With strong experience delivering aviation infrastructure projects, Jason advocates a solutions-based approach to project management.

He believes that optimal project outcomes are only achieved through active and open stakeholder engagement to ensure that the key objectives, requirements and drivers of a project are understood by client and contractor, alike.

What is your role on major aviation projects? How does Advisory collaborate within the broader spectrum of stakeholders on these projects?

We often act as project managers on major aviation projects, working closely with owners to ensure that project objectives are delivered and benefits realised. This often starts at business case/ feasibility stage, refining project objectives, developing procurement strategies and managing risk. It helps, of course, that we can team up collaboratively with our engineers and technical specialists to arrive at effective, commercial solutions.

It is vital to understand the diverse range of stakeholders involved in aviation projects. Our approach is to identify the stakeholders and understand their interests in the projects. Often in aviation projects, there is a multiple number of commercial operational agreements that need to be understood and worked through.

What are some common key objectives for clients in the airports sector?

One of the consistent requirements is to minimise the disruption to existing operations. This has many aspects, but the key requirements tend to be managing safety by ensuring that all facility users are safe and ensuring passenger access and egress is maintained and that risks associated with interfaces, such as tying the project into the existing assets, are managed.

Detailed project planning and the identification of dependencies is a critical component of our approach. This needs to be combined with the stakeholder consultation with clear and concise methods used to communicate often complex issues.

Aurecon has successfully delivered a number of work packages at Wellington International Airport. How has this been achieved?

We consider that the success of our projects, to date, has been based on understanding the key objectives and project drivers for the projects. For example, it is not possible to undertake carpark redevelopments without impacting on some aspects of the carpark functionality; however, it is important to identify what are non-negotiable constraints.

We consider that by identifying the critical project aspects we have been able to develop procurement strategies, to best respond to the needs.