Archive for Juli 8th, 2008

Are we any closer to the end? Escalation and the case of Taurus (Drummond, 1999)

Dienstag, Juli 8th, 2008

Taurus

Drummond, Helga: Are we any closer to the end? Escalation and the case of Taurus; in: International Journal of Project Management, Vol. 17 (1999), No. 1, pp. 11-16.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0263-7863(97)00074-4

The Taurus Project is a great case study. First of all it is a failed IT project. It took the project some 500 million GBP and 5 years to fail. And secondly it was a visionary project overhauling the IT of the London financial market. Drummond examines the route to failure. In this article she applies Escalation Theory aka Escalation of Commitment or the Vietnam War Syndrome as it was labelled in Freakonomics.

What did Drummond see? A destructive progression, i.e., one sub-optimal decision leading to another sub-optimal decision, that leading to another sub-optimal decision and so on. This effect was reinforced by an effect first found by Kahnemann & Tversky. They showed that gradual deterioration in a condition is usually underestimated and goes unnoticed. [Therefore addicts need an intervention]

What are the lessons learned?
Avoid the Garbage Can Effect. Don’t let the solution dictate the problem. Especialy if you have a keen vendor.
Make progress tangible. On Taurus experienced managers where struggling with controlling and managing the project because progress in IT systems‘ development can not be touched.
Engage in Second-Order Thinking. First-order thinking is solving the problem with the usual problem solving patterns, aka ‚more of the same‘. This does not help in deteriorating conditions. To break that vicious cycle second-order thinking is needed, which basically examines the assumptions of given decisions, plans, requirements, solutions.
And lastly balance power and responsibility. Politics and outside over steering destroyed the power and responsibility balance in this case. Project Managers had huge responsibilities but no decision power whatsoever to really solve the problem. Even if they saw recognised the problem and asked for project cancellation earlier than it was acknowledged by the project board.

Posted in Actuality Research, Case Study, Critical Success Factors, Failed Projects | 1 Comment »

Rethinking Project Management: Researching the actuality of projects (Cicmil et al. 2006)

Dienstag, Juli 8th, 2008

Rethinking PM

Svetlana Cicmil, Svetlana; Williams, Terry; Thomas, Janice; Hodgson, Damian: Rethinking Project Management – Researching the actuality of projects; in: International Journal of Project Management, Vol. 24 (2006), No. 8, pp. 675-686
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijproman.2006.08.006

Cicmil et al. describe their idea for the future direction of project management research. The authors outline 3 ideas they had in mind when thinking about project management. (1) projects are complex social settings loaded with conflicts, (2) project management practice is a social conduct, (3) Heidegger’s Da-Sein.  With this starting point Cicmil et al. describe their methodological considerations which are rooted in pragmatic epistemology. They argue that in this tradition non-quantitative research can build epistemic theories.

Moreover Cicmil et al. outline quality criteria/standards for Actuality Research. It needs to fulfil practical reasoning, sense-making and thus it can explain hard to quantify concepts of emotions, power, tensions, negotiations, and political agendas. Finally they highlight topics for future research which are suited to be explored using an Actuality Research approach.

Posted in Actuality Research, Methodology, Theory | 1 Comment »

Balancing strategy and tactics in project implementation (Pinto & Slevin 1987)

Dienstag, Juli 8th, 2008

Balancing Strategy and Tactics

Pinto, J.K.; Slevin, D.P.: Balancing strategy and tactics in project implementation; in: Sloan Management Review, (1987), pp. 33–41.

This article is a very classic. It is one of the most cited articles on success factors in research papers on IT projects. Pinto & Slevin outline 10 critical success factors (most of them seem common sense today), which are make-or-break factors on any given project

  1. Communication
  2. Project Mission
  3. Top Management Support
  4. Project Schedule
  5. Client Consultations
  6. Personnel Recruitment, Training, and Selection
  7. Technical Tasks
  8. Client Acceptance
  9. Monitoring & Feedback
  10. Trouble Shooting

Posted in Critical Success Factors | No Comments »

Revisiting the Implementation Metaphor (Borum & Christiansen 2006)

Dienstag, Juli 8th, 2008

Theoretical Basis of PM

Borum, Finn; Christiansen, John: Revisiting the implementation metaphor–a comment on “Actors and structure in IS Projects: What makes implementation happen?“, in: Scandinavian Journal of Management; Vol. 22 (2006), No. 3, pp. 238-242.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.scaman.2006.08.003

Borum & Christiansen outline which concepts of organisation research they found in their previously published case study research. Somehow Project Management Research seems to be a bit behind the mainstream areas of administration, economics, or organisational research. However Borum & Christiansen provide a comprehensive list of Organisation Theories which conceptualise project behaviour:

  • Neo-Institutional Theory (structure vs. process)
  • Network Theory (actors and dynamic networks)
  • Social constructivism (social fabrics everywhere)
  • Structuration theory (dichotomies everywhere + structure is created by repetition of behaviour)
  • Cultural perspectives on organisations (integrate-differentiate-fragment)
  • Case Study Research (micro processes)

Posted in Theory | 2 Comments »