Page 209 - Global Project Management Handbook

9-14 COMPETENCY FACTORS IN PROJECT MANAGEMENT

to work together. To be able to solve the yet unidentified problems, they will need to
make creative use of the diverse and rich set of skills and resources they bring collectively
to the project. In solving the emergent problems, both the project concept and the project
organization may need to be modified or adapted. Flexibility in the organization and the
concept will facilitate the necessary adaptation.
Inversely, a project organization in which the members have no real incentive to solve
collective problems but are motivated to exit the project or escalate internal conflicts is
more likely to unravel in the face of an emergent crisis. Project teams and project plans
that have been optimized in terms of material resources and competencies to meet the
anticipated project requirements and risks are likely to fall short in attempts to solve
emergent problems. Likewise, rigid project organizations and concepts are less likely to
be adaptable to unforeseen situations.
Projects as complex systems need to be instilled with the properties of cohesion and
resilience in order to perform well in unforeseeable situations. As complex systems, they
must have the requisite variety to deal with the situations they will face. In other words,
their repertoire of possible responses must be at least as rich as the set of situations they
will face. In practical terms, this means that the project organization must have a rich set
of competencies and resources at its disposal if it is to be able to solve future problems.
This is best accomplished by having an organization whose members have diverse com-
petencies and backgrounds and also have surplus professional and material resources that
they can draw on if needed.
Having the professional and material resources to solve problems is insufficient. Team
members must have the motivation and incentive to do so. This is best accomplished through
ownership in both the psychological sense of commitment and in the sense that the team
members have a material incentive to make the project a success. In structuring the project,
the sponsor must establish a project organization in which all the key players have the moti-
vation and the incentive to solve problems creatively and make extra efforts if the project
gets into difficulty. Creating a project organization whose members have the incentives and
the means to solve problems will instill flexibility and responsiveness into the system.
Effective sponsors take additional measures to instill flexibility into their projects. The
project front-end development takes several years, and it is not possible to foresee the
exact situation that will prevail when the final concept is chosen. Developing alternate
scenarios and concepts and delaying commitment to the final concept give the project
more flexibility. In some projects, it is possible to use modular designs that allow partial
execution or more flexibility, but this is only possible on certain projects. Instilling flexi-

bility gives a project more resilience in the face of emergent risks, but there is a cost to
flexibility. Developing alternate scenarios and delaying concept selection generate costs
and delays and can lead to suboptimal design.
Creating a project concept and organization to deal with emergent risk is a very active
and very lengthy process. The project sponsor exercises influence on the project context
and anchors the project into this context. The sponsor also conceptualizes the project as a
complex system and builds a cohesive, resilient, and responsive organization. In so doing,
the sponsor goes much beyond the management methods that are effective for the man-
agement of anticipated risks.

COPING WITH TRADEOFFS IN THE MANAGEMENT
OF ANTICIPATED AND EMERGENT RISK

The approaches used by effective sponsors to manage anticipated and emergent risks are
often complementary, but in some cases they create paradoxes. Tradeoffs are necessary.