Managing Organisations,

Innovation and Sustainability

Lecture 9: Project-Based Organisations

Dr Ping-Jen Kao
Lecturer in Information Systems
 Module Overview
Understanding Leveraging Managing
Review and
Knowledge and ICT-driven Innovation Organisations
Consolidation
Innovation and Sustainability Effectively

Week 3
Knowledge-intensive
Organisation

Week 4
Week 8
ICT-driven
Knowledge Creation
Organisational
in Teams
Week 1 Change
Introduction
Week 5 Week 9 Week 11
DT with AI, Robotics Project-based Revision, Q&A and
Week 2 and IoT Organisations Feedback
Knowledge and
Innovation Week 10
Week 6 HR and Knowledge
Revision Management
Systems

Week 7
DT and Sustainability
Assessment!
Module Survey
Teams and Projects

What are the differences

between a Team and a
Project?
 Teams versus Projects

• Key features of a team (Proehl)

• Shared identity – all members perceive themselves as part of a unit
• Common goal – all members are working towards a common goal
• Interdependence – all members have to contribute towards the task
in some way
• Personal interaction – members communicate and share
information with each other
• Mutual influence – each member influences every other member

• These features are not generally all present in a

project
 Projects

• Even though we might talk about project teams the reality is that a
project in an organisational context often does not have a fixed
membership and the work undertaken in a project is often very
temporary, fluid, interrupted and distributed

• The tight deadlines that are often imposed on projects can mean that
creativity is curtailed at the expense of expediency

• Projects can stimulate knowledge creation and be fertile sites for

learning, precisely because they bring together individuals from
different backgrounds to work collectively to achieve some kind of
common objective, with the objective typically having something to do
with creating something new
 Projects & Project Management

• Projects focus on achieving a specific goal (and will then disband)

• Project management is the discipline of planning, organising, motivating

and controlling resources to achieve specific goals and meet specific
criteria
• Triple aim: Scope, Cost, Time

• Planning and control involve specialised techniques

• For example using Gantt charts

 Planning a Project

• List of activities that will be needed, time taken to do each activity

• Timing of each activity (relative to the others)

• Interdependencies (Thompson)
• Pooled, Sequential, Reciprocal

• Potential risks and contingency plans

• Preparing your group project:

• List key activities, times and timings, including inter-dependencies
• Create a Gantt chart of each activity
• What are the risks and how can they be mitigated
PIN:
Teams versus Teaming

• Team vs Teaming (Edmonson)

• Teaming describes most
projects that depend on
project management tools and
methods and effective team
leadership
- Technical tools
- Social aspects
Teams versus Teaming

• Technical tools – scoping, structuring

(scaffold not the building), sorting
(prioritising and deciding how to manage
interdependencies)

• Social aspects – emphasising purpose,

psychological safety, embracing failure,
putting conflict to work

• Social aspects often where the challenges

lie!

• Teaming – executing and learning

simultaneously
 Behaviours of Successful Teaming
• Speaking up (not conforming! – Group thinking, Janis)

• Listening intently (not just speaking!)

• Integrating (synthesising to create new possibilities –

brainstorming)

• Experimenting (iterative approach to development)

• Reflecting (crucial to learn from conflict and failure)

• For the team
• For the organisation – lessons learned
Assumed Relationship between Team
& Organisational Learning

Teams Action and Organisational

learning Reflection learning

What are problems with this figure?

 Sharing Learning Across Projects
Organisations have recognised the importance
of cross-project learning
• Maintaining project documentation and
conducting project learning reviews

Sharing learning across projects is often

problematic
• Belief in uniqueness of context
• Standardisation
• Ability to capture and access ‘softer’ lessons
• Project reviews and milestones – often too late
• Lack of awareness that knowledge transfer is
needed
 Absorptive Capacity (AC)

(adapted from Cohen and Levinthal)

AC has been defined as “a firm’s ability to recognise the value of new information,
assimilate it, and apply it to commercial ends”

Degree of AC needed depends on type of project

 Different Ways of Organising Project Teams
(more or less separated and complex)

Single project Multiple projects Multiple projects in

part of programme Distributed project multiple organisations –
Within an organisation
Often temporarily separated
(e.g., theragnostic, Skin)

Here multiple projects run Single endeavour conducted

concurrently at one location from multiple locations, often Complex because it
involving different organisations requires managing
multiple interdependencies
across time and space.
 Project Ecology

Distribution of project(s) across:

• Organisations (actors)
• Space/geography
• Time

A project ecology can vary on this dimension of

complexity, from low to high
 Complex Project Context

Project Low project interactivity High project interactivity

Ecology/ Project
Interactivity
Complex ecology Multiple dispersed Multiple dispersed projects
projects involved but working together
each operating reciprocally on tasks in
independently (pooled or order to integrate
sequential) knowledge

Simple ecology Small number of co-located Small number of co-located

projects each operating projects working together
independently on tasks reciprocally on tasks in
(pooled or sequential) order to integrate
knowledge
 Next Week (Week 10)

• Read Chapter 6 and 7 of the textbook

• Presentation Group 5-8

 Q&A

Dr Ping-Jen Kao
Lecturer in Information Systems
p.kao@sussex.ac.uk