Name: K Susmitha

PRN: 18020841164
Date: 30/07/ 2019
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
1) Describe the organizational structure at BEC. What departmentalization approaches
does the company use? What are the pros and cons of this structure for BEC?
Ans:
ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE AT BEC
The organizational structure at BEC has five functional departments namely marketing
department, consulting department, training department, research and development
department and administration department. Each functional department is assigned
different responsibilities and is headed by a Department Manager.
Along with the functional departments at BEC there are two project departments which
are responsible for various projects undertaken by the company. They allocate resources
and schedule tasks. The project departments are headed by a Project Manager.
Project and Department managers were at the same level in the hierarchy of the company
and they worked together on planning and conducting each project.
The top management consists of Chief consultant, CEO and Vice president. According to
their areas of expertise the top management heads different departments in the company.
Chief consultant manages R&D department and Administration department. Vice
President manages Marketing department and Project department A. CEO manages
Project department B, Consulting department and Training department.
The company has divided all the functions into different departments and since the
majority of the work the company gets is in the type of projects, they have designed two
project department teams. The company uses a MATRIX type of structure. In this
structure, the horizontal dimension is represented by the various projects and the vertical
dimension is represented by different functional departments. For each project, the project
manager along with the department manager will assign resources from different
departments and prepare their schedules and deadlines.
The PROS and CONS of this type of structure:
PROS:
Efficient resource Allocation
Flexible
Opportunity Assessment
Easy post Project transition
CONS:
Dysfunctional conflict
Infighting
Stressful and slow
Lack of in-depth technical expertise
 Name: K Susmitha
PRN: 18020841164
Date: 30/07/ 2019

BEC Company

Marketing Dept. R&D Dept. Admin. Dept. Consulting Dept. Training Dept.

Project Manager
Project Dept A Project 1

Project Manager
Project 2
Project Dept B
Project Manager
Project 3

Project Manager
Project 4

2) “Flexible structure made BEC a learning-oriented organization with open culture”. Do

you agree that this true everywhere? Why or Why not?
Ans: During the initial years of BEC, the founders of the company lacked business expertise
so they concentrated more on research work and conducted practical research in stress
management practices. The work was mainly project based and there was no clear structure
for the organization, the six employees and two founders that were present in the organization
and also part time counsellors were involved in all the projects as there were no different
specialized departments with clearly defined responsibilities.
All the employees worked on a project and the project manager would assign the tasks to
employees based on the skills and schedules. Every employee worked on two or more tasks
including design o project plans, interviewing customer employees, telephone and face to
face consulting, designing promotional brochures and so on. The employees treated each
project as a learning opportunity and they discussed the difficulties they faced and provided
each other suggestions for improvement.
During the initial years of the company the structure was quite informal and each employee’s
roles and responsibilities were flexible. This structure allowed employees to access all stages
in the EAP project and gain understanding of each aspect in the entire project. So this flexible
structure allowed the company to be a learning oriented organization with open culture.
 Name: K Susmitha
PRN: 18020841164
Date: 30/07/ 2019
This was mainly possible because of the small size of the company and flexible organization
structure and also because the company was focussing more on doing research and gaining
knowledge than on increasing profits and gaining customers.
This will not be possible everywhere and every time because the company would grow
rapidly as the number of projects and customers increases and it will be difficult for everyone
to be part of every project at every stage so there should be a proper structure to the
organization, because of that the companies usually tend to have more organized structures
like matrix structure to tackle different projects, departments and rapid growth.

3) SWOT Analysis of BEC Company

Strengths:
- First consulting company to provide EAP service that are used by many mobile
companies and China and high demand from North America.
- Highest market share and its customers include multinational organizations operating
in China and Chinese organizations
- The expertise of the team, senior management and other part time counsellors. Most
employees have a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree in Psychology
- The research that the company conducted during the initial years on practical stress
management techniques.
- Efficient and market-oriented company after the structural change in the company.
Weakness:
- The projects were not handled properly and employees had to work on multiple
projects and work over time and also on weekends.
- The new structural change in the organization was not clearly understood by all the
employees and that is causing confusion

Opportunities:
- Growing demand for the employee psychological assistance in companies
- Increase in the business and number of customers

Threats:
- Conflicts between the functional managers and project managers.
- Frustration of the employees due to the conflicting roles of the functional department
manager and the project manager which might lead to the delay in the project
- Growing management problems due to rapid growth of the company and its business.
 Name: K Susmitha
PRN: 18020841164
Date: 30/07/ 2019
4) What caused the conflict between the project managers and other employees?
Ans: The organizational structure at the BEC company has different functional departments
headed by a functional manager and two project departments headed by a project manager.
The functional manager takes care of various responsibilities to be performed by the
department and project manager assigns resources and schedules resources to the project. The
functional manager and project manager have to work together to ensure proper execution of
the projects and they are at the same level in the hierarchy of the organization.
After the structural change in the organization, the role of the project manager was not clearly
understood by the department staff and employees would receive instructions from
department manager and project manager and when conflict arises they are confused and
frustrated and usually tend to use their own discretion which might affect the project and
cause unnecessary delays.
Since the functional managers and project managers are at the same level, it was difficult for
project managers to assign tasks and show direct influence on the functional managers.

5) How would you design the responsibilities and authorities of a project manager at BEC?
Ans: The problems are arising at the company due to conflicting roles and responsibilities
and same level in the hierarchy of both the functional and project managers. So it would be
better if we have a hierarchy in them and since the company is project driven company the
project departments should be placed over other departments and a STRONG MATRIX
structure should be adopted in which the project manager decides the resources, schedules
and the functional manager assists the project manager to complete the tasks and to ensure
project completion.
This solution would solve the problems of the conflicts arising between the project manager
and functional manager and the employees will also concentrate on the completion of the
project rather than on wasting time on conflicting objectives.

6) BEC is still growing and need to hire more employees. For the future do you have any
suggestions for Mr. Zheng about employee qualifications and training sessions?
A strong matrix structure should be adopted by the company and more focus should be given
to the completion of projects.
Hire people from top universities that offer courses in psychology and employees with work
experience in different companies in specialized department.
The new employees hired must be trained in cross functional area since the company is
growing at a faster rate and requires the employees to work on multiple projects at same time,
so it would always be beneficial if the new employee has an understanding of the entire
system rather than just his work.
 Name: K Susmitha
PRN: 18020841164
Date: 30/07/ 2019
The company has to hire more project management professionals who are certified to ensure
that projects are completed on time and the rapid growth of the company can be turned into
more profits.
The new employees should be made aware of their responsibilities, working of the entire
EAP system and also should be made aware of the organizational structure of the company.

7) Responsibility matrix
Tasks/ Top Marketin Admin R&D Training Consulting Project
People Management g . Dept.
Sign a R
contract
with
company
Conducting R
Interviews
to collect
information
Delivering R
brochures
Setting up a R
toll free
helpline
Develop and R
design
Onsite
training
sessions
Financial R
functions,
HR Plan
Branding, R
media
associations,
target
markets
Quality R
managemen
t for
consulting
Research R
strategy and
coordinate
with other
 Name: K Susmitha
PRN: 18020841164
Date: 30/07/ 2019
depts to
develop new
projects

WBS
BEC

BEC
1.1

1.1.1 1.1.2 1.1.3 1.1.4 1.1.5

Project A

Marketing Training R& D Admin Consulting

Project management
- Allocate employees and other resources to provide high quality service
- Work with Marketing, R& D Dept and other functional depts.
Marketing
- Branding, media associations, target markets
R& D
- Research strategy and coordinate with other depts to develop new projects
Training
- Develop and design Onsite training sessions
Consulting
- Quality management for consulting
 Name: K Susmitha
PRN: 18020841164
Date: 30/07/ 2019
Admin
- Financial functions, HR Plan
This structure would resolve all the problems as it will ensure a proper resource allocation
among all the projects and the STRONG Matrix structure in which the project manager is
given more authority over the functional manager would resolve the infighting and conflicts
among the managers.
The project manager will assign employees and create schedule with the assistance from
functional managers and the employees are under project manager as long as they are
assigned to a project so the employee will not face any conflicting instructions.