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Impacts of implementation of project management information system in a

small R&D company – case study

Conference Paper · March 2013

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 32. mednarodna konferenca o razvoju organizacijskih znanosti
PAMETNA ORGANIZACIJA
Talenti. Vitka organiziranost. Internet stvari.
20. - 22. marec 2013, Portorož, Slovenija

Impacts of implementation of project management

information system in a small R&D company – case study

Mirjana Kljajić Borštnar

Fakulteta za organizacijske vede, Kidričeva cesta 55a, Slovenija
mirjana.kljajic@fov.uni-mb.si

Vesna Kobal
Arctur d.o.o., Industrijska cesta 5, SI-5000 Nova Gorica, www.4pm.si
vesna.kobal@arctur.si

Tomi Ilijaš
Arctur d.o.o., Industrijska cesta 5, SI-5000 Nova Gorica, www.arctur.si
tomi.ilijas@arctur.si

Povzetek
Problemi upravljanja kadrov, financ in časa v večprojektni organizaciji so po naravi
kompleksni, zato jih moramo obravnavati celovito tako v velikih, kot manjših
organizacijah. Pri tem je potrebno zagotoviti odprto komunikacijo med zaposlenimi in
med partnerskimi organizacijami. Obstaja veliko metodologij in orodij za podporo
projektnemu delu, vendar so večinoma prekompleksne in zato slabo sprejete,
predvsem v manjših organizacijah. Cilj tega prispevka je analizirati vpliv uvedbe
fleksibilnega spletnega projektnega informacijskega sistema z vidika kadrovskega in
finančnega managementa ter sodelovanja. V ta namen smo izvedli študijo primera v
manjšem slovenskem raziskovalno-razvojnem podjetju, ki je uvedlo spletno rešitev
4PM. Rezultati študije nakazujejo, da uporaba 4PM učinkovito podpira upravljanje
več-projektne organizacije, pozitivno vpliva na zadovoljstvo in participacijo
zaposlenih ter preglednejše vodenje finance. Implikacije in priporočila za prakso so
podana v zaključku.

Ključne besede: več projektni management, projektni informacijski sistem, sistemski

pristop, majhna organizacija

Abstract
Problems of resources management (human, financial, time) in a multiple project
companies are inherently complex and need to be addressed systematically be it in
small or large organizations. Furthermore, there is a need for transparent
communication and collaboration within the organization as well as with partnering
organizations. There are many methodologies and tools supporting project
management, which are themselves complex and are therefore not widely adopted,
especially among small companies. The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of
a flexible cloud based project management information system implementation from
the human resources, financial management, and collaboration point of view. We
have conducted a case study in a small sized Slovene research and development
company using the web based project management information system 4PM. The
results of the study suggest that the use of 4PM in support of multiple project
management improves human resources and financial management in a
collaborative and transparent way. The implications and recommendations for similar
organizations are drawn and discussed.

Keywords: multi project management, project management information system,

systems approach, small organization

1 Introduction
Modern organizations are more and more project oriented. Furthermore, the projects represent
their core business. Projects are interrelated within the organization through human resources,
finances, and time planning. Research on the project management in the past decades has
been primarily focused on single project management (Lindkvist et al, 1998; Lundin &
Söderholm, 1995; Shenhar & Dvir, 1996), but recently the focus has shifted towards the
multiple-project management (Van der Merwe , 1997; Packendorff, 1995; Nandhakumar &
Jones, 2001; Engwall & Jerbrant, 2003; Cusumano & Nobeoka, 1998). Problems of resources
management (human, financial, time) in a multiple concurrent project organizations are
inherently complex. Geraldi (2007) addressed complexity in multi-project organizations as
ability of these companies to deal with the coexistence of order and chaos. She proposed four
organizational archetypes: the creative-reflective, mechanic-structured, chaotification of
order, and bureaucratization of chaos. This means that multi-project organization has specific
needs in terms of supporting creative work process while keeping the structured processes.
Basic presumption in management of complex dynamic systems is that the system can be
observed and controlled by feedback information (Kljajić Borštnar et al., 2011). Furthermore,
not only feedback, but also anticipative information is necessary for efficient management of
a complex system. Information system plays the most important role in all living and
technical systems. It provides communication among elements and environments in the
course of achieving goals. Without feedback and anticipative information, the functioning and
developing of the systems would be impossible. However, depending of the nature of the
systems, there are enormous differences among the types and complexities of IS. Hence the
basic role of information systems must be to provide the right information when needed.
Nevertheless, the information alone is insufficient for successful decision making. Decision
processes in organizational systems are primarily based on the participating subjects.
While integral information systems are widely adopted among large and medium sized
companies, especially Enterprise Resources Planning systems (ERP) and Customer
Relationship Management systems (CRM), Project Management Information Systems (PMIS)
are used partially, mainly single-project management oriented, lacking holistic support of all
business processes of multiple-project oriented organizations and according to (Dahlgren &
Söderlund, 2010; Raymond & Bergeron, 2007) “the wider and fundamental issues of
organization-wide coordination and control between projects need to be addressed” (pp. 3).
Problems of complexity, chaos vs. order and multi-project interdependencies are especially
difficult to address in a small to medium sized research and development (R&D) companies.

2
These organizations rely on acquiring projects and successful execution of projects from
various financers (private and public). Furthermore, there is a need for transparent
communication and collaboration within the organization as well as with partnering
organizations. To be able to successfully manage different projects (in type, funding, scope,
scale) and at the same time keeping people motivated and creative, they need to address this
systematically. There are many methodologies and tools supporting project management,
which are themselves complex and are therefore not widely adopted, especially among
smaller organizations. Furthermore, the new ways of working demand flexibility from
organizations and people in the way of planning the work, monitoring and controlling the
work, overcoming various communication and collaboration challenges and cultural
differences. So-called global groups, acting in various cultural, language, time, and
interdisciplinary environments collaborate on various projects (e.g. new product, service, and
knowledge development) in a virtual environment without even one live contact. Another
challenge in such projects is in efficient knowledge transfer within the financial and time
limits of the given project.
While project managers have to provide a transparent and efficient planning, monitoring and
controlling of resources in order to achieve the project goals, top management has to have an
overview of the company as a whole (Martinsuo & Lehtonen, 2006). The use of integral
information system that efficiently supports all aspects of multi-project oriented organization
is thus essential.
The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of a flexible cloud based project management
information system implementation from the human resources, financial management, and
collaboration point of view. We have conducted a case study in a small sized Slovene
research and development company using the web based project management information
system 4PM.

2 Methodology
We have conducted a single case study in a small Slovene R&D ICT company. The company
is a typical small research and development multi-project company. The company was
established in 2003. It has 58 employees, of which 85% are male. Average age of the
employees is 32. The employees’ educational structure is 10% of PhD, 10% MSc, and the rest
with university degree. The yearly turnover is about 3.15 million EUR. Their main income
comes from R&D projects financed by the national, EU funding and commercial development
projects. They currently run 5 EU projects in which they are partners, and over 30
development-commercial projects.

The company soon realized that they would need a systematic approach to managing the large
number of projects to support the financial planning, human resource planning (task
delegation according to competences and time), documentation archiving, monitoring and
controlling, and reporting. The company was a typical representative of a multiple-project
organization with clearly identified needs that has to be addressed in a systematic way.
The single-case study was used as a research framework to research three main aspects of use
of the 4PM in a multiple-project oriented organization: the human resources aspect, finance
planning aspect and collaboration aspect. The research was conducted in four stages
according to Yin (1994): design, conduct, analyze the evidence, and develop the conclusions,
recommendations and implications.

3
2.1 Design of the study
This study was designed to address two of the possible applications for a case study model
(Yin, 1994), firstly to describe the real-life context in which intervention has occurred and
secondly, to describe the intervention itself. The intervention, implementation of the 4PM
application, was done in the following steps that were also used for data collection. Evidences
were gathered by using triangulation data collection methods. We used the following
instruments (Yin, 1994): direct and participant observations, interviews, and documentation.
Phases in the process of research followed the implementation phases as occurred in an
intervention and are presented in Figure 1. In the first phase the processes and problems were
identified and visualized by observation of participants, documents analysis and interviews. In
the second phase the test users started using the application. Feedback information was
collected by observation and interviews with the test users. Adjustments were done on the
basis of the feedback from the test users. The last phase was the use of the application
throughout the company. Again feedback information was collected from the users and
several adjustments made. Processes and users opinions were analyzed via observation and
interviews after the software was in use for six months.

Figure 1: Phases of the research process

2.2 Conducting the study

The study was conducted within the time span of one year in total. During that period all the
phases in Figure 1 were executed. Observation of the participants was used to identify the
processes and the soft system methodology (Checkland, 1999) to depict the problem state and
processes. During all three phases the semi structured interviews were conducted with the
manager, projects managers and other employees. Interviews were designed around three
main topics: employee satisfaction, financial management and collaboration.

4
Identification of problem state and processes (participants’ observation, interviews,
document analysis)
In an interview with the manager we identified key problems, goals and processes that needed
to be supported. In a small company top management is actively involved in work processes,
they rely on a democratic and open working relations based on transparent communication.
However, they expressed the need to support the creative part by structured processes that can
be monitored and controlled. Priority was set on the public co-funded projects, with their
strict reporting requirements. Also, the need for a gradual implementation that would follow
the competencies of an individual project manager was noted.
Implementation of 4PM for test users (feedback information, adjustment)
Test user group, the manager and administrative workers, that were familiar with the use of
4PM, started using the 4PM. Administrative workers took care of the initial data input. First
they started using the financial module, later the document management system and
collaborative environment. The latest stage of this phase was introduction of the non-project
related module (absence, travels, etc.).
Implementation of 4PM across the organization (feedback information, processes analysis,
participants’ observation and interviews)
After 4PM was introduced and used for half a year, interviews with the management and
administration workers were conducted and the impact of implementation was assessed.

3 Findings
Problems described by the participnts are common to many SMEs, especially in time of
accelerated growth of projects and employees. Current management practice is not sufficient.
Experts in certain business domains lack knowledge of human resources management,
financial management, and other competences, important for successful project management.
Complexity of multi-project organization is reported to be overwhelming and need for
systematical IT support had been identified on the project management and top management
level. Participants clearly identified three key areas, which have to be supported:
 Human resources management (work load planning, task delegation, evaluation of
performance, communication and collaboration),
 Financial management (revenues planning, inflow planning, costs planning, cash flow
planning, cost controlling), and
 Overall projects management.
Both, observation and documents analysis supported evidences of the interviews with project
managers, that they are overloaded by the project administration. This was mostly related to
reporting to the management and financers.
Three groups of participants were identified according to their needs for IT support:
 Top management, which has to communicate accurate and up-to-date information to
the project managers about the changes, and risks upon which the project managers
would rely for the decision-making about the project. On the other hand top
management has to have an aggregated overview about the critical business
information (cash flow, performance indicators …);
 Project managers needs to be supported in their everyday project activities (task
delegation and control, controlling the financial plan execution, reporting),
 Members of the project team, which need the operating platform supporting the
project structured and unstructured communication, and documentation management.
Basic idea of the company management was that every member of the project team should
participate in the quest for positive project results, collaborate and communicate with all
members of the team, transparent insight into the state of the project, reporting about the work
5
done, time spent, and other relevant data about the project. Furthermore, the company was
looking for a flexible solution that would, by its use, contribute to learning and thus
strengthening of the project management competencies of the managers and team members.
The solution should provide efficient decision-making about priorities based on the systems
overview throughout the whole company.

3.1 Human Resources Management

Productivity of the employees working on multiple projects concurrently is hard to assess,
many times reporting of time spent on a task and effective time is not the same. Furthermore,
the requirements for reporting to financers do not show the real status. By dynamical work
planning according to the overview of the actual time allocated to specific tasks (Kobal,
2009), reporting about the time spent on a task and reporting about the content of work,
transparent employee rewarding based on the agreed effective time and work done, and better
workload distribution can lead to greater employee satisfaction and motivation for work.
Hence the basic role of 4PM was in supporting of the democratic process of dynamic work
planning with monitoring and controlling the process, transparent rewarding. This process is
best described as a democratic process of reporting of subjective judgment of time spent on a
specific task, communication and negotiation about the effective time acknowledged,
qualitative and quantitative work assessment, absence planning, work load planning, etc. For
this purpose it was of high importance that the top management was actively participating in
promoting the culture of reporting, monitoring and controlling of the time spent on tasks and
quality assessment of the work done.
Although a flexible solution, it should provide standardized and, where possible, automated
handling of the following activities: task delegation, time allocation, automated notification
about changes, documentation handling and reports preparation. Structured and standardized
processes, maintaining flexibility for the task scheduling, and documentation handling is
crucial in efficient support of all participants in the process and allows participants to be
focused on goals rather than administration. At the same time all three groups of participants
have feedback and anticipative information when needed.
There are two instances of reporting needed, on for the management and other for the purpose
of financers. Well defined and supported processes offer higher reliability in preparation of
various reports (scheduled reports, ad hoc reports and analysis) based on coherent and reliable
data. Furthermore, connectivity to other information systems, such as accounting IS, and
HRMIS, would contribute to better efficiency in planning, monitoring and controlling not just
the human resources processes, but all business processes. Furthermore, reports on the
analysis of the work planned vs. work done, yearly appraisals revealed some interesting
information that can help to better human resources management. Based on the historical data
predictions can be done for workload planning as well.
The need for handling the unpredicted situations (tasks needed to be executed before the next
activity) by relocating free work capacities is based on the overview provided by PMIS. But
not only the information about the current and predicted workload distribution, task
delegation is done in an open communication, in which each member have the right to accept
or decline the task due to other prioritized tasks. Open communication within and outside the
project team is vital, but nevertheless, focused and facilitated discussion is supported as well.
Together they contribute to better employee involvement and collaboration, and fewer
conflicts. Transparency of processes, based on systematic feedback information at all levels of
decision-making (operational – task realization, tactical – goals achievement, strategically –
overall performance success), leads to better motivation of employees, transparent

6
performance assessment of employees, knowledge transfer between the project members and
between projects.

3.2 Financial management aspect

Financial management in a multi project organization is complex due to: limited financial
resources, unpredictable costs, different currencies, specific financial reporting requirements
of individual financers, possible large investments before receiving of funds, travelling
expenses. Basic challenge is cash flow planning. Usually the costs occur before the cash
inflow, it can happen that large costs occur in several projects at the same time period;
therefore the need for planning the cash flow is crucial for business.
Since largest part of the project costs are personnel costs, efficient financial management is
connected to work planning and realization reporting. Performance indicators, identified by
the top management and project managers, are personnel costs planning (task delegation,
hourly rate dependent on the project, realization of their tasks). Only accurate reports received
in time can offer valuable decision-making information.
One of the requirements of the organization was to maintain the existing accounting IS
(especially with the account payable and receivable), therefore integration with the project
management IS was needed. Information on cash inflows and outflows should be at hand
when the event occurs. The major challenge integrating the two information systems was not
technological, but organizational. What is the case in many other similar cases is that the
employees, not directly involved in the project work, have difficulties to comprehend the
nature of project work. Further, the data structure (agregation level), format and time had to
be aligned in order to provide suitable information to the designated person in time.

3.3 Collaboration aspect

The aspect of collaboration was one the three main areas identified by the top management
and project managers. Along financial and human resources management, collaboration is
crucial in success of the heterogeneous R&D project teams. Group work encompasses open,
focused and documented communication, and knowledge transfer. Knowledge can be stored
in documents, communications, and there is always tacit knowledge hidden within the project
groups.
For the organization in question, the R&D groups are heterogeneous in existing within and
outside the organization, being multidisciplinary (programmers, systems engineers, web
programmers, designers, administration workers, and others), multicultural, and multilingual.
Many times the work is located out of the company premises, sometimes team members don't
even meet in person. For this reason the collaboration platform should provide support for
efficient communication among the team members and structured and transparent
communication and document management between project team members.
Project Document Management System
One of the projects major challenges is document management in a structured and systematic
way that supports:
- Project management documentation,
- Versioning of the documents,
- Granting access rights,
- Reporting.
Integrated with a collaboration platform it forms a powerful knowledge management tool. It
encompasses the following functionalities:
 Prepared templates and reports (with comments, documents and files and folders
structure),
7
  Learning platform for the within and between project knowledge transfer (time plans,
various reporting options, standardized contract drafts, technical specifications,
minutes meetings, etc.).
 Standardized and centralized documents capturing, archiving, organized by projects
 Versioning (locking, access rights, work on the latest version),
 Access rights control,
 Group work support (sharing, editing/reading rights, advanced search options).
In setting up an efficient collaboration information system that encompasses monitoring of the
document workflow, the project manager determines what information is needed by the three
groups of users and by each team member, top management, and the document flow within
the project group and with the other stakeholders. Again, the balance between the formal
(structured) communication and informal (unstructured) communication was the basis for
creative and open collaborative work.

4 Conclusions
There are more and more organizations that face the complexity of a multi project
management. Research on the subject is scares, mainly focusing on a specific aspects or a
single project management information support. We analyzed the impact of implementation
of a flexible cloud based project management information system in a small Slovene R&D
company, from the human resources, financial management, and collaboration point of view.
For this purpose we conducted a single case study. Evidences gather in the three phase
process aligned by the implementation process, were gathered using semi structured
interviews, document analysis and users observations.

R&D groups are a set of creative people developing innovative solutions, but on the other
hand have to be able to work with different stakeholders (financers, part time workers,
managers). Furthermore, they have to follow strict project rules set by the financer, such as
time plans, reporting, documenting, especially for complex national and EU funded projects.
Many times working on a project means having flexible working hours, with peaks highly
exceeding the 40 hour week working hours. The studied evidences revealed the importance of
a system approach to supporting key areas of project management processes assessed by the
companies’ top managers and project managers. Findings support the proposed theory of
keeping the balance of the creative processes that are unstructured, rules free and even chaotic
on one hand, and structured processes with ability to monitor and control on the other hand
(Geraldi, 2007).

Further, the evidences revealed that the key to a successful multi project management is in
efficiently support of the employees by empowering them in the process of work planning and
reporting, transparent work evaluation and open communication. The results of the study
suggest that the use of 4PM in support of multiple project management improves human
resources and financial management in a collaborative and transparent way.

The most important lesson learned is about the process of implementation of an project
management information system. The process itself should be transparent, the roles of
individuals clearly defined, the implementation plan aligned with the organization strategies
and internal rules. And finally, the organizations’ top management has to support this quest in
setting an example and creating conditions for organizational culture to evolve in a way that
each employee will adopt the system.

8
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