TABLE OF CONTENTS Many of us are like the little boy we met trudging along a country road with a cat rifle over his shoulder. What are you hunting, buddy? we asked. Dunno, sir, I ain t seen it yet.
R.LEE SHARPE
An emerging conviction among those professionals who do research on, publish, and practice project management is the belief that projects are building blocks in the design and execution of organizational strategies. An ongoing and competitive organization has a stream of projects flowing through the organization that support changes in operational and strategic initiatives.
In this chapter the strategic relationship of projects to organizational purposes will be considered. A project selection framework will be suggested. An initial look at project planning will be provided, along with a description of the project owner s need for participating in the selection and use of projects to support organizational purposes. A key part of this chapter includes the description of a project management system, which provides a philosophy and standard for a systems view in the management of projects.
[1]Portions of this chapter have been taken from D.I.Cleland, Measuring Success: The Owner s Viewpoint, Proceedings, PMI Seminar/Symposium, Montreal, Quebec, September 20 25, 1986; and D.I.Cleland, Project Owners: Beware, Project Management Journal, December 1986, pp. 83 93.
The most dangerous time for an organization is when old strategies are discarded and new ones are developed to respond to competitive opportunities. The changes that are appearing in the global marketplace have no precedence;
