Search results

Seeks to focus on operations priority patterns and operations strategy. Configurations by testing them in a specific environment which contributes to demonstrating their applicability and generalizability.

Using data from 130 Spanish companies with project process organization, their operations strategy is analyzed as a whole, without the following of a trade‐off pattern being observed.

Cost, conformer and innovation strategy types, compared with other operations strategy configurations regarding variables used to develop project management configurations, for the most part exhibit a coherent behaviour, giving support to operations strategy validation at a higher theoretical level.

The two most important limitations are the relatively small sample size used in the study and the results obtained with the organization structure variable. Similar studies in other specific production process contexts should also be undertaken.

Results obtained contribute to demonstrating the applicability of the operations strategy framework to the study of operations management in different environments and its coherence with the specific variables that are used to characterize them.

This study is virtually breaking new ground, prompted by recent calls for empirical research and for testing developed theories on operations management.

For optimising long-term building operations, building clients need to enable integration of operational knowledge in the design process of new buildings. This study aims to investigate and compare how operational knowledge is integrated into the design of buildings and large ships, focussing on the roles affiliation and the competences of the client’s project manager play.

A cross-sectional qualitative methodology with multiple case studies (five cases) was used. In addition, ten expert interviews and two validation focus group interviews were conducted. Case studies included in-depth interviews, document analysis and observations.

The study showed that organisational affiliation, focus and competences of the client’s project management play an important role in how much effort and resources go into ensuring integration of operational knowledge in the design process. In the ship cases, projects managers’ highest concerns were operations. Yet, the fewest procedures and tools to integrate operational knowledge in design were found implemented in these cases. Contrastingly, in the building cases, where operations were not the main matter of concern of project management, a large number of procedures and tools to integrate operational knowledge in design were implemented.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this research is the first to compare how integration of operational knowledge is taking place in the design process of buildings and large ships and identifying what these industries can learn from each other. Furthermore, it adds to the limited research on operations in large ship design.

Recent research has proposed the position of a project owner as the individual accountable for realizing target benefits. However, there is a lack of understanding in the literature of this role – in particular, the specific responsibilities of the project owner that can enhance benefits realization and operations performance. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

The paper identifies these responsibilities in practice through two studies – a qualitative study, which includes interviews with senior executives who fund projects, and an in-depth longitudinal case study, which describes a company that continuously realizes the benefits from its projects.

The results suggest that a project owner should have 22 key responsibilities across four project phases and that an operations manager is often the most suitable candidate to fulfill this role in operations improvement projects. When performing these project responsibilities effectively, operations managers enhance benefits realization and operations improvement. Finally, the paper proposes five hypotheses for future research.

Based on agency theory, the paper increases our knowledge of the role of the project owner in practice. This new knowledge can enhance the realization of target benefits from projects and ensure a smooth transition from the project to the operations environment.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the effect of a systematic commissioning process on project management performance of construction projects, expressed as cost, time, quality and customer satisfaction. The building commissioner in focus uses the term systematic completion (SC), defining it as a structured process, throughout the whole project assuring the fulfillment of functional requirements in the building.

A qualitative single case study was used to analyze the effect of a SC process by one Norwegian building commissioner in the public sector, exemplified with four projects. The analysis was conducted by studying project documents and conducting interviews.

SC has a positive effect on the performance of a construction project, enabling completion on cost, schedule and with fewer defects at handover. Involving facility management assures mutual learning, trained operations personnel and potentially lower costs of operations because of fewer corrections and optimized systems. Higher efforts and resource use in the early phases of the project and in testing are largely offset by the generated benefits.

This case study is limited to the building commissioner’s perspective in four projects. The design team’s, the contractor’s and the client’s perspectives are not represented in the study. Only one of the projects is completed, which limits the ability to draw quantitative conclusions.

Existing studies focus on the technical aspect of SC. The present study provides valuable insights into the effect of SC on project management performance, especially on its implications for the takeover of the building by operations.

The purpose of this paper is to assess how we implement new ways of managing relational risk at the operational level of outsourced projects and to provide guidance to project management (PM) policy makers and practitioners seeking to ensure project operations consistently deliver project relational risk management (PRRM) strategies.

Through exploratory study data were obtained from a panel of six experts in PM and from a pilot survey of PM practitioners. The data reveal future directions and vectors for scholarship and research activity in terms of the impact of PRMM-related mechanisms and deliverables on project success and the implementation process to enhance PRRM as a key PM capability.

Deliverables for PRRM need to part of a multidimensional framework that includes mechanisms besides the contract. Such a framework enables the codification of PM knowledge so that PRRM contributes to project success. With knowledge codified, PRRM strategies can be consistently delivered at the operational level. The framework is novel in that it integrates hereto disparate elements that are encompassed under the broad umbrella of relational governance mechanisms.

PM policy makers and practitioners recognise the importance of effective relationships to deliver projects successfully, yet they lack practical solutions to address the negative effects of dysfunctional relationships. The authors provide a list of PM deliverables for effective PRRM, including deliverables besides those related to the contract, which can be used in practice to bring the gap between PRRM strategy development and implementation. This will enable client organisations that outsource their projects to an external contractor to enhance their PRRM capability and increase the likelihood of project success.

The authors provide insights into how PRRM is practised at the project operations’ level where PM is outsourced. These insights lead to three pathways of impactful Operations Management (OM)/PM scholarship and research, namely, the following: 1) How PM deliverables act as a key success factor for effective PRRM? 2) How the duality of roles carried out by PM actors influences PRMM practices? 3) How companies innovate to enhance their PRMM capability? These pathways will enable PM research and scholarship to address disconnects between PRMM strategy and operations and hence go beyond answering “what” PRMM is to encompass “how” it is implemented.

Cross-boundary cooperation with shared goals and values involving the poor has been argued as an indispensable means for inclusive business (IB) success. Cooperation may become dynamic, especially when exploratory and creative attempts with effective cooperative learning among partners can be realized. Even so, not many companies have reported successful in building the cooperation. One case, providing clean, affordable drinking water to the poor in Tanzanian rural villages, suggests that a delegated and grassroots-based approach in cooperation with a highly trustworthy local partner can successfully promote cooperative learning and transfer know-how in both operations and management. This approach also stimulates local and self-initiated activities for expanding water facilities and generating local businesses in an area where employment is scarce. Deviation from mainstream-institution-based operations and management is one example of institutional interconnections that enable the rural poor to self-manage projects and stimulate self-initiated business activities, consequently contributing to rural development and sustainable development goals.

Safety and productivity are key concerns in the construction projects. While safety looks to the construction workers need to work in a safe environment, productivity affects the project’s profitability and is of a paramount importance from the project owner’s view. The different perspective to the safety and productivity from these two major players in construction projects poses a potential for the conflict between the two. This problem can be fundamentally addressed by methods concurrently improving project safety and productivity. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

To this aim, a discrete event simulation (DES) based framework applicable was proposed for complex and hazardous operations. The utility of the framework was tested using a case study of an eight-story residential building in the north-east part of Tehran, Iran. The excavation and stabilization operation was identified as the most hazardous and critical operation in this case. The framework could improve safety and productivity of this operation by 38 and 4 percent, respectively.

This framework is a complement to the conventional construction project safety and productivity planning methods. Its main application is in complex and hazardous construction operations.

For the first time, a comprehensive framework for concurrently improving safety and productivity of an entire project was proposed in this research. DES was used as the main modeling tool in the framework to provide an ex-ante evaluation foundation applicable to a wide range of construction projects.

The purpose of this paper is to gain a deeper understanding of how companies integrate their innovation and operations processes. Referring to the dynamic capability approach, the authors derive an “integration capability” construct from a set of qualitative data. The authors expand this concept stressing the specific role of management control as a crucial part of an integration capability to align the different processes.

Case studies in eight German industrial and service companies were conducted and qualitative material was analysed guided by a grounded theory approach.

The paper aims at exploring a specific dynamic capability in order to integrate innovation and operations processes. Based on a qualitative study of eight cases, three distinctive categories are derived describing the construct of an integration capability: organization, communication, and management control. Furthermore, influencing factors which lead to different levels of intensity of integration are described.

Comparing the findings with existing research on integration capabilities fosters and expands knowledge on the construct “integration capability”. Effective coordination and communication based on efficient and structured processes seem to be crucial elements of integration capabilities. The paper expands the literature on the role of technology in integration capability which plays a major role in organizing effective coordination and communication.

Management control culture contributes to the present design of control systems of every company studied. Starting point for the design of control systems in research departments is the standard of management control in operations management. Therefore, it is assumed that higher control intensities in operational units will lead to higher control intensities in R&D departments.

In turbulent market environments, companies need to set up organizational processes which effectively coordinate and deploy internal and external resources. These dynamic capabilities are crucial to gain a sustainable competitive advantage. Until now, research on integration capabilities has lacked an analysis of the role of management control; with the empirical findings, this paper shows how management control improves integration capability.

This study examines the criteria for evaluating the quality of servitization and the factors influencing the project–service system's success.

Evidence was collected through three rounds of Delphi consensus with 42 project managers.

The results indicate that the quality of servitization in project-oriented organizations is conceptualized as a cumulative construct driven by the product-service system's overall ability to offer more customer value. This value is defined by three interconnected dimensions: the service, the project and the integration system. The study also proposes a novel customer-oriented quality process with two connected levels comprising eight key factors influencing the quality of the project–service systems and nine key quality criteria that assist in evaluating the project–service systems.

Offering extra services is crucial for successful project-oriented organizations to deliver more customer value. The value of servitization is the combined value of products and services. The failure of one of these components to satisfy customers leads to the collapse of the whole system, which entails the need for a balanced-focus quality system toward projects and services.

This study contributes to the quality of servitization in project-oriented organizations, arguing that a balance between service orientation and project orientation is preferred to increase customer value and reduce the clash and ambiguity between project operations and service provision.