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Project failure occurs due to several reasons, but complexity and underestimation of complexity are often seen as the cause. Because of the interdisciplinary character of projects, it seems that project management approaches are not sufficient to deal with the complexity of projects. Therefore the interdisciplinary aspect has to be considered and managed appropriately, which brings us to the following research question: “How can project managers combine tools and techniques from project management approaches and discipline oriented approaches, for managing multidimensional complex projects successfully?” First a number of management approaches are selected and classified, in order to identify the focus and steps of the approaches. Next, complexity is taken into account, where it becomes clear that complexity in construction projects can be assessed by the TOE framework, while on a meta level the complexity elements of the ASC framework can provide insight in the complexity of projects. Expert interviews were conducted to identify the extent to which different management approaches support mapping and managing project complexity elements. The results point out that the Project management body of knowledge scored weak in dealing with actors, support tools and involving the context elements of a project. Finally, some techniques of other management approaches which score better are presented in order to enhance the project management approach for dealing with complex projects.

This graduation thesis aims to provide solutions for the improvement of the quality of estimations at the first stage (fuzzy front-end) of projects. In order to do so, three research questions were answered: How are the project front-end estimations currently made and by whom? What knowledge sources are used in the process of estimations and to what extent? And what are the main factors that make difficult the practice of front-end estimation and how can they be overcome? A qualitative research was carried out and four data collection methods were used: literature review, corporate archival records analysis, structured interviews and non-participatory observations. The research is carried out in the context of the Healthcare Imaging Systems industry; a sector that offers interesting characteristics for carrying out the proposed research. The study does an extensive exploration of how to improve the quality of estimations. A categorization scheme was developed to structure the discussions. It was found that obstacles and solutions can be divided in 6 major categories: Political, Organizational, Methodological, Technical, General and External. The study also has some limitations. The internal validity is limited at some extent due to the number of respondents. Results can hardly be generalized; however, they provide interesting insights as explained below. This limitation is compensated by the fact that all the interviewees possess extensive technical experience in the organization in addition to their managerial expertise thus providing a balanced mix between technical and managerial insights. Summarizing, the ultimate contribution of this research is to identify the main factors that hinder the practice of carrying out front-end estimations. By analyzing these issues and contrasting them with the good practices found in literature and in a complex environment like that of the Healthcare Imaging Systems sector, this study aims to shorten the research gaps mentioned above and contribute to the body of knowledge of project’s estimation. The main conclusions are that estimations in the context of this industry are carried out primarily using expert knowledge and standard times and that even though current estimations lead to the success of the organization, some opportunities of improvement were found. The high granularity and variety of the obstacles and solutions found in literature and in the empirics makes them quite precise, recognizable and addressable in the case study organization. However, it makes it difficult to consolidate them without losing valuable details.

Ever since sophistication of technology and human desire for a better, more comfortable and luxurious life have started to converge, it has had a direct impact on the way engineering projects are approached and handled. This is especially true since the second half of the previous century. A natural consequence of this is that conventional project management approaches are increasingly coming under stress. One thing that can be generally assumed to have happened is the increase in project complexity. However, the understanding of complexity by professional bodies and academia still seems to be at an early stage. This affects all industries and sectors, be they civil, electrical, manufacturing, IT or any other. As an example, we can look at the process and energy industry, with the oil sector being a case in point. Easily accessible oil fields have long since been discovered forcing new reservoirs and discoveries to be made in remote areas, deep seas or in complex forms like tar-sands. This research was undertaken to increase understanding of the role of project complexity in project management and its influence on the chances of achieving a successful project. This study focused on application of the new TOE framework on identifying and understanding the different elements (fifty in our case) of complexity, how they can be potentially grouped together into clusters of influence (fourteen in our case), contributing towards the three dimensions of complexity (Technical, Organizational and Environmental). The separate effect of these three dimensions on five common success criteria of cost, schedule, quality, safety and future business prospects was investigated. Also, the computed complexity dimensions were compared with a general perception of these three dimensions in the experience of the respondents to see the extent of the fit. To do this a survey was distributed to project managers in the member companies of the NAP network, a competence network of the Dutch process industry. The online survey contained questions on the interviewees’ most recent finished project. Through the survey, data was acquired on 67 projects performed in the NAP network. This data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and multivariate statistical techniques. Owing to the characteristics of the data, non-parametric analysis technique was used. The results of the study show the potential usefulness of application of TOE framework in project management research. The relationships found also have practical implications for project management in the NAP network and the process industry. It was shown that project complexity negatively influences project success, with technical and organizational complexity playing the most significant part. It was shown that cost and schedule were two categories of success showing the most susceptibility to complexity, whereas quality, safety and future business prospects showed resiliency towards any kind of complexity to a large extent. From the literature review, several observations were compared with the results of the thesis, showing interesting moot points. Confirming (Kloppenborg & Opfer, 2002), all types of risk have been shown to be of influence on the project result. It has been shown that the opinion of (Thomas & Mengel, 2008) that expert project management has not been paid too much attention is also confirmed by our results. Lack of planning is also shown as potential cause of project failure as indicated by (Dvir, Shenhar, et al., 2003). The biggest surprise was to find that project size has no correlation with project result, thus disproving (Collyer & Warren, 2009).

This research is focussed on a project management technique called fast tracking. Fast tracking is the integration of design and construction phases by arranging work packages of the total project and overlapping the design and the construction of these packages as well as overlapping the total work packaging. The relocation of the faculty of architecture, after the fire in May 2008, was the case study used for this research.

Despite the extensive body of knowledge that exists on innovation management and project management, the number of failed projects is still disappointingly high. This is especially true in projects that involve break-through innovations. Recent literature suggests that the application of a contextual approach rather than a universal approach could improve this situation. This observation has prompted a search for factors that affect the performance of projects, as well as the development of several contextual frameworks. This research builds upon these areas and specifically aims investigates the relationships between the context and characteristics of a project, the leadership styles, and the decisions that project leaders make early on in projects. The choice of these fields will be explained individually. It is suffice to say at this point that even though research in each of these topics on its own is rather well-developed, the connections between them have not been fully researched before. As an example: the focus of this thesis is on the early phases of projects - also known as the front end development (FED) phase, because in this phase decisions are not yet finalized. Project costs in this phase are still low and making changes is easier. This thesis uses an exploratory study, due to the unavailability of prior integrated research. In this work, we review the literature and attempt to find the project contexts, project characteristics, and leadership styles that influence a project leaders’ decision making. We also look at the decisions that project leaders actually make during the FED phase. We then seek for plausible relationships among these factors and decisions, and in the process build a framework which includes all these factors and decisions. In our proposed framework, the characteristics and contexts of a project influence the decisions that managers make in the early phases of a project. The chosen leadership styles moderate these relationships. We complement the model by presenting several scenarios that aim to refine and show the plausibility of the model. Based on our study, we propose the following conclusions: first, technological uncertainty has a direct and positive effect on risk management, and yet a direct and negative effect on planning, which means that in the case of high technological uncertainty, risk management should be formalized but planning not. These relationships are positively moderated by the leadership variable of task behavior, so if the project leaders’ style is delegating, this would imply more formality in risk management, and more flexibility on planning. The other major conclusion is that project complexity has a direct and negative effect on both risk management and planning, which means that in cases of highly complex projects, both risk management and planning need to be formalized. These relationships are positively moderated by the variable of task behavior, so if the project leaders’ style is telling this would mean more formality in risk management and planning. The model and conclusions can be seen as forms of working hypothesis. In future work, researchers could focus on testing these hypotheses quantitatively and assess the validity of the model. Eventually, the model can be complemented by adding more contextual variables. The proposed conceptual model connects the fields of innovation management, project management and leadership theory. We hope that the model contributes to these fields and to the understanding of the realities which project leaders face, and that it can act as a stepping stone for further research.

Researchers often obtain rich insights from their studies and generate ideas based on the research results. To keep the project going, it is essential for them to convey the results and ideas to stakeholders insides the organization, but outside their team, for example, the sales people. However, their stakeholders are often sceptical or doubtful based on their professionals or disciplinary experience. It causes difficulties and misunderstandings in communication between the two sides. This graduation project aims to develop a deep understanding of the way that researchers communicate with their stakeholders, which the author approaches via qualitative research. Based on the research results, concepts and prototypes are developed to improve the information sharing between researchers and their stakeholders. This graduation project is supported by The Human Interaction & Experience group at Philips Research in Eindhoven, which provides the opportunities for observations and interviews. The literature study consists of two topics that are essential in this assignment: information sharing and organization stakeholders. Information sharing between different departments brings difficulties to problem solving process, which is identified as knowledge boundary. The knowledge boundary is classified into three levels: syntactic, semantic and pragmatic. Based on the knowledge boundary theory, objects can be designed to assist information sharing between different functions. As to the organization stakeholders, the literature describes three attributes (power, legitimacy and urgency) of stakeholders and RASIC model to identify stakeholders' responsibilities. Furthermore, when this project comes into the design phase, existing examples of workshop design are studied from literature. To obtain an understanding of communication between research team and their stakeholders, the author executed a case study, supported by a research team in Philips. In the case study, the author conducted a client meeting observation and two rounds interviews. Objects from the client meeting to assist information sharing are photographed and used in the second round interviews to facilitate retrospection for participants. The transcriptions from the interviews were analysed and eight infographics were generated to illustrate the case study results. At the same time, insights were extracted and grouped into "demands" and "wishes", which helped to formulate eight design directions. The author mapped the eight directions according to two axes: relevance to case study insights and access to resources. The direction which was both relevant to the case study results and easy to resource access was selected to be developed further. The design direction is to design a tool to support information transfer by improving the researchers' awareness of stakeholder relationships and the differences between them. The differences exist among expectations, preferences on communication and knowledge backgrounds. At the same time, several design criteria were formulated. Based on the design direction, the author conducted self brainstorming and executed a creative session with a group of students to generate ideas. The ideas were evaluated by three researchers in Philips and generated into four concepts. Then, the concepts were discussed with superiors in Philips and TU Delft and integrated an initial concept. It is described as follows: To improve researchers' awareness of stakeholder relationships, expectation differences, preferences on communication and knowledge backgrounds, a kick-off workshop with three main tasks (structuring, brainstorming and sharing) is developed. Correspondently, three tools (movie, inspiration cards and guidance) are designed to support the workshop. In addition to the initial concept, design criteria at the feasibility aspects were generated. To make the final design more practical, the author involved insights from researchers and clients into the concept, through user-centred iterations. The author developed draft prototypes and evaluated them with about twenty researchers and fived clients through three rounds interviews. After each round, the draft prototypes were upgraded based on the comments from participants. The final design consists of three parts: a stop motion introduction movie to structure the four aspects (stakeholder relationships, preferences on communication, expectation differences, and knowledge backgrounds) in researchers and clients' minds, a set of magnet inspiration cards to assist the their brainstorming and workshop guidance (booklets and video clips) to facilitate the kick-off workshop. The final design was evaluated with a research team in a workshop. The team members watched the introduction movie, selected two topics out of the four and mapped the information out together. The feedback from the evaluation was concluded as suggestions for future development. The design outcomes can be evaluated with several teams in the future, and if the design is proved to be beneficial to team communication, they can be promoted within Philips in the future.

A Project Management & Project Portfolio Management Maturity Model is developed based on a vast body of knowledge. The Model was applied to 30 companies and analyzed statistically in order to provide an assessment for each of the companies. The quantitative data was further analyzed to link Project Management & Project Portfolio Management Maturity to Project Success.

Nowadays, in an environment of globalisation, intense competition and rising research costs, Collaborative Research Projects (CRP) are essential means of sustaining technological growth. Collaborative research activities are increasingly applied across research-based and business-based organizations and are becoming an efficient way to achieve mutual outcomes. However, collaboration engages a broad sample of organizations often differs in culture, in values or project interests. Furthermore, the fact that CRP are being performed in an unclear innovative environment adds extra difficulties to be managed. Uniresearch BV is a firm that coordinates EU Research Projects and has developed its own techniques and methods to manage the execution of Collaborative Research Projects. With the aim to acquire a deeper and explorative insight into the methods and tools used to execute Collaborative Research Projects (CRP); the central research question to this study is: How can the management of the project execution be improved in Collaborative Research Projects? To answer this question several research approaches have been performed in this study. The main research approach adapted was conducting interviews of organizations, managing Collaborative Research Projects. The first part of the interview attempts to find what is considered as Project Management Success in CRP, the second seeks to pinpoint what the methods are used to monitor and control CRP, how do they contribute to achieve PMS, and how do they change across projects. The purpose of the last part is to identify which factors affect Project Management Success. Moreover, two questionnaires are part of the methodology used in this research. One questionnaire has been performed to Uniresearch BV employees in order to obtain a definition of Project Management Success. The other one to the most frequent users of Uniresearch BV web based management tool, with the intention of obtaining a better view of the standard tools used on CRP. This study has identified the usability of the final outcome and accomplishing the main objectives of the project as the main indicators of Project Management Success (PMS) in Collaborative Research Projects. In order to obtain a higher degree of PMS, this study has found two paths: through improving the methods and tools to monitor and control CRP, and identifying the relevant factors that affect the execution of the project and therefore the Project Management Success. Regarding the methods and tools to monitor and control, the findings show that in every project new methods have to be developed and adapted to the project. Consequently the interviewees claim that more integrated, standard and formal procedures are needed. Since they consider that Collaborative Research Projects is uncertain and this connotes a lack of knowledge about accomplishing the defined goals, formality provides more organization, policies and adherence to routine operations. They also agreed that the tools developed should be user friendly. Even though it has been found that the methods and tools used to monitor and control Collaborative Research Projects are not currently used in every kind of project, the findings show that risk management deserves more consideration in complex projects, like Collaborative Research Projects. Looking at the factors influencing the execution of the project, this research has identified that Communication, Trust & Commitment are crucial in achieving Project Management Success. Furthermore, a connection between these two factors has been observed during the research. As a conclusion, improving the level of communication means to improve the degree of trust & commitment between managers and partners. Apart from these two important factors, other factors have been found in this study. The results reflect that the project Set Up including the planning and the responsibilities of the partners must be well defined in order to execute the project in a good order and to ensure Project Management Success. Furthermore, the Partner Selection is another important aspect that has been found; the respondents of the interview consider that is relevant to select a partner with past experience or with proper skills to add to the project. The last factor identified is the managerial skills of the project manager. The respondents found that adequate personnel who apply the methods and tools properly make a difference in achieving Project Management Success. A pattern across the interviewed organizations has been identified. As a result, the differences between groups of projects have been examined over five categories: partner homogeneity, reporting frequency, communication frequency, methods to establish trust and commitment and managerial skills. Although the conclusions extracted from this analysis might not be proved, the differences demonstrated are undeniable. Private Research Projects, managed by private companies, report higher values in all the five categories and therefore it is expected to have better levels of management success. On the other hand, Research EU Projects registered lower level of partner homogeneity, which means higher project complexity but controversially, their methods are more flexible and less explicit. A set of recommendations to Uniresearch BV has been formulated based on the previous conclusions. First the methods currently in use to manage Collaborative Research projects should be further examined. Then, if it is required, the firm should implement more formal methods to establish communication with partners, as communication plans. Moreover, considering the importance of Trust & Commitment, it is essential to ensure explicit and described methods to enhance Trust & Commitment. Another recommendation might be effective when the company participates in the first stages of Collaborative Research Projects. Finally, it is important to describe in detail the tasks and project responsibilities and to choose carefully the partners to be involved. Although this research has its limitations, as the imprecise selection of the interview sample or the lack of detail collecting data, this study has achieved its aim of examining the methods and the influencing factors on the execution of CRP, providing conclusions and recommendations on how the management of CRP can be improved. Further research can be conducted to analyze in a quantitative approach whether the factors are affecting the Project Management success in each type of Collaborative Research Projects. Moreover, it is also suggested to study each type of CRP separately to identify which factors are more relevant in each group.

Learning from projects is one of the major challenges which appears to be critical to consistent success of project-based organizations. To learn from past projects for current problem situations, knowledge and experience often has to be shared across time or space. However, while it seems to be possible to capture explicit knowledge (e.g. about products and technical problems), softer types of knowledge (i.e. knowledge about the processes that a team had deployed to achieve their goals and why these processes seemed to have worked well or badly) are more difficult to retain. By observing how knowledge people like managers or engineers communicate, we have found that they tell stories. Stories are an ancient way to communicate experiences (i.e. direct observations of or participation in events as a basis of knowledge) and are used by todays engineers to convey the challenges and solutions they encountered. Based on these grounds we propose an approach to freeze stories of project managers by capturing (and processing) their stories and thereby opening up an opportunity for sharing these stories across space and time. First trials of this approach are promising: it was easy for project managers to share experiences resulting in rich accounts. In addition, we tested the acceptance and applicability of frozen stories with apprentice project managers. We found that it reminded them of their own experiences and of stories they have heard. Furthermore, it stimulated the exchange of experiences with peers.

Since the start of CubeSat development different universities and organisations have succeeded in launching and operating their own satellites. Each of these institutes has their own ways in which these projects are organised.Furthermore each project has its own design philosophy and heritage that influence the project. What all these projects do share is a common set of standard CubeSat requirements and similar handbooks on Project Management and Systems Engineering (PMSE). Furthermore the general development time and workforce behind the project are also similar for all institutes. With this in mind it is interesting to investigate where the resulting projects and CubeSats differ and learning opportunities arrise.

The link between project management and sustainability is relatively new. More projects today are driven by sustainability goals than ever before. The need for sustainability as a critical factor for project success is clear. However, the question is what the stakeholders involved in the project think of it. The main objective of this research is to investigate whether stakeholders’ perspectives on sustainability can give a positive contribution to project management practices. Additionally, the research will try to fill the gap in the literature.

Managing uncertainties in practice differs from the suggested uncertainty management approach in the (scientific) literature. Uncertainty managers are not aware of the many tools and techniques that are available to manage uncertainties in their projects. They deal with uncertainties in a rather implicit way with varying success. Furthermore it appeared that there is a strong emphasis on (financial) risks rather than opportunities in practice and (to a less extent) in literature. This research identified some major problematic discrepancies between uncertainty management in practice and theory. These discrepancies are interrelated and lie at the root of a fundamental deadlock between project, politics and management. Breaking through this deadlock can only be achieved step by step with the support of practice as well as science. Close cooperation between practice and the academic world is recommended, but further research will have to show how a culture shift can take place on a wider scale.

In high-tech industries, projects play a central role in the development of new products and processes. Since these projects can be quite complex, it would be useful to look at where complexity in projects comes from and how these complexities influence these projects. The research project described in this thesis aims to increase the understanding of this topic in a company in the semiconductor industry, NXP Semiconductors. Products that are produced in the semiconductor industry play an increasingly important role in our lives. Products ranging from mobile telephones to cars to lighting are all equipped with semiconductor products and the performance of these products is steadily increasing with time. Therefore, the development of these products and the processes, which are needed to produce the products, are becoming more complex. The research project To describe the complexities that are encountered in the process engineering industry, a framework (the TOE framework, where TOE stands for Technical, Organizational and External) was developed earlier. The TOE framework consists of 47 elements (which are categorized into the three aforementioned categories) that describe aspects that can contribute to a project’s complexity. To understand the complexities that are encountered in the semiconductor industry, this research project has applied the TOE framework to this industry. The goal of this research project is twofold: firstly, it aims to understand where complexities in projects in the semiconductor industry come from; secondly, it would be useful for the company if the company would be able to understand which complexities could play a role in a future project and this could be used to come with the right measures to cope with these complexities. The main research question that this research project aims to answer is: What benefits does the application of the TOE framework provide for projects at NXP? This question is answered by doing a combination of desk research and case studies on projects in the company. In the desk research phase, the current practice related to development projects at NXP is investigated and a tool is described that calculates the design complexity of a new product design: Numetrics. Case studies To understand what complexities play a role in NXP projects, 16 projects have been investigated. The projects that are studied are from a wide variety of departments within NXP, but all projects (except for one) involve development of a new product or process. From each project, one person (the project manager) was interviewed. During the interviews, these project managers were asked to explain what the project entailed, which complexities were encountered during the projects, what influence these complexities had on the project and how the project managers coped with the complexities. The project managers were asked to indicate too which degree the complexities in the TOE were applicable to the project and if any complexities were missing in the framework. The complexities in the TOE framework that scored highest on the TOE scoring list are: - Involvement of different technical disciplines - Technical risks - High project schedule drive - Level of competition These high scoring complexities reflect the image that development projects in the semiconductor industry require multidisciplinary teams, that technical risks are often high (since it is not always known whether certain solutions will provide the required functionality), that there is high drive to develop new products quickly and that there is a high level of competition on the market. Next to the complexities that are directly related to the TOE framework, interviewees were also asked to share their views and experiences with the Numetrics system. A number of observations and recommendations with respect to this system are presented in this thesis. Adaptation and application of TOE From the original TOE framework, five elements were considered to be not applicable to the projects by the interviewees. These elements are not present the adapted version of the TOE framework for use at NXP. The interviewees also indicated that a number of complexities were missing or not precisely enough described in the TOE framework. In total 13 elements are added to the existing framework (4 technical, 5 organizational and 4 external elements). These adaptations lead to a new version of the TOE framework, that is modified to meet the situation at NXP. A preliminary version of a score chart is made, on which a project manager can indicate which complexities could be present in a project that is under planning. However, further research would be needed to successfully implement the application of TOE in practice. A possible way of applying TOE would be to use a similar approach that is taken by Numetrics – a tool that is currently being used at NXP to assess the design complexity of product developments. Since the relevance of Numetrics is limited to product development projects, the TOE approach would have an added value by also addressing other types of projects, such as process developments. Next to the version of TOE that is adapted to meet the needs of NXP, a suggestion is made for the inclusion of four new elements, which were the result of the case studies that were performed in this research project. Conclusions The research project shows that the possible application of the TOE framework could have benefits for NXP. As the case studies show, complexities can have a large influence on the project’s execution and success. Therefore, a tool that can assess the complexity and sources of complexity of multiple types of (development) projects would be of value to the company. Recommendations Towards the company, a number of recommendations are given. Firstly, although the BCaM framework is of much value to the company, one of the outcomes of the interviews was that the time between gates can be quite long. This can have a negative effect on the focus in the project team and including more steps into the system would increase the focus in the team. Secondly, we believe that the implementation of TOE in the planning phase of projects can add value by giving the project manager insight into the types of complexities that are expected to be encountered in the project under planning.

Dit onderzoek is specifiek gericht op de relationele samenwerkingsvorm ‘partnering’, aangezien ‘partnering’ een veelbelovende nieuwe projectbenadering is en aansluit op de wijze waarop corporaties bouwprojecten kunnen organiseren. Bij partnering wordt in een vroeg stadium van de planontwikkeling samengewerkt, hierbij worden de werkprocessen en belangen tussen de betrokken partijen onderling afgestemd. De samenwerking is meestal in teamverband waarbij kennis en kunde van de betrokkenen in vertrouwen gedeeld wordt. In de internationale constructieliteratuur is veel onderzoek gedaan naar ‘partnering’. Daarbij is ook empirisch onderzocht welke ‘condities’ in hoofdlijn van belang zijn voor een succesvolle toepassing van ‘partnering’, dit zijn de zogenaamde ‘kritische succesfactoren’ (Nyström 2005; Yeung 2007; Chan 2010). Deze condities kunnen als checklist gebruikt worden om partnering succesvol toe te passen. Wanneer aan deze condities zorgvuldig invulling wordt gegeven, verhoogt dit de kans op succesvolle partnering.

With the continuous rising competitiveness, the need for improving performance has become vital for organizations to stay in the market. In order to improve the performance, one first needs to evaluate the output of a process or procedure on basis of efficiency. Having it measured, the processes or procedures could be modified such that it increases the output, efficiency or effectiveness. For this measuring, a tool known as maturity model has been developed over the past years. Despite the existence of many project management maturity models, several shortcomings and lacking can still be found, such as ignoring the human and organizational aspects as one of the many examples. This results in the main research question of this report: “How can the existing maturity models be further enhanced and applied effectively across several industries?” This question is further divided into three sub-questions, where the first sub-question focuses on the current state of the project management maturity models and the project management elements a model should possess, which will assist in making a new project management maturity model. The second sub-question delves deeper in the various project management elements (competencies) and identifies commonalities and dependencies of the maturity levels of these competencies. The last sub-question serves the purpose of testing the applicability of the newly developed maturity model. The methodology employed to collect the data is a multiple case study with multiple resources. The quantitative approach helped gathering empirics by applying the model on various organizations. Followed by a detailed analysis, a qualitative approach was used to validate the model and its findings, to minimize biases in the research conclusions. Besides thoroughly analysing the existing project management maturity models on their unique features and shortcomings, this study provided a newly developed maturity model which addressed these shortcomings. The application of the model on various organizations and the followed data analysis together with the validation interviews provided some interesting findings like: - The categorization of various project management competencies targeting a broader set of competencies (especially soft and societal factors). The categorization, helped finding out what elements within the field of project management were given the most/least importance and what the correlations were amongst these elements - Besides one overall maturity level, unlike existing maturity models, this maturity model due to its unique way of calculating provides four overall maturity levels. Each of the four overall maturity levels, represent one of the four categories, where various elements are grouped based on their properties. This gives a broader overview of the strengths and weaknesses of the organization, such that those weaknesses can be easily identified and worked upon. - Although maturity models in general get easily influenced by subjectivity and different opinions of respondents, the questionnaire used for this model was found to make things more objective due to the clear descriptive answers. Besides contributing to the existing academic literature, this study also provided empirical evidence on the way various project management competencies are perceived and might need extra focus. The empirics and recommendations provided by this study could then be used for further for further research or be directly applied in practice.

Project management has always been an interesting topic and has received much attention, not only because of the method but also in its application. It has been observed that in literature ‘mega-projects’ receive much attention while little is written about small projects. There can be several reasons for this, but it is believe that this is mainly due to the idea that the project management practices can be used for any project, occasionally leaving some prescribed project activities out or by using a scaled version of the activity when applied to small projects. The developed project management bodies of knowledge provide guidelines for project execution. These guidelines are referred to as ‘traditional’ project management practices, as they are focusing on planning and controlling the project. Traditional project management approaches are based on a predictable, fixed and relative simple model with little focus on behavioral and complexity aspects. Nowadays, environments are much more dynamic compared to the environment where the traditional project management approach was developed. Adaptive project management can be seen as a derivative of traditional project management but is less focused on tasks and activities but more on a strategy-based management approach to achieve maximal benefit of the project. Adaptive project management is of importance for the smaller projects, because the project management approaches can be too cumbersome for this kind of projects. Adaptive project management is not in conflict with traditional project management, but it ensures that the activities used are made fit for purpose towards the project. Royal Dutch Shell has developed a project manual for downstream projects with expenditures over USD 100 million. This manual is also used for the smaller projects at the refinery of Shell Pernis but the question is whether this improves or hinders the efficient execution of small projects. The goal of this thesis is to investigate and contribute to knowledge on project management for small projects and to provide recommendations for the current situation for small projects at Shell Pernis. To reach this goal, a qualitative research study at Shell Pernis was carried out. The research started with exploratory interviews as there was little specific knowledge on the topic available. These exploratory interviews led to the identification of four themes: project classification, fit for purpose execution, project team and front end development. These themes refer to possible improvement areas for the execution of small projects. Literature review was provided to define the themes in more detail and to compare the project management approach of Shell (called Opportunity Realization Manual - ORM) with the information found in literature. The following step was to identify possible issues that were not apparent from the literature study and comparison with the ORM. This is done via surveys, in-depth interviews and project data. The data is analyzed and ranked to find the most important issues that influence fit for purpose execution of small projects. Improving these issues is likely to increase fit for purpose execution. Fit for purpose is used to describe that sufficient and efficient effort must be undertaken in order to reach a goal successfully. The top six issues that were identified are: 1. Difficult cooperation between stakeholders 2. Unclear tasks and responsibilities of team members 3. Different performance indicators per stakeholder group 4. The usage of the same project structure for every project 5. The lack of a good and complete scope definition 6. The business model of the engineering contractor and the communication with Shell In order to prevent these issues from occurring, the following minimal requirements are identified in order to enable fit for purpose execution of small projects: • Project team formation and integration • Focus on contracting and procurement • Stakeholder management • Usage of a project assurance plan • Scheduling (including ‘the way forward’ of a project) • Opportunity framing for proper scope development (including lessons learned) • Risk management