Management Theory and Projects (RECO 7074) Introduction 2019
Management Theory and Projects (RECO 7074) Introduction 2019
Management Theory and Projects (RECO 7074) Introduction 2019
Introduction to Management
Theory and Projects (RECO 7074)
Roine Leiringer
Today
• Some boring admin
• Introduction of course self-study module
• Introduction of project case study
• Evolution of management theory
• Fundamentals of construction
First of all
WELCOME!
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Course philosophy
Important!
• This is ‘management theory’!
• Not algebra, physics, chemistry…
• The course is not prescriptive, nor is it normative.
– This is not vocational training…
• The aim is to provide an introduction to different
ways of thinking, not to tell you what to think!
– i.e. provide the origins of and fundamentals behind
practice, rather than to tell you how to undertake
such practice.
– As such it serves as a foundation for other courses.
RECO 7074
• 7 lectures
• 1 student presentation session
• Group work (case study)
• Project management fundamentals self-study
modules
• Exam
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Lectures
Course material
• 2 recommended books (sections
corresponding to lecture material).
• Papers and other learning materials made
available on the moodle page.
• Reading directions will be provided
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Project work
• Norwegian Technologies case study
– incorporates all the key components of the course.
• Will be used to discuss issues in class each week.
• Groups to be formed before next class (Moodle).
– Groups of five.
• Half-time submission in week 4 (1-2 pages).
– Submit no later than 08.00 on 30 September (in order for me to able
to read and comment on all of them)
• Presentation on 11 November
– 12 minutes maximum
• Report
– No set word limit. Use your own judgement. 5000 is probably not
enough and 15000 is too much...
– Turnitin!
• Adopt an ’Early Warning Signs’ approach to project governance
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Interim feedback
• There is a halftime feedback questionnaire for all
courses, which you should make good use of.
BUT:
Questions
Breaks?
Norwegian Technologies
• The case incorporates aspects of project organising,
management of projects and project management.
What immediate problems might the company be facing by having both a military and non-
military production?
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Introduction
to
Management Theory
What is theory?
• In social science, a way of looking at a field that is intended to have
explanatory and/or predictive implications.
– Simplifications
– Relationships between ‘factors/variables’
– Constructs
– Assumptions
• Rational man, structure/agency etc.
Learning Objectives:
• To understand the way in which management
thought has evolved in the West since 1900.
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Classical School
Classical school
• Taylor: Scientific Management
– Emphasis on obtaining increased productivity
from individual workers through the technical
structuring of the work organisation and the
provision of monetary incentives as a
motivator for higher output.
– Each job broken down into component parts,
each part timed and the parts rearranged into
the most efficient way of working.
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Classical school
• Scientific management continued…
• Workers should be controlled not only by giving
orders and maintenance of discipline, but also by
removing from them any decisions about the
manner in which their work was to be carried out.
Classical School
Henri Fayol:
- We must also train the managers!
•5 Functions of Management
- 14 Principles of Management
5 Functions of Management
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14 Principles of Management
14 Principles of Management
Bureaucracy
• Tasks of organisation are allocated as official duties among
the various positions.
• There is an implied clear-cut division of labour and high
level specialisation.
• A hierarchical authority applies to the organisation of
offices and positions.
• Uniformity of decisions and actions through formally
established systems of rules and regulations.
• An impersonal orientation designed to result in rational
judgements by officials in the performance of their duties.
• (Employment is based on technical qualifications and
constitutes a ‘lifelong’ career.)
(Mullins, 1996)
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Classical School
Critique
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Rose 1988
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Douglas McGregor
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Critique
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Systems School
Classical school emphasised technical requirements of the
organisations and its needs – ‘organisations without people’
Systems School
‘If the structure [of an organisation] is its skeleton, the jobs,
perhaps, its muscles, the people its blood and guts and its
physical perspectives its flesh, then there still remains the
nervous system, the respiratory system, the circulation
system, the digestive system, etc. As with the body, the
systems of an organisation overlap and interlink the parts, the
structure and its members. They are of a different logical order
from the structure or the components pieces, for they are
defined by their purpose, and are concerned with flows or
processes through the structure. They are in fact ‘systems’ - it
remains the best, if the vaguest, word meaning at its broadest
only an interdependent set of elements.’
Handy (1985)
Systems School
‘If the structure [of an organisation] is its skeleton, the jobs,
perhaps, its muscles, the people its blood and guts and its
physical perspectives its flesh, then there still remains the
nervous system, the respiratory system, the circulation
system, the digestive system, etc. As with the body, the
systems of an organisation overlap and interlink the parts, the
structure and its members. They are of a different logical order
from the structure or the components pieces, for they are
defined by their purpose, and are concerned with flows or
processes through the structure. They are in fact ‘systems’ - it
remains the best, if the vaguest, word meaning at its broadest
only an interdependent set of elements.’
Handy (1985)
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Systems School
Critique
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Contingency School
• Reappraisal of the role of management
theories.
• Each theory or school of thought can no longer
be viewed as an independent approach.
• Rather than searching for the one best way to
organise under all conditions. Structure of
organisation (and success) is contingent upon
the nature of the tasks with which it is designed
to deal and the nature of environmental
influences.
Mechanistic Organic
Organisation Organisation
Structure Rigid Flexible
Mechanistic Organic
Organisation Organisation
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Contingency School
‘Contingency theory suggests that “organisational
variables are in a complex inter-relationship with one
another and with conditions in the environment”, and that
environmental contingencies act as constraints and
opportunities and influence the organisation’s internal
structures and processes.’
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Fundamentals of construction
Learning objective(s)
• To fully appreciate the practices, processes,
techniques, technologies, theories and thinking
that that will be presented in this course we first
need to appreciate the fundamentals of
construction and the construction industry.
– The nature of the product/service
– The nature of process
– The nature of the industry
– The project
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A never ending stream of reports (at least one every 3 to 5 years in most developed
countries)
• The criticism:
– The construction industry is under-performing
– Costs are too high and often escalate
– Delivery is slow and frequently delayed
– Working practices are unsafe
– Too conservative; innovation is very low
• The reasons given:
– highly fragmented delivery structure
– ’lowest cost agendas’
– Conservative ’culture’
• The solutions offered:
– Hardly ever have any real impact on practice
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Construction is a problem of
information
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Construction is local
• Historically true, but somewhat changing…
– Materials
– Labour
– Site specific (more about this later)
– (local laws, regulations, norms, codes etc.)
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• Economic cycles
• Investment cycles
• Geographically dispersed
• (Competitive) Tendering
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Why so conservative?
• Norms, standards, codes, regulations, laws…
• Institutionalised practices
• No common platform…
• Cash flow business
• Learning (explore/exploit)
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Finally
• There are two sides to the coin!
– Most of the core structural reasons behind the
criticism is also what makes construction work so
well.
Coming classes
• Individual level
• Organisational level
• Focus is on the project based organisation and
project organising
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