Project Controls Expo 2020 – A virtual conference experience

The global pandemic may have stopped us all from travelling, but it also meant that it was easier than ever this year for project professionals to experience the Project Controls Expo. Normally held in three separate venues across the year – Melbourne, Australia; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; and London – this year’s event combined all three into one four-day virtual event.

The PCE team had worked phenomenally hard to try to replicate the opportunities for networking and knowledge sharing that come with a conventional face-to-face event of this kind and the virtual doors of the expo remained open all hours, giving 24-hour access to the event from anywhere in the world, with presentations on-going through the night so that wherever you were during working hours, there would be something going on for you.

That difficult timetable clash, when you’re faced with two simultaneous presentations of interest to you suddenly wasn’t a problem, as registered visitors could bookmark the presentations they wanted to ‘attend’ and then watch the recordings on ‘catch-up’ at a later time.

A Networking Café organised into groups offered a space to find and chat with like-minded fellow attendees and to follow-up on presentations, but the heart of the event was the Partner Showcase, with virtual booths for all the participating companies, including RPCuk, who were there as Platinum Partners once again this year. Here at our virtual stand, visitors could download documents about us and what we offer, as well as handouts following our presentations – and, crucially, chat with the RPC staff who were manning the booth via text or video call just as you would face-to-face in a normal year. Sadly, despite the fabulous views out of the virtual windows, we weren’t in Melbourne.

At RPC, we are ‘people’ people, and doing all of this via a screen from home was always going to be a challenge. There were some technical glitches with internet overload, with the sound on presentations not always working well, and with the video chat function on our stand, but the organisers were learning on the job as much as we have all been in the past 8 months, and did their best to address and rectify issues as quickly as possible. RPCuk Chairman Peter Gable was impressed by the tenacity of the organiser, Anil Godhawale, and his team. ‘I think it was a great first attempt by Anil. Day 3 and I have the booth video working and can see the dashboard with visitors, so on a positive note Anil is treating our issues with high priority.’

Director, Keith Hogben, feels the same. ‘The technical issues detracted from the level of satisfaction with the event. However, to be fair, Anil and his PCE team deserve a big pat on the back for having the courage to stage an event of this magnitude. There is no doubt that, for us, the overwhelming value of exhibiting at PCE comes from face-to-face networking opportunities and, similarly, in-person visits to our stand. Clearly, neither are currently possible due to COVID-19 restrictions.’

Projects Director, John Lister agreed, too: ‘The presentations worked, but to me that’s only a fraction of the reason why we do these shows.’

As in previous years, RPCuk is proud to be in a position to share our knowledge and advances in the Project Controls arena, and had two presenting slots at the expo. Peter Gable gave a presentation in the Case Study zone about RPCuk’s Rapid Application Development approach and how it was used in an implementation with waste-water industry specialist, Glan Agua, attracting 24 attendees from as far afield as Australia and Malaya.

And on his first day in his new job at RPCuk, Chris Woodbridge was well and truly thrown in at the deep end with a presentation in the Innovations zone introducing our latest Oracle Primavera Unifier Solution Set around NEC4 contract compliance.

‘Speaking to a screen and not knowing who is in the audience is a bit unnerving,’ observed Pete. ‘Also, I couldn’t see the chat or Q&A messages during the presentation so that would have been nice.’ Fortunately, the questions at the end of the presentations did, at least, confirm that Pete and Chris hadn’t been talking to themselves! And their recordings will remain available to delegates after the event, meaning that they have potential to reach a much wider audience than would usually be possible.

Overall, it was a bold and interesting solution to an event that would otherwise have had to be cancelled, but – as with so much else this year – we’re hoping that next year we’ll be back to something like normal and will be able to see and talk to many of you in person.