11. Keys to Success
What make an Integrated Corridor Management Program and System, or any transportation management system for that matter, a "success"? As noted in Reference 16, "a system is generally considered successful if it has been designed to meet the needs of the corridor stakeholders and corridor users; if the system has been implemented within a reasonable time and budget; if the various hardware and software components have been installed, integrated, operated, and maintained to function properly; and the system is utilized to its full potential [e.g., all functions and strategies used, optimum response plans, expansions] over a number of years." The degree to which success has been achieved can include quantitative assessments based on the corridor performance measures and metrics. It also requires a qualitative assessment - an excellent measure being the attitude of the stakeholders (ICMS and network system operators, maintainers, management personnel, decision makers) who interact with the system. If these individuals have faith in the ICMS and its capabilities, then ICM, the system, and the overall process have been a success.
Systems Engineering Process
Using the systems engineering process to develop and implement the ICMS will contribute greatly to its success. It is not important that the exact sequence of steps defined herein be followed, as long as the basic principles of systems engineering are applied.
Systems engineering helps accomplish four key activities that impact a project's success. These are:
- Identify and evaluate alternatives. The feasibility of each alternative, be it ICM approaches and strategies, the ICMS architecture, the component and sub-system designs, or others, must be measured and evaluated from several different perspectives, including technical, operational and institutional, as well as cost and schedule. Usually trade-offs are required, deciding which alternative offers the better value.
- Manage uncertainty and risk. If the future could be accurately predicted, it would be easy to avoid mistakes and problems. However this is not the case. In real life, the corridor stakeholders must deal with uncertainty and risk. Systems engineering focuses on three aspects of risk management: identification, analysis, and mitigation.
- Design quality into the system. This is accomplished by addressing those factors that can negatively affect quality. Paraphrasing the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), quality may be defined as "the totality of features of a system that bear on its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs." Among the factors that can negatively affect the quality of an ICMS are its complexity, its inflexibility, its lack of standardized components, and its reliability and availability.
- Handle program management issues that arise. This requires good plans, including the Systems Engineering Management Plan (SEMP), ICMS Program Plan, Configuration Management Plan, Operations and Maintenance Plan, and the other "specialty" plans (e.g., verification, validation). A good plan is one that is complete, comprehensive, and communicated to all individuals that are involved or affected. It should include all tasks that must be performed, accurately estimate the resources required to accomplish each task, assign the appropriate resources to each task, define all dependencies among tasks, identify all products or other criteria whose completion signifies that a task is done, and determine how to measure progress against plan when managing the project.
Program Management
As noted above, good systems engineering starts with planning. The SEMP/ICM Program Plan represents the "roadmap" for achieving success. Then the program must be managed, including:
- Tracking each task. Ensuring that tasks begin and end on schedule and, if they don't, determining what caused the variance from plan.
- Measuring progress. Monitoring the consumption of resources on each task to determine whether the products being delivered are consistent with the time, effort, and money being expended.
- Revising or expanding the overall plan. Updating the schedule, as well as adding more details (e.g., integration, verification and validation procedures, operations and maintenance) as the process continues from one stage to another.
- Addressing obstacles. Identifying a problem is important, but a solution must also be developed that removes the obstacle or reduces its impact on the overall program effort.
Another important program management activity (and one inherent in the systems engineering process) is that of continuous reviews and audits. All the ICMS products, including the concept of operations, requirements report, designs, procurement documents, software code, test plans and results, system performance measurements, and anything else that might give an indication of the ICMS and its quality, are reviewed, thereby gathering stakeholder input and ensuring that the stakeholders know at any time what the system consists of and where all of its parts reside. An essential part of this review process is the concept of traceability. All the ICMS products are linked together via "traceability matrices": the system sub-systems and components are mapped back to designs, which are mapped back to requirements, which are mapped back to system objectives, which are mapped back to corridor needs. Additionally, the various verification and acceptance tests are based (i.e., linked) on the various concept, requirements and design documents. This forward and backward traceability is one of the keys to a successful ICMS.
Stakeholder Involvement
The importance of stakeholder involvement to the success of an ICM program cannot be over-emphasized. Establishing the corridor stakeholder group is one of the initial activities in the process. As noted in the description of this activity:
"All appropriate stakeholders need to be brought into the picture early on to make sure their needs are considered, and to determine how they will be involved in the process to plan and develop an ICMS. Bringing together all the stakeholders throughout this process can serve to heighten awareness of the importance and need for integrated corridor management, and to cultivate an interest in coordinated operations and corridor solutions. Moreover, it allows each entity (e.g., network owner / operator) to understand the specific functions and perspectives of their partner agencies, as well as their respective institutional constraints and barriers, thereby making the collaborations more productive."
NCHRP Synthesis 337: "Cooperative Agreements for Corridor Management" stresses the importance of stakeholder involvement with the following conclusion: "it is vital to proactively confront the tough corridor management issues through direct involvement of the affected parties." Such stakeholder collaboration and coordination must be viewed as a "deliberate, continuous, and sustained activity."
Other key considerations related to stakeholder involvement include the following:
- The process is most effective when the managers and engineers (i.e., stakeholders) have domain knowledge about corridor management, the proposed ICMS system, and the overall process. Domain knowledge includes a fundamental understanding of the technology and operational functions and strategies involved in the system, and the institutional environment in which the system will be built and operated.
- Champions are essential to take the lead in the ICM endeavor, to arrange and organize inter-agency meetings, to continuously promote the need for ICM, and to show the individual network stakeholders the benefits that can accrue on both a corridor and individual network basis from integrated corridor management. The champions must also have the authority, ability, and credibility to influence decisions within all agencies and groups. This includes outreach to policy makers.
- Public safety entities represent an important corridor stakeholder group, and their continuing involvement in the ICM is crucial. Training and corridor management exercises for various events and incidents have proven effective for engaging public safety in ICM.
- Integrated corridor management will involve numerous individuals and organizations throughout the process, each with specific functions and responsibilities. Coordination and collaboration between these stakeholders is critical. It is also essential that there be a single institution or group which is ultimately responsible and accountable for delivering a fully functional ICMS. Moreover, concomitant with an assignment of responsibility must be the necessary authority and flexibility to control and manage the associated risks.
Funding
The availability and commitment of funding and other resources to develop, implement, and operate and maintain an Integrated Corridor Management Program and an ICMS is an obvious key to success. The stakeholders should consider innovative ways of funding the system, such as pooling their respective funding sources, and sharing key resources (e.g., equipment and personnel) across jurisdictional boundaries among the network providers. Innovative procurement approaches may also be considered for an ICMS. Of course, these "outside-the-box" approaches require a strong institutional network of ICM stakeholders and detailed inter-agency agreements.
There is a sort of "chicken and egg" challenge here. As noted during one of the corridor site visits, "you need institutional integration (funding) to generate operational integration; however, you need some level of operational integration to demonstrate success and thus gain the support necessary to facilitate institutional integration." As such, outreach is a critical activity for securing funding. As noted in the ITE publication A Tool Box for Alleviating Traffic Congestion and Enhancing Mobility, some of the most successful efforts at adopting transportation programs have exhibited the following characteristics:
- Waging an aggressive campaign to inform the public of what is likely to occur if something is not done.
- Clearly stating what the average citizen will gain from these actions.
- Providing opportunities for citizens and interest groups to participate in the planning and decision making process.
- Actively pursuing business support for the proposed actions.
- Seeking media support in editorials and news reporting.
- Developing a cost effective program that appeals to as broad a political base as possible.
As noted in NCHRP Synthesis 337 (Reference 12) : "Create frequent opportunities for educating partners and their stakeholders on the importance of the corridor management effort. Most agencies experience some setbacks in their corridor management efforts, even with formal cooperative agreements. Those having success recognize that corridor management is an ongoing process that benefits from continuous education and periodic technical assistance."
Sustainability
As noted above, ICM may require some "outside-the-box" approaches for funding and procurement. After all, managing the movement of people and goods on a corridor basis, transcending traditional agency and network boundaries, is itself somewhat outside the box. Nevertheless, one of the major institutional issues, and a key to long-term success, is sustainability. With the proper pieces in place (e.g., stakeholder group and champions, ICM program plan, configuration management plan, operations and management plan, agency agreements), the path and momentum should be established for making ICM and integral part of each agency's management and day-to-day operations. For example, NCHRP states: "partners should be asked to incorporate the substance of the corridor agreements into their plans, policies, design standards, manuals and regulations to facilitate enforcement."
Human Relations
A recurring theme in this ICM Implementation Guidance is that Integrated Corridor Management is an ongoing, iterative effort requiring collaboration and coordination on the part of numerous agencies and organizations. The various agencies that are involved or impacted by the ICM don't attend and participate in coordination meetings and decision-making processes, per se; rather, it is their representatives that discuss and (hopefully) resolve the numerous institutional, operational and technical associated with ICM and a corridor-based system.
ICM requires the talents of many people. In fact, most institutional challenges and barriers are really about human relations. As stated in the FHWA "Guidelines for Successful Systems" (Reference 16), "excellent human relations are therefore essential to a systems success. In fact, this may be the most critical aspect of the process. If the various participants cooperate, then a successful system is almost assured. On the other hand, when the relationships between individuals disintegrate and they start to work at cross-purposes, the success of the system is seriously endangered." The importance of personal relationships among leaders and staff members of key operating agencies and neighboring jurisdictions, who recognize common problems and opportunities and agree to work together to improve regional transportation systems performance, cannot be overemphasized.
The dependence on the social behavior of different individuals can be a bit unsettling. After all, the most critical element of the process to develop, implement, and operate an ICMS is also the least controllable. Reference 16 notes that the absence of good human relations can be attributed to a variety of causes, including:
- Poor communications between people and organizations, which in turn leads to misunderstandings. Face to face contact can mitigate this problem.
- Insufficient knowledge, experience and/ or information on the part of key individuals.
- Persons in position of responsibility without the appropriate authority.
- Lack of continuity of key personnel throughout the process.
- Significant differences of opinion as to what is required from each organization involved in the process.
The systems engineering process addresses many of these potential problems, For example stakeholder meetings; comprehensive program and operational plans; in-depth walk throughs of requirements, plans, designs, etc; well-written agency agreements all contribute to improving understanding and agreement. Additionally, there are a number of general principles which can help to promote and maintain good human relations, and therefore minimize many of the potential barriers to collaboration and coordination. These principles include:
- Empathy — viewing problems and issues as others do, which requires careful listening.
- Honesty — clearly presenting the facts and being truthful in all dealings.
- Individuality — approaching people as individuals, not as stereotypes.
- Thoughtfulness — showing respect for the opinions and talents of others.
- Positive thinking — showing confidence in the concept of an ICMS.
- Flexibility — recognizing that circumstances change, and being open to new ideas.
Experience has shown that, far beyond any formal processes and written controls, system success depends on informal elements. That is, a successful ICMS must be a human success if it is ever to be a technical and operational one.