Effective ESCO Project Management*

Congratulations! The performance contracting opportunity you have been working on for the past 6–12 months has finally been negotiated and awarded. Now it's time to perform for your company and the customer. As the energy service company (ESCO) project manager in charge of this project, you have a tremendous opportunity to make money for your company, enhance your career, save your customer a lot of energy and dollars, build an enduring and mutually beneficial relationship with that customer and lay the groundwork for future performance contracts with this and other customers. To do this, you must now manage this multimillion dollar project. You can do it, but your solid engineering skills that have served you so well up to the present must now share the spotlight with your professional project management skills. You need to think like a manager—the person who has to make it all happen. You must now manage the financial, technical and schedule performance of the project in a manner that satisfies the contract, and meets or exceeds the expectations of your client and your company's management. This article presents proven project management competencies you can use to achieve those goals. ©, Copyright Association of Energy Engineers (AEE).