How did I (finally) talk to my CEO about project KPIs? Testimonial from startup Bornes Solutions 

"How many electric bollards were installed last week? How far along are the projects?"  

For the QSE project manager at Bornes Solutions, these two questions became the starting point for in-depth reflection on project portfolio management within the company. 

Indeed, when projects are at the heart of the company's activity, it's essential to be able to respond quickly and effectively to these questions posed by the CEO. 

In this article, we find out how the implementation of a PPM approach and the use of Project Monitor software have enabled Bornes Solutions to secure the deliverability of its projects in a context of strong growth.  

Also in this article, discover the challenges, tips and keys that have enabled the company to become a key operator of "new service stations". 

The challenges of rapid growth for Bornes Solutions

Exponential growth in just a few years...

It was in 2015, seeing the first Tesla vehicles arrive, that Jérôme Princet had the founding idea for Bornes Solutions. Electric vehicle owners would need to recharge their vehicles at home and at work. And this is the start of the deployment of these new service stations, with an offer as an operator of electric charging stations. 

The year 2020 marks a turning point in the company's history, with an acceleration in the electric vehicle market. The Paris-based startup, whose CEO had himself installed the first charging station in a Paris garage, set out to conquer France, deploying teams and projects in every region.     

.... Which shows challenges visibility on project follow-up

This large-scale deployment soon gave rise to monitoring problems, prompting Hachim Abdallah and his CEO to adopt a project-based approach.  

In fact, the company's rapid deployment across the country poses problems of visibility.

In the beginning, the founder knew all the files... but very quickly we had to change scale and have a business model to steer growth. Deploying the kiosk network became a project portfolio management challenge.

Hachim ABDALLAH

It has become impossible to track projects in 7 regions simultaneously using Excel files. The multiplication of Excel files poses a performance problem and can be a source of false manipulations. This calls for standardization, consolidation and homogenization. 

Set up processes that evolve according to a series of stages with different timeframes

Bollard installation "is not just a technical act". It follows a process that unfolds in several stages, each with a different timeframe. These stages may overlap, take place in parallel or be sequenced. As each site and each parking lot has its own specific characteristics, flexibility is required to involve the key players at the right time. From project launch by the sales department to final delivery of the terminal to the user, the project is supervised by a project manager. Each project mobilizes field teams and experts from the design office, with the support of the sales administration team. 

Establishing a position in the market means moving fast, while ensuring that financial resources are mobilized at the right time. The Bornes Solutions business model enables them to "pre-create" equipment projects for a residence in order to anticipate the workload, but to launch the work only when the first "terminal contract" is signed. In this way, an "infrastructure project" is initiated when a co-ownership signs a commitment contract, but the work is only triggered when an end-user signs, this time with the creation of a "bollard project". This particular sequencing implies a high degree of flexibility and agility in scheduling and monitoring projects, going beyond the limits of traditional Excel spreadsheets.    

Setting up a project approach and tools

The growth year of 2020 and its host of problems has prompted Hachim Abdallah and his Managing Director to think about implementing a real project approach. The aim is to regain visibility of the field in real time and standardize the monitoring of a large number of projects. The idea of implementing a project portfolio management tool came to the fore. That's when they chose Project Monitor software. 

The main objectives of this approach are to : 

• Securing the project portfolio of operational staff 
• Portfolio management tools  
• Support project managers 

It quickly became apparent that, beyond the tool, a real PPM approach was being implemented, with a dual challenge: to cope with a sharp rise in business and to build the startup's long-term operating mode. 

In fact, thinking about Project Monitor helped the startup set up project rituals and best practices. For example, Bornes Solutions had to define "how to manage the arrival of projects in Project Monitor and how to process and model them in the software? " 

The roll-out of Project Monitor has helped to introduce best practices such as recording all project comments and highlights.  

Initially conceived in project and project portfolio mode, the use of Project Monitor quickly revealed unsuspected benefits in day-to-day management. Indeed, the task management functionality has become a major tool for monitoring daily activity. Today, this functionality enables Bornes Solutions teams to : 

• Streamline the transmission of information between departments 
• Freeze deliverables by setting up task templates  
• Prioritize requests by due date 
• Better visualize activity with multi-project Kanban

The portfolio review function is a real time-saver, enabling you to review around twenty projects in an hour to an hour and a half. This feature also helps to identify sticking points and corrective actions to be taken, which can be shared with all concerned.  

The use of Project Monitor offers invaluable time savings and, above all, "in a fast-growing market, time is the most precious commodity".   

Key KPIs for measuring project performance: Project Monitor

As we saw at the beginning of this article, PPM's entire approach stemmed from the fact that, faced with a rapidly growing business, Hachim Abdallah was no longer in a position to respond effectively to his CEO's need to monitor terminal installation projects.  

Project deliverability KPIs

With Project Monitor Hachim Abdallah has been able to set up an entire data infrastructure enabling him to monitor and control all projects with the utmost precision.  

The collection and exploitation of this information allowed the company to respond calmly to its DG and to set up key indicators of project deliverability:    

• Number of terminals installed  
• Number of terminals being installed  
• Number of terminals planned for installation  

This information is vital from an operational point of view, to enhance the value of our highly mobilized teams in the field, but also from a strategic point of view, to provide shareholders and financiers with precise data on the assets created.  

The use of Project Monitor has given us new temporal and geographical visibility, notably through project mapping.  

Project performance KPIs

The implementation of Project Monitor has also been part of a continuous process improvement approach, enabling sticking points to be identified and corrected as and when necessary. Data interpretation has enabled the creation of key project performance indicators such as :  

• Average project duration  
• Number of projects managed per project manager 
• Number of projects by type  
• Identifying project complexity  

Project Monitorthe key tool at the heart of interfaces 

The choice of Project Monitor was determined by the possibility of interfacing the tool with the CRM via the Zapier connector. Indeed, it was essential for Hachim Abdallah that the tool chosen should be at the heart of the project approach, and thus be able to integrate into the core of the IT system. It was crucial that the "deals won" in the CRM were automatically transferred to Project Monitor , so that no time was wasted in creating them manually, and that operational staff were immediately informed of the arrival of a new project.   

Also, the ability to structure and organize the project portfolio by region, so that the right project can be attached to the right region, has been an invaluable time-saver, and offers the possibility of consolidation keys to create relevant reports.  

We also chose Project Monitor because of its ability to create custom attributes and fields, enabling us to structure our data in a personalized way so that it can be exported and used in data visualization software (power BI).  

Power BI was used to interconnect various data sources, including information from CRM, Excel files and data extracted from Project Monitor. As a result, Hachim Abdallah was able to process a large amount of data and create dashboards that enabled him to make informed decisions and improve the performance of Bornes Solutions.    

Key tips for successful PPM implementation 

Drawing on his experience of setting up a PPM approach and implementing Project Monitor, Hachim Abdallah gives us some valuable advice:  

• It is essential to involve operational teams from the very first phase of the project, for example by inviting project managers to the solution parameterization workshops. It is also essential to bring in the Virage trainer as soon as possible to help project managers get to grips with the tool.   
• You also need to be a good listener, and not hesitate to organize workshops so that project managers don't lose interest in the tool.   
• It is essential to ensure that the company's structural organization effectively supports the implementation of the PPM approach. In the case of Bornes Solutions, the need to create a function of assistant project managers dedicated to the use of Project Monitor quickly came to mind. The aim was to enable project managers to concentrate on the operational side of the business, and get things moving.  
• It's a good idea to keep questioning ourselves and evolving our practices when necessary. This was the case when we simplified the templates to ensure that information was entered correctly.   
• It's important not to spread yourself too thin, but to stay focused on your core business and choose a few key indicators to help you manage it.  

The experience of Bornes Solutions illustrates the importance of project portfolio management for the success of projects when they are at the heart of the business. Thanks to the implementation of KPIs, the company was able to meet the challenges of monitoring and standardizing projects in a context of exponential growth, thus guaranteeing the deliverability of electric terminals in all regions of France. The implementation of a project portfolio management approach has been a key success factor in achieving the startup's objectives. Since September, it has joined forces with Zeplug to form the leading operator of charging services for electric vehicles in condominiums and businesses. Today, more than a million parking spaces are covered by the service. 

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