Concurrent Projects: How Many Can You Handle?

Abstract

The number of projects a person can handle simultaneously is a relevant factor in strategic planning and in project portfolio management. Internationally the de facto standard seems to be that a person should not work on more than two or three projects simultaneously; but several factors could influence this figure. Empirical evidence indicates that, in some South African sectors, people tend to work on many more than two or three projects simultaneously. In this paper, factors that influence the number of projects a person can work on are identified so that they can be investigated in further studies. Some ideas about using key resources optimally are also presented. OPSOMMINGDie aantal projekte wat 'n persoon gelyktydig kan hanteer is relevant in strategiese beplanning en in projek portefeuljebestuur. Internasionaal is die de facto standaard blykbaar dat mens nie gelyktydig op meer as twee of drie projekte behoort te werk nie; maar daar is verskeie faktore wat hierdie syfer kan beïnvloed. Empiriese data vanuit sommige Suid-Afrikaanse sektore toon dat mense tipies gelyktydig op veel meer as twee of drie projekte werk. In hierdie artikel is faktore wat die aantal projekte waarop 'n persoon gelyktydig kan werk geïdentifiseer, sodat dit in verdere studies ondersoek kan word. Idees vir die optimale aanwending van sleutelhulpbronne word ook voorgestel. * Corresponding author 2The author was enrolled for a master's degree in project management in the Department of Engineering and Technology Management, University of Pretoria.

Multiple Team Membership: An Integrative Review

“…Yet, doing so requires expedited and increased task switching, decreasing productivity (Yaghootkar & Gil, 2012). Indeed, many organizations overutilize their employees by having them engage in too many concurrent projects (Steyn & Schnetler, 2015). An MTM worker brought this theoretical perspective to life, highlighting how switching projects can be detrimental to productivity—“It would be OK to keep moving people between projects if they were like boxes.…”

“…Chen et al, 2019). As illuminated in the review thus far, frequent structural operationalizations of MTM include the number of teams or projects in which one participates (e.g., Carton & Cummings, 2013; Cummings & Haas, 2012; O’Leary et al, 2011; Steyn & Schnetler, 2015) or the fragmentation of time across teams and projects (e.g., Matthews et al, 2012; Mortensen, 2014; Pluut et al, 2014). However, more recently, researchers have begun to look beyond structural approaches by opening the black-box of MTM to focus on the qualitative experiences that accompany MTM.…”

Navigating multiple team membership: A review and redirection of its influence on effectiveness outcomes

“…This allows us to detect patterns of covariation between these variables and MTM constructs. Organizational rank, salary, and performance level tend to correlate with MTM number (e.g., Berger et al., 2022; Cummings & Haas, 2012; Steyn & Schnetler, 2015; van de Brake et al., 2018), while leadership position does not (Cummings & Haas, 2012; Li et al., 2020). Gender and age have mixed 1 correlations with MTM variables, and personality variables have to date only been considered as controls in a single MTM study (van de Brake et al., 2020b).…”

Exploring Project-Related Factors That Influence Leadership Styles and Their Effect on Project Performance: A Conceptual Framework

“…While programmes and portfolios of projects cannot be regarded simply as higher levels in the project hierarchy [45], the diamond model (described earlier) allows work entities such as projects, sub-projects, work packages and activities all to be measured on the same scales and to be compared with one another, regardless of the terms used to describe them [46]. Addressing the relationship between the types of project, as described by the diamond model, therefore obviates the need to investigate the relationship between leadership style and the level within the project hierarchy.…”