Terry Williams

Assessing and moving on from the dominant project management discourse in the light of project overruns

There has been much prescriptive work in project management, exemplified in various Bodies of Knowledge. However, experience shows some projects overspending considerably. Recently, systemic modeling research into the behavior of large projects explains project oversponds by systemic effects and the (sometimes counterintuitive) effect of management actions. However, while this work is becoming more widely known, embedding the lessons in project-management practice is not straightforward. The current prescriptive dominant discourse of project management contains implicit underlying assumptions with which the systemic modeling work clashes, indeed showing how conventional methods can exacerbate rather than alleviate project problems. Exploration of this modeling suggests that for projects that are complex, uncertain, and time-limited, conventional methods might be inappropriate, and aspects of newer methodologies in which the project emerges rather than being fully preplanned might be more appropriate. Some of the current literature on project-classification schemes also suggests similar parameters, without the rationale that the systemic modeling provides, thus providing useful backup to this analysis. The eventual aim of this line of work is to enable project managers to choose effective ways to manage projects based on understanding and model-based theory.

Now, let’s make it really complex (complicated):A systematic review of the complexities of projects

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to contribute to operations management (OM) practice contingency research by describing the complexity of projects. Complexity is recognised as a key independent (contingent) variable that impacts on many subsequent decisions in the practice of managing projects.Design/methodology/approach – This paper presents a systematic review of relevant literature and synthesises an integrated framework for assessing the complexities of managing projects.Findings – This framework comprises five dimensions of complexity – structural, uncertainty, dynamics, pace and socio‐political complexity. These five dimensions present individuals and organisations with choices about how they respond to each type of complexity, in terms of business case, strategic choice, process choice, managerial capacity and competencies.Originality/value – The contribution of this paper is to provide a clarification to the epistemology of complexity, to demonstrate complexity as a lived experience for pro...

Governance frameworks for public project development and estimation

This paper investigates how the interface between governance and project management works for public projects. It describes governance frameworks, analyzes embedded governance principles, and discusses the consequences. Based on an initial literature study giving theoretical underpinning, a characterization of frameworks is developed and used to investigate three public-investment-project governance frameworks in Norway and the United Kingdom. This gives a systematic comparison of framework scope, structure, and embedded principles, and shows the differences between the frameworks and elements, despite the stated purposes being the same: increasing value for money and better use of public spending. The analysis shows the frameworks have to be politically and administratively well anchored. A case study particularly looking into cost and time illustrates how the framework influences the project through scrutiny. The analysis shows the governance frameworks are important in securing transparency and control and clarifies the role of sponsor. This work will be useful in establishing frameworks in other contexts and should be helpful in working with governance of major public projects.

Understanding project failure: using cognitive mapping in an insurance project

Many projects fail, especially IT projects. The only way that companies can get better at performing projects is by learning from projects they have carried out. But traditional practice of holding a lessons-learned session during or following a project may not allow organizations to examine the deep and “messy” reasons why projects fail, particularly with complex projects. Complex projects can best be understood by using modeling, such as cognitive mapping. Cognitive mapping aids identification of causal chains and where these close in on themselves to form positive feedback loops, which helps to understand not only what went wrong, but also the reasons. Cognitive mapping is used to understand the impacts of management decisions on a project, both intended and unintentional. This approach is used here to examine a large software development project carried out by an insurance company which overran its original plan by several years. Some suggestions are made both for using such methods and lessons to be learned for future projects.

Building Confidence in Models for Multiple Audiences: The Modelling Cascade

This paper reports on a model building process developed to enable multiple audiences, particularly non-experts, to appreciate the validity of the models being built and their outcomes. The process is a four stage reversible cascade. This cascade provides a structured, auditable/transparent, formalized process from “real world” interviews generating a rich qualitative model through two intermediate steps before arriving at a quantitative simulation model. There are a number of advantages of the cascade process including; achieving comprehensiveness, developing organizational learning, testing the veracity of multiple perspectives, modeling transparency, achieving common understanding across many audiences and promoting confidence building in the models. The paper, based on extensive work with organizations, discusses both the cascade process and its inherent benefits.

Systemic risk assessment: a case study

Project Risk Registers have been used extensively for many years. However, they do not account for the interaction between risks, for example, the occurrence of one risk exacerbating other risks or portfolios of risks being more significant than the sum of the individual risks. This leads to the need to consider ‘risk systemicity’ as a part of risk analysis. This paper reports on a specific case for a large multinational project based organization, one that the authors had been involved with in the analysis of a number of projects that had massive cost overruns. Following these analyses the organization was persuaded of the importance of risk systemicity. The organization therefore engaged the authors to develop a ‘Risk Filter’. This filter is a tool for identifying areas of risk exposure on future projects and creating a framework for their investigation. The ‘Risk Filter’ is now used on all projects ever since its introduction; by the end of May 2003 it had been used by nine divisions, on over 60 major projects, and completed by 450 respondents. It is also used at several stages during the life of a project to aid in the risk assessment and management of each project, and contributes to a project database.

An Empirical Approach to Service Classification for Productivity Management Studies

This paper presents key results of a research project on the application of service dimensions and classifications, to study differences between productivity management challenges across 12 important service sectors in the UK. The research methodology was mainly empirical in nature: unlike other research in this area, appropriate service dimensions and consequent classification models were introduced only after analysing the relationship between a number of candidate dimensions and aspects of productivity management. Among the dimensions studied, Front/Back Value Added, Personnel Judgement and Product/Process Focus turned out to be suitable indicators for a range of aspects relating to productivity management in services.

A TQM Approach to HR Performance Evaulation: A Questionnaire Survey

The impact and effectiveness of Human Resources (HR) performance evaluation system is studied through a questionnaire survey of Scottish-based quality driven organizations. Findings suggest that improvement of employees performance, customer care, active involvement and approaching performance evaluation as a quality effort are the most generally agreed components of a Total Quality Management (TQM) driven HR performance evaluationIn contrast to previous research on HR performance evaluation in quality organisational environments, which is mainly confined to the literature and theory-based studies, this paper provides a partial answer to the question: what is a typical quality-oriented HR performance evaluation system? In this study, an attempt is made to highlight the key generic criteria of a quality-driven HR performance evaluation system through a questionnaire survey of Scottish-based quality-driven organisations. It allows the reader to map the most important issues in HR performance evaluation in a quality management context. In addition, the study analyses the degree of effectiveness of the currently conducted HR performance evaluation in identifying training needs, employee motivation, improvement in future performance and overall performance of the organisation. Finally, suggestions are offered for moving towards a quality-based HR performance evaluation.

Managerial approaches towards service quality: the case of three service organisations

Using a multiple case study, this paper is concerned with assessing the impact of senior managements approach and attitudes on service quality and its implications for middle and firstline managers. Date from 52 semi-structured interviews representing a variety of managerial levels suggests that there exist many conflicts and differences in senior managements orientation and approach towards quality management (QM) with that of middle and firstline managers. The results further indicate that getting such consistency appropriate to the needs of top, middle, and firstline management, and of the QM itself, is one of the key problems of current management of service quality. However, the findings highlight that where there is consistency between senior managers underlying approaches towards service quality goal with that of middle and firstline managers, service quality programmes will highly likely produce expected results. Finally, the implications of these findings as well as future research are put forward.

A profile of OR research and practice published in the Journal of the Operational Research Society

In this paper we reflect on the last 10 years of the Journal of the Operational Research Society (JORS). We use metadata and citation analysis to profile OR research and practice published in this prestigious journal. The analysis of the published material includes examining variables such as the most productive authors, the papers having the highest number of citations, the universities and organisations associated with the most publications and their geographic diversity, OR techniques and their application areas, the number of authors per paper, the background of the authors, etc. Moreover, this work includes variables from a previously published study of JORS that profiled research from 1981 to 1999. Therefore, the analysis allows a comparison to be conducted between some of the findings of the two studies. This research has implications for researchers, journal editors and research institutions.