There are multiple types of organizations within project management that have there own way of playing a majored role in how projects are carried out.
How do organizational structures affect projects and project management?
In a functional organization, projects that exist within a single functional division generate no organizational issues. But projects that extend across functional divisions are demanding to manage. This is because the project manager has no direct functional authority and must obtain continual cooperation from other divisions in order to meet project objectives.
In a matrix organization control is shared. The project manager shares responsibility for the project with a number of individual functional managers. In this type of structure there is a balance between ongoing operations and projects. Local body organizations are responsible for both maintaining existing infrastructure and commissioning the construction of new projects.
Communication, conflict resolution and team building will be key to your success as a project manager. Recognizing and understanding the impacts of working in a project-led organization will raise awareness of the potential project management pitfalls. Project teams develop a strong sense of identity which in turn creates a high level of commitment from team members. Due to their involvement in consecutive projects, project organizations can develop and maintain a long-term body of experience and skills.
There are multiple types of organizations within project management that have there own way of playing a majored role in how projects are carried out.
How do organizational structures affect projects and project management?
Organizational structures affect the projects and project management because they are different ways that the projects are run and who has autonomy in that project, if anyone has autonomy at all. For instance, a functional organization has a chief executive, and multiple functional managers who has staff under them. This allows for the project to be done within a department and one person makes all the decisions. Each organizational structure has a different way they run their projects and who runs them.
Organizational structures, in addition to more effective communication and autonomy in a project, provide the handoff of the project from development to post launch as well as lead the culture of the company. Projects that have a matrix based team may have a smoother transition as there will be a resource from the development team and sustaining team that allows for a smoother transition. In terms of culture, since everyone is working toward their project and they aren't looking at the functional manager role (not as much power as a functional organization), they share their knowledge more readily with the teams they are involved in which allow projects to run well. In a functional organization, there will be a culture of those who will strive to only be the top and never figure out what their peers may need if it doesn't benefit their career. This culture point is important as a matrix organization can also be difficult in understanding who are your stakeholders that you provide information to that may not directly be thought of as your stakeholders in your functional role. A functional organization may work well if a team has been together for years and works on similar projects, but can break apart when their team starts to leave for different paths in their career and the person who fills in the role does perform in the same manner as their predecessor.
A project organization is a structure that facilitates the coordination and implementation of project activities. It creates an environment that fosters interactions among the team members with a minimum amount of disruptions, overlaps and conflict.The way your organization is structured influences how you manage and run projects. It can also influence how much authority and reach an individuals has to do their job as a project manager. There are three common organizational structures, and project managers work in all of them: functional, project, and matrix. Organization structures establish an effective organization chart for the delivery team and define the roles and responsibilities of the team members.
Janicki, T. (2016). The impact of project organizational structures on the effectiveness of innovative projects implementation. Torun Business Review, 15(4), 51-59.
A project organization is a structure that facilitates the coordination and implementation of project activities. It creates an environment that fosters interactions among the team members with a minimum amount of disruptions, overlaps and conflict.The way your organization is structured influences how you manage and run projects. It can also influence how much authority and reach an individuals has to do their job as a project manager. There are three common organizational structures, and project managers work in all of them: functional, project, and matrix. Organization structures establish an effective organization chart for the delivery team and define the roles and responsibilities of the team members.
Janicki, T. (2016). The impact of project organizational structures on the effectiveness of innovative projects implementation. Torun Business Review, 15(4), 51-59.
Organizational structures will affect project management in the way the project is conducted and how much power the project manager, functional lead, or executive head will have. A functional organization will place a lot of power in the chief executive's hands, and they will be the ones to dictate projects and the direction of them. I would imagine this is a pretty inefficient way to go about project management and makes it difficult to do more than one project at a time. Depending on the organization, the chief executive may not know a whole lot about how a particular project should go about, so the project's schedule and quality may diminish by a lot. A project-based organization creates many project teams with each team containing one person for every function (marketing, regulatory, etc.). There may be a lot of duplicates depending on how many teams there are. People representing a certain role would not have the benefit of interacting with people in the same role as them, creating a very limited pool of knowledge in every project team. Matrix organizations are the best choice of handling projects in my opinion. Every project chooses one staff member from each department who has a functional lead the PM must negotiate with before pursuing the project. In my opinion, projects would be done more efficiently in matrix organizations because of the high level of cross-functional interactions that employees would experience every day. Project managers are able to be in close touch with the project and employees would have a wide breadth of knowledge since they would be working in their own departments.
