PM Perspectives - Article Listings

Study links good leaders to successful projects

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

While good leadership must have something to do with successful projects, it's surprising how few studies have examined this correlation.

A new study from the United Kingdom however, finds that there is a statistically significant relationship between the two, and pinpoints the leadership dimensions that most influence a project's success.

Researchers Linda Geoghegan of Electronic Data Systems and Professor Victor Dulewicz of the Henley Business School at the University of Reading hope that organizations can exploit this knowledge to improve project outcomes.

Using a project-success questionnaire and a leadership-dimensions questionnaire, the researchers set out to examine leadership in a large U.K. company. In all, 52 respondents (81 percent of the company's project managers) completed both questionnaires.

The researchers divided their study into two groups. They administered leadership dimensions questionnaire (LDQ) to project managers who had worked on projects with budgets greater than £350,000 and gave a project-success questionnaire (PSQ) to project sponsors for projects of a similar size.

The PSQ comprised two key themes: the project and the client, covering 12 common measures of success, such as whether the project was completed on time and on budget, project performance, client satisfaction and the project's impact on organizational effectiveness.

Leadership traits on the LDQ included seven emotional competencies, five managerial competencies, and three intellectual competencies. Of these 15 possible leadership factors, the researchers found that eight had an impact on project management success:

Critical analysis
Self-awareness
Sensitivity
Influencing
Motivation
Manage resources
Empowering
Developing

The researchers compared the results of both questionnaires, looking for correlations between satisfactory project outcomes and good leadership.

Interestingly, they discovered that project managers scored higher than the norm for leadership traits related to conscientiousness, sensitivity and self-awareness. The researchers suggest that these high scores may result from the project managers' exposure to leadership activities such as influencing difficult stakeholders and their need to obtain commitment from senior management in order to move their projects forward.

The project managers scored relatively lower on vision, strategic perspective and achieving, with the vision score being statistically significantly lower than the norm. The researchers suggest that the project managers scored poorly in this area because they are never involved in setting an organization's vision but instead focus on implementing projects that fulfill a pre-defined vision.

Overall, the research reveals several leadership dimensions that contribute to successful projects. The most significant dimensions were managing resources, empowering, developing and motivating. For example, project managers who rated highly for ‘solving problems' on the PSQ also demonstrated leadership strengths in empowering and developing their colleagues, were able to manage resources efficiently and effectively and were also highly motivated. Surprisingly, these project managers did not score highly on critical analysis, although the overall survey group did score well in this area when compared to the norm.

There was also a significant correlation between the leadership dimensions that measured the ability to manage resources, empower and bring a project in on budget. "This is not surprising considering the relationship between managing resources and managing the budget," says Geoghegan.

She and Dulewicz say their research clearly demonstrates that leadership dimensions that are directly linked to successful projects should be the focus of project manager training.

"It's important that senior management are aware that leadership competencies do have an impact on the personnel with whom they work and ultimately, on the success of their change programs," says Dulewicz. He suggests that project leaders could be selected based on their leadership profile as measured by a proven questionnaire such as the Leadership Dimensions Questionnaire (LDQ).

Because the research study involved relatively few respondents and just one company, the researchers say further and broader studies must be undertaken before transferring any relationships between leadership dimensions and project success to other industries.

Contributing authors: Linda Geoghegan and Victor Dulewicz

Source: Geoghegan, Linda; Dulewicz, Victor. "Do Project Managers' Leadership Competencies Contribute to Project Success?", Project Management Journal, 39:4, December 2008, pp. 58-67.

PMPerspectives.org is a website which connects project managers and sponsors with project management researchers. Our mission is to understand and improve project management practices. The research team comprises Dr. Blaize Horner Reich and Dr. Andrew Gemino from Simon Fraser niversity, Canada and Dr. Chris Sauer from Oxford University, UK.

© Reich, Gemino, Sauer (2010)

Know Your Knowledge Risks

Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

When it comes to managing knowledge during an IT project, most project managers hide their heads in the sand. Knowledge management is a complex topic and most projects are already tough enough.

Yet Dr. Blaize Horner Reich's research reveals that managing knowledge is important if the project has a high level of uncertainty, is particularly large or long, or is a critical part of the organization's strategy.

Reich, of Simon Fraser University, and her colleagues have been investigating knowledge management - or its lack - in IT projects for the past three years. They have identified four kinds of knowledge that are important to IT projects and 10 knowledge risks to manage. They have also developed practical guidelines and practices for these 10 knowledge risks. (see follow-up PMPerspectives article called Managing Knowledge Risks)

"Many project managers say they routinely face knowledge-based risks but lack a formal process for acknowledging or mitigating these risks," says Reich. "Our goal is to help project managers identify and manage them."

During her research, Reich interviewed 15 senior project managers in Canada and New Zealand. She also took her findings on the road, presenting them to several academic, practitioner and CIO groups.

One finding was a lack of common understanding about the meaning of knowledge management within a project context. She suggests that knowledge management has three parts: creating and integrating knowledge, minimizing knowledge losses and filling knowledge gaps throughout a project's duration.

Reich's research reveals four types of knowledge that are important to IT project success:

1) Process - knowledge about the project structure, methodology, tasks and time frames. "This knowledge allows a team member to understand his or her part in the overall project, to understand what is expected and when it is to be delivered. It also allows a team or sub-team to self-organize.

2) Domain - knowledge of the industry, firm, current situation, problem/opportunity and potential technical solutions. This knowledge is spread widely within and outside the project team.

3) Institutional - knowledge of the history, power structure and values of the organization _ "what is really going on" - which is transferred by means of stories or anecdotes by organization insiders or observers.

4) Cultural - knowledge of how to manage team members of different cultures or from many disciplinary groups such as web designers, IT architects or organizational development experts.

Finally, Reich's research revealed 10 knowledge risks to watch for:

1) Lessons not learned.

Few projects, says Reich, use the lessons learned from prior projects.

2) Team selection is flawed.

While project managers may know the kinds of skills they want to hire for, they often have difficulties meeting those requirements. "When the team selection process is flawed," says Reich, "the project manager will not know what the team knows collectively or, more importantly, what it doesn't know."

3) Volatility in the governance team

During a project, there is gradual knowledge-building among the key stakeholders. The loss of any of these governance members results in a knowledge loss that may severely impact the project's ability to succeed.

4) Lack of role knowledge among the governance team

Many senior executives do not have the experience or the training needed to function as project sponsors and champions.

5) Inadequate knowledge integration

Integrating knowledge between the technical and business team members is important because together, they can create knowledge that is greater than the sum of the parts: a new idea, a shared understanding or an integrative model. Often, says Reich, one group may not know what the other is doing or what it knows.

6) Incomplete knowledge transfer

Knowledge transfer, often from vendor or consultant to the internal project members, is critical. Reich notes that although project managers may include in the project plan activities to support knowledge transfer, they often have no objective way to measure how effectively these activities were performed.

7) Exit of Team Members

While all project managers know that losing team members results in knowledge gaps, few create a plan to mitigate such losses.

8) Lack of a knowledge map

People on a team need to have a "map" of each other's skills and knowledge, so they can get help and give help when needed.

9) Loss between phases

Team composition often changes from phase to phase. This generates significant risk that knowledge from one phase won't be adequately transferred to the next phase.

10) Failure to learn

Lessons learned during a project are rarely satisfactorily captured, either during or at the end of a project. This topic is covered in another PMPerspectives article, called Applying Lessons Learned to a Project.

"By sharing this information," says Reich, "we aim to empower project managers to better manage these knowledge risks and improve IT project performance and organizational project competence."

Source: Reich, B.H. "Managing Knowledge and Learning in IT Projects - A Conceptual Framework and Guidelines for Practice", Project Management Journal, 38:2, June 2007, pp. 5-17. (Winner, Best Paper of 2007 from PMJ.)

© Reich, Gemino, Sauer (2008)

New Roles for the Consultant Project Manager

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 00:00:00 -0700

There's a new trend evolving in external project management and it isn't for the faint-of-heart.

Increasingly, companies are relying on consultant project managers to not only deliver their tougher information technology (IT) projects but to help realize value for money.

A recent study focusing on this trend finds that external project managers are moving beyond their traditional responsibilities to fulfill three additional roles: account manager, surrogate sponsor and profession leader.

Researchers Blaize Horner Reich of the Segal Graduate School of Business at Simon Fraser University, Canada and Chris Sauer of the Saïd Business School at Oxford University, England, interviewed 25 senior consultant project managers in the USA, Canada and the UK who had managed transformational IT projects.

The researchers discovered that external project managers are often asked to take on account management responsibilities because the client develops a stronger relationship with them than with the appointed account manager. They also become surrogate sponsors when the business sponsor is unwilling or unable to support a project. And they assume the role of profession leader because it assists in developing the supplier's reputation in project management. "Ability to juggle these roles over time," notes Reich, "enhances the external project manager's long-term career success."

Traditionally, account managers within a supplier firm act as the principal point of contact for the client: to manage the relationship, develop sales and take responsibility for client satisfaction. Today, says Reich, "external project managers are taking on aspects of this role in four ways: they're winning initial business, maintaining the relationship with the client, selling follow-on business and managing profitability."

To fulfill this role, external project managers must acquire sales skills to create situations in which clients want to buy new projects or follow-on work.

The researchers also learned that as projects become critical to executives' fulfilment of their role, external project managers will often take on client responsibilities including standing in for the sponsor at executive management or board meetings to sell the business case and report progress on the sponsor's behalf. Often the project manager coaches the sponsor on his or her role. In extreme cases, the project manager may take over all of the sponsor's responsibilities.

Fulfilling the surrogate sponsor role, says Reich, requires both generic business knowledge and specific knowledge of the client's business. "The external project manager has to rapidly build a network within the client organization that will keep them apprised of internal information and help them access the power structure so that they can stand in when necessary," she says.

The third role expected of external project managers is that of profession leader. As they become more senior, they are expected to be more visible, produce more knowledge and act as a role model. They need a broader perspective, says Reich, in order to demonstrate thought leadership and to demonstrate the supplier's ability to handle more ambitious challenges.

So how can external project managers cope with these new roles and responsibilities? Reich and Sauer acknowledge that IT project managers, who typically come from a technical background, are not always equipped to play executive and entrepreneurial roles. Still, they say, by crafting a long-term self-development plan, junior project managers should be able to take on increasing responsibility and visibility within the firm, the client and the profession.

Here are their recommendations for education:

Take a sales course. Learn how to influence the client as well as identify and seize opportunities.
Take an MBA or other general business program. If you don't understand topics such as marketing, finance, strategy and human resources, you can't take part in discussions about project benefits.
Take a public-speaking course or join associations such as Toastmasters. Become confident at making compelling points in meetings or as a featured speaker.
Take a negotiation course. Learn to negotiate from interests and create win-win solutions.
Take a coaching course. Learn how to understand and inspire great performance in others.

Reich and Sauer also make recommendations for action:

On long-term projects, take every opportunity to learn more about the strategy, financials and competitive position of the client.
Focus your career on an industry vertical and become deeply knowledgeable about this sector through personal research, attending industry meetings and joining professional associations.
Develop a networking plan within the client organization. Get to know the key individuals and the up-and-comers - their goals and constraints, their history and aspirations.
Establish your leadership within the profession. Reflect on your projects and develop lessons from them. Take opportunities to share these ideas by speaking or writing.

Source: Reich, B.H. and Sauer, C. "Roles of the External IT Project Manager", Communications of the ACM, 53:5, May 2010, pp.126-129.

© Reich, Gemino, Sauer (2008)

IT Projects: Getting Beyond CHAOS

Mon, 27 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Over-achieving IT projects? It sounds too good to be true. But new research by Dr. Andrew Gemino of Simon Fraser University completely contradicts those gloomy Standish Group 2006 CHAOS report statistics indicating that two-thirds of IT projects perform poorly or fail and only one-third succeed.

Gemino has just compiled results from a 2003 research survey in which two-thirds of IT projects succeeded and just one-third failed, with several projects actually over-achieving their targets.

The research comprised two independent studies in the U.S. and U.K., in which the researchers examined survey responses from a total of 741 project managers with 15 years or more experience in the IT industry and eight or more years managing projects.

Gemino then used a data-driven clustering method that identified five types of project groups reported in the surveys: abandoned, budget-challenged, schedule-challenged, good performers and star performers.

"The most interesting group we found was the star performers," says Gemino. "These projects over-performed on budget and scope and were present in both studies. We were the first to report this finding."

A new benchmark for success

This new research, says Gemino, suggests that we need a new benchmark for what is reasonably achievable in IT projects. Based on his research, experienced project managers should be able to come within small margins (plus or minus seven percent) of their budget, schedule and scope targets on at least two out of every three projects.

"IT projects are as likely to over-perform as they are to fail, but we don't seem to hear about over-performing projects" says Gemino. "Failures gather more attention, but our economy's continued investment in IT suggests organizations must be getting good value. The star performers we found provide some justification for this "

Perhaps more importantly, Gemino suggests that some of the attention placed on budget and schedule targets is misplaced. "The Standish Group has focused on hitting scope, schedule and budget targets," explains Gemino. "But how much does this tell us about a project's real performance? We need to place more focus on a project's benefits and business value when we're considering performance. Senior managers need to recognize this and organizations need to focus on creating value through projects.

"Simply hitting budget and target schedules does not mean the project adds value."

© Reich, Gemino, Sauer (2008)

New Research on Effecting Change in the Organization

Tue, 27 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead, cultural anthropologist

This quote is equally true in business. The difficulty, however, is in knowing how closely to integrate your change team with your organization to achieve change that works.

While successful change should always be tied to an organization's business strategy, researchers Paivi Lehtonen and Miia Martinsuo of the Helsinki University of Technology wondered about the most effective route to change. Should change programs and projects be closely aligned to the parent organization so that they will be more easily accepted and implemented? Or will this hamper the change team's freedom to effect radical change?

To find out, Lehtonen and Martinsuo studied two major organizational change programs to identify the different ways in which they were integrated into their parent organizations and the different management practices that kept them distinct from these organizations-referred to as boundary-management practices. Their research involved almost two dozen interviews with senior program staff and executives at a public-sector and a private-sector organization.

They discovered that while both organizations used similar integration mechanisms, they differed in their levels of integration. For example, both used boundary-management activities such as information scouting, boundary shaping, and ambassadorial and protecting activities, but they used them to different effect.

Information scouting involves active entry into the parent organization to gather as much information as possible relevant to the change program. This could involve pre-design workshops to understand current practice satisfaction surveys or requests for suggestions for improvement.

Boundary shaping involves choosing areas in which to involve and integrate the parent organization. For example, deciding which parts of a change program will use leaders from the line and which will be the responsibility of the project team. Or deciding when to use planning tools commonly used in the parent organization and when to use project-specific tools.

Ambassadorial and protecting activities are partly in tension. Ambassadorial activities promote the change initiative and its benefits to key stakeholders including sponsors, line managers and the proposed end users. Protecting activities keep the program safe from the parent organization's or stakeholders' premature criticism and attack. For example, the projects may decide to release new ideas and concepts only when they are sufficiently developed and when they will be best received by the parent organization.

The researchers found there are three types of activities required to effectively integrate a change program into the parent organization:

A. Integration activities: These bind the change program and its constituent projects into the parent organization. These activities relate to formal, higher-lever decisions about organizing and managing the organization's connections. The researchers observed four integration mechanisms:

1. Organizational structures and formal control mechanisms. For example, steering groups, management groups and reporting procedures.

2. Human resources mechanisms: strategic decisions related to recruitment, location and work-time.

3. Establishment of links between the program's goals and content and the organization's strategic goals, business processes, supportive functions, daily activities, and other projects. This provides requirements and channels for communication and collaboration.

4. Implementation of the same methods and procedures used in the wider organization. For example, using organizational project-management models as well as existing planning tools, document templates and communication channels.

B. Boundary-management activities: These define and protect the change program's distinct existence and autonomy. These activities include creating legitimacy via ambassadorial activities, defining responsibilities and collaborations, information scouting and negotiating, ensuring continuity, and guarding and isolating the program from external disturbances.

C. Isolation activities: These go further than boundary- management activities and assert the change program's separateness from the parent organization. These necessary activities co-exist with, and complement, integration. They prevent program-related issues from getting out of the program, and block external influences from disrupting the program.

"Learning to use such activities skillfully is a key requirement for change-program managers," says Lehtonen. "For example, change-program managers who are skilled at using isolative activities can protect the emerging program and reserve time for building momentum and readiness for change."

The researchers also found three distinct contextual factors that can affect integration and boundary-management activities:

1. factors related to the organization's unique characteristics,
2. factors stemming from the nature of the change programs, and
3. individual-level factors based on the characteristics of a program's key actors.

The secret to implementing a change program successfully, say the researchers, involves understanding how and when to use integration mechanisms, and how far to exploit integration dynamics, boundary management and isolation. Their research results suggest that integration should not only be examined from the change program's viewpoint, but is also something that the parent organization may enable or prohibit.

While the researchers don't give a definitive answer on how integrated a change program should be, they do feel their research raises issues that executives and program managers should consider as they think about the challenges of integrating or isolating their change program.

SOURCE:

Lehtonen, P. and Martinsuo, M. "Integrating the change program with the parent organization", International Journal of Project Management 27:2, Feb 2009, pp. 154-165.

Paivi Hoverfalt (nee Lehtonen) is project management consultant at Project Institute Finland Ltd. She is finalising her doctoral thesis on the initiation of large-scale change programs. Dr. Miia Martinsuo is professor of industrial management at Tampere University of Technology, Finland.

PMPerspectives.org is a website which connects project managers and sponsors with project management researchers. Our mission is to understand and improve project management practices. The research team comprises Dr. Blaize Horner Reich and Dr. Andrew Gemino from Simon Fraser University, Canada and Dr. Chris Sauer from Oxford University, UK.

Managing Great Expectations

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Did you ever ask for an outrageously expensive brand-name toy for your birthday - and then received a generic version that just didn't have the same cachet?

And then found that you couldn't bring yourself to play much with it because it just didn't live up to your expectations?

Well, end-users of new software systems often feel the same way. In fact, failure to manage user expectations is one of the biggest risks to project success when project managers are implementing new software systems.

Research demonstrates that users who harbour unrealistic expectations are more likely to be dissatisfied with the project outcome and less likely to take best advantage of it.

Fortunately, this is one risk factor that project managers can influence and minimize, according to Professor Stacie Petter at the University of Omaha at Nebraska. The key, she says, is to work with the users and keep them involved, establish leadership and gain user trust.

Petter recently completed a research project that defines practical tactics that project managers can use to align user expectations with project delivery.

She and another researcher interviewed project managers from a global IT and consulting company with more than 75,000 employees across almost 50 countries.

Petter asked each project manager to recall two projects in which they faced challenges in managing user expectations - one that they managed successfully and one that they felt wasn't successfully managed.

She then analyzed their responses, drawing out successful tactics for involving the user, establishing leadership and gaining trust - the three strategies that she discovered are key to managing user expectations. Her findings:

Involve the Users

"Every textbook," says Petter, "advocates involving the users, but it's often done badly. People think that one meeting with the users is enough." The value of this research is that it proposes actionable tactics. Project managers should ask themselves how well they do the following:

Communicate. Get users involved early in the project and keep them involved throughout.
If the user base is large, create small user groups.
Listen to them, ask questions and give credit for good suggestions.
Let users make tough choices about budget, schedule and/or functionality.
Recognize their concerns about change and help them to feel at ease.
Build positive momentum and continue it throughout the development phase.
Offer training, help desks and other support functions to maintain comfort and involvement during implementation

Establish Leadership

"There are two types of leadership that need to be exhibited during a software project to properly manage user expectations," says Petter. "A project champion for the users and a project manager/leader for the team."

The project champion, she says, helps to manage expectations by promoting the project vision, educating users about the software's values and benefits, and by rallying the ‘troops' and explaining how they can assist. One interviewee recommended choosing someone who is influential, well respected and well connected within the client organization.

The project manager, says Petter, must lead both project colleagues and users along the correct path. "To do this, the project manager needs to be knowledgeable about the business problem, the system's technical aspects and also project management."

For a successful outcome, she says, a project manager should also:

Articulate a clear view of the project
Ensure you have a strong project champion to share the vision
Educate users about the value and benefits of the system, while also ensuring they have reasonable expectations
Obtain buy-in from the primary, or most vocal, stakeholders and work outward
Don't oversell the project
Motivate the project team to complete on time

Finally, says Petter, the project manager needs fortitude. "Be strong with users," she says. "If they ask for additional functionality, it's important not to simply agree to every request." Instead, initiate a formal change-request process and educate users about the consequences of any changes.

Establish Trust

Project managers who involve users and develop a relationship with them will be on their way to establishing trust. Petter notes that there are other important tactics for gaining and maintaining trust:

Use clear terminology. For instance, inform users they will see a prototype in one week, not ‘soon'.
Be willing to share both good and bad news throughout the project - don't leave others to disseminate such news.

Overall, says Petter, "the tactics for managing user expectations that we've identified in our research aren't complex. They're really quite simple.

"Yet if software project managers truly understood and followed these tactics, managing user expectations would not be among one of the three highest-ranking risks in software projects."

Contributing authors: Dr. Stacie Petter

Source: Petter, S. "Managing user expectations on software projects: Lessons from the trenches", International Journal of Project Management, 26:7, Oct 2008 pp. 700-712.

© Reich, Gemino, Sauer (2008)

Sponsors Play a Vital Role in Projects

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Project sponsors don't get much applause-in research literature or on the job. Yet there is convincing evidence that a project's success or failure often relies on top management support.

Researcher Lynn Crawford, of the Lille School of Management in France (ESC Lille) and Bond University, Australia, and her international colleagues recently conducted over 108 interviews relating to 36 projects in five different regions: Australia, China, Europe, North America and South Africa.

The researchers were looking for data that would make sense of-and define-the sponsor's true role. They discovered that project sponsors do play a pivotal role, both in influencing a project's success and overseeing its governance requirements.

"Sponsors are often the critical link between corporate and project governance," says Crawford, "ensuring that governance requirements are met and that projects receive the support they need."

Sponsors act as the bridge between the organization and the project, she says, and must have experience, knowledge, perspective, credibility and authority. They should also be excellent communicators, passionate about their cause and capable of handling ambiguity as well as managing their time and stress levels.

A sponsor's governance role, Crawford and her colleagues say, can be structured around six dimensions:

Governing the project
Taking accountability for business case and benefits
Giving direction and making decisions
Critically reviewing progress
Managing internal and external interfaces
Representing the project to the organization.

The sponsor's support role has four dimensions:

Having credibility and using networking ability
Providing leadership
Maintaining effective relationships
Being available and providing timely support

Some projects, says Crawford, will have a greater emphasis on governance while others will require more support from a sponsor.

Generally, she says, governance will be more important in those projects where there is:

High-risk exposure for the organization if the project fails
Persistent under-performance of the project
Rapidly changing market conditions
Attention drawn to corporate governance(e.g. Sarbanes-Oxley)
Suspected illegal or non-compliant behaviour in the project
Project is mission-critical
Need to realign project to new strategy or organizational context

Projects exhibiting a greater need for support include those where:

The organization fails to provide sufficient resources for the project
Some parts of the parent organization are resisting the project's implementation
Different stakeholders in the parent organization are seeking to impose conflicting requirements on the project
The parent organization is failing to provide the project with decisions necessary to maintain planned progress
The project manager is inexperienced or weak
There are early signs of difficulty within the project, such as a possible shortfall in benefits

The researchers have created a two-by-two model of sponsor roles. This model suggests that:

1) A project with a low need for support or governance can be successful with a guardian sponsor

2) A project with a low need for support and a high need for governance needs a judge

3) A project with a high need for support and a low need for governance needs a mentor

4) A project with high needs for both support and governance needs a Professor Dumbledore - someone wise and powerful.

The bottom line, says Crawford, is that it is a difficult job to be a good project sponsor. As one of her interviewees says:

"You're a bit removed from the detail.... So you have to just spend the time talking to people, trying to understand what they are saying... and that's a real challenge for a sponsor when you've got so many other things to do."

"While the project sponsor role has often been taken for granted, the new emphasis on corporate and project governance is now highlighting the role's importance, as well as its complexity and variability," says Crawford. "We'll continue to examine our data for more information that can synthesize and capture the richness of the sponsor's role and commitment."

Contributing authors: Dr Lynn Crawford, Dr. Terry Cooke-Davies, Dr. Brian Hobbs, Dr. Les Labuschagne, Dr. Kaye Remington, and Dr. Ping Chen

Source: Crawford, L., Cooke-Davies, T., Hobbs, B., Labuschagne, L., Remington, K. and Chen, P. "Governance and Support in the Sponsoring of Projects and Programs", proceedings, biennial PMI Research Conference, Warsaw, Poland; July 2008.

PMP Certification Undervalued in IT Industry

Sun, 20 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

For the past 25 years, the Project Management Institute's Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge has been considered the global standard for project managers, and its Project Management Professional (PMP®) designation has been considered the gold standard in certification.

Yet a recent study reveals that information technology (IT) recruiters in the U.S. consider PMP certification to be the least valuable of 15 core competencies. What's more, the study also reveals that IT executives don't find any significant differences in project-success rates among PMP-certified project managers and those who are uncertified.

In Phase I of the study, researchers Ernst Bekkering and Deborah H. Stevenson of Northeastern State University (NSU) in Oklahoma, U.S. surveyed 32 IT recruiters across the U.S., using online questionnaires and phone interviews. Each recruiter was asked to identify which characteristics they sought when hiring project managers. In Phase II, researchers Jo Ann Starkweather and D. Stevenson (NSU) polled IT executives nationwide for their opinions on the 15 competency areas identified by recruiters.

The study found that recruiters were most interested in experience and ‘soft' skills such as the ability to communicate at multiple levels, and an understanding of when and how to exercise leadership. What was surprising, however, was that they had so little regard for the PMP certification.

The PMP was initiated in 1984 "to recognize an individual's demonstrated understanding of the knowledge and skills to lead and direct project teams and to deliver results within the constraints of schedule, budget, and resources " (PMI, 2009). Eligibility requirements included significant project-management experience.

The researchers had hypothesized that PMP-certification would be highly valued, yet only 52 per cent of recruiters found it to be an important competency; 48 per cent did not. Further, only 15 per cent of IT executives accorded any importance to certification, although they did perceive PMP-certified project managers to be more technically competent than uncertified project managers.

As a result of their study, the researchers have developed several suggestions for credentialing and hiring in the project management sector:

• PMP curriculum developers should re-assess whether there is enough attention devoted to soft skills, and also determine whether certification candidates have been given opportunities to demonstrate their ability to apply soft skills under various project constraint.

• IT executives must emphasize the importance of soft skills in the attributes they forward to recruiters for screening potential project manager.

• IT recruiters must find screening methods or instruments that can more effectively evaluate a candidate's soft-skill competencies.

The researchers also recommend that PMP curriculum developers find out more about IT executives' definition of project management success and discover what competencies they associate with success and how they would change the PMP certification to enhance its contribution to project management.

"Project management needs to be viewed and valued as a core activity in organizations, and should be better integrated into corporate strategy rather than relegated to the tactical arena," says Starkweather and Stevenson. They further suggest increasing budgets for project management training and developing additional screening procedures for new hires.

"Our research suggests that IT execs perceive success as more than the techniques and procedures incorporated in the PMP curriculum body of knowledge," they say. "If certification is to be viewed as more than a paper chase, a more relevant curriculum and experiential knowledge base must be developed."

SOURCE:
Jo Ann Starkweather and Deborah H. Stevenson 2011. "PMP® Certification as a Core Competency: Necessary But Not Sufficient," PMJ, Vol. 42, No. 1, 31-41.

Deborah H. Stevenson and Ernst Bekkering , 2007. "Project Management Certification Criterion as a Predictor of Hiring Success-Phase 1. Presentation. Knowledge & Project Management Symposium, October 3-4, Tulsa, OK.

PMPerspectives.org is a website which connects project managers and sponsors with project management researchers. Our mission is to understand and improve project management practices. The research team comprises Dr. Blaize Horner Reich and Dr. Andrew Gemino from Simon Fraser University, Canada and Dr. Chris Sauer from Oxford University, UK.

Building The PM-Centric Organization

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 00:00:00 -0800

What can IT service firms and in-house IT organizations learn from the construction industry?

"Continuous improvement of project management skills," says Chris Sauer, a researcher with the Saïd Business School at Oxford University, England. "Construction companies stand or fall by their project performance. And we've discovered that the lessons they've learned can be applied to the IT sector."

Where before IT organizations considered managing day-to-day operations as their core, today there's a dawning realization that project management capabilities should be at the heart of all they do.

"The IT sector has changed," explains Sauer. "IT projects are now recognized as critically important to core business. As well, IT outsourcing has led to the growth of systems integrators, for whom projects are the core business."

And while the disciplined application of tools and techniques has traditionally been the IT sector's approach to project management, this doesn't seem to be the entire answer, since so many projects still fail to satisfy the client.

So it only makes sense that these companies should improve their project management competencies. But how?

For answers, Sauer turned to the construction industry, gathering data and conducting interviews with employees and board directors of four large, successful Australian construction companies with a reputation for consistently high project performance.

"The secret of their success lies in the way they focus the entire organization on project management," says Sauer. "As one manager told us, "In our industry, project managers are kings."

Multiplex Constructions Pty Ltd., for example, has an outstanding track record of success in its home country. It achieves its high project performance because its organizational structures, management processes, roles, skills and culture all focus on achieving project success. And the point of convergence, says Sauer, is the project manager.

Companies like Multiplex, he says, use a combination of individual and organizational-level capabilities, with experience from each project feeding back into those capabilities. "These feedback loops are what make the construction model both sustainable and effective," he says.

Sauer's study reveals that effective organizational capability is a complex arrangement requiring:

A career structure to give project managers incentives to develop
A project management office as a focus for developing project management knowledge and as a ‘home base' for managers
Support from above - a direct reporting line to powerful directors who can offer political and resource support during tough times
Reduced challenge from other functions - if project management is truly what matters, other functions must be subordinate to the project's needs

Individual capability is a combination of skills and competencies such as planning, controlling, communicating, negotiating, problem-solving and leading, as well as three important personal characteristics: experience, commitment and a drive to achieve.

To foster individual capability, organizations must establish:

A pool of talented project managers with no underperformers.
Development plans for improving project managers' skills and experience
Mentoring
Peer-group learning in a safe environment such as peer workshops or Friday evening drinks
Opportunities to be stretched

Finally, effective project conduct requires:

Matching the project manager's abilities to the project's needs
Giving project managers the resources and authority to be successful
Performance management from above
Active support from above

What makes this organizational system so effective, says Sauer, is the tight alignment between the development of individual and organizational capability and what is needed for project performance.

"These construction companies are repeatedly successful at projects because they have developed both organizational and individual capabilities that they can apply to every project as a part of normal organizational functioning," says Sauer.

"Once IT project managers are treated more like their "regal" cousins in construction," he says, "consistent IT project success will be a more attainable goal."

Source: Sauer, C., Johnston, K. & Liu, L. "Where Project Managers are Kings: Lessons for IT from the Construction Industry", Project Management Journal, 32:4, December 2001, pp.39-49.

Measuring for Success in IT Projects

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0700

There's a familiar French proverb that says, "Nothing succeeds like success."

But it's difficult to get the benefit if success is not defined, measured and built on. This is particularly true of information technology (IT) projects. Most organizations find it troublesome to identify the criteria that represent a successful IT project outcome. Consequently, they are inconsistent in managing to these criteria or evaluating the results.

That's why researchers Graeme Thomas and Walter Fernandez of Australian National University recently undertook a study to examine how organizations in Australia define IT project success. They also wanted to know which methods are most effective, and why.

What they discovered: IT project outcomes do improve when organizations define and measure their success criteria.

The researchers studied 36 Australian companies operating in three industry sectors: finance and insurance; electricity, gas and water supply; and mining.

They found that just one-third of these companies had formally defined success measures. These companies, they found, also had higher levels of overall confidence that their IT projects were producing benefits.

Defining success

Companies in the study categorized success into three broad areas: project management success, technical success and business success. While the study found 14 success criteria in use overall, the average company used only five. These included the standard notions of ‘on time' and ‘on budget' but also included ‘delivery of benefits', ‘met business objectives' and ‘business continuity' (the level of disruption that an IT project has on operations). Other criteria used included ‘sponsor satisfaction', ‘project team satisfaction' and ‘steering group satisfaction.'

One-third of companies used a formal success definition while another third had no formally agreed success construct.

"There was recognition among more thoughtful companies that it's possible to have project management success without business success, and vice versa," notes Fernandez. "Success was more than just meeting the requirements in the business case."

Overall, companies with a high level of confidence in their success also had a formal success definition that was widely understood and accepted; used a balance of about five success criteria, drew a clear distinction between project management success and business success, and had a clear focus on delivering benefits.

Measuring success

While 75 percent of all companies studied did attempt to measure success, only five companies were highly effective at doing so.

In fact, most companies indicated that identifying and measuring the costs and benefits of their IT projects is a major challenge. What's more, just over half of companies said they identify all benefits while 28 per cent said that they adequately measure them.

Only the five companies that clearly defined their success criteria went on to measure for success using a post-implementation review, a benefits realization process or a combination of both. They then tracked benefits for six to 12 months after implementation. The researchers found that using these formal systems, rather than just relying on perceptions, also helped to manage the tension between performance incentives and the desire to over-report success.

"Consistent measurement of success provided the basis for improvement of both project and benefits delivery," notes Thomas.

In other companies, post-implementation reviews only occurred ‘when things went wrong'. Reasons for not conducting post-implementation reviews or benefit realization included lack of management support, unclear ownership of processes, limited accountability, resource constraints, difficulties with measurement and attribution and inadequate use of evaluation results.

Applying success

The researchers discovered that those companies with a high level of confidence in their IT projects not only agreed on a definition of success and then constantly measured it; they also used the results. This included managing the project according to the agreed definition, a willingness to stop projects, accountability for results and a connection to learning.

The most effective evaluation practices were found in the companies that held their business managers accountable for results. Accountability was enforced through formal project reporting, performance incentives, individual appraisals and department budgets.

Nor was measuring success solely to the benefit of the one project. These companies used the results to continuously improve project management and estimation and also reinforced the use of post-evaluation practices.

"Our research clearly demonstrates how important it is to capture what success means to an organization in order to achieve success," says Fernandez.

Recommendations for success

Obtain wide agreement on the definition of success as early as possible. Recognize that it may have multiple elements.
Measure consistently against your agreed definition
Apply results to better manage progress and performance, using rigorous accountabilities.

"Quite simply, says Thomas, if you know what you are looking for and if you track your progress and are willing to alter your path, then your chances of success will be better".

Contributing authors: Dr Walter Fernandez and Mr. Graeme Thomas

Source: Thomas, G. and Fernández, W. " Success in IT projects: A matter of definition?", International Journal of Project Management, 26:7, Oct. 2008 pp. 733-742.

PMPerspectives.org is a website which connects project managers and sponsors with project management researchers. Our mission is to understand and improve project management practices. The research team comprises Dr. Blaize Horner Reich and Dr. Andrew Gemino from Simon Fraser University, Canada and Dr. Chris Sauer from Oxford University, UK.