Improving efficiency: time-critical interfacing of project tasks

doi:10.1016/S0263-7863(00)00044-2

International Journal of Project Management

Volume 20, Issue 2, February 2002, Pages 143-153

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0263-7863(00)00044-2 Get rights and content

Abstract

The paper discusses the management of time-critical operations and their dynamic interrelations in project environments. It is well known in theoretical literature that delayed operative tasks generate a cumulative effect, which delays the overall delivery time making efficient time management difficult. However, practising managers seem to be helpless with this phenomenon if judged by the often reported poor performance of project management. To control the use of time, managers tend to plan safety buffers in their operations, which bias the overall planning of projects. The result of all this is uncontrolled and unknown outcome of the whole operation and, even worse, it inherently makes development efforts very difficult to implement, as the true performance of the organization is hidden in the realization of airy plans. Based on case studies in various industrial environments, we propose that project schedules need to be managed by putting special emphasis on the time-use within individual tasks and by ensuring that work proceeds smoothly along the critical chain of tasks. To enable this, high transparency is needed on how time is used in project organizations.

Section snippets

Preamble

A study by the Standish Group scanned more than 8000 projects and compared their anticipated results with the real outcome. According to this study, only 16% of the projects were able to meet the goals set in terms of time, budget and quality [1]. Further on, the project management literature (e.g. [2]) clearly points out that success in project management is often judged according to subjective perceptions:

1.
The Fulmar Oil Field in the North Sea was late, but extremely profitable for the owner,

Research method and data

During 1980s and 1990s time was promoted as the prime performance criterion to assess productivity in manufacturing operations [5]. The time-based management literature [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12] has highlighted the importance of timely and well-concerted operations to achieve faster throughput times resulting in rapid and accurate deliveries. [13] describes how time has become one of the most important sources of competitive advantage in manufacturing industries. He describes the

A reference case from supply chain management in the manufacturing environment

The case paper mill is situated in Scandinavia with main markets in central Europe. Managing the operations was difficult because of biased demand information and the buffering of goods in inventories in each echelon of the supply chain to secure good customer service. Because of the uncertainty and long production cycles the delivery times were lengthy and production batch sizes large. The company initiated a radical change process, the product palette was revised and low-volume products were

Cross-case analysis and the lessons learned

In a sequence of suppliers, retailers and sales offices, each link embeds a certain amount of instability in the operation of the whole chain. When transmitted along the chain, minor distortion creates biased demand information. This in turn creates the so-called flywheel effect [24], [25]. In short, this means that demand distortion causes problems with the production capacity, which implies delivery shortages. This triggers over-ordering, causing some demand amplification, but also indicates

Conclusions and suggestions for further research

The main message of this article is to emphasize the importance of ensuring work to proceed efficiently in the individual tasks and to make tasks interface with related tasks fluently. The obtained results for better time-based performance in project management, sharpen our understanding of the applicability of time-based management in the project business environment. These cases were complemented with one non-project industry case, which showed that an analogy between operations management in

References (25)

A.-P. Hameri
Project management in a long-term and global one-of-a-kind project
International Journal of Project Management
(1997)
J.D. Frame
Establishing project risk assessment teams
P.W.G. Morris et al.
The anatomy of major projects — a study of the reality of project management
(1987)
J.M. Juran
Juran on leadership for quality: an executive handbook
(1989)
Suzaki, K., Work-in-process management: an illustrated guide to productivity improvement. Production and Inventory...
Schmenner RW. The merit of making things fast. Sloan Management Review, 1988:...
G. Stalk et al.
Competing against time
(1990)
R.J. Schonberger
World class manufacturing — the lessons of simplicity applied
(1986)
R.J. Schonberger
Building a chain of customers
(1990)
J.P. Womack et al.
The machine that changed the world
(1991)

The Toyota Production System. Toyota City, Toyota Motor Co., Int. Public Affairs Division, Operations Management...

Womack JP, Jones DT. Lean thinking: banish waste and create wealth in your corporation. New York: Simon & Schuster,...

Cited by (21)

Review of supply chain management within project management
2021, Project Leadership and Society
Citation Excerpt :
Coordination of interfaces among each supply chain participant and between consecutive project tasks contributes to project complexity. The ignorance of such interfaces and lack of time-based management often make a project fail (Hameri and Heikkilä, 2002). Serdarasan (2013) classifies complexity into three types of drivers, which are static, dynamic, and decision-making.
Supply chain management (SCM) adoption in a project-based environment brings substantial benefits but requires careful planning and execution. The current research examines a number of publications that are relevant to both SCM and project management in project management journals. First, we identify the key antecedents of successful SCM implementation in a project-based environment. Then we category these factors into four main areas, namely, IT integration, organizational coordination, risk management, and supply chain resilience and complexity. Third, we explore inter-relationships among these factors through a comprehensive literature review. A broad and enhanced understanding of the conceptual integration of SCM with project management is provided by exploring application areas outside the more common integration domain of the construction industry. This research presents and interprets this integration using a systemigram that visually illustrates a SCM strategy adoption pathway and depicts the complex procedures in an understandable manner.
Measuring and benchmarking managerial efficiency of project execution schedule performance
2016, International Journal of Project Management
Citation Excerpt :
These results implied that understanding of portfolio level issues needs to be considered as part of project managers' capabilities and could not only be a top management concern. Other studies have (i) covered improving time efficiencies at project task levels using case studies and descriptive statistics (Hameri and Heikkilä, 2002); (ii) proposed integrated models to improve construction management efficiencies using literature synthesis and multiple criteria decision making (Schieg, 2009); and (iii) considered managerial efficiency as one of many causal factors to reduce the owner's transaction costs for construction projects using structural equation modeling (Li et al., 2013). However, neither of these studies had measurement and benchmarking of project management efficiency as their central research objective nor used DEA as their preferred modeling technique though DEA has been a popular managerial efficiency measurement technique in other sectors.
Though managerial efficiency is considered to be a key driver for successful execution of projects, not much study is reported to measure and benchmark this efficiency. In this study, a basket of 57 projects is selected and configured as Decision Making Units (DMUs) in a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) procedure which is then integrated with Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Suitable modifications are made in this DEA-PCA engine to factor in the overall and relative performance of DMUs to measure and rank their managerial efficiency. On the basis of combination of the inputs and managerial efficiency scores, DMUs are then classified using alternative methods of clustering into a five category benchmarking model: “excellent”, “good”, “fair”, “unsatisfactory” and “poor”. Distinguishing features of the model and the findings are discussed in representative DMUs that enable practitioners and policy makers to implement the model and objectively institute a multi-sector managerial performance recognition systems.
Development of computer-aided maintenance resources planning (CAMRP): A case of multiple CNC machining centers
2007, Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing
Total productive maintenance (TPM), total maintenance assurance, preventive maintenance, reliability-centered maintenance (RCM), and many other innovative approaches to maintenance problems all aim at enhancing the effectiveness of machines to ultimately improve productivity. Each of these concepts demands a unique decision support system for maintenance resources planning, and implementing each of them requires a radical restructuring of work. Introducing computer-aided maintenance resources planning (CAMRP) system is a major challenge because the maintenance operations environment is usually traditional and unfavorable to change. This paper presents a computer-aided planning system for a maintenance business unit that serves a number of manufacturing facilities, each consisting of a set of high-precision CNC machining centers. The workforce in the maintenance business unit is responsible for preventive as well as corrective maintenance activities of all CNC machines within the different manufacturing sites. The newly developed decision support tool embodies a set of structured heuristics methods for the coordination of tasks among maintenance crews which will help conduct different maintenance activities of manufacturing units in a more synchronized way. Through what-if-analyses, the tool generates well-founded decisions for capacity planning are; synchronizes maintenance activities to predict maintenance start and expected finishing times, thereby leads to lower costs.
Energy Management in Modern Buildings Based on Demand Prediction and Machine Learning—A Review
2024, Energies
Causes of delay in offshore wind turbine construction projects
2023, Production Planning and Control
Project-Based Organizations’ Pursuit of Production Efficiency and Legitimate Power: An Institutional Perspective
2022, Project Management Journal

View all citing articles on Scopus

View full text

Improving efficiency: time-critical interfacing of project tasks

Abstract

Section snippets

Preamble

Research method and data

A reference case from supply chain management in the manufacturing environment

Cross-case analysis and the lessons learned

Conclusions and suggestions for further research

International Journal of Project Management

Establishing project risk assessment teams

The anatomy of major projects — a study of the reality of project management

Juran on leadership for quality: an executive handbook

Competing against time

World class manufacturing — the lessons of simplicity applied

Building a chain of customers

The machine that changed the world