Information Systems Project Management—David Olson

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Chapter 2: Human Aspects

IS project work environments

Common project team problems
Communication
Differences: Functional & Project

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Cooperation

• IS projects bring diverse people together

– Working with computers creates a machine
focus in some
– Working with people creates a different
mindset
– IS project managers need to make both work
together

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IS Project Features

• Very valuable
• Highly diverse
– Web sites
– Transactional processing
– Decision support systems
– Enterprise resource planning systems

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Waterfall Development Model

Stage Personnel
Feasibility analysis Systems analysts, users, finance
Software requirements Systems analysts, users
Product design Systems analysts
Detailed design Systems analysts
Coding Programmers, Testers
Integration Systems analysts, Programmers, Testers,
System administrators
Implementation System administrators, Testers, users
Operation & Maintenance Maintenance

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IS Group Conflict

• Conflict inherent in
– Human organizations
– information systems
• Lack of trust & understanding
• Hostility
• Frustration
• Barki & Hartwick [2001]
• Disagreement
• Interference
• Negative emotion

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IS Project Characteristics & Conflict

Barki & Hartwick [2001]

Individual Team Project Organization

Personality Size Time Culture

pressure
Background Heterogeneity Resources Form

Role & status Leadership Success

Individual Participation Top support

goals
History

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Individual Characteristics

• Personality
– Technical people tend to dominate IS projects
– Users need to participate as well
• Background
– Different education, experience
• Organizational Role & Status
– Hierarchical power won’t match expertise
• Individual Needs & Goals

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Team Characteristics

• Team size
– Larger tends to have more conflict
• Team heterogeneity
– More diverse tends to have more conflict
• Team Leadership
• Participation
• History

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Project Characteristics

• Time pressure inherent in most IS projects

– People react differently
• Resource constraints
– Often have to work with what’s available
• Success criteria
– Expectations
• Top management support

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Organizational Characteristics

• Organizational culture
• Form of organization
– Many project organizations use Matrix
• Creates high pressure, highly dynamic environment

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Conflict & Performance

• Better to avoid interpersonal conflict

– High conflict in some high performing groups
• Need to be able to reach closure
– Low performing groups often had less conflict until the
end
• Encourage
– Open discussion
– High levels of personal respect
– Cohesive & supportive team leadership

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Organizational Forces Impeding IS

Success Ward [1995]
1. Project scope & objectives rarely communicated
to project team
2. Business rationale for project rarely
disseminated
3. Project budgets inaccurate (or skipped)
4. Lack of project support
5. Project control contested or not firmly
established
6. Rules changed during project execution

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Project Communication

• Communications barriers natural

– Within or across organizations
• In traditional organizations, people cope
– In Projects, don’t know ropes
• (projects are new)

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Customer Relationship Management

Marks & Frolick [2001]

• Popular advanced information technology

• Data mine large sets of data
– Find details of what each customer wants
– Customer segmentation
– Cross-selling
• Very expensive
– Return can be very high

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CRM Project
• Implementation of data warehouse
– Needed to store large amount of data
– Monitor value of each customer
– Cross-selling opportunities
• Hired consultant to help implement
– Needed to merge many brand files
• Problems
– Defining database fields
– Lack of cooperation across brands
– No influential project champion
– Consultant didn’t understand organization
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CRM Project cont.

• Initial project failed

• Second attempt
– More focused goals established
– New project leadership
– Consultants let go
– Less functionality, more controllable
• 2nd effort successful, project profitable

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Project Managers

• Get work done through outsiders

– Diverse people on project team
• Different skill sets
• From different organizations
• Projects are temporary
– Matrix common
• Dual lines of authority
• Requires ability to convince
• Generalist rather than specialist

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Comparison

Functional manager Project manager

Clear authority; quasi- Low authority; temporary;

permanent; can direct must convince
Established organization Developing organization

Long-term relationships Short-term relationships

Small set of skills managed Diverse set of skills managed

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Summary

• Information systems projects very valuable

• Many difficulties in managing personnel
– New activities
– Diverse people
– Dynamic environment
– Pressure (time, budget)
• IS Project Managers need special abilities
– Get things done without authority

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