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PGDip in Project Management

Module 1: Managing Projects
Individual Academic Essay
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Due date: 08 April 2019

Declaration:

I hereby declare that this is my own and original work, and I have never
submitted it as a whole or in part, to any other institution for purposes of earning
a qualification.

Siboniso M Zungu
Name:
22158820
Student number:
07 April 2019
Date:
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page

1. INTRODUCTION 5

2. MAIN BODY 6

2.1 Literature review 6

2.2 Application 8

3. CONCLUSION 8

4. REFERENCES 10
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LIST OF TABLES

Table Page

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure Page
WSS High Level Structure 6

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
COU CITY OF UMHLATHUZE
WDM WATER DEMAND MANAGEMENT
DMM DEPUTY MUNICIPAL MANAGER
HOS HEAD OF SECTION
MM MUNICIPAL MANAGER
DWS DEPARTMENT OF WATER AND

SANITATION
WSA WATER SERVICES AUTHORITY
IS INFRASTRUCTURE SERVICES
PMU PROJECT MANAGEMENT UNIT
IDP INTERGRATED DEVELOPMENT

PLAN
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DISADVANTAGES OF A FUNCTIONAL STRUCTURE IN A

PROJECT ENVIRONMENT

1. INTRODUCTION

The way an organization is structured influences how one can manage and run
projects. In project organizational structures, the structure used influences how
much authority a project manager has to do their work. There are three common
organizational structures, and project managers work in all of them: functional,
project, and matrix.
In a functional organization structure, the project manager and all the resources
work under one company division and usually the functional manager will have
more authority than the project manager will.

My chosen topic will focus on the department I work for, in the City of uMhlathuze
(CoU) which is the Water and Sanitation Services (WSS) department where I head
the Water Demand Management (WDM) section.

For the purpose of this essay the focus will be on the WDM section which is
responsible for managing the municipality’s water resources. It acts as link
between municipality and the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS). CoU is
a B1 category municipality and holds a status of being the Water Services
Authority (WSA); meaning it is a requirement by law that it supplies the whole
community of umhlathuze with water.

CoU follows the functional structure and as part of this essay, the focus will be on
disdvantages of utilizing such form of structure.
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2. MAIN BODY

2.1 Literature review

Below is the high-level structure of WSS section

Figure 11: WSS High Level Structure

The disadvantages that the WSS section encounters as a functional structure are:
 Problem in coordination and or lack of focus 2 – WDM has a project in
Esikhaleni Township named ‘Pressure Management Control’ where the
WDM section is required to control the water pressure in the pipes
automatically without adjusting the isolation valves. The challenges that
WDM faces are:

1 City of uMhlathuze, IDP 2017/18, Financial Year.

2 LarsonE.W, &Gray C.F. Seventh edition. Project Management: The Managerail Process.
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o Lack of support from the maintenance department. The maintenance

department fails to distribute their resources accordingly; they
prioritise their own internal works and do not share resources
timeously with WDM. This has led to over a week of lost time whilst
the service provider is charging WDM section.
o The maintenance department does not honor meetings set to resolve
differences, making it more difficult to work together towards one
common goal of servicing the customers’ needs efficiently.

 Conflicts in departments and lack of ownership3– The WSS department

consist of two sections, the WDM section and the Infrastructure
Maintenance section. Whenever there is a new project, WDM will
continuously engage with the maintenance section because at the end of
project they will need to take over for maintenance purposes. The
maintenance team however never wants to take full accountability of any
breakdowns that occur after the handover. Every challenge/breakdown that
occurs on site, the maintainance team struggles to assist and always refer
the matter back to WDM because to them the project belongs to WDM
although it is their infrastructure but they simple cannot assist without
shifting the blame to another section.

 Ignorance of organizational objectives4 –The main driver in the municipal

environment is Service Delivery and each department plays a role in
achieving the municipal’s objectives/goals.
The departments therefore need to work together in ensuring that the name
of the organisation is rated high by delivering the services on time and
within the allocated budget. The challenge within the organization is that it
lacks the drive to push beyond boundaries in achieving the set goals.
Decision-making is not simple as there are many processes that needs to
be followed when a project manager is not satisfied with the progress on
site.

3 LarsonE.W, &Gray C.F. Seventh edition. Project Management: The Managerail Process.
4 LarsonE.W, &Gray C.F. Seventh edition. Project Management: The Managerail Process.
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 Slow and poor integration 5 – Within the CoU organization; a Project

Steering Committee (PSC) is formed at the conceptual phase of a project.
This committee incorporates all the departments within WSS. Normally the
first meeting is a success but as the project continues, the members of the
committee are not there to assist in decision making thus leaving the whole
responsibility to the concerned section project manager who takes
accountabily of all the issues raised during the handover process/phase.

2.2 Application

A functional structure also has benetifs that can assist the organization to fulfil its
mandate of deleveiring projects on time and within budget by following the basic
principles of project management. The functional structure utilized positively can
ensure that projects are a success based on the following summary of its
advantages6:
 It represents no change
 It has flexibility
 It has in-depth expertise and,
 Easy post – project transition
Within CoU structure, the culture is set up such that each manager takes charge of
the project from inception to completion. The above-mentioned advantages have
functioned but close monitoring and control is required to ensure the success.
With the minimum exposure that I have to proper policies and procedures of
managing projects, I strongly believe that CoU still needs to work hard on changing
their behavior as an organization as well as their culture in the management of
projects.

3. CONCLUSION

In closing, a functional structure in a project environment has its pros and cons.
This type of structure requires a strong character project manager, for a project to

5 LarsonE.W, &Gray C.F. Seventh edition. Project Management: The Managerail Process.
6 LarsonE.W, &Gray C.F. Seventh edition. Project Management: The Managerail Process.
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be delivered successfully because a functional manager always has an upper

hand at decision-making.
At CoU this organizational structure is not practiced in a proper manner hence;
most projects managed by the WDM section are hardly completed on time.

The municipality finds itself working against ensuring that it meets expenditure
rather than following the proper project management principles. Due to lack of
resources to execute the projects, the municipality ends up relying on the
information it receives from the service providers and when there are delays, there
is not much accountability within the organization because the Project Manager is
managing more projects than they can handle. This requires urgent attention
especially on the maintenance section to improve service delivery.
There is an opportunity for improvement within the departments and CoU as an
organization but all lies with the senior management to be willing to implement
change.

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4. REFERENCES

 Larson, E.W, & Gray, C.F. Seventh Edition. Project Management: The
Managerial Process. New York, NY10121. McGraw-Hill Education.
 Burke, R. 2010. Fundamentals of Project Management-Tools and
Techniques. Burke Publishers.
 City of uMhlathuze, Integrated Development Plan, 2017/18 Financial Year.
 You Tube, www.aims.education.