Project and Commercial

Leadership of Complex

Projects

Associate Professor Stephane Tywoniak Course Coordinator QUT Graduate School of Business Email: s.tywoniak@qut.edu.au

Mid 20th Century: Defence (Manhattan, Polaris ~ PERT) and

Construction Project Management (DuPont CPM)

Mid-Late 20thCentury: Classical Project Management

Growth of project based organisations

Large IT and business change projects

Industrial revolution: urbanisation and construction

Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Chinese... construction projects

The Evolution of Project Management From Construction Management to

‘Complex Project and Commercial Management and Leadership’

21st Century: Complex Project Management

Interconnected global business environment

Classical Project Management

Control and eliminate uncertainty

Methods focus on the ‘iron triangle’ / ‘triple

constraint’ of cost, schedule and scope • PMBOK

• PRINCE2 – Projects IN a Controlled Environment

The 21st Century Business Environment

A 2010 global survey by IBM of some 1,500 chief executives identified ‘managing complexity’ as the biggest challenge

Organisations must become more creative in order to deal with the uncertainty and volatility of today’s market conditions

We must become better at managing complexity to:

• Manage Risks

• Eliminate bureaucracy

• Form and manage relationships

Our Complex Environment: A function of

the divergence in stakeholder values

Complex

Complicated

Simple

Unitary Pluralist Coercive

Increasing divergence of stakeholder values

Projects as Complex Adaptive Systems

Political and external

influences

Dynamic

interfaces

Effect

not

solution

Reframing Project Management

Classical Project Management Complex PM and Leadership

• Primacy to realising planned

benefits

– Aligned with the business strategy

• Holistic approach

– System of systems

– Numerous influential stakeholders

• Complex adaptive system

– Multidimensional, unpredictable

– Environment affects and is

effected

• Adaptive & enabling leadership

– Complexity management

– Plans use multiple maps relevant

to the terrain (no one best map)

• Primacy to scope, cost and

time

– Process and task focused

• Reductionist approach

– Rigid work breakdown structure

– Specified stakeholders

• Rational, universal and

deterministic

– Linear, sequential approach

– Resists environmental change

• Administrative management

– Control - process compliance

– Project plan is the map of the

terrain (A true reflection of reality?)

AND

Developing Program and Commercial

Delivery Leaders

Program

and

Commercial

Leadership

Project

Management

Systems

Engineering

Procurement

and Supply

Chain

Logistics

Multidisciplinary project, program,

portfolio and commercial leadership

focused on strategic benefit realisation

Procedural compliance and

engineering management

”necessary but

not sufficient for

complex projects”

Executive Master of Business - EMCPL: Complex Program Leadership

- EMBSP: Strategic Procurement

• Developing experienced project & commercial

managers as program delivery leaders

• A multidisciplinary program, combining

classical reductionist project management

with a holistic system of systems approach to

program and commercial leadership in

complex business environments

Competency Standard for Complex

Project Managers

Strategy and Project Management

Systems Thinking (hard and soft)

Lifecycle Business Planning

Change and Journey

Innovation and Creativity

Organisational Architecture

Leadership

Culture

Probity and Governance

Co

ura

ge

Lead

s In

no

vativ

e T

eam

s

Ac

tion

an

d O

utc

om

es

Wis

do

m

Influ

en

ce

s

Design of the Executive Master’s

programs

Three integrated domains that

work together to challenge the

observable workplace behaviour

of each participant

Focus on both the ‘what’ and the

‘how’ of complex project and

commercial leadership

Executive Masters Award Course Content

EMCPL and EMBSP share a common core (80%)

and are delivered together

The academic course is grouped

into three phases: 1. Understanding Yourself, Others

and Complexity

2. Performing for Results

3. Leading for Results (Capstone)

Executive Coaching

• Build upon self realisation and personal development – Understand self, others and how

other see them

– Challenge workplace behaviours

• Reflect on opportunities for and the reality of transference of learning to the workplace

• Option of post course extension coaching

Expanding Horizons: Challenging Behaviours

• Safe learning environment to explore leadership

and decision making through interactive case

studies (Prophetical), debrief and reflection

Delivery Model

• Part time, blended flexible learning program

– Online resources and facilitated on line workshops

– Six one week residential workshops over three years

(one each six months).

– International Study Tour

– Capstone workplace project

Participants are drawn from national & international,

corporate and government organisations

International partnership: University of

Ottawa

• The Telfer School of Management at University

of Ottawa (Canada) will launch a local delivery of

EMCPL/SP in September 2015

– Same program, with local adaptation to Canadian

context

– Teaching staff exchanges between Brisbane and

Ottawa

– Possibility of study exchange for participants

The EMCPL Graduate and Supervisor experience:

Transferring learning to the workplace

“A recent external audit estimated the CPM

initiative improves the achievement of ‘fit for

purpose’ project outcomes and with a very

positive cost benefit realisation”

Mr Harry Dunstall

General Manager Commercial

Defence Materiel Organisation, April 2011

“Our Executive Masters graduates

are shaking up the organisation”

Dr Stephen Gumley

AO, CEO

Defence Materiel Organisation

August 2010

“…I think the most significant outcome is that we

now have very senior project and commercial

managers who have changed. We have managers

who can lead the required cultural change within

government and industry to ensure that projects

are more consistently successful”

Mr Kim Gillis

Deputy CEO

Defence Materiel Organisation

April 2010

“All my assignments are directly work

related where I use them to address a

specific DMO issue. I now have a catalogue

of topics as a result of my assignment

investigations, where I have used the

material to value add to my work. I see the

assignments as a way of contributing to and

furthering my work”

Mr Laurence Bode

EMCPL part-time participant, DMO

Resulting in

• Improved relationships with major suppliers, despite addressing significant issues in some major complex projects

• Dampening of the ‘conspiracy of optimism’ through higher levels of trust enabling candid conversations of project complexity and the status of organisational/industry capability

• Improved return on capital and available defence capability

Understanding Yourself, Others & Complexity

• Strategic Management of Complex Projects

• Systems Thinking

• Self Realisation and Personal Development

• Problem Solving in Complex Environments

• Communicating Effectively

• Developing and Leading High Performance Teams

• Understanding Organisational Behaviour and Culture

• Workplace Project #1

EMBSP IP Strategy and Management

Performing for Results

• Acquisition Strategies

• Complex Projects and the Law

• Financial Analysis and Decision Making

• Planning for Risk and Change

• Managing Innovation in Technology-Based Organisations

• Building Organisational Capability

EMBSP Managing Strategic Contracts and Suppliers

• Business Planning

• Negotiation and Mediation Strategies

Leading for Results

• Study Tour

• Implementation of Complex Projects

EMBSP International Contracts

• Leadership for Results

• Planning and Implementing Change

• Managing Contract Relationships

• Accountability and Governance

• Stakeholder Engagement and the Media

EMBSP Contract Risk Allocation and Insurance

• Capstone Workplace Project

The EMCPL Graduate and Supervisor experience:

Transferring learning to the workplace

Research by Professor Caroline Hatcher

• Strategic thinking

– ‘seeing things with a different set of eyes’ and ‘trying

out a wider field of view’

– ‘He is a strategic thinker and a full spectrum leader’

(supervisor)

The EMCPL Graduate and Supervisor experience:

Transferring learning to the workplace

• Desire for Organisational Improvement – ‘spirit of discovery’ & bringing ‘a new skill set to make

improvements’ & ‘new spirit of corporate citizen’ instead on

‘staying in their project cocoon’

– ‘If I know about an issue, the balls in my court to do something’

– ‘You can’t enable them with all this creativity approach if they

don’t have a corporate sponsor’ (supervisor)

The EMCPL Graduate and Supervisor experience:

Transferring learning to the workplace

• Personal confidence in and critical reflection on

decision-making – ‘my decision-making is now clear cut’

– Before they would ‘rush in’ now they would ‘consider the

documentation, question why they were doing it, find supporting,

and exercise reasoning and persuasion’ (supervisor)

The EMCPL Graduate and Supervisor experience:

Transferring learning to the workplace

• Being self aware and using communication

effectively – ‘You catch more with honey than vinegar’

– ‘linking skills’ and ‘listening reflectively’

– ‘Very much more strategic and collaborative approach. Using all

the right words. Get stuff done. People are happy with the

outcome’. (supervisor)