Advanced Project Recovery Programme

Project Recovery and Turnaround

Diagnose troubled projects, stabilise the delivery environment and make evidence-based decisions to recover, restructure, narrow, pause or stop.

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Course overview

Replace optimism and fragmented action with a credible recovery system.

Project Recovery and Turnaround develops the judgement and practical discipline required when a project has lost delivery confidence, stakeholder trust or control over its commitments.

The course begins with rapid diagnosis and fact-base development. Participants learn how to test schedule, cost, scope, commercial, risk, governance and stakeholder evidence before committing to a recovery path.

The programme does not assume that every troubled project should continue. Participants evaluate recovery, restructuring, narrowing, pausing and stopping options, then develop a realistic rebaseline, governance reset and mobilisation plan for the selected decision.

Learning outcomes

What participants will be able to do.

By the end of the course, participants should be able to:

  • Recognise early warning signals, control failure and the conditions that justify formal project recovery.
  • Establish a recovery mandate, authority structure, confidentiality approach and immediate stabilisation priorities.
  • Build a credible recovery fact base using documentary, performance, commercial and stakeholder evidence.
  • Test the realism of scope, schedule, cost, resource, risk and benefit commitments.
  • Identify root causes, systemic constraints, critical interfaces and the assumptions driving project distress.
  • Assess contractual exposure, supplier performance, claims risk and the commercial implications of recovery options.
  • Stabilise stakeholder relationships, reset expectations and restore decision-making credibility.
  • Develop and compare continue, recover, restructure, narrow, pause and stop options.
  • Produce a defensible recovery recommendation, governance reset and integrated rebaseline.
  • Mobilise the recovery plan with clear ownership, decision gates, indicators and conditions for further escalation or termination.

Who should attend

Designed for professionals responsible for distressed, high-risk or strategically important projects.

  • Senior project and programme managers.
  • Project directors and turnaround leaders.
  • Project sponsors and steering-committee members.
  • PMO, assurance and governance professionals.
  • Project controls, planning, cost and risk specialists.
  • Commercial, procurement and contract-management professionals.

Prerequisites

Advanced, practical and evidence focused.

  • Meaningful experience of project, programme or major delivery environments is recommended.
  • Participants should understand basic scope, schedule, cost, risk and governance concepts.
  • Participants should be prepared to analyse incomplete and conflicting evidence under time pressure.
  • Corporate cohorts may use an anonymised troubled or recovered project as the principal case.

Course structure

Five integrated modules from rapid diagnosis and stabilisation to rebaseline, mobilisation and sustained control.

The programme uses an evolving troubled-project case in which evidence, stakeholder behaviour and commercial conditions change as recovery decisions are made.

1

Module 1

Recovery mandate, triage and immediate stabilisation

  • Recognising project distress and loss of delivery confidence.
  • Recovery mandate, authority, independence and confidentiality.
  • Immediate containment and stabilisation priorities.
  • Critical decisions, obligations and stakeholder risks.
  • Designing the rapid diagnostic plan.
2

Module 2

Building the recovery fact base

  • Evidence quality, gaps, contradictions and confidence.
  • Scope completeness and change exposure.
  • Schedule realism, critical path and remaining duration.
  • Cost-to-complete, cash flow, contingency and forecast exposure.
  • Resources, productivity, quality, risk and benefit assumptions.
3

Module 3

Commercial, governance and stakeholder stabilisation

  • Contract position, supplier performance and claims exposure.
  • Governance failure, decision rights and escalation.
  • Sponsor, board and leadership alignment.
  • Stakeholder trust, communication and expectation reset.
  • Root causes, systemic constraints and critical interfaces.
4

Module 4

Recovery options and executive decision

  • Continue, recover, restructure, narrow, pause and stop options.
  • Option criteria, trade-offs and consequence analysis.
  • Strategic value, feasibility, affordability and residual risk.
  • Recovery options paper and executive recommendation.
  • Decision conditions, approvals and no-go triggers.
5

Module 5

Rebaseline, mobilisation and sustained recovery control

  • Integrated scope, schedule, cost and resource rebaseline.
  • Governance reset, ownership and operating rhythm.
  • Recovery mobilisation and stakeholder commitments.
  • Leading indicators, decision gates and confidence reviews.
  • Transition from recovery mode to controlled delivery or closure.

Learning experience

Diagnose, decide, stabilise and mobilise.

Participants work through a demanding recovery simulation in which they must diagnose, challenge, decide, communicate and mobilise under pressure.

Triage

Rapid recovery assessment

Participants determine what must be stabilised immediately and what evidence is required before major commitments are made.

Test

Recovery fact-base laboratory

Teams challenge schedule, cost, scope, risk and commercial evidence to establish realistic remaining exposure.

Stabilise

Governance and stakeholder reset

Participants redesign authority, escalation, communication and stakeholder commitments for the recovery environment.

Decide

Recovery-options workshop

Teams compare recover, restructure, narrow, pause and stop options using transparent criteria and consequences.

Mobilise

Rebaseline and turnaround plan

Participants create the integrated baseline, operating rhythm, ownership and decision gates required for execution.

Defend

Executive recovery board simulation

Teams present and defend their recommendation, confidence level, conditions and stop criteria to a simulated board.

Course completion

Demonstrate recovery judgement under pressure.

  • Participate actively in diagnosis, recovery-planning and executive decision simulations.
  • Complete the principal fact-base, options, rebaseline and mobilisation outputs.
  • Contribute to the final recovery-board presentation and challenge session.
  • Prepare a practical recovery-readiness or workplace application plan.

Participant outputs

Typical course outputs include:

  • Recovery mandate and diagnostic plan.
  • Project recovery fact base.
  • Root-cause and constraint analysis.
  • Stakeholder and governance stabilisation plan.
  • Recovery options paper.
  • Integrated recovery rebaseline.
  • Recovery mobilisation and control plan.

Delivery options

Choose the format that fits your recovery and intervention environment.

Instructor-led

Live Classroom

Face-to-face delivery with diagnostic workshops, evidence challenge, recovery simulation and executive-board presentation.

Instructor-led

Live Virtual Classroom

Interactive online delivery using collaborative evidence packs, breakout recovery teams and real-time governance challenge.

Flexible

Blended Learning

A structured combination of preparation, live workshops, recovery assignments and follow-up application.

Organisation-specific

Corporate and In-Company

Tailored delivery built around the organisation’s governance, commercial environment, project controls and anonymised recovery cases.

Frequently asked questions

Course information and participation.

Is the course only for projects that have already failed?

No. It is relevant when delivery confidence is deteriorating, major commitments are no longer credible or leadership needs an independent basis for intervention.

Does the programme assume that every project should be recovered?

No. A central feature is the disciplined comparison of recovery, restructuring, narrowing, pausing and stopping options.

Does the course include schedule and cost rebaselining?

Yes. Participants test remaining schedule and cost realism, then develop an integrated rebaseline for the selected recovery option.

Can the programme use a real organisational project?

Yes. Corporate delivery can use an anonymised current or completed case, subject to confidentiality and evidence availability.

Does course completion provide a professional certification?

The programme develops advanced project-recovery capability and may provide an INDENTRA completion record where applicable. It is not presented as a third-party professional certification unless separately stated.

Take the next step

Restore decision credibility before project distress becomes irreversible.

Discuss public delivery, a recovery leadership cohort or a tailored programme built around your organisation’s turnaround and intervention requirements.

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INDENTRA may adapt sequencing, exercises and examples to suit the delivery format and participant profile while preserving the stated learning outcomes.