ME2018 Leading temporary organizations and projects

Course introduction

Who am I?

• Johann Packendorff• Associate professor of project management

and operations management at KTH since 2001

• Member of the Swedish Project Academy• Research on project management,

entrepreneurship and leadership

Operations Management – Basic Principles

All types of enterprise have an operations function, even if it isn’t called ‘operations.

Most operations produce both products and services.

Materials

Products and services

Information

Customers

Operations management is concerned with producing and

delivering products and services

That is:

Operations are – if organized in the right fashion – a source of competitiveness and survival for the firm!

The strategic role of operations can be defined by its aspirations (Hayes and Wheelwright)

Give an Operations Advantage

Externally supportive

Internally supportive

Externally neutral

Internally neutral

The ability

to Implement

Link Strategy With

Operations

Adopt best Practice

Correct the Worst

Problems

Increasing contri

bution of o

peratio

ns

STAGE 1 STAGE 2 STAGE 3 STAGE 4The

ability to

Drive strategy

Stop holding the

organization back

Be as good as

competitors

Be clearly the best

in the industry

Redefine the industry’s

expectations

The abilityto

support Strategy

An operation contributes to business strategy by achieving five "Performance

Objectives"

CHANGING what you do a FLEXIBILITY advantageGives

Doing things CHEAPLY a COST advantageGives

Doing things ON TIME a DEPENDABILITY advantageGives

Doing things FAST a SPEED advantageGives

Doing things RIGHT a QUALITY advantageGives

VolumeLow High VolumeLow High

Var

iety

Lo

wH

igh

Var

iety

Lo

wH

igh

Project

Jobbing

Batch

Mass

Contin--uous

Professional service

Service shop

Mass service

Service process types

Manufacturing process types

Development trends

Management Management Management

Line-basedoperations

Projects

Line-basedoperations

Project-basedoperations

Line-basedoperations

IndustrializedProject operations

Projects

1980 2000 ?

Towards project portfolio management

200019801960194019201900

Mass manufacturing

Project management

MTMToyota sy

stem

TQM Lean

manufacturin

g

Scientifi

c

management

Gantt

schedules

MBO Network

planning

Matrix

organizatio

ns

Critical

chain PMBOK

Certific

ations

Project portfolio managementOPM3

PM as co

re co

mpetence

Lean en

g.

Stage-g

ate m

odels

Risk m

anagement

PM offi

ces

Project dependence in Swedish industry

• Project-based exports (Svensson, 1996)– The total of project-based operations amounted to 193

billion SEK, about 50% of total Swedish exports

• R&D intensity(SCB, 2002)– Amounts to 5% of GNP, but in some firms about 20-30%

of total sales (development projects)

• The character of fast-growing industry segments (SCB, 2002)– IT, drugs, consultancy

• Big-firm depencence (ISA, 1999)– A large share of our most important multinationals are

project-based firms (e.g. Ericsson, ABB and Skanska)

Types of projects• Delivery projects

• Development projects

• Change projects

Jonas Söderlund

Delivery projects Development projects Change projects

Aim Deliver and implement complex solutions/systems to customers and/or end users.

Develop new technologies, products or services for manufacturing and/or sale to mass market or for use in the firm’s delivery projects.

Change organizational routines in order to improve everyday performance and/or improve the firm’s delivery or development projects.

Guiding parameter

Contracts Technology Organization

Competence problem

Integration of knowledge between customer and provider.

Integration of knowledge between different technical disciplines and organizational parts.

Change of competence structure and integration of organizational knowledge.

Managerial focus

Customer dialogue, customer interaction, negotiation.

Specifications, technical solutions, integration of technical solutions.

Change resistance, internal marketing, managerial hierarchies.

Success criteria

ProfitabilityCustomer satisfaction

ProfitabilityRisk spreadStrategic marketing considerations

Realized improvement potentialManagement/sponsor satisfaction

Project management as a core competence

• ABB– Project Support, World Class Training

• Ericsson– Project Office, EPMI, PROPS

• AstraZeneca– PMSO, Global Project Directors/Managers

• Tetra Pak– Core Values

• Volvo PV– Project Director, Project Management

”The ability to successfully carry out projects.”

Project-level improvement:THE “STAGE-GATE” PROCESS IN R&D

What is the “Stage-Gate” Process?

Increasin

g Demands o

n Reso

urces

Increasin

g Level o

f Scru

tiny

“Ideation”

PreliminaryAnalysis

Build a Business

Case

“Go/Kill”?

Development

“Go/Kill”?

“Go/Kill”?

“Go/Kill”?

Testing

Launch

Stage

Gate

The basic idea is that each “stage” has a set of

deliverables. If these are not produced (or if the

findings are not favorable), the project gets killed at the

following “gate”.

Legend:

Company-level improvement: OPM3

Remaining problem

• Focus on certification- Individual (PMP, IPMA levels)- Organizational (OPM3)

• Focus on procedures developed from traditional project management thinking

• Neglecting inspiration from the dominating Operations Management movement: Lean Manufacturing!

• Neglecting inspiration from current organizational research

• Calls for a philosophical re-orientation, not only more rules, procedures and standardisation

…therefore, a course…

Course goals

The aim of the course is to develop advanced in-depth knowledge on leading different forms of temporary organizations, departing from several contemporary perspectives in operations management and project management research.

Learning outcomes

The student shall be able to:• Describe the connections, similarities and differences

between project management and general operations management.

• Describe, analyse and solve managerial problems in different forms of dispersed and/or network-based projects

• Use bibliographical databases for continuous learning and development within the fields of project management and operations management.

• Apply contemporary research perspectives for the practical solving of managerial problems in project-based operations.

ME2018

• Lectures• Individual task (IJPM)• Group (2-5 pers) tasks – five thematical

reports• Seminar series – plenary discussion

seminars• Tentamen

Reviewing a project management research article

– individual term paper task Term paper 1: Each student shall indiviually select an article from a

leading project management journal and write a paper of maximum 10 pages.

The first half of the report is a summary of the article, whereafter the second half is spent analysing and criticizing its assumptions, contents and conclusions. The analysis and critique should make use of the course literature and own experiences. IJPM is electronically available as an E-journal through the KTH library, www.lib.kth.se. Preferably, issues from 1995 onwards should be used. The report is submitted in paper format – including a printout of the article – no later than April 15th, 2011.

Five themes

1. Lean project management

2. Project management across borders

3. Leadership in projects

4. Innovative and entrepreneurial projects

5. Critical project studies

For each theme

• Introductory lecture, ended by a set of discussion questions

• Set of articles published at the course homepage or handed out in paper format

• Hand-in of group report, containing (1) literature review, (2) group’s opinions/answers to discussion questions

• Plenary discussion seminar, all groups expected to be able to make short presentations and participate actively

Course literature

• ”Virtual” list of readings updated regularly at course homepage

• Own literature searches

Exams

ME2018: Tentamen (50%), group reports (25%), article review (25%)