Editorial

Welcome to the eighth issue of the journal. We have gone well past the infant mortality period of academic journals, which is usually three years. For this, we owe our gratitude to our unsung heroes — our reviewers — our special issue editors and authors. I also owe thanks to Daniel Adler, who has started supporting the journal recently and to Dr Gita Sankaran who has helped me with the copyediting and proofreading as a volunteer.

Role and impact of social relationships and networks in a software project team environment – a conceptual framework

The establishment of social relationships between information technology (IT) project team members is a phenomenon all IT professionals are exposed to and, in many cases, involved in. Furthermore, these relationships are used by IT project team members for personal as well as professional purposes. The question is what positive or negative contributions do these kinds of relationships have on the project itself? Past studies have placed little focus on these social relationships and networks, and have failed to take cognisance of their importance in the IT project environment. This paper demonstrates that social relationships and networks in the IT project environment play a significant role in project teams and should be managed in such a way that the team members and the project as a whole can benefit from them. A partial grounded theory (GT) research approach was followed. Interpretive patterns from GT enabled inferences to be drawn about the role and impact of social relationships and networks in IT project teams. The research findings provide practical considerations and highlight potential problem areas. A conceptual framework is proposed to support management in decision making and to give them a better understanding of the complexities involved in such relationships.

Applying system dynamics for outsourcing services in design-build projects

This study analysed a system dynamics model for outsourcing engineering services in a large and complex project organisational structure that is typically associated with design-build (DB) project delivery. A literature review indicated that most of the reviewed papers implied the project engineering resources were totally insourced or the authors were silent regarding any resources that were outsourced. Comprehensive sensitivity analysis of various model variables was performed, which indicates that the quality and productivity of the outsourced resources as well as the initial number of assigned experienced engineers significantly impacted the amount and timing of engineering work completion. Project outcomes were also impacted by varying the number of initial and changed engineering tasks. The decision to insource/outsource engineering work on DB projects may have significant cost and time impacts, which should be considered by decision makers.

Managing human capital to engineer process improvement for team interfaces: a case study Team Interfaces: A Case Research

Process improvements of existing team interfaces in the organisation Zygus Engineering India Pvt Ltd are used in this case study to explore challenges in human resource management of project-based organisations. The findings suggest that both design and interventions in engaging human capital, and their subsequent impact, play a critical role in determining the effectiveness and efficiencies in project team environments.

Workforce issues and their impact on projects: study on the Indian IT and ITeS industry

Today’s information technology (IT) industry is facing challenges from different corners because of globalization, technological changes, market and economic fluctuations and dynamic changes in customer requirements. A new stream of jobs has been emerging from time to time in the IT and IT enabled services (ITeS) industry. People management is gaining more concern when compared to technology management. Issues of recruiting right people with right and special skills, motivating them to improve their productivity continuously and retaining potential and productive people are becoming additional challenges to the success of IT projects by enabling the IT industry achieve steady growth and continue the ongoing projects without any interruptions or constraints. The study focuses on the dynamics of human work force of IT projects and analyses the important issues of managing the manpower and their impact on time, cost and quality of the projects. From the analysis of data collected through surveys in some big IT and ITeS companies in India, it was found that the issue of availability of human resources stood as the most significant issue in addition to showing highest impact on quality, cost and time of the IT projects. In contrast, the issue of employees-oriented programs attributed lowest significance and showing least impact on the three success factors of IT projects when compared with remaining ones.

Work motivation as a determinant of organisational and professional commitment in temporary organisations: theoretical lenses and propositions

The purpose of this paper is to present a theoretical framework to investigate the relationship between work motivation, organisational commitment and professional commitment in temporary organisations. Through a review of theory, we contend that work motivation has two major patterns — internal motivation (which includes intrinsic, need-based and self-deterministic theories), and external motivation (which includes cognitive or process-based theories of motivation) through which it has been investigated. We also hold the nature of employee commitment to be of three types — affective, continuance and normative. This commitment may be towards either the organisation or the profession. A literature review revealed that the characteristics of the temporary organisation — specifically tenure and task — regulate the relationship between work motivation, organisational commitment and professional commitment. Testable propositions are presented

Critical analysis of existing business process reengineering models: towards the development of a comprehensive integrated model

Over the past two decades, business process reengineering (BPR) has been one of the most popular approaches to improving the efficiency and effectiveness of an organisation. However, a review of the relevant literature reveals that available BPR models that have been widely in use have some serious limitations and fail to take into consideration the human factor and change management. The theoretical gap identified in academic research is also reflected in industrial practice. This article analyses existing BPR models in order to set the stage for the development of a comprehensive integrated model to address their theoretical deficiencies. The article will provide an overview of the main issues, limitations and challenges of existing BPR models. The limitations will then be itemised, described and analysed to provide evidence for the need of a more systematic model that would help organisations to successfully carry out BPR initiatives and projects.

Cost–benefit analysis of a staff recreation centre project: build or lease? – A Case Study

This case study aims at comprehensively assessing a decision by XYZ Ltd (name withheld due to confidentiality), New Delhi, on whether to build or to lease a recreation centre for its rank-and-file employees. Based on a cost–benefit analysis, we concluded that the centre should be built since the company would recover its investment within 11 years. Apart from the financial considerations, the recreation centre could be considered a long-term investment in employee morale, as it would lead to a better quality of life for the staff and their families, and is likely to enhance their sense of belonging and improve productivity. To date, what little space there is available for hosting family functions is reserved for the use of the officers, and only officers and their families are invited to most company functions. Thus, the other employees feel neglected by the management. Hiring a community centre external to the organisation for a function would involve spending a lot of money as the company is located in a prime real estate area where the cost of land and rentals is huge, and sometimes even availability is an issue. Most of the staff cannot afford such places and are generally under a lot of stress whenever they have a family function. This, in turn, tends to affect their productivity.

Editorial

Editorial For Vol 4 No 1.

Editorial

Dear Readers Welcome to the sixth issue of the Journal of Project, Program & Portfolio Management. This issue is late for very good reasons. We started out with a call to emerging researchers in project management to submit a paper and offered them guidance as well. We thank all the reviewers who spent more time than they normally would have to provide detailed comments and suggestions to the authors to get the papers into shape. We also achieved one more aim of the journal by being able to publish papers from authors from around the world. Thus we have articles from Poland, Brazil and India and a case study form India as well. The first paper in this issue is by Beata Jalocha, who has recently completed her PhD from Jagellionian University, Poland. She has reflected on the concept of projectification and its impact on public organisations in Poland. Her research concludes that while European Union-funded projects are successfully completed in Poland they are still falling behind in creating the value expected by the communities they were intended to benefit. The second paper from four researchers in Brazil proposes that knowledge management can contribute to project management by helping in project integration and thus contributing to corporate sustainability. The third paper from India by Shah and Janardhanan addresses an important concern that educational institutions offering programs in project management are faced with — how to provide superior student experiences to students both with and without experience to acquire leadership competencies that require hard and soft skills. The case study by Nag, Singh and Tiwary addresses the issue of the contribution of transport capacity as an economic lever by examining a dedicated freight corridor conceived by Indian Railways. Enjoy! Daniel Adler & Shankar Sankaran