue that many patrons encountered - the hour long queues for drinks of any kind. The revocation of the venue's BYO licence meant that alcohol could only be purchased from on-site vendors. Unfortunately, there were not enough of them to cater for the 25,000 who attended - I commented to Stephanie on arriving at 4pm that there could be a demand problem - by 5pm the lines were enormous, and the food queues were just as long.
An effective risk management and scenario planning exercise would likely have detected this and perhaps resulted in spreading more vendors across the complex. As some free advice, I would suggest they also consider mobile vendors to walk among the crowd as well and having stands dedicated to non-alcoholic drinks to get people out of the "wine lines".
This is an example of how important planning is to any project and lessons learned will be taken into next year's event.
Zenith Solutions is a Wanganui-based management consulting practice. It specialises in strategic planning, business process improvement and financial management services. Contact russell@zenith-solutions.co.nz or phone 021-244-2421.