A bstract-Despite all of the attention that has been paid to the strategic concerns of more repetitive operational contexts over the past few years, almost all of the research on project management has remained focused on various aspects of network manipulation. For any project where the simple application of network techniques could be inappropriate or dysfunctional, the continued oversight of strategic issues is unfortunate. This paper addresses several strategic issues involved with the structural aspects of project management and finds several of them significantly interrelated with project success and the implication of particular project management control systems. The structural variables that are studied include: organizational structure, managerial authority, and scale of the project. The study draws on data collected by a mail survey of 103 development projects in 30 different firms.Ever since Schumpeter [8] argued that structural factors such as organizational size and market position should affect the propensity to undertake R&D activities, students of R&D project management have been concerned with the impact which structural conditions have on the relative effectiveness 0018-9391/85/0500-0071$01.00
The annual decision on how much of the Air Force procurement budget should be spent on the many different aircraft and how much on the many different munitions is of great interest to many people. How the Air Force staff develops information to support the decision has changed over the years. Currently, a linear program is being used by the Air Force Center for Studies and Analyses and is being tested by the Munitions Division of the Plans and Operations Directorate (AF/XOXFM) for munitions trade-off analyses. The LP uses existing data and estimates on (1) aircraft and munition effectiveness, (2) target value, (3) attrition, (4) Aircraft and munition costs, and (5) existing inventories of aircraft and munitions. Other factors considered are weather and the length of the conflict. Enhancements currently being implemented include attrition changes as a function of time and the distance the aircraft must fly.
Do universities provide industry with System Engineers (SEs) that industry expects and wants? Are company sponsored training programs for System Engineers a worthwhile investment? Unlike traditional engineering disciplines, there is no prescribed educational program for Systems Engineering that meets the majority of industry's needs. Consequently, there appears to be no way for an organization to hire graduates who will, with certainty, be qualified to perform the majority of systems engineering functions within that organization. How much of this is due to the lack of standardization within industry, and how much is due to the lack of a standardized academic curriculum? This paper presents results of an empirical study aimed at identifying answers to these and other questions that are extremely important to the development of a close, effective partnership between industry (the customer) and educational/training programs (the producers).
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