Question

Project Trans had been in trouble since the initiation. Crowley, who had been an assistant project manager, was involved with the project from its conception. When the Trans Project was accepted by the company, Crowley was assigned as the project manager. The program schedules started to slip from day one, and expenditures were excessive. Crowley found that the functional managers were charging direct labor time to his project but working on their own pet projects.

When he complained of this, he was told not to meddle in the functional manager’s allocation of resources and budgeted expenditures. After approximately six months, Crowley was requested to make a progress report directly to corporate and division staffs. Crowley took this opportunity to bare his soul. The report substantiated that the project was forecasted to be one complete year behind schedule. Crowley’s staff, as supplied by the line managers, was inadequate to maintain the current pace, let alone make up any time that had already been lost.

The estimated cost at completion at this interval showed a cost overrun of at least 20 percent. This was Crowley’s first opportunity to tell his story to people who were in a position to correct the situation. The result of Crowley’s frank, candid evaluation of the Trans Project was very predictable. Nonbelievers finally saw the light, and line managers realized that they had a role to play in the completion of the project. Most of the problems were now out in the open and could be corrected with adequate staffing and resources. Corporate staff ordered immediate remedial action and staff support to provide Crowley a chance to bail out his program.

The results were not at all what Crowley had expected. He no longer reported to the project office; he now reported directly to the operations manager. Corporate staff’s interest in the project became very intense, requiring a 7:00 a.m. meeting every Monday for complete review of the project status and plans for recovery. Crowley found himself spending more time preparing paperwork, reports, and projections for his Monday morning meetings than he did administering the Trans Project. The main concern of corporate was to get the project back on schedule. Crowley spent many hours preparing the recovery plan and establishing manpower requirements to bring the program back onto the original schedule.

Group staff, in order to closely track the progress of the Trans Project, assigned an assistant program manager. The assistant program manager determined that a sure cure for the Trans Project would be to computerize the various problems and track the progress through a very complex computer program. Corporate provided Crowley with 12 additional staff members to work on the computer program. In the meantime, nothing changed. The functional managers still did not provide adequate staff for recovery, as they assumed that the additional manpower Crowley had received from corporate would accomplish that task.

After approximately $50,000 was spent on the computer program to track the problems, it was found that the computer could not handle the program objectives. Crowley discussed this problem with a computer supplier and found that $15,000 more was required for programming and additional storage capacity. It would take two months for installation of the additional storage capacity and completion of the programming. At this point, the decision was made to abandon the computer program.

Crowley was now a year and a half into the program with no prototype units completed. The program was still nine months behind schedule with the overrun projected at 40 percent of budget. The customer had been receiving reports on a timely basis and was well aware that the Trans Project was behind schedule. Crowley had spent a great deal of time with the customer explaining the problems and the plan for recovery.

Another problem that Crowley had to contend with was that the vendors who were supplying components for the project were also running behind schedule. One Sunday morning, while Crowley was in his office putting together a report for the client, a corporate vice president came in. “Crowley,” he said, “in any project I look at the top sheet of paper, and the man whose name appears at the top of the sheet is the one I hold responsible. For this project, your name appears at the top of the sheet. If you cannot bail this thing out, you are in serious trouble in this corporation.” Crowley did not know which way to turn or what to say. He had no control over the functional managers who were creating the problems, but he was the person who was being held responsible.

After another three months, the customer, becoming impatient, realized that the Trans Project was in serious trouble and requested that the division general manager and his entire staff visit the customer’s plant to give a progress report within a week. The division general manager called Crowley into his office and said, “Crowley, go visit our customer. Take three or four functional line people with you and try to placate him with whatever you feel is necessary.” Crowley and four functional line people visited the customer and gave a four-and-a-half-hour presentation defining the problems and the progress to that point.

The customer was very polite and even commented that it was an excellent presentation, but the content was totally unacceptable. The program was still six to eight months late, and the customer demanded progress reports on a weekly basis. The customer made arrangements to assign a representative in Crowley’s department to be on-site at the project on a daily basis and to interface with Crowley and his staff as required. After this turn of events, the program became very hectic. The customer representative demanded constant updates and problem identification and then became involved in attempting to solve these problems. This involvement created many changes in the program and the product in order to eliminate some of the problems.

Crowley had trouble with the customer and did not agree with the changes in the program. He expressed his disagreement vocally when, in many cases, the customer felt the changes were at no cost. This caused a deterioration of the relationship between client and producer. One morning Crowley was called into the division general manager’s office and introduced to Mr. Bartley. Crowley was told to turn over the reins of the Trans Project to Bartley immediately. “Crowley, you will be temporarily reassigned to some other division within the corporation. I suggest you start looking outside the company for another job.” Crowley looked at Bartley and asked, “Who did this? Who shot me down?” Bartley was program manager on the Trans Project for approximately six months, after which, by mutual agreement, he was replaced by a third project manager. The customer reassigned his local program manager to another project. With the new team, the Trans Project was finally completed one year behind schedule and at a 40 percent cost overrun.

QUESTION 1

What are the major problems of The Trans Project? Critically discuss your answers based on the case study.

Answer 1

Answer:

Major problems associated with the Trans project are as follows:

1. The program schedules of the project started to slip from day one, and expenditures on the project execution were excessive. Project was running one year behind the schedule. The staffs allocated by the line manager were inadequate and project overrun cost was estimated to be 20% more than the expected project cost.

2. Crowley, a project manager for Trans project, found that the functional managers were charging direct labour time to his project but working on their own pet projects. When he complained of this, he was told not to interfere in the functional manager’s allocation of resources and budgeted expenditures.

3. In order to bring the project back on schedule, corporate staff used to conduct meeting at 7 Am on every Monday morning. Crowley had to spend more time in preparing paperwork, reports, and projections for his Monday morning meetings rather than administering the Trans Project.

4. Group staff, in order to closely track the progress of the Trans Project, assigned an assistant program manager. The assistant program manager determined that a sure cure for the Trans Project would be to computerize the various problems and track the progress through a very complex computer program. Corporate provided Crowley with 12 additional staff members to work on the computer program. In the meantime, nothing changed. The functional managers still did not provide adequate staff for recovery, as they assumed that the additional manpower Crowley had received from corporate would accomplish that task.

5. After approximately $50,000 was spent on the computer program to track the problems, it was found that the computer could not handle the program objectives. Crowley discussed this problem with a computer supplier and found that $15,000 more was required for programming and additional storage capacity. It would take two months for installation of the additional storage capacity and completion of the programming. At this point, the decision was made to abandon the computer program. This has resulted into the wastage of additional time and money that has been injected in handling the project schedule through the complex computer program. At this point, Crowley was a year and a half into the program with no prototype units completed. The program was still nine months behind schedule with the overrun projected at 40 percent of budget.

6. Another problem that Crowley had to contend with was that the vendors who were supplying components for the project were also running behind schedule.

7. After another three months, the customer, becoming impatient, realized that the Trans Project was in serious trouble and requested that the division general manager and his entire staff visit the customer’s plant to give a progress report within a week. Crowley and four functional line people visited the customer and gave a four-and-a-half-hour presentation defining the problems and the progress to that point.

8. Customer demanded progress reports on a weekly basis. The customer made arrangements to assign a representative in Crowley’s department to be on-site at the project on a daily basis and to interface with Crowley and his staff as required. After this turn of events, the program became very hectic. The customer representative demanded constant updates and problem identification and then became involved in attempting to solve these problems. This involvement created many changes in the program and the product in order to eliminate some of the problems.

9. Crowley was brought down from the Trans project as being the project head and the charge was given to Bartley. After some time even Bartley was brought down and charge was further transferred to several other project managers. The main problem with Trans Project was that it was lacking the appropriate allocation of the human resources and the leadership that could effectively result into its completion.