Laslett International’s Managing Director Bob Laslett was engaged by a major oil & gas company to project manage the crucial retained business part of a significant divestment project.
The project objective was to create a new company into which various elements and products of the existing business would be transferred. This allowed the company to be divested to maintain business as usual for key products which were not part of this complex divestment deal.
The principal challenges were to ensure zero disruption to ongoing business and maintain cash flow as usual while splitting up an integrated entity. In addition to separating the front-line functions, the project would require designing and implementing of all the associated support services including financial control and accounting, HR, pensions and IT and infrastructure.
Bob was responsible for a range of disciplines to keep this ever changing and geographically diverse project on track:
• Project management, governance, and assurance
• Planning, resource scheduling, progress monitoring and tracking
• Project accounting and budget/project cost control
• Issue management
• Risk management and mitigation
• Management reporting and facilitation of meetings
• Interface and interdependency identification and control
While Bob remotely managed the set-up of the retained business, the oil company project director was able to focus on negotiating the divestment. Notably, the project director, who was based some 7 hours flying time away, was assured that the retained business activity transition was on time and to scope by means of clear project controls and regular formal and informal communications.
This project emerged as a resounding success for the client, underscoring Bob Laslett's adept leadership and the effectiveness of the applied project management strategies.