Organization Strategy and Project Selection
Organization Strategy and Project Selection
Organization Strategy and Project Selection
Organization Strategy
and Project Selection
Why Project Managers Need to Understand
the Strategic Management Process?
• Strategic Management
– Provides the theme and focus of the future
direction for the firm.
• Responding to changes in the external environment
—environmental scanning
• Allocating scarce resources of the firm to improve
its competitive position—internal responses to new
action programs
– Requires strong links among mission, goals,
objectives, strategy, and implementation.
Strategic Management Process cont’d.
T Time related
Project Portfolio Management Problems
• The Implementation Gap
– The lack of understanding and consensus on
strategy among top management and middle-level
(functional) managers who independently
implement the strategy.
• Organization Politics
– Project selection is based on the persuasiveness
and power of people advocating the projects.
• Resource Conflicts and Multitasking
– The multiproject environment creates
interdependency relationships of shared resources
which results in the starting, stopping, and
restarting projects.
Benefits of Project Portfolio Management
• Builds discipline into project selection process.
• Links project selection to strategic metrics.
• Prioritizes project proposals across a common
set of criteria, rather than on politics or emotion.
• Allocates resources to projects that align with
strategic direction.
• Balances risk across all projects.
• Justifies killing projects that do not support
organization strategy.
• Improves communication and supports
agreement on project goals.
Portfolio of Projects by Type
A Portfolio Management
System
• Selection Criteria
– Financial: payback, net present value (NPV),
internal rate of return (IRR)
– Non-financial: projects of strategic importance
to the firm.
• Multi-Weighted Scoring Models
– Use several weighted selection criteria to
evaluate project proposals.
Financial Models
• The Payback Model
– Measures the time it will take to recover the
project investment.
– Shorter paybacks are more desirable.
– Emphasizes cash flows, a key factor in
business.
– Limitations of payback:
• Ignores the time value of money.
• Assumes cash inflows for the investment period
(and not beyond).
• Does not consider profitability.
Financial Models (cont’d)
• The Net Present Value (NPV) model
– Uses management’s minimum desired rate-of-return (discount
rate) to compute the present value of all net cash inflows.
• Positive NPV: the project meets the minimum desired rate of return
and is eligible for further consideration.
• Negative NPV: project is rejected.
Net Present Value (NPV) and Internal Rate of
Return (IRR):
Example Comparing Two Projects
Project Screening Matrix
Applying a Selection Model
• Project Classification
– Deciding how well a strategic or operations
project fits the organization’s strategy.
• Selecting a Model
– Applying a weighted scoring model to bring
projects to closer with the organization’s strategic
goals.
• Reduces the number of wasteful projects
• Helps identify proper goals for projects
• Helps everyone involved understand how and why a
project is selected
Project Proposals
• Sources and Solicitation of Project Proposals
– Within the organization
– Request for proposal (RFP) from external
sources (contractors and vendors)
• Ranking Proposals and Selection of Projects
– Prioritizing requires discipline, accountability,
responsibility, constraints, reduced flexibility, and
loss of power.
• Managing the Portfolio
– Senior management input
– The priority team (project office) responsibilities
Major
Project
Proposal
Risk
Analysis
Managing the Portfolio
• Senior Management Input
– Provide guidance in selecting criteria that are
aligned with the organization’s goals
– Decide how to balance available resources
among current projects
• The Priority Team Responsibilities
– Publish the priority of every project
– Ensure that the project selection process is
open and free of power politics.
– Reassess the organization’s goals and priorities
– Evaluate the progress of current projects
Project
Screening
Process
Priority
Analysi
s
Project Portfolio Matrix
Project Portfolio Matrix Dimensions
• Bread-and-butter projects
– Involve evolutionary improvements to current products
and services.
• Pearls
– Represent revolutionary commercial advances using
proven technical advances.
• Oysters
– Involve technological breakthroughs with high
commercial payoffs.
• White elephants
– Projects that at one time showed promise but are no
longer viable.