Organisation and Team; Work Breakdown

Structures; Academic Skills

 Today’s agenda:

• Project management and organisation

• Project governance
• Team working
• Project leadership

• Work Breakdown Structures

• If we have time…academic skills session

Organisational Structure and Culture

Organisation structures may be based on:

 Functional areas
 Divisions (product groups)
Organisational culture may be:
 Enabling
 Disabling
Culture in this sense has to do with:
 Custom and practice (established ways of working)
 Internal politics and relationships (power positions)
 Formality (rule-based v. task-based)
 Handy (1985) Culture of
Organisations
 Apollo: bureaucracy  Athena : innovative

 Zeus: entrepreneurial
 Dionysus: collaborative
Characteristics of ‘manager’ in organisation...

 Apollo strong principles, follows rule book

 Zeus risk taker, innovator, political/diplomatic (plays both sides),
enthusiastic, networker
 Athena free-thinker (thinks out of the box), observer, empathy (good
manager), diplomacy (good relationships)
 Dionysus philosopher (thinks a lot!), ideas person.. , experts, doesn’t
like rules
How will the culture of organisation affect the following...
Apollo (rule based, formal) Athena (innovative, problem
solver)

Type of project take on Type of project take on

Attitude to risk Attitude to risk
Attitude to team work Attitude to team work
Attention to detail Attention to detail

Zeus (entrepreneurial, autocratic Dionysis (collaborative, resource

leader) sharing)

Type of project take on Type of project take on

Attitude to risk Attitude to risk
Attitude to team work Attitude to team work
Attention to detail Attention to detail
 Project Organisation

 Project structure will impact upon:

 The authority of the project manager / leader

 The autonomy of the project team
.

Line and Staff Authority

6-8
Project Organisation
Project organisation ...
 Pure Project Organisation
 More effective for large scale projects and where type of project is repeated (e.g. construction)
 Team working important – success here may lead to longevity in team
 May lack technical depth (costly consultants)
 Managing external communication (with non team members)
 Fractional resources problems (bored staff)
 Some evidence of ‘drag’ towards end of long projects
 Functional Project Organisation
 Embedded in functional group where project will be used
 Problem of cross organisational cooperation (e.g. IT support in manufacturing department)
 ‘Baton passing’ between different functional areas – R&D to production etc.
 Lines of communication
 Problems of problem sponsorship (competing priorities)
Project organisation...
 Matrix Project Organisation
 An attempt to capture advantages of Pure and Functional Project Organisation
 Will have a ‘functional’ division for projects/programs in organisation
 Depending on how staff and resources are assigned to projects matrix can be strong, weak or balanced
 Problem of ‘too many bosses’ (Project Manager v Functional Manager)
 PM requires strong negotiation skills (to influence functional managers)
 Problem of team commitment
 Contract organisation
 Contracted in to do work
 Project manager in charge
 Client (customer) may find control more difficult
Relationship between project structure and objectives (Adapted from Maylor,
2010, 253)

Lightweight matrix Functional project Pure project organisation

project organisation organisation
Advantage Quality maintained Lower admin costs Dedicated resources,
Some team building Career development for organisation design
possible staff dependent on project
Retains functional Line management clear strategy
strengths Team strengths
Acceptability among Teams as profit centres
functional heads
Disadvantage Some cost disadvantage Coordination across Can incur significant
due to additional functions difficult additional cost due to
coordination expense of Communication issues the relative expense of
the matrix Hierarchy contractors, may not
Dual reporting Less creativity improve quality over
Staff appraisal difficult time, instability for staff
Imposed staff
Issues for project Two bosses problem Chain of Command Management of
manager knowledge
PROJECT GOVERNANCE
Projects, Programmes and
Portfolios  Within organisations projects can sit
within programmes – allowing
commonalities between projects to
be shared e.g. a music tour, the
Project successful completion of each ’gig’
may be seen as a project, but the
Programme overall tour a programme
 These programmes may sit within
Portfolio
overall portfolios which relate to
organisational strategy e.g. the
record companies portfolio of stars
Project Governance
 Many public and private sector organisations are now developing project
management offices to assist in project management processes
 PMOs typically provide documentation, checks and controls, mentoring, staff,
resources and support for project managers – develop project management
manuals for use across organisations
 Most projects will implement a project board / steering group (within context of
research projects) to assist / advise / provide quality assurance for projects
Portfolio Project Management (APM Website)
• Teamworking will not be as visible in the portfolio dimension, other than in the
core portfolio management team. The wider group of individuals with
responsibility to deliver different parts of the portfolio form a collaborative team.
• It is in the interest of the portfolio manager that the appropriate type of
teamworking is encouraged and exploited at all levels to maximise portfolio
performance. Collaborative and cooperative working within the portfolio with a
shared vision of the strategic objectives should also be encouraged.
 https://www.apm.org.uk/body-of-knowledge/people/interpersonal-skills/teamwork/
Programme Management (APM Website)
• Within a programme there will be a number of sub-teams that the programme manager
needs to develop as well as the overall ‘team’. These could include, for example, the:

• Teams of project managers

• Support team (risk manager, communications manager, administrators, etc.).
• Sub-teams will be developed concurrently with the objective of achieving the programme’s
vision and component benefits. Inevitably there will be a significant turnover rate within
the programme team as projects are instigated and closed or as business-as-usual units go
through the change management process.
• Maintaining a team ethos across this broad, diverse and changing community will require
excellent communication and leadership skills on the part of the programme manager.

 https://www.apm.org.uk/body-of-knowledge/people/interpersonal-skills/teamwork/
Project Governance
 Many public and private sector organisations are now developing project
management offices to assist in project management processes
 PMOs typically provide documentation, checks and controls, mentoring, staff,
resources and support for project managers – develop project management
manuals for use across organisations
 Most projects will implement a project board / steering group (within context of
research projects) to assist / advise / provide quality assurance for projects
The Corporate Portfolio Management Office Design
(Leverett and Braithwaite 2011)

Portfolio
Management
& Gateway
Approval
Project Stakeholder &
Management Communic
Capability - ations
Management

CPMO
Reporting & Project &
Benefits Programme
Tracking Standards
Programme
and Project
Assurance
Advantages of New Approach

 Accountability
 Reduce waste
 Process to monitor / control
 Organisational value
 Staff development
 External credit
THE PROJECT TEAM
Definition of a team
 “Collectives who exist to perform organisationally relevant tasks, share one or
more common goals, interact socially, exhibit task interdependencies, maintain
and manage boundaries, and are embedded in an organisational context that
sets boundaries, constrains the team and influences exchanges with other units
in the broader entity” (Mathieu et al. (2008) p.411)

 In some ways teamwork and leadership are the same in all situations where
people are involved (APM, 2018: 35)

 …a group of people thrown together to form a project team is unlikely to work

together well from the outset (APM, 2018: 37)
Complexity of team working on projects

 Novelty of projects – learning curve issues

 Crossing organisational boundaries – functions (with own ways of doing
things) – hierarchy (chain of command)
 Global teams – time zone, e-correspondence, cultural expectations
 Temporary working relationships – emotional investment,
accommodating individual ‘ways of working’
Tuckman’s
stages of team Forming
formation
(1965)
Storming

Norming

Performing

Adjourning
(mourning)
Project Life Cycle
Team Performance Issues
 Lack of clarity about:
 Team objectives, goals and target dates
 Team structure, authority and responsibility
 Balance of various functional roles
 Break down of the overall work (WBS)
 Individual targets, commitment and motivation

 Poor team management

 Inadequate leadership & poor communication
Key team activities
Advising - gathering & reporting info.
Innovating - creating ideas
Promoting - exploring & presenting opportunites.
Developing - assessing & testing applicability of new approaches
Organising - establishing & implementing ways of making things
work
Producing - concluding & delivering outputs
Inspecting - controlling & auditing the working of systems
Maintaining - upholding & safeguarding standards & processes
 Belbin Team Roles –

Click to Watch:
What’s it all About?
https://youtu.be/eFsA4wUf3I0

What’s a Team Role?

https://youtu.be/9M0Al3Oi0-8

(CMI, 2018) 29
Virtual teams - definition
• Virtual teams enable people separated geographically to work together to
achieve common goals through the use of technology.

Challenges:

• Lack of social dimension to work – very task focused

• Potential misunderstandings; poorer communication – no body language
• Difficult to build cohesion and trust within virtual teams; not easy to go
through usual processes of group formation – forming/norming etc.
• Harder for leader to exert influence (can be a benefit!)
• Manage diversity e.g. cultural
• Organisational culture & context must be supportive
Factors which affect team success

 Trust:
 Antecedent factors
 Contextual factors
 Relational factors

 Complexity of project structure (e.g. Inter-organisational projects)

 Location of project team (e.g. Virtual teams)
 Membership of team (personality clashes, continuity of membership)
Team working

 For projects to succeed do team members need to get on with one

another at a personal and professional level?

 What factors may influence how well team members collaborate and
cooperate?

 What barriers may you face in building an effective team?

Leadership

• What does leadership mean for you?

• What does leadership of project management mean to you?

• Discuss with reference to an example?

The PM’s human resources role on projects

 Facilitator
 Facilitator v. supervisor
 Communicator
 Senior management, project team, client, other stakeholders
 Virtual Projects
 Meeting – chairing, convening
 Building structure and culture to suit the task
 Kotter’s comparison of management and
leadership
Transactional Leadership (Management) Transformational Leadership (Leadership )compariosn

Creating Agenda Plans and budgets. Establishes directions.

Develops plan - a detailed map of how to Vision of the future.
achieve results. Develops strategies of change to achieve goals.
Allocates resources.

Developing HR Organising and staffing. Aligning people.

Which individual best fits each job and what Communicates vison and strategy.
part of the plan fits each individual. Influences creation of teams which accept
Develops policies procedures and monitoring. validity of goals.

Execution Controlling and problem solving. Motivating and inspiring.

Monitoring results and identifying deviations Satisfying basic human needs for achievement;
from the plan and solving ‘problems’ belonging; recognition; self-esteem; a sense of
control

Outcomes Produces a degree of predictability and Produces changes – often to a dramatic degree.
consistency.
Leadership and management style depends on:

 Project definition (nature of the task)

 Organisational culture
 Leader’s position & experience in the organisation
 Leader’s personal background (education, training & personality)
 Example set by leader’s manager
 Team members’ motivations & expectations
 Team location(s)
 Time pressures and performance measures

(Maylor, 2010; Larson and Gray, 2018)

Interpersonal skills that underpin leadership

 Communication skills
 Listening
 Feedback
 Recognition
 Reward
 Encouragement
 Emotional Intelligence / Empathy
Reflection on own leadership skills / abilities

 What is your own approach to working with other people? Do you lead or
follow? If you lead how do you encourage people to follow your ideas? If you
follow how proactive are you when working in a team? How might you improve
your current practice?
Work Breakdown Structures
Contents of a Project Plan…
• Overview or summary
• Project scope
• Technical plan
• Quality and management (Deliverables, Stage Gate)
• Organisation and personnel (Stakeholder, RACI)
• Today - Resources and facilities (WBS)
• Project schedule (Gantt Chart)
• Risk assessment and risk management
 Project
Estimation…

43
Project Estimation

Estimating is a key part of project planning, although not perfect science

Role of the project manager: varies from the collection of estimates from other
people in the preparation of the proposal to the provision of detailed financial cost-
benefit analysis

Important: estimation should not occur in a vacuum – feedback from previous plans,
experiences, estimations should be used

Estimation not just at the beginning of the project but throughout the project (you
will have more certainty and estimates will be more accurate)
Estimating
• There are important reasons for doing this properly, especially for TCQ, but project
stakeholders will understand the inherent uncertainty in all projects (Larson and Gray,
2018: 129 -30)

• However, as Maylor (2010: 135 states, it will involve guesswork and may become
more certain as a project progresses
Who should do estimation?

• Professional estimator – not involved in project – eliminates bias / ‘too cautious’

• People who undertake project – coordinated by project manager – responsibility

= realistic estimates / skills?
The Quality of Estimates
• Underpinned by project requirements

• Communication tool for stakeholders

• Identifies factors (costs) to be controlled (contingency planning)

• Recognises realities of life (productive/unproductive days on project – leave, sick

days, bank holidays)
Estimation (Time, Cost, Resources)
• Top down
• Bottom up
• Top down and bottom up
• Comparative estimating
• Parametric estimating
• Single point estimating
• Three point estimating
• Delphi technique
Estimation (Time, Cost, Resources)
Top down
• Once a good overall estimate has been arrived at for the plan (by whatever
means), it can be subdivided through the levels of the product breakdown
structure.
• By way of example, historically development may be 60% of the total and
testing may be 30%. Subdivide development and testing into their components
and apportion the effort accordingly
Estimation (Time, Cost, Resources)
Bottom up
• Each individual piece of work is estimated on its own merit. These are then summed
together to find the estimated efforts for the various summary level activities and
overall plan
Top down and bottom up
• An overall estimate is calculated for the plan. Individual estimates are then
calculated, or drawn from previous plans, to represent the relative weights of the
tasks.
• The overall estimate is then apportioned across the various summary and detailed-
level tasks using the bottom-up figures as weights
Estimation (Time, Cost, Resources)
Comparative estimating
• Much data exist about the effort required and the duration of particular items of
work. Overtime an organization may build up its own historical data regarding
projects that it has undertaken (previous experience or lessons learned).
• Where such data exists, it may be useful to reference it for similar projects and
apply that data to the estimates

Parametric estimating
• Basing estimates on measured/empirical data where possible (for example,
estimating models exist in the construction industry that predict materials, effort
and duration based on the specification of a building)
Estimation (Time, Cost, Resources)
Single point estimating
• The use of sample data to calculate a single value which is to serve as a ’best guess’
for the duration of an activity

Three point estimating

• Ask appropriately skilled resources for their best-case, most likely and worst-case
estimates. The value that the Project Manager should choose is the weighted
average of these three estimates
Estimation (Time, Cost, Resources)
Delphi technique
• This relies on obtaining group input for ideas and problem solving without requiring
face-to-face participation.
• It uses a series of questionnaires interspersed with information summaries and
feedback from preceding responses to achieve an estimate.
Approaches to Cost Planning
• Materials requirements planning (realm of quantity surveyors in construction)
• Labour requirements includes selection of skills, productivity assumptions (inc.
possible learning curve effect)
• Learning from earlier projects (reference point plus/minus) if applicable
• Target costing (starts with income and profit targets to ascertain maximum cost)
Project Breakdown…

55
Work Breakdown Structures

• Identification of activities or key tasks which must be completed in project

• Classification of activities or key tasks into project phases and key tasks
• Can help project manage determine budget and resource requirements (human
and goods)
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)
• Small project: you can just write a list of “things to do”

• Large activities (the ‘elephant’): breaking down into comprehensible or manageable

units (the ‘slices’) is fundamental.

• WBS is also known as ‘chunking’ or ‘unbundling’. Dividing the project into

‘manageable parts’

• WBS also facilitates financial control

Benefits 1
 All of the work to be done by the project is identified. By reviewing the WBS with
project stakeholders you will be less likely to omit any work needed to deliver the
desired project results.

 Allows for more accurate cost and schedule estimates. Having identified the key
deliverables in the Project Scope Statement, it is possible to estimate costs and
schedule. But because they are at a high-level, they will be "ballpark" estimates.
Breaking down each deliverable into smaller components will enable you to provide
a more accurate and detailed estimate of costs and schedule.

(http://www.project-management-skills.com/work-breakdown-structure.html)
Benefits 2
• WBS provides a basis for resource requests and task assignments. By breaking down
each deliverable into distinct work packages, you will be able to determine the skill
sets needed to complete the work as well as the number of people needed for each
task.

• Finally, a WBS will enable you to provide clear status reports on project progress
since each work package is a measurable unit of work.
Simple Example: Cleaning A Room
Product
Development
Different Types of Breakdown
• Activity breakdown: most project broken down into major groups of activities

• Functional breakdown: project is divided into functional areas. Divisions around areas
of specialisation.

• Physical breakdown: different parts of the product or objects/tools used in the project.
Activity Breakdown Structure (Maylor 2010) for installation of a new computer system

Install new computer

system

Implement new
Define needs Select Suppliers
system
Functional breakdown structure (Maylor 2010) for installation of a new computer system

Install new computer

system

Finance IT Operations
Physical breakdown structure (Maylor 2010) for installation of a new computer system

Install new computer

system

Hardware Software
Example of WBS

(www.wbsforproject.com)
Key Principles / Rules for WBS
• 100% rule – all tasks required
• Start at top – work packages should be subsets of main tasks (logical sequence of
tasks)
• Mutually exclusive – each work package adds up to main task, links to phase,
links to final outcome
• Description of task should focus on outcomes (i.e. what expect to achieve at end
e.g. ‘identify contracts’, ‘put out tender’ etc.
Key Principles / Rules for WBS
• It should be possible to test whether a package is complete
• Appropriate level of detail – so team members understand task – at lowest level
should enable individual team member to understand their role and
requirements
• Appropriate coding scheme – link to Gantt chart
• Can be shown as a tree diagram, or hierarchical list
 Group Work - Work Breakdown Structure G
(exclude budget and time breakdown)
Stage 1 - Identify key tasks for organising a DMU graduation ball
• Graduation ball for 100 postgraduate students plus guests
• Dinner Dance
• ‘Black tie’ event
• Ticketed event
• Must meet health and safety requirements
• £500 initial budget (reliance on ticket sales)

Stage 2 - Work breakdown structure

• Design a WBS for the graduation ball
Further Reading - Teaching

• Handy, C. https://www.provenmodels.com/8/gods-of-management/charles-b.-
handy/ Accessed: 10.10.19
• Maylor, H (2010) Project Management 4th Edition. Pearson: London.
• APM (2018) Starting Out in Project Management; 3rd edition. APM: Princes
Risborough.
• Mathieu et al. (2008) Team Effectiveness 1997-2007: A Review of Recent
Advancements and a Glimpse Into the Future. Journal of Management 34 (3)
401-476
• Larson, E. and Gray, C. (2017) Project Management: The Managerial Process -
Seventh edition. McGraw-Hill: London.