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Padrões de Comunicação em Projetos: uma análise teórica das perspectivas de ciência das redes e fluxo de informação View project
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1 Introduction
Collaborative product development projects require a complex mix of planning,
evaluation and decision-making. All of these activities, in turn, are based on
information generated during the projects. This information should be updated and
available to all. Research on collaborative engineering projects has emphasized the
importance of this information to concurrent engineering (CE) by indicating factors
that prevent the accomplishment of their objectives (except for those of a political
nature) [3]. These factors are: ignorance about what other project teams are doing,
failure in controlling project change, different perspectives on project goals,
1
Assistant Professor, University of Sao Paulo, Sao Carlos School of Engineering, Industrial
Engineering Department, Integrated Engineering Research Group (EI2). Trabalhador
Saocarlense, 400; 13566-590; Sao Carlos-SP; Brazil; Tel+55(0)16 3373-8289; Fax +55(0)16
3373-8235; Email: amaral@sc.usp.br ; http://www.numa.sc.usp.br/grupoei/
342 C. Araujo and D. Amaral
2 Methods
The method used was the multiple-case studies according to Yin [7]. It was
adopted a holistic approach. Three dimensions were considered in each case: the
product development process (PDP), the IT infrastructure employed to support this
process and problems, and the practices and critical factors of success for
collaborative CE projects. The data collection instruments were: interviews, non-
participant observations and document analysis. Models of the enterprises’s PDP
phases were devised to analyze the data, which included the modeling of software
used to assist the processes. BPMN [2] was employed in the process modeling. The
study analyzed capital goods enterprises with distinct sizes (medium versus large)
and different manufacturing strategies (only Engineer-To-Order versus a mix of
Engineer-To-Order, Make-To-Stock, Make-To-Order and Assembly-To-Order).
Figure 1 represents each case.
A Comparative Analysis of Project Management Information Systems 343
3 Results
The results presented in this article derive from the study of four cases as described
in the above section, i.e., capital goods enterprises. The deficient areas are
presented without detailed descriptions.
3.1 Enterprise A
3.2 Enterprise B
3.3 Enterprise C
3.4 Enterprise D
4 Final Considerations
The requirements and challenges presented in this study illustrate the difficulties
encountered in managing collaborative CE projects, especially concerning the
integration of several types of data and their communication to all collaborators
involved in the projects. The main contribution of this paper is to present the
difficulties for use the features of current tools as well as the requirements and
challenges to development a new class of project management systems capable of
supporting collaborative work in the industry of capital goods. In addition, the
cases described in this study may be of assistance to professionals interested in
building or improving IT infrastructures to support project management in
collaborative concurrent engineering of capital goods.
5 References
[1] Barnes TA, Pashby IR, Gibbons AM. Managing collaborative R&D projects
development of a practical management tool. Int J of project management 2006;24:395-
404.
[2] BPMN. OMG Final Adopted Specification, 2006. Available at:
<http://www.bpmn.org/Documents/OMG%20Final%20Adopted%20BPMN%201-
0%20Spec%2006-02-01.pdf>. Access on: Dec. 15th 2007.
[3] Hameri A, Puittinen R. WWW-enabled knowledge management for distributed
engineering projects. Computers in Industry 2003;50:165-177.
[4] Li WD, Fuh JYH, Wong Y S. An Internet-enabled integrated system for co-design and
concurrent engineering. Computers in Industry 2004;55:87-103.
[5] Rodriguez R, Al-Ashaab A. Knowledge web-based system architecture for
collaborative product development. Computers in Industry 2005;56:125-140.
[6] White D, Fortune J. Current practice in project management: an empirical study. Int J
of Project Management 2002; 20:1-11.
[7] Yin RK. Case Study Research-Design and Methods. Newbury Park, Sage
Publications,1994.