Case Study - the Blue Spider Project
Case Study – The Blue Spider Project
1. Discuss the project management organization on the project. Strengths? Weaknessess? Recommendations. Parks Corporation used a matrix project management organization on the Blue Spider Project. It was a multi-disciplinary team where the members came from different functional units such as Research and Development, Engineering, Manufacturing, Quality Control, Purchasing, and Finance. Gary Anderson, the Project Manager, was responsible for the project but his responsibility for performance of the individual phases of the work to be accomplished on the project remained with the functional managers. Anderson assigned, monitored, and coordinated work among the project team. But, the functional managers had the last say on would be involved in deciding who would work on the project team and remained responsible for long-term administrative issues. All the people working on the Blue Spider Project had two bosses and if they were working on more than one project they could have had even more. If all the key players involved with the Blue Spider Project had understood the distinction between what and how, the conflicts between Anderson and the functional managers would have been greatly reduced. Success of the Blue Spider Project depended on the ability of Anderson and the willingness of the functional managers to cooperate. But this did not occur very often if at all. Personnel working on the project reported to their functional managers who had objectives that sometimes did not coincide with Anderson’s objectives on the Blue Spider Project. There was also little or no understanding of the relationships between the different functional organizations and this created communication problems between Anderson and the other team members, as well as the other functional managers. The team’s ability to react quickly was hampered by the poor communication and a lack of priority control over facilities and other projects that were being
1. Discuss the project management organization on the project. Strengths? Weaknessess? Recommendations. Parks Corporation used a matrix project management organization on the Blue Spider Project. It was a multi-disciplinary team where the members came from different functional units such as Research and Development, Engineering, Manufacturing, Quality Control, Purchasing, and Finance. Gary Anderson, the Project Manager, was responsible for the project but his responsibility for performance of the individual phases of the work to be accomplished on the project remained with the functional managers. Anderson assigned, monitored, and coordinated work among the project team. But, the functional managers had the last say on would be involved in deciding who would work on the project team and remained responsible for long-term administrative issues. All the people working on the Blue Spider Project had two bosses and if they were working on more than one project they could have had even more. If all the key players involved with the Blue Spider Project had understood the distinction between what and how, the conflicts between Anderson and the functional managers would have been greatly reduced. Success of the Blue Spider Project depended on the ability of Anderson and the willingness of the functional managers to cooperate. But this did not occur very often if at all. Personnel working on the project reported to their functional managers who had objectives that sometimes did not coincide with Anderson’s objectives on the Blue Spider Project. There was also little or no understanding of the relationships between the different functional organizations and this created communication problems between Anderson and the other team members, as well as the other functional managers. The team’s ability to react quickly was hampered by the poor communication and a lack of priority control over facilities and other projects that were being