The Dynamics of Business Behavior

5Planning and Risk Management

JUST SOUTH OF the German capital Berlin in the state of Brandenburg lies the Berlin Brandenburg Airport. Between its conception in the early 1990s, its scheduled opening in 2010, and its actual opening in 2020, Brandenburg Airport became one of the most notorious examples of human error in planning and risk management. The story entails multiple delays, scandals, bribes, and multiple billions in cost overruns.¹

As construction finally began in 2007, the airport's opening date was set for October 2011 with an initial estimated budget of approximately 2.8 billion euros. However, due to delays in the technical building systems, the need to install additional security screening lines, and one of its contractors going bankrupt, the opening date was pushed back to 2012. This is when things started going farther south.

After years of continuous delays and leadership changes, the airport's opening was denied just weeks before it was set to open. Inspectors identified approximately 120,000 defects, including fire safety concerns, malfunctioning automatic doors, and sagging roofs. They also discovered that about 170,000 kilometers of cable, located both inside and outside the airport, were improperly wired and posed a danger. With the efforts of multiple high-paid airport company managers over the course of more than nine years, the airport finally opened its gates in 2020. Just in time for the COVID-19 pandemic.

Bad luck and inevitable disasters aside, ...