2016 _ MBLEPMY_ doc 2016 _ MBLEPMY_ doc Module overview 2016 Executive Project Management & Field Study MBLEPMY IMPORTANT INFORMATION: This module overview contains important information about your module. MBLEPMY 3 CONTENTS Page CONTENTS............................................................................................................................................... 2 1 INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................... 4 With the rapid adoption of this new managerial approach..................................................................4 2 PURPOSE, BROAD AND SPECIFIC OUTCOMES FOR THE MODULE......................................5 2.1 Purpose......................................................................................................................................... 5 2.2 Broad and specific outcomes......................................................................................................... 5 3 LECTURER(S) AND CONTACT DETAILS....................................................................................7 3.1 Lecturer(s)..................................................................................................................................... 7 3.2 Area............................................................................................................................................... 7 3.3 University....................................................................................................................................... 8 4 MODULE-RELATED RESOURCES..............................................................................................8 4.1 Prescribed books........................................................................................................................... 8 5 TOPICS......................................................................................................................................... 9 5.1 The change to project-oriented organisations, strategic emphasis or projects and top management influence................................................................................................................ 9 5.1.1 Tuition period............................................................................................................................... 9 5.1.2 Specific outcomes....................................................................................................................... 9 5.1.3 Critical questions......................................................................................................................... 9 5.1.4 Learning through activities.......................................................................................................10 5.1.5 Self-assessment......................................................................................................................... 11 5.1.6 Reflection................................................................................................................................... 11 5.1.7 Conclusion................................................................................................................................. 11 5.2 Developing a core team process, organising for project management and developing a project management information system................................................................................11 5.2.1 Tuition period............................................................................................................................. 11 5.2.2 Specific outcomes..................................................................................................................... 12 5.2.3 Critical questions....................................................................................................................... 12 4 MBLEPMY 5.2.4 Learning through activities.......................................................................................................13 5.2.5 Self-assessment......................................................................................................................... 13 5.2.6 Reflection................................................................................................................................... 13 5.2.7 Conclusion................................................................................................................................. 14 5.3 Developing a plan for project manager selection and a learning organisation...................14 5.3.1 Tuition period............................................................................................................................. 14 5.3.2 Specific outcomes..................................................................................................................... 14 5.3.3 Critical questions....................................................................................................................... 14 5.3.4 Learning through activities.......................................................................................................15 5.3.5 Self-assessment......................................................................................................................... 15 5.3.6 Reflection................................................................................................................................... 16 5.3.7 Conclusion................................................................................................................................. 16 6 STUDY SCHOOL PLAN.............................................................................................................. 16 6.1 Study School............................................................................................................................... 16 7 MODULE-SPECIFIC STUDY PLAN............................................................................................17 8 MODULE PRACTICAL WORK AND WORK-INTEGRATED LEARNING...................................17 9 ASSESSMENT............................................................................................................................ 17 9.1 Assessment on postgraduate level..............................................................................................17 9.2 Assessment plan.......................................................................................................................... 18 9.3 General assignment numbers......................................................................................................18 9.3.1 Unique assignment numbers.......................................................................................................18 9.3.2 Due dates for assignments.......................................................................................................... 19 9.4 Submission of assignments.........................................................................................................19 9.5 Assignments................................................................................................................................ 20 9.5.1 Group assignments...................................................................................................................... 20 9.5.2 Repeaters' Individual Assignments..............................................................................................33 10 OTHER ASSESSMENT METHODS............................................................................................37 11 EXAMINATION............................................................................................................................ 37 12 FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS..........................................................................................37 13 SOURCES CONSULTED............................................................................................................ 38 14 CONCLUSION............................................................................................................................. 38 5 1 INTRODUCTION Project management is no longer a \"special-need\" management, but is rapidly becoming a standard way of doing business. An increasing percentage of the typical firm's effort is devoted to projects. Phrases we hear and read daily at work and in conversations with our colleagues, such as "management by projects" and "project management maturity", reflect this increasing trend in every society. These phrases maintain that it is awesome to watch the almost explosively rapid adoption of such a powerful tool as project management by organisations trying to achieve their goals and objectives. With the rapid adoption of this new managerial approach there are many projects that fall outside the organisation's stated mission there are many projects being conducted that are completely unrelated to the strategy and goals of the organisation there are many projects with funding levels that are excessive in relation to their expected benefits Furthermore, it is not unusual nowadays for organisations to be wrestling with hundreds of new projects. With so many on-going projects it becomes difficult for smaller projects to get adequate support, or even the attention of senior management. The following three problems are particularly common in organisations trying to manage multiple projects: 1. Delays in one project delay other projects because of common resource needs or technological dependencies. 2. The inefficient use of corporate resources results in peaks and valleys of resource utilisation. 3. Bottlenecks in resource availability or lack of required technological inputs result in project delays, particularly for those that depend on scarce resources or technology. The challenges thus facing the contemporary organisation are how to tie their projects more closely to the organisation's goals and strategy, how to handle the growing number of ongoing projects, and how to make these projects more successful. This module provides a comprehensive and systematic knowledge base to deal with the above challenges facing contemporary organisations. The module covers a number of areas relevant to addressing the challenges discussed above, which include project selection team, the need for planning, developing and supporting core teams for project success, organising the project management effort, the need for project management information systems, selecting and developing the project manager, developing a project management learning organisation, and creating an environment for successful projects in a contemporary organisation. The projects under consideration span the full spectrum found at all levels of corporate, business and functional strategy implementation, and within all academic areas of study, namely, value chain, finance, leadership and strategy. It also covers \"hard\" projects (eg building a dam, the Gautrain project and commissioning a plant) and \"soft\" projects (eg doing a merger transaction, launching a new brand, a research project, introducing a mentor system throughout an enterprise and entering a foreign country). 6 MBLEPMY In summary, it is important to note that the primary focus of this module is to provide an appropriate knowledge base on how best to foster an environment for successful project execution, thus improving the success rate of strategy implementation in an enterprise. 2 PURPOSE, BROAD AND SPECIFIC OUTCOMES FOR THE MODULE 2.1 Purpose The purpose of the learning in this module is to equip graduate students with a comprehensive and systematic knowledge base of strategic project management, including a set of best practices within organizations for creating an environment for successful projects. The module provides students with contemporary and comprehensive knowledge base on how to develop project management as an organization practice. 2.2 Broad and specific outcomes Specific outcome 1: Students can critically appraise the need for project management as a means by which organizations achieve their objectives under a changing environment Assessment criteria Evidence will show that students can: Rigorously evaluate the forces fostering project management Rigorously evaluate the environmental components which foster successful projects Critically understand the necessary fundamentals required towards a project based organisation Coherently understand the organisation revitalisation process model/ or model for changing organisation behaviour Be able to rigorously participate in devising appropriate process in creating an environment for successful organisations Critically understand the importance of strategic emphasis Be able to rigorously describe the importance of linking projects with organisational strategy Be able to critically understand how the decision-making process is handled in project oriented organisations Critically understand a process to select projects that will achieve organisational strategy Have the ability to critically evaluate what specifically needs to be done to get the desired mix of projects to market Be able to communicate effectively to specialist the potential problems in the project selection process 7 Be able to identify good practices in multiple project management and develop a project sponsor programme Coherently understand the fundamental requirements of influencing project success from upper managers. Specific outcome 2: Students can coherently understand the importance of a project as part of the functional organization, different types of organizational structures and principles of choosing organizational forms and teams Assessment criteria Evidence will show that students can: Coherently understand how to develop a core team process Rigorously evaluate the functions of upper management in developing core teams Coherently understand how to develop a team reward system in recognising the work of teams Coherently understand how to build trust with people who work off-site Critically articulate and discuss rigorously the role of organisational structure in project management Rigorously evaluate the main types of organisational structures, their merits and demerits Rigorously participate as a leader in the process of determining an organisational structure Specific outcome 3: Students can comprehensively appraise the need to develop the project management information system and the importance of a project management office PMO). Assessment criteria Evidence will show that students can: Rigorously participate in appraising the importance of information in a project based organization Coherently understand behaviour issues of information in project based organisations Have the capacity to evaluate contents of a project management information system (PMIS) Critically evaluate the dynamics of PMIS and communication Rigorously critique the process of developing a PMIS Critically understand the purpose of the Project Management Office (PMO) Rigorously participate in the process of determining the PMO tasks Be able to analyze different forms of PMO Have the capacity to describe in detail the process of implementing the PMO Specific outcome 4: 8 MBLEPMY Students can rigorously evaluate the project manager's role, authority, practices in selecting the project manager and relationships among project and functional roles; Assessment criteria Evidence will show that students can: 3 Master in understanding the problems that develop when an organisation uses the accidental project manager Critically evaluate various approaches to project manager selection Coherently understand the five important criteria for project manager selection Critically appraise a project manager development process and the role of upper management in it Coherently understand the meaning of learning experience in project based organisations Comprehensively analyse the principles of adaptive and generative learning in organisations Critically evaluate the role of leadership in learning organisations and new leadership skills required LECTURER(S) AND CONTACT DETAILS 3.1 Lecturer(s) The lecturer for this module is: Prof P M D Rwelamila (Module leader) Room 3-10, Unisa SBL Campus, Corner of Janadel and Office: Alexandra Avenues, Midrand Telephone number: +27 11 652 0236 E-mail address: rwelapmd@unisa.ac.za Fax number: +27 11 652 0371 Lecturers can assist with enquiries of an academic nature only, such as enquiries about the contents of assignments. You must provide your student number and the course code of this module (MBLEPMY) whenever you send us an enquiry. 3.2 Area Please direct any administrative enquiries concerning the Value Chain area to our administrative support staff. Value Chain Area 9 Name Telephone number E-mail address 3.3 Ms Tintswalo Mathebula + 27 11 652 0319 tmathet@unisa.ac.za University The contact points for any enquiries about administrative support are listed below. Remember to use your student number as reference whenever you contact the University. Description of enquiry Reception / Information Desk Registrations Prescribed Books MBL3 Programme Administration Library myUnisa Finance 4 Telephone +27 11 652 0214/48 +27 11 652 0290 +27 11 652 0218 +27 11 652 0352 +27 11 652 0341/2 43582 (SMS) +27 11 652 0324 E-mail address Zinhle Rakhomo dlaminz@unisa.ac.za sblregistrations@unisa.ac.za Terrance Lebepe lebepmt@unisa.ac.za Talana Lebelo lebeltg@unisa.ac.za Megan Scheepers scheema@unisa.ac.za myUnisaHelp@unisa.ac.za SBLfinance@unisa.ac.za MODULE-RELATED RESOURCES 4.1 Prescribed books Graham, RJ & Englund, RL. 2004. Creating an environment for successful projects. 2nd edition. San Francisco: John Wiley & Sons. 4.2 Attached papers and Web links Morris, PWG & Jamieson, A. 2005. Moving from corporate strategy to project strategy. Project Management Journal, 36(4):5-18. Rwelamila, PD. 2007. Project Management competence in public sector infrastructure organisations. Construction Management & Economics, 25(1):55-66. Rwelamila, PD & Purushottam, N (2012). Project Management Trilogy Challenges in Africa - Where to from here? Project Management Journal, 43(4): pp. 5-13 Louw, T & Rwelamila, PD (2012). Project Management Training Curricula at South African Public Universities: Is the Balanced Demand of the Profession Sufficiently Accommodated? Project Management Journal, 43(4): 70-80 10 MBLEPMY Association for Project Management: http://www.apm.org.uk/ Project Management Institute: http://www.pmi.org/ 4.3 Electronic Reserves (e-Reserves) The prescribed book and attached papers and two international project management websites as described above, are adequate for the module subject matter scope and depth. But you are encouraged to read extensively without restrictions provided you are reading relevant literature. The SBL librarians have developed a project management link and this can be used for additional articles. The link can be found at: URL: http://libguides.unisa.ac.za/content.php? pid=506500 5 TOPICS 5.1 The change to project-oriented organisations, strategic emphasis or projects and top management influence 5.1.1 Tuition period Time allocation: Before the study school 5.1.2 Specific outcomes After completing this topic, students must be able to select the critical and strategic projects in an organisation and interpret the environment of project management in contemporary organisations. 5.1.3 Critical questions Project management has emerged because the characteristics of contemporary society demand the development of new methods of management. There are many forces that have created this environment and, consequently, a number of critical questions. These forces have combined to mandate the use of teams to solve problems that used to be solvable by individuals. These forces have combined to greatly increase the complexity of goods and services produced plus the complexity of the processes used to produce them. This, in turn, has led to the need for more sophisticated systems to control both outcomes and processes. In addition to the growth in the number of organisations adopting project management, there is also an accelerating growth in the number of multiple, simultaneously ongoing, and often interrelated projects in organisations - particularly consulting, construction, auditing, systems development and maintenance and matrix organisations. Hence, the question that naturally arises is: How should one manage all these projects? Are they all really projects? There are strong indications to suggest that perhaps up to 80% of all \"projects\" are not actually projects at all, since they do not include the project requirements for objectives, budgets and due dates. Should we be undertaking all of them? Of those we should implement, what should be the priorities? 11 Across the private and public sectors, it is not unusual these days for organisations to be wrestling with hundreds of new projects. With so many ongoing projects it is becoming difficult for smaller projects to get adequate support, or even the attention of senior management. Therefore, the challenges facing contemporary organisations are how to tie their projects more closely to the organisation's goals and strategy, how to handle the growing number of ongoing projects, project selection and criteria of choice, and how to make these projects more successful. Given that the entire organisation has an appropriate mission statement and strategy, projects must be selected that are consistent with the strategic goals of the organisation. In this topic the following questions will be dealt with: What are the forces fostering project management? What environmental components foster successful projects? What are the necessary fundamentals required for a project-based organisation? What is the organisation revitalisation process model or model for changing organisational behaviour? What is an appropriate process in creating an environment for successful organisations? What is the importance of strategic emphasis? Is it important to link projects with organisational strategy? Is it possible to develop a process to select projects that will achieve organisational strategy? How is the decision-making process handled? What specifically needs to be done to get the desired mix of projects to market? What are potential problems in the project selection process? What are good practices in multiple project management and in developing a project sponsor programme? What are the fundamental requirements for getting upper management to influence project success? 5.1.4 Learning through activities Read the following texts: Graham and Englund (2004): chapter 1, 2 and 3 These chapters address the fundamentals of leading the change in a project-based organisation; the need to give projects a strategic emphasis; and good practices in influencing project success from the corporate level. 12 MBLEPMY 5.1.5 Self-assessment 1. Assuming that your organisation is a project-oriented organisation, use the important points listed on pages 34 and 106 in Graham & Englund (2004) to assess your immediate superior. How does your superior rate on the points listed? 2. Provide a detailed critique of what Graham and Englund (2004) refer to as an approach to selecting projects (Figure 2.2, p 47). Use the suggested approach to assess your organisational model in selecting projects. 5.1.6 Reflection After working through the seven chapters of the prescribed books above, it is clear that we have managed to analyse the salient issues on the environment that influence contemporary organisations, strategic management and project selection. Generally, we have dealt with the following: The change to project-based organisations Strategic emphasis for projects The need for upper managers to change the way project managers are appointed and rewarded in the organisation 5.1.7 Conclusion By now you have examined the need for project management in business organisations. You have looked at project-oriented organisations as a basis for the future and the move towards that organisational style. You have examined the organisation revitalisation process as a model of organisational change. Furthermore, you have discussed how organisations get into project management without strategic emphasis, and examined the fundamentals of linking projects to strategy. In order to help the chosen projects succeed, you have looked at why the upper management team needs to develop a system that supports multiple-project management. Finally, you have examined good practices in influencing project success from the higher echelon of the organisation. 5.2 Developing a core team process, organising for project management and developing a project management information system 5.2.1 Tuition period Time allocation: Before the study school 5.2.2 Specific outcomes 13 After completing this topic, students must be able to develop project management structures and teams, select the critical and strategic projects in an organisation and select and develop an appropriate project management information system (PMIS). 5.2.3 Critical questions Failures in projects can often be traced to the inability of a team to make the right decisions or perform the right tasks. These failures often stem from the maladies that teams suffer from: Internal conflict Member anxiety and frustration Time wasted on irrelevant issues Decisions made haphazardly by senior people, by coalitions or by default Team members are often more concerned with getting the task done than with doing it right. Many teams never know what their purpose is, so they never know when, or if, they have achieved it. From this it is clear that for teams to perform successfully, management must remove all organisational barriers and demonstrate (through their actions) continued support for the team structure and autonomy - hence the need to develop and support the core team. While the importance of developing and supporting core teams cannot be overemphasised, it is important to acknowledge that, if successful, an organisation will grow, add resources and people and thus develop an organisational structure. Commonly, the focus of the structure is specialisation of the human elements of the group. As long as its organisational structure is sufficient for the tasks imposed on it, the structure will tend to persist. It is, therefore, an important function of upper management to support project teams by designing the organisation to emphasise projects or integrate projects into the current organisation. Supporting core teams and organising the project management effort will not work unless the organisation has an appropriate monitoring system. The monitoring system in an organisation needs to be constructed so that it addresses every level of management, but reports need not be of the same depth or made with the same frequency for each level. It is important, therefore, that managers must be concerned enough to make certain that an information system is put in place before projects begin. In these two topics, the following questions will be addressed: 14 How do you develop a core team process? What are the functions of upper management in developing core teams? How do you develop a team reward system to recognise the work of teams? How do you build trust with people who work off-site? What is the role of organisational structure in project management? What are the main types of organisational structure? MBLEPMY What is the process of determining an organisational structure? What is the importance of information in project-oriented organisations? What are typical contents of a project management information system? How do you develop a project management information system (PMIS)? 5.2.4 Learning through activities Read the following: Graham and Englund (2004): chapter 4, 5 and 6 These chapters address the dynamics of developing and supporting core teams for project success; the need to support project teams by designing the organisation for support management; and the need for upper management to be concerned enough to make certain that an information system is put in place before project design. 5.2.5 Self-assessment Using your organisation as a case study, review the current system in your organisation in terms of the functions of upper managers in staffing and making the core team concept work. Read chapter 4 of Graham and Englund (2004), which appraises the organisational set-up. After reading chapter 5 of Graham and Englund (2004) \"Organising for Project Management\