The post The Best Online Project Management Courses appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>I want to share with you the ones that helped me the most.
Joseph Phillips has a few very good PMI Exam Prep courses on Udemy. This is the PMP Exam Prep:
https://www.udemy.com/course/pmp-pmbok6-35-pdus/
And this one is the PMI-ACP Exam Prep:
https://www.udemy.com/course/pmiacp_21pdus/
For Scrum, I highly recommend Vladimir Raykov courses:
https://www.udemy.com/course/the-ultimate-agile-scrum-master-certification-training/
On Pluralsight, Benjamin Day has a great Advanced Scrum course:
https://app.pluralsight.com/library/courses/scrum-master-skills/table-of-contents
The post The Best Online Project Management Courses appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>The post The Best Project Management Books I’ve Read appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>One of the most comprehensive agile books, Mike Cohn’s Agile Estimating and Planning is probably the best guide on how to estimate and plan agile projects. It helped me understand in depth the rationale of planning and estimating in an agile way, and also the best practices to realize it.
Favourite quote: “Planning is everything. Plans are nothing.” —Field Marshal Helmuth Graf von Moltke”
Scrum Mastery is a book that serves as a reminder on what makes a great Scrum Master. It shows the differences between good and great Scrum Masters and how the latter, as Servant Leaders, build high-performing teams.
The book is highly recommended to practicing Scrum Masters, to those that want to reach a higher level of maturity in their practice or to be inspired with a fresh view on the mission of their role. It could be also useful for other people in the organization, that work with Scrum Masters and want to understand better how a great Scrum Masters contribute for the team and the organization.
Favourite quote: “It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”
One of the most practical books on Project Management, Making Things Happen uses examples and use-cases from Scott Berkun’s years of project management experience at Microsoft. Centered around software development, the author covers real-world situations that occurs in the daily activities of a project: schedules, specifications and requirements, how to figure out what to do, how to make good decisions, how not to annoy people, what to do when things go wrong and others.
Favourite quote: “Without change and the occasional struggle, we can’t learn or grow.”
The story of Scrum, written by one of its creators, Jeff Sutherland. This is not a how-to guide, (for that you should probably start with the Scrum Guide) but mostly is a detailed journey of Scrum, from its beginnings to how it became the standard framework for software development teams.
Favourite quote: “No Heroics. If you need a hero to get things done, you have a problem. Heroic effort should be viewed as a failure of planning.”
As we know, Scrum is easy to understand but hard to master. Mike Cohn is one of the leading thinkers and authors on Agile Software Development and in this excellent book he succeeds to shed light on the best practices for implementing Scrum and offer solutions to the challenges practitioners face when transitioning to Agile.
Favourite quote: “If a project manager can overcome the old habits of directing the team and making decisions for it, it is likely such a project manager can become a good ScrumMaster.”
A small book covering the basics of Scrum, for those that need a quick reference or for those that after reading the Scrum Guide feel the need for more guidance. It covers the most important information needed to get a Scrum certification or to get ready when starting a new Scrum project.
Favourite quote: “Scrum Master, as the promoter of Scrum and self-organization, should consider how to help a team work out their problems themselves and offer any tools, trainings and insights on how best to do this.”
This book is largely a study of a 800 project managers survey, trying to identify the traits of the top 2% (the Alphas), that make them stand out in the eyes of their senior managers, customers and other stakeholders.
Favourite quote: “Until my product is in the customer’s hands, communication is my deliverable.”
Mary and Tom Poppendieck’s engaging book presents us how to drive high-value change throughout a software organization.
Main topics:
Systems thinking: focusing on customers, bringing predictability to demand, and revamping policies that cause inefficiency
Technical excellence: implementing low-dependency architectures, TDD, and evolutionary development processes, and promoting deeper developer expertise
Reliable delivery: managing your biggest risks more effectively, and optimizing both workflow and schedules
Relentless improvement: seeing problems, solving problems, sharing the knowledge
Great people: finding and growing professionals with purpose, passion, persistence, and pride
Aligned leaders: getting your entire leadership team on the same page
Favourite quote: “Your purpose is probably not to develop software. It is a rare customer who wants software; customers want their problems solved. If customers could solve their problems without software, they would be delighted.“
A good book that I’ve used to prepare for the PMI-ACP certification. It provides theoretical information of multiple agile frameworks, practices and tools and how agile can be blended with waterfall in hybrid approaches. I would recommend it only to prepare for PMI’s certifications.
A well written book, Fixing your Scrum deals with the common dysfunctions and challenges that emerge while doing Scrum. Listing a series of anti-patterns such as lacking goals, not having a clear vision, one product, many product backlogs, the superhero scrum master, too many meetings, the authors provide practical solutions on how to overcome them.
Favourite quote: “Want to know the best way to demotivate a development team? Keep them from seeing how their work impacts your customers.”
The post The Best Project Management Books I’ve Read appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>The post How project managers ensure teamwork and collaboration appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>As detailed in a previous blog post, “What is a Project-Based Organization?”, since the 2nd half of the 20th century there has been a corporate shift from the functional bureaucracy management practices to project-based organizations. This change has started as a reaction to the evolving nature of the business environment from stable, slowly changing technology, predictable customer requirements, and mass production to rapid, continuous technological innovation, demanding customers and highly customized products (Turner, J.R. and Keegan, A., 1999).
One of the most important challenges faced by today’s project-based organizations is to instill a culture of teamwork and collaboration across the company and within its project teams.
While teamwork is important in functional, hierarchical line management, I consider it not as difficult to ensure it as in project-based organizations. Functional operations teams usually have standardized processes, running them more or less in the same sequence for many years and decades. This is in stark contrast with project teams in project-based organizations, that are quickly assembled to run a highly complex, uncertain initiative that will last for a limited time, usually not more than one or two years.
This blog post’s quest is to understand what is the role of the project manager in building teamwork and collaboration between the members of the project team.
The emergence of the Project Manager as a relational leader in the organization
While management is about processes and systems, leadership looks at how it can support people by offering them guidance and direction. DuBois, M. et al. (2015).
In an increasingly globalized environment, organizations embrace project management as the method to implement successful strategies. In order to obtain the desired results out of these highly complex and uncertain initiatives, companies recognize that they require not just project managers, but project leaders.
However, between sitting in a leadership position and acting as a leader there are big differences. Time and experience, failures and success, learning and observing are all factors that contribute to the development of leadership traits. Good business outcomes are no longer enough for the aspiring leaders, they also need to aim high towards creating a culture where people are inspired to work together for a common purpose.
In this context, teams are the go-to solution for organizations that deal with complex and difficult activities says Salas, E. et al. (2008).
As the challenges companies face continues to grow, the tasks often exceed the capacity of an individual to take informed decisions and working in a collaborative way is becoming the norm.
The increasing dependency of organizations on teams makes them critical in project environments. To get the most from the project teams, the project manager needs to empower them to create meaningful work.
In complex projects it’s no longer possible for the project manager to control and direct all aspects of the project work. Instead, the project manager needs to provide an overall plan of action, to facilitate collaboration between the team members, to give key team members decision-making authority, to promote creativity and innovation that contribute to the project goals.
A project cannot succeed without the common effort of the project team members. DiTullio (2009)
A set of behaviors a high-functioning project team should share: treat others respectfully, support teamwork, understand the impact of your actions on others, make timely decisions, provide and request ongoing feedback, share knowledge and information.
In this context, the project manager has an important leadership role in the project team cohesion. Thamhain (2004)
Project leaders play a definitive role in developing team virtues such as work ethics, respect and trust, honesty and courage. Kloppenborg and Petrick (1999)
These authors are sketching a project managers’ portrait as a central figure on the organizational scene, one that can gather up teams and strengthen teamwork, ensuring that projects and organizations reach their goals.
Team members’ morale, Dye (2011) found, has a critical impact on their engagement, behavior and productivity.
A few rules a project manager can follow to increase and keep a team’s morale at high levels: communicate and listen, establish clear performance goals, assign well-defined responsibilities, show commitment, share honest and reliable feedback, encourage innovation and calculated risk taking, make effort to maintain a safe, healthy and friendly workplace, instill a team spirit.
Project leaders play a definitive role in building teams. DuBois, M. et al. (2015)
Team building should be one of the project manager’s primary activity and it should be integrated as a daily task. The authors consider that providing emotional support and motivating team members to stay focused in times of stress and ambiguity have a great impact on the odds of delivering positive project outcomes.
The post-heroic, post-alpha male model of leadership is usually defined as pervasive throughout the organization, not bounded by function and hierarchy, an interdependent and collaborative practice of trust, empathy and empowerment (Cunliffe, A. L., and Eriksen, M. 2011).
Relational leadership derives from this discourse, it presents how leaders are in relation to others and recognizes the intricate nature of our relationships.
The authors look at relational leadership as a way for the leader to understand his everyday interaction with others, how the leader acts in seemingly mundane, constantly emerging exchanges. This view emphasizes the important role the leader plays by being present, responsible and accountable in the daily flow of interactions with others. The leaders must understand the intersubjective nature of these relationships and to self-reflect on the assumptions they have about their relationships with others. After they examine the influence of their behavior, leaders will be able to anticipate what matters in their relations, will create open-dialogue opportunities for fruitful conversations, mutual understanding and respect.
All in all, relational leaders must be aware of their influence on others, must guard against their biases, and must be prepared to continuously learn and adapt.
The increased adoption of project management in organizations have changed project managers’ leadership identity from a managerial perspective to a relational one. Psychogios et al.’s (2017)
The ramping up levels of business complexity and uncertainty also determined this shift. In this context, project-based organizations construct a leadership identity that moves between project coordination tasks and developing relationships with project stakeholders.
In this key, project leadership is identified as relational and not something that belongs solely to the leader.
Conclusion
As companies gradually shift from functional, bureaucratic to project based structures, project management took over as the main vehicle through which they achieve strategic objectives. During this transition, the project manager emerged as a leader in the organization, the one that coalesces diverse, cross-functional individuals into fine-tuned teams.
I hope that this analysis helped us to understand the realm of project-based organizations and the role of their project managers in setting up teams and ensuring collaboration.
We saw that project managers are valued due to their role and ability of helping companies fulfill complex and difficult strategic initiatives. It seems they can do that by acting as relational leaders, playing a central role in orchestrating and empowering teams to reach project goals.
References
Cunliffe, A. L., & Eriksen, M. (2011). Relational leadership. Human relations, 64(11), 1425-1449.
DiTullio, L. A. (2009). Expected behaviors for project team performance: road rules, not road rage. Paper presented at PMI® Global Congress 2009—North America, Orlando, FL. Newtown Square, PA: Project Management Institute.
DuBois, M. et al. (2015) ‘Leadership Styles of Effective Project Managers: Techniques and Traits to Lead High Performance Teams’, Journal of Economic Development, Management, IT, Finance & Marketing, 7(1), pp. 30–46.
Dye, L. D. (2011). The significant role of the project manager in establishing and maintaining team morale. Paper presented at PMI® Global Congress 2011—North America, Dallas, TX. Newtown Square, PA: Project Management Institute. https://www.pmi.org/learning/library/team-morale-motivation-ideas-maintain-6175
Kloppenborg T. J., & Petrick, J. A. (1999). Leadership in project life cycle and team character development. Project Management Journal, 30(2), 8-13
Psychogios, A., Kapsali, M., and Prouska R. (2017) Theorising Relational Project Leadership Identity: An International Qualitative Study, Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Leadership Symposium, Theme: Leadership, Followership & Identity, May 2017, Mykonos, Greece
Salas, E., Cooke, N. J. and Rosen, M. A. (2008) ‘On Teams, Teamwork, and Team Performance: Discoveries and Developments’, Human Factors, 50(3), pp. 540–547. doi: 10.1518/001872008X288457.
Thamhain, H. J. (2004). Linkages of project environment to performance: lessons for team leadership. International Journal of Project Management, 22(7), 533-544.
Toma, L. C. (2021). Project Manager as a Relational Leader in Project-Based Organizations. The University of Sheffield International Faculty, City College
Turner, J.R. and Keegan, A., 1999. The versatile project-based organization: governance and operational
control. European management journal, 17(3), pp.296-309.
The post How project managers ensure teamwork and collaboration appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>The post Employee turnover types and retention strategies appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>High turnover rate creates serious difficulties for organizations: increased expenses, knowledge drain, lost business, dissatisfied customers, low quality services, reduced employee commitment, negative market reputation, high pressure on the recruiting team and others. Below I’ve analyzed the main causes of employee turnover, the types of employee turnover and why voluntary turnover is the largest turnover issue in organizations.
Turnover and retention, the good and the bad
Employee retention is one of the most important items on top executive’s agenda in organizations across the globe. (Herman, 2005)
As the economic growth creates more jobs that need to be filled by knowledgeable and skilled employees, organizations will face difficulties if they do not have enough qualified workers.
The employee turnover is a critical issue for companies and managers, while the recruiting, selecting, and training costs for new employees exceeds the annual salary for the recruited position (Allen et all, 2010).
Ployhart et all (2011) confirms that retaining high-performing employees is a critical asset for organizations that successfully adapt their strategy to market changes.
Probably, the key fact is that retaining skilled and motivated employees naturally boosts the bottom-line (Covella et all, 2017).
Receiving significant attention from scholars and practitioners, employee turnover is widely studied, most papers trying to answer the question of why individual employees leave organizations (Hausknecht & Trevor, 2011).
The employability paradox is an issue for organizations. (Nelissen & Verbruggern, 2017)
The concept means that activities that are increasing individuals employability also increase the risk of turnover. The authors found that horizontal career advancement is a sign of career success and it increases the employee’s external market attractiveness and turnover intentions. Also, the internal career alternatives do not influence the turnover intentions, if they are not perceived as being more attractive than the external alternatives.
It seems that the employability paradox does not always apply and trainings pay-back for the organization.
In another study, Kampkotter & Marggraf (2015) found that there is a reciprocity connection between company sponsored trainings, absence behavior and turnover probability. The authors argue that the employees may be willing to pay-back the trainings with higher commitment to the organization and increased efforts. Their study concluded that general trainings provided by organizations lead to lower turnover rates, even more for the new employees.
De Cuyper & Witte (2011) also found that organizations providing general trainings to their workers are considered as more attractive to work for, and they even suggest that employers that increase the workers’ self-rated employability also reduce the turnover rates.
Evidence of increased retention effects are also associated with employee involvement in Corporate Social Initiatives with positive social impact (Bode and Rogan, 2015).
The study found that women, young- employees and high performers may greatly benefit from participating in CSI projects and that the activities increased their individual motivation, identification with the firm and positively related with retention rates in the organization.
High levels of employee engagement in organizations leads to reduced turnover intentions. (Smith & Macko, 2014)
Gruman and Sacks (2011) highlight the fact that it is possible to increase employee performance by involving the performance management system in the development of employee engagement. According to the authors, firstly the organization should provide the employees with the resources needed to perform the job. Secondly, when the employees are assigned tasks and jobs, managers need to ensure that there is a good match between them and the employee skills, knowledge and characteristics. Thirdly, the authors consider that an important part of increasing employee engagement through the performance management system are evaluation and feedback.
The relation an employee has with his first line manager is often the deciding factor in the turnover decisions (Allen et all, 2010).
Leader Member Exchange is a concept defined by Covella et all (2017) as a negotiation medium between leaders and subordinates focused on creating a relationship that fosters employee engagement and influences employee’s career decisions. The authors show that organizations that provide leadership and communication trainings increase the quality of the manager – employee relations and lowers the turnover intention.
Job satisfaction is directly related to employee’s resignation decisions (Ployhart et all, 2011).
By using periodic employee surveys, organizations can identify changes in job satisfaction and they can react to turnover intentions. By focusing on the dynamics of job satisfaction, organizations can adapt retention strategies for greater impact.
Hom and Kinicki (2001) point to how job dissatisfaction progresses into turnover.
Job avoidance manifested as excessive absences and lateness are signs of turnover intentions and the organization’s efforts to penalize these behaviors may accelerate the resignation decisions. Inter- role conflict is a source of job avoidance and turnover. Unhappy employees experience not only job-content related dissatisfaction, but also other disengagement factors such as work schedules and business travel that are not aligned with their personal duties.
Hom et all (2012) found 4 employee states: enthusiastic leavers and stayers and reluctant leavers and stayers.
Enthusiastic stayers willingly remain within the company for as long as they can. They are committed, engaged and they are treated well by the organization. Reluctant stayers remain with the company until something happens and they can leave. Enthusiastic leavers are described as the most analyzed subpopulation in turnover and retention studies. This category, also named “voluntary leavers” want to resign and can do so. Reluctant leavers would like to stay but need to leave. Named “involuntary leavers” they are the employees picked-out for dismissals and layoffs.
Turnover is not uniformly bad (Allen et all, 2010).
Positive outcomes of employees’ turnover such as reduced labor costs, increased innovation and flexibility, career growth, promotions opportunities, greater performance and productivity have been identified by Hausknecht and Trevor (2011).
New ideas, perspectives and reduced staff costs are also turnover advantages (Smith and Macko, 2014). On the one hand, low turnover rates may cause stagnation, high personnel costs, undesirable homogeneity, and a high number of low performers. On the other hand, when turnover is high, increased recruiting, training costs and human and social capital loss are detrimental (Hancock et all, 2013).
Not all industries are the same.
Turnover rates that seem high in general could be lower than those of direct competitors. High/low replacement costs, individualistic/collective cultures, managerial/non-managerial positions, and high/low skill requirements are powerful differentiators when we analyze an organization turnover.
Voluntary turnover is started by the employee, while involuntary turnover is initiated by the firm. (Allen et all, 2010).
While organizations should manage involuntary turnover, the retention strategy should concentrate on voluntary turnover, because these are the workers we would like to keep.
Key recommendations for counteracting employee turnover are:
Creating a motivating vision for employees, one that focuses on improving the work conditions, that promotes internal employability and develops career plans. When promotion rates are high, we see an increase in job satisfaction, performance and a reduction in high-performers voluntary turnover.
Investing in training and preparing the employees in building job-specific skills, and increasing their interpersonal, relational aptitudes by providing soft-skills and leadership trainings. Training or hiring a human resources retention specialist will support management to reduce turnover and its related costs.
Increasing employee engagement is an effective method of reducing voluntary turnover, of stimulating performance and organizational attachment. Companies need to ensure that the employees have the skills and resources to fulfill their day to day tasks. Coworkers need to trust that they have equal chances, benefits and fair treatment. Evaluation and feedback, performance rewards and incentives will increase employee engagement, as well as involving our socially-minded colleagues in corporate social initiatives.
References:
Allen, D. G., Bryant, P. C., & Vardaman, J. M. (2010) Retaining Talent: Replacing Misconceptions With Evidence-Based Strategies. Academy of Management Perspectives, 24(2), 48–64. Available from: https://doi.org/10.5465/AMP.2010.51827775
Bode, C., Singh, J., & Rogan, M. (2015) Corporate Social Initiatives and Employee Retention. INSEAD Working Papers Collection, (34), 1–39. Available from: http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=102362400&site=ehost-live
Chen, G., Ployhart, R. E., Thomas, H. C., Anderson, N., & Bliese, P. D. (2011) The Power of Momentum: A New Model of Dynamic Relationships between Job Satisfaction Change and Turnover Intentions. Academy of Management Journal, 54(1), 159–181. Available from: https://doi.org/10.5465/AMJ.2011.59215089
Covella, G., McCarthy, V., Kaifi, B., & Cocoran, D. (2017) Leadership’s Role in Employee Retention. Business Management Dynamics, 7(5), 1–15. Available from: http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=127910858&site=ehost-live
De Cuyper, N., & De Witte, H. (2011) The management paradox. Personnel Review, 40(2), 152–172. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1108/00483481111106057
Kampkötter, P., & Marggraf, K. (2015) Do employees reciprocate to intra-firm trainings? An analysis of absenteeism and turnover rates. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 26(22), 2888–2907. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2015.1005655
Gruman, J. A., & Saks, A. M. (2011) Performance management and employee engagement. Human Resource Management Review, 21(2), 123–136. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2010.09.004
Hausknecht, J. P., & Trevor, C. O. (2011) Collective Turnover at the Group, Unit, and Organizational Levels: Evidence, Issues, and Implications. Journal of Management, 37(1), 352–388. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1177/014920631038391
Herman, R. E. (2005) HR managers as employee-retention specialists. Employment Relations Today (Wiley), 32(2), 1–7. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1002/ert.20058
Hancock, J. I., Allen, D. G., Bosco, F. A., McDaniel, K. R., & Pierce, C. A. (2013) Meta-Analytic Review of Employee Turnover as a Predictor of Firm Performance. Journal of Management, 39(3), 573–603.
Hom, P. W., & Kinicki, A. J. (2001) Toward a Greater Understanding of How Dissatisfaction Drives Employee Turnover. Academy of Management Journal, 44(5), 975–987. Available from: https://doi.org/10.2307/3069441
Hom, P. W., Mitchell, T. R., Lee, T. W., & Griffeth, R. W. (2012) Reviewing Employee Turnover: Focusing on Proximal Withdrawal States and an Expanded Criterion. Psychological Bulletin, 138(5), 831–858.
Nelissen, J., Forrier, A., & Verbruggen, M. (2017) Employee development and voluntary turnover: testing the employability paradox. Human Resource Management Journal, 27(1), 152–168. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12136
Smith, J., & Macko, N. (2014) Exploring The Relationship Between Employee Engagement And Employee Turnover. Annamalai International Journal of Business Studies & Research, 6(1), 56–69. Available from: http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=109025157&site=ehost-live
Toma, L. C, (2019) Strategies to reduce voluntary turnover in ABC organization. The University of Sheffield International Faculty, City College
The post Employee turnover types and retention strategies appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>The post What is a Project-Based Organization? appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>In this blog post, I delve into the origins and rationale of project-based organizations, highlighting the differences between them and functional, hierarchical line management. We also show how traditional bureaucratic line management started to morph into a new type of organization that runs the business and executes strategy as a series of projects.
Organizations as a “collection of projects”
During the second half of the 20th century there has been a corporate shift from the functional bureaucracy management practices to project-based organizations. (Turner, J.R. and Keegan, A. , 1999)
This change has started as a reaction to the evolving nature of the business environment from stable, slowly changing technology, predictable customer requirements, and mass production to rapid, continuous technological innovation, demanding customers and highly customized products.
According to Thiry, M. and Deguire, M. (2007) a project-based organization refers to a variety of organizations that use temporary structures to accomplish business outcomes. This type of organization is growing to become an emerging corporate form.
The most technologically advanced corporations reorganized their hierarchies to flatter, agile, and more flexible groupings of teams, communities and networks. This change in the business structure enables them to integrate knowledge from inside and outside the organization and to create innovative collaboration models for the development of new products and services. Applied to a wide range of businesses like construction, IT, engineering, professional services, PBOs aim is to run business as a series of projects. However, there is no clearly demarcated line between bureaucratic and project-based organizations, most of the organizations having a matrix organizational structure, using with varying degrees project and functional based approaches. (Bourouni, A. et al. , 2014).
Classical, functional management was well understood and documented, providing to the traditional organization many advantages such as central governance and control, integrated planning, knowledge management and human resources development (Turner, J.R. and Keegan, A., 2001).
The project-based organizational form requires a different management approach to address its changing and unique nature of work. While it has been suggested that organizations should adopt integrally project-based approaches for their operations, this could not be entirely applicable. Managing operations as projects adds an additional layer of governance over its existing hierarchy, creating complex hybrid structures with higher costs. For all its flaws, functional, bureaucratic line management proved that is the most efficient choice for essential, routine operations.
Functional hierarchical line management has started to gain traction during the 19th century when engineers have started to build machines and infrastructure (Turner, J.R. and Keegan, A., 1999).
The managers of the period wanted to instill the consistency and predictability of the machines to the workforce. Traditional management based on functional hierarchy function well where machines also function well: where there is a sequential, repetitive task to be done; there are little changes on the market and a business environment that ensure long product life cycles; precision is required. The classical management approach started to be challenged after 1950s due to reasons like: fast-paced developments of military equipment and infrastructure in the post-war period, the space race, the rapid development of the emerging computer industry, the rise in consumer products diversity and fragmentation. These events propelled the adoption of project management frameworks and project teams to undertake the work that functional hierarchical structures are not fit to.
Whitley, R. (2006) points to the lack of homogeneity across project-based organizations.
There is a considerable variety between these companies, from the high-tech, high-growth Silicon Valley organizations to project based firms in construction, business services, financial services and entertainment industry. Their dissimilarity comes from the goals they have and the outputs they produce, the distinctiveness and stability of the workers’ skills employed, the longevity of the project teams and how the project work is structured and coordinated.
When project-based entities are established to create a single or a few products or services and skilled project teams coordinate without managerial intervention the project work, these temporary organizations do not manage to create an identity and to develop the firm’s technical competencies.
The learning and knowledge accumulated during the project will be mostly accomplished by individuals or small teams and will not be internalized in the organizational procedures and practices. Only when project-based organizations build core project teams to undertake a series of projects on a long-term basis, the company is able on the long run to build a specific organizational identity, to learn from project experiences, to develop problem solving and technical capabilities.
Mature project-based organizations need to develop consistent approaches to structure the delivery of strategy, consolidate governance and integrate knowledge. (Thiry, M. and Deguire, M. , 2007)
Established companies still view their projects as singular initiatives disconnected from the organizational strategy and governance. The widespread adoption of project management approaches started to influence the way companies develop and execute their strategy. Project-based organizations have started to shift from a containerized project environment to a more integrated one with the emergence of program and portfolio management frameworks for managing multiple project streams.
Final Thoughts
Project management as a field and occupation is the driving force behind the transition to post-bureaucratic organizations. (Paton, S. et al. , 2010)
Promoted as universally applicable in the knowledge-based capitalist economy, the project manager’s role is perceived as a vital contributor in post-bureaucratic organizations and as an imperative of the contemporary economic and technological climate. There are almost no indications for a route to becoming a project manager, most of the project managers have been technical specialists and only a minority are claiming to be career project managers. Project managers develop a personal identity connected to the perceived value and status their profession embodies. At the same time, while they understand the pivotal role they play, the structural and cultural aspects of most of the organizations undermine their authority, decision-making, and legitimacy. Ultimately this brings into question the contribution project management can make in organizations that do not understand and embrace this form of strategy implementation.
References:
Bourouni, A., Noori, S., & Jafari, M. (2014), Organizational groupings and performance in project-based
organizations: an empirical investigation. Adlib Journal of Information Management, 66: 156-174.
Paton, S., Hodgson, D. and Cicmil, S., 2010. Who am I and what am I doing here?: Becoming and being a
project manager. The Journal of Management Development, 29(2), pp.157-166.
Thiry, M., & Deguire, M. (2007), Recent developments in project-based organizations. International
Journal of Project Management, 25: 649-658.
Toma, L. C. (2021). Project Manager as a Relational Leader in Project-Based Organizations. The University of Sheffield International Faculty, City College
Turner, J.R. and Keegan, A., 1999. The versatile project-based organization: governance and operational
control. European management journal, 17(3), pp.296-309.
Turner, J.R. and Keegan, A., 2001. Mechanisms of governance in the project-based organization:: Roles of
the broker and steward. European management journal, 19(3), pp.254-267.
Whitley, R. (2006), Project-based firms: New organizational form or variations on a theme. Industrial and
Corporate Change, 15: 77-99.
The post What is a Project-Based Organization? appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>The post The Project Manager as an Orchestra Conductor appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>As PMP certification holders know, the Guide for the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) is a largely a very dry read. It’s getting really technical at times, uses plenty of Project Management jargon and it’s overly structured.
As all the deserts have their pockets of freshwater, fertile land, PMBOK has also its oasis, a passage that it’s written with the reader in mind.
Making an analogy between a project manager and the conductor of an orchestra, the guide also finds similarities between the project team and the orchestra. The musicians playing various instruments are compared with the various roles a project team could comprise, such as analysts, designers, developers, testers and the major sections of the orchestra are mirrored in the different business units and departments involved in a project. The project manager and the conductor are responsible for the outcomes of their teams and while they are not supposed to know how to play the various instruments or to execute the array of tasks in the project, their leadership is essential in order to guide and coordinate the team in fulfilling meaningful work that contributes to the project objectives.
I consider that this analogy it’s useful for someone who wants to understand more of project management, creating a visual representation of the Project Manager’s role, that contrasts positively with the rest of mostly abstract concepts in the PMBOK.
The post The Project Manager as an Orchestra Conductor appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>The post The article that sparkled my interest to pursuit Project Management appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>In 1991, Tom Peters wrote a famous column titled “Pursuing the Perfect Project Manager“. This article inspired me in my study and practice of Project Management.
Tom Peters believed that the organization of the future will be a “collection of projects”. As organizations will compete to develop products, services and systems in an ever-changing network of vendors, intermediaries and customers, we can ask ourselves who will be in charge. The author observes that the project manager seems to be the most likely candidate for taking the leading role of moving the organization into the future.
However, a few challenges lie ahead. In a balancing act, the project manager needs to learn how to navigate masterfully through eight dilemmas of every-day project management:
1. Total ego/No ego. The author states that project managers need to be deeply involved, “consumed by the project”. Many times project managers (myself included) identify themselves with the project. We say “my project does good or bad” or “I have a project”. Project managers need also to be humble and egoless. We rarely have the level of authority to direct the project or to command the stakeholders involved so we need to achieve project goals through persuasion, collaboration and teamwork.
2. Autocrat/Delegator. The project manager needs to be aware when he needs to roll up its sleeves and put down the work and when he can delegate, assign work to other project contributors. There are multiple instances when fast, decisive action is required and others that are less urgent, require high expertise and can/should be delegated.
3, Leader/Manager. While it is critical to lead the project team, set an example, inspire, create a vision, and get their commitment, a project manager needs to be also a good manager. He needs to plan, execute and control, to ensure that the work gets done within the set parameters.
4. Tolerate ambiguity/Pursue Perfection. Fourth dilemma of the project management profession derives from the inherent complexity of project environment. A project should not be confounded with the routine operations of the organization, projects goal is to create a unique product or service. Most projects suffers from a good deal of ambiguity, and project managers have to deal with it. In this volatile environment, they need to create and maintain order and predictivity. Dealing with the projects complexity and ambiguity, they need to clear the way for the project team, helping them to be at their best.
5. Oral/Written. Communication is considered by many project managers as the most critical element of a project. Actually, this is what project managers are doing (or what they should do) most of the time. They are communicating with their team, with the senior managers, with the customers and vendors. Improving both oral and written communication makes a big difference for the projects they lead and how they are perceived as professionals.
6. Acknowledge complexity/Champion simplicity. As already mentioned, projects are complex. Tom Peters says that while project managers need to be able to handle this complexity, they need to be adopters and promoters of simplicity, trying relentlessly to contain the projects specific complexity. This is true in my experience as well, you get real benefits by making things simple and straightforward.
7. Think big/Think small. Making the analogy with the forest and the trees saying, Tom Peters says that project managers need to appreciate most. As a PM you do both grand schemes of multiple years and multiple streams projects, while you also need at times to check various reports details and communication for accuracy and consistency.
8. Impatient/Patient. Missing the formal authority of functional line managers, Project Managers need to balance their bias for action with relationship building and influence skills. Dealing with many equals within the project team and almost as many superiors within the senior stakeholders, they need to constantly adjust their approach and to compensate their required assertiveness with a constant awareness of their relationships within the project.
Out of the many articles and papers read about Project Management, Tom Peters’ column is always on top of my mind. He captures within a few paragraphs the essence of the Project Manager’s role, predicting back in 1991 the transformation of a large part of today’s organizations in a “collection of projects”.
You can find the original article here: https://tompeters.com/columns/pursuing-the-perfect-project-manager/
The post The article that sparkled my interest to pursuit Project Management appeared first on Cornel Toma.
]]>