Modern project team

The term "modern team" has become very fashionable in USA. The number of interpretations of this concept is close to the number of people who use it. Therefore, in this article I will try to give the understanding of "teams in the project", which is used in modern project management (project management, project management) within the framework of international standards, requirements and norms of professional activity of managers and project managers.

Project management

Currently, USA is increasingly interested in project management (PM) as the most effective organizational and activity paradigm and management culture of project implementation. However, due to its novelty, the PM itself, as a professional field of activity, is often interpreted in the concepts and connections of system analysis, systems management, information technology, etc. or confused with such types of management activities as administration, management, controlling.

PM has not yet become widespread in USA due to the fact that it is a fundamentally new organizational and professional market culture for american managers, managers and managers. In order for people to change their culture of professional activity - and this is a change in the system of values, mentality and way of acting - it takes considerable time and purposeful effort.

There are various definitions of project, project management, project management and other terms from the field of project management in sources that are normative in nature (knowledge bases, standards) in relation to the activities of professional project managers [1-3].

In particular, project management, as a type of professional activity, includes planning, organizing, monitoring and controlling all aspects of the project in the course of continuous achievement of its goals [1]. And project management is:

on the one hand, the process (processes) of using the knowledge, skills, methods, tools and technologies of project management in the implementation of the project in the implementation of the project in order to effectively achieve the set goals with a given quality, on time and within the approved budget and in accordance with the expectations of the participants;
on the other hand, a group of people (roles) managing the project, that is, providing the processes of management, communication and decision-making for the implementation of the project.
Project management in a broader sense is a professional activity focused on obtaining effective results through the successful implementation of projects as purposeful changes.

One of the main concepts in the PM is the concept of "team", and in project management - project human resource management, which includes the processes of planning, forming and creating a team (Team Building), its development and support of activities (Team Development), transformation or disbandment of the team.

(The question of the expediency of the formation of new terms and phrases in such quantities, especially those that are a direct calque from English, is controversial. Here we note only that in this article the author distinguishes the management of staff and labor resources as formally measurable quantities from what is much less formalized and which is often indicated also by a combination of words that is not very pleasing to the ear: "human factor. – Editor's note.")

Project management team

Teams in the project

The formation and creation of a team in the general case is understood as the process of purposefully "building" a special way of interaction of people in a group (called a team), which allows them to effectively realize their professional, intellectual and creative potential in accordance with the strategic goals of this group (team). A team in this case is defined as a group of people who complement and interchange each other in the course of achieving their goals.

Conventionally, it is possible to define four types of Teams (groups), classified according to the content of their work, which are most often formed explicitly or imply in the practical activities of enterprises [4].

1. Teams that create something new for the organization or do work that has not been done before.

Project Teams (Project Teams) fall completely into this group. They are of a temporary nature, which is determined by the essence of the project as a temporary specific organizational form of achieving goals and solving unique problems.

2. Teams (groups) that deal with problems, goals and objectives in the enterprise through analysis, control and recommendations. Audit and controlling teams, quality assessment teams.

3. Teams (groups) that are not special, but constitute a permanent part of organizational development and carry out the process of production and performance of repetitive work.

Production teams (groups), sales teams and service teams (brigades, groups).

Teams of a multi-executive managerial nature.

These teams are usually formed at the highest levels of enterprise management and take the form of executive committees, management teams or top management of the enterprise.

In the organizational structure of large projects and in their management, at least three types of project teams can be distinguished.

Project team (KP) - an organizational structure created for the period of implementation of the entire project or one of the phases of its life cycle. The task of the project team management is to develop a policy and approve the project strategy to achieve its goals. The team includes persons representing the interests of various project participants.
Project Management Team (UC) is an organizational structure that includes those KP members who are directly involved in project management, including representatives of individual project participants and technical personnel. In relatively small projects, the CIP may include almost all KP members. The task of the CPA is to perform all management functions and works in the project in the course of its implementation.
Project Management Team (ILC) - an organizational structure headed by the project manager (general manager) and created for the period of implementation of the entire project or its phase. The project management team includes individuals directly engaged in managerial and other project management functions. The main tasks of the project management team are the implementation of the project policy and strategy, the implementation of strategic decisions and the implementation of tactical (situational) management.

The ratio between different teams in the project

The question of when and why it is necessary to distinguish several types of teams in the project, whether it is worth not complicating the situation, needs to be clarified.

World practice shows that the separation of teams is advisable in projects in which it is necessary to clearly fix the positions of its various participants (rights, powers, responsibilities, shares of participation and shares in profits, etc.). In particular, the allocation of several project teams is advisable for large, mixed, medium- and long-term projects or when the number of project participants is large enough, and their interests are contradictory.

The main criterion for the effectiveness of the teams in the project is its success. If the general manager of the project believes that the differentiation of teams reduces risks and contributes to the success of the project, then in this case it is he who takes full responsibility for the successful achievement of the project goals. However, it should clearly stipulate the conditions for its implementation, ensure a formal description, separation and consolidation of competencies of various types of project teams. In today's project management culture (both "Western" and "Eastern"), this fact is a conscious necessity for the successful implementation of any project.

Since the teams in the project differ in their goals, objectives, competence and responsibility for the results of the project, their position, place and role in the project and in relation to the project are determined by the goals of their persons and representatives of the project participants, the degree of participation of the team in the project processes and its responsibility.

As a rule, the KP is organized for long-term projects with a large number of participants who may not be directly involved in the management of project processes, but determine the policy and strategy of the project, based on their own interests.

A CBP is also organized within sufficiently large projects or when the project ("controlling stake") is mainly owned by the executing (or parent) organization. In this case, individual management functions or the implementation of some project processes may be entrusted to technical personnel or functional units of the organization (for example, part of the project cost management functions or communications related to the information infrastructure of the implementing organization).

The peculiarity of the ILC is that it simultaneously occupies an external (subject of management) and internal (an element that changes in the course of the project) position in relation to the project (as an object of management) and to the processes of its implementation.

The fact is also that the ILC is a set of managerial roles that can be performed by several people or one professionally competent project manager. This set includes roles such as "manager", "administrator", "trainer", "leader", "project manager", "project manager". In each case, the distribution of role management functions between individuals - project participants, their completeness and content are unique, depending on many factors (culture of the performing organization, class, type and type of project, available resource opportunities, etc.).

The relationships between these types of commands vary by project. For large projects, the presence of three types of teams is quite obvious. And in small projects, KP and KUP can "fit" into the ILC.

One of the criteria for allocating several teams in a project is the appropriateness of dividing responsibilities between different participants and project personnel according to the levels of decision-making (see Figure 1).

Levels of decision-making by different project teams

The division of competencies in the field of decision-making - political, strategic and tactical, their implementation and ensuring operational management allows us to assess the feasibility of creating certain project teams within a particular project.

The ILC must satisfy the interests of the Customer and other project participants who are not members of the team, which are expressed in the form of declared and / or latent (hidden, not explicitly formulated. – Editor's note) goals. For example, in the project you can highlight: the goals of the Customer; goals of the project participants who are part of the team; goals of other project members who are not part of the team; the goals of the parent (executing) organization; project objectives; team goals; goals of team members.

In practice, the objectives of the Commission, the interests of the participants and the corresponding goals and objectives of the project (declared and latent) are often contradictory. The multiplicity of interests and goals of different project participants determines the zone of their conflict (see Fig. 2). Therefore, the qualifications, skill and art of project management play a crucial role in achieving the part of the project goals that is related to meeting the expectations of its participants.

Goals in the project environment and in the project

Goals in the project environment and in the project, the carriers of which are various project participants.

The tasks initially assigned to the project management team and arising during its implementation are fully determined by the set of those declared and latent goals, the carriers of which are the project participants.

3. Establishment and development of the ILC
3.1. Essence and characteristics of the ILC
The difficulty of establishing and developing an effective ILC is due to the fact that it takes a threefold position in the implementation of the project.

However, the main problem in the creation of the ILC is not so much in its three "entities" (hypostases), in the quantity and quality of elements, but in the fact that this entire set of elements should work in a coordinated and purposeful manner.

Moreover, it is difficult to single out priorities from this set, since they can change for different purposes and at different phases of the project life cycle.

Therefore, the creation and development of the Commission require technologies that would allow the integration of the members of the Commission into the workspace of a particular project in the course of its implementation in a targeted manner for certain goals and objectives.

This type of technology is called cross-cultural and cross-professional integration (in this case, it refers to the intersection, crossing, mixing of cultures and professionalism of team members in the integrated space of the project in a targeted manner.) and are used both in the creation of the ILC and in the integration of the ILC into the project(flanges gost 12821-80).

Particular consideration should be given when forming a team that an effective ILC cannot be created "at all" for any projects. For each specific project, it is necessary to create an ILC that is most adequate for it.

And we are not talking about replacing the personal staff, but about the redistribution of managerial roles, relationships between members of the ILC, responsibility, etc. Otherwise, entrusting the implementation of a new project to the team of another project without its "technological adjustment" to perform other unique tasks (let me remind you: any project is unique in its definition) almost always leads to the inadequacy and ineffectiveness of team actions in relation to a new project.

It should also be borne in mind that the ILC changes as the project moves from one phase to another. The changes concern not so much the personal participants of the project, but the redistribution of roles, functions and responsibilities among the members of the Commission. This means that as the project progresses, some people who have "weight" and significance in one phase of the project will lose their "weight" in it when moving to another phase. The conflict of interest is obvious, but such a conflict is resolved with great difficulty and often with great losses for the project. The art of the project manager is to translate the conflict into a constructive course.

The period of existence of the ILC is always associated with the beginning and end of the project. Therefore, there are five stages of the existence of the ILC [2, 4, 5, 7].

Education (forming) – team members unite with the desire for cooperation.
Intensive storming – after the start of joint work, it turns out that the opinions of team members regarding how to achieve the goals of the project and approaches to its implementation are different, which can lead to disputes and even conflicts.
Normalizing – team members come to a mutual agreement as a result of negotiations and compromises and develop norms on the basis of which their further work will be built.
Execution of project execution plans (performing) - after the motivation of team members and the effectiveness of its work increases, the project implementation process stabilizes, and the project team can work with high efficiency throughout the entire period of its implementation.
Team Transformation or Disbandment – Completing a team's work as a project is completed requires addressing the future work of its members. By the end of a project, the effectiveness of its implementation can either increase (team members concentrate their efforts on completing the task, having a fairly clear perspective of their future) or decrease (team members regret the end of their joint work, especially if their future is not determined).

In practice, all these stages manifest themselves in different forms, and very often the Teams "fall apart", never having reached not only the effective implementation of the project, but also the stage of normalization of activities.

It depends on the overall level of managerial professional culture both within and around the organization. The art of the team manager (leader, leader) is to ensure the constructive transition of the project team from one life phase (stage) of the project to another within the framework of the project activity and bring the project to a successful conclusion.

Project Human Resource Management and Project Human Resource Management

In general, the human resources of a project are a set of professional, business, personal qualities of project participants and members of its team and their capabilities (influence, "weight", connections, etc.) that can be used in the implementation of the project. Labor resources are part of human resources, viewed as a measurable resource in a project.

Personnel are specific individuals, part of which is their qualifications, performance of functional and job duties, etc., which is described in the staffing table of the project.

There is always something in a project that is managed through the use of certain processes, and something that cannot be managed in the process form. What can be "managed" in a project in terms of process management?

Labor resources and project staff, that is, those objects of management that are "measurable" mainly in quantitative form. What can be "managed" in the project in conditions of lack of information and weak predictability of the behavior of the control object when making a particular management decision?

In other words, from the standpoint of "management" and "art"? Human resources and personnel, that is, those objects of management that are measured partially – and then mainly in a qualitative form. When we talk about modern management in relation to human resources and personnel, we mean the management of immeamensible quantities.

You can plan what is meterable. As part of the organizational planning of the project, the calculation of the labor resources required for its implementation is carried out.

In this case, the terms and duration of use (loading, labor costs) of managers and specialists are planned.

The cost of the labor resources involved is also determined, based on their qualifications, needs and capabilities of the project, types of work (packages of work), the corresponding market or standard value of their works (services), etc. Personnel are also assigned to certain works (packages of work) and / or areas of work.

All specialized project management software products (PP) use staff and human resources management units with good communication capabilities for project personnel to work together.

The rather common and supported in the American PP market include both "large" multi-project professional systems - PrimaVera Planner 3.0, Open Plan Professional, and more "modest" - Microsoft Project 2000, Sure Track Manager 2.0. Within the framework of personnel management subsystems, these PP are well positioned to plan and use the specialists involved in the project (as its measurable resource). But that's not enough.

It is important for the project to understand the boundaries of the applicability of software products in the field of human resource management: when it comes to "human management" as a measurable resource, specialized project management software products are sufficient.

In projects where the human element is crucial, focusing only on the management of "human resources" and "staff" without taking into account organizational and professional cultures, the individual characteristics of team members and other poorly identifiable and measurable characteristics of teams often leads to conflicts, difficulties "out of the blue" and the failure of the entire project.

The basic philosophy of the organization, its culture plays a more significant role in achieving the success of the project than technological and economic resources, organizational structure and compliance with project deadlines.

The culture of the different types of teams in the project generally includes national, corporate, organizational and professional cultures.

The types of crops are described by the following main characteristics:

Corporate culture includes a system of values, mentality and a model of actions of the parent (executing) organization, in the structure of which the project and the team are located, as well as other main participants in the project.

Organizational culture includes the system of values, mentality and model of actions of the ILC.
Professional culture includes a system of professional values, professional thinking and a model of professional activity of project participants both as individuals and as members of the ILC.
Overcoming differences in culture, professional orientation, stereotypes of the work of members of the Commission is achieved through the use of special approaches and technologies.

To create an effective CMP, it is necessary to harmoniously combine various value systems, mentalities and ways of action, the carriers of which are team members - individuals, in the integrated space of the project (see Fig. 3).

Therefore, a fundamentally important difference between the ILC and another type of teams working in a different organizational and activity model is the organizational and professional culture of the PM.

Basically, the cultural aspects of the activities of the teams in the project are considered in the context of mixed or international teams [4, 6-8]. Indeed, questions of attitude to power, individual and collective, responsibility, family ties, time, life, etc. are connected with national culture.

However, the practice and analysis of the components of the activities of mixed teams show that the influence of the organizational and professional culture of the members of the ILC on its activities overlaps the effects of national differences.

The organizational and professional culture of the PM can be considered the measure that distinguishes project teams from other types of teams and which can be taken as a basis for the creation and development of the ILC both in real project work and in trainings.

Results of the Commission's activities

For each project and each customer, success criteria can be defined and described in a measurable form. Three traditional types of criteria can be distinguished:

the traditional project management criterion of "on time, within budget, in accordance with the requirements for results and quality";
criteria of the leading organization, customer, user;
criterion of benefit for project participants.

In each specific project, a choice is required both for the criterion of its successful completion and the choice of characteristics and indicators (qualitative and quantitative) that make it possible to assess the effectiveness of the Commission's activities.

This is the key task of those project participants (customer, project owner, sponsor) who invest their resources (money, time, connections, etc.) in the project and expect to receive the corresponding benefits (profit, status improvement, empowerment, etc.).

In general, the main successful results of the Commission's activities are:

achievement of project goals or goals of its life phase;
solving tasks and obtaining project results within the specified time frames and with given resource constraints.

Other, more specific results of the ILC's activities in the project are determined in relation to the executing organization, to the project, to the team as a participant in the project and in relation to team members.

It should be borne in mind that the results of the Commission's activities should ideally be measurable. Therefore, at the planning stage of the project, a system of criteria for assessing the results of its work and the corresponding quantitative and qualitative indicators is envisaged, on the basis of which it can be asserted: the project was implemented successfully or unsuccessfully.

What is an effective ILC?

How much are you willing to pay for spectacular and effective work? How do you even determine the effectiveness of an ILC?

There are many sets of characteristics of the effectiveness of the ILC. For example, the characteristics of an effective project team [4]:

job satisfaction,
contribution to team culture,
<the sense of pride in the Team,/li>
involvement in activities,
loyalty to the members of the Team,
harmony and harmony,
result orientation.

Another set of characteristics of a highly efficient integrated ILC:

a clear understanding of common goals,
openness
confidence in each other,
separation of competencies,
effective internal procedures,
flexibility and adaptability,
improvement and growth of competence.

Another set of characteristics of the effectiveness of the ILC [9]:

a well-defined Mission and Strategy of the Project,
no more than ten people in the ILC,
autonomy, or freedom and breadth of decision-making regarding the activities of the Commission in accordance with the content of the Mission of the parent (performing) organization,
resources for the implementation of the Project,
a reasonable main way to achieve the objectives of the Project,
clear expectations from its activities under the Project,
Team members who understand the expectations of others from the execution of the Project,
patience and tolerance,
participation of all in the activities of the Project,
the presence of a Leader.

The choice of a particular set of criteria and characteristics of the ILC's effectiveness depends both on the expectations of the participants and the criteria for the success of the project determined at the start of the project, and on the real and timely allocated resources (financial, material and human) and the professionalism of the managers and specialists involved in the work.

However, in any case, the main criterion for the effectiveness of the Commission will be the final result of the implemented project of the required quality, on time and within the limits of resources.

The Project Management team is a critical factor in the success of the project.

The Main "tool" for achieving project results that meet the criteria for assessing its success is the Commission. Therefore, the ILC is one of the critical factors in the success of the project.

The ILC is one complex tool. And each time it needs to be set up for a specific project, for a certain range of specific tasks.

At the same time, the following approach is often found: since this group of people has successfully implemented one project, it means that this is already an effective team that successfully implements another project. A big misconception, often leading to frustration.

The stereotypes of the ILC's work, which naturally develop from a single project, can do a disservice to a new project. Therefore, when making a final decision on the implementation of a new project, it is necessary to take this fact into account when forming and creating a new project team.

Conclusion

Currently, in American there is a change in managerial cultures in those areas of professional activity that are related to the social-economic and political system of the state (economy, finance, management, management, social sphere, etc.).

Most of the problems of the American economy are organizational, managerial and personnel in nature. Any changes – re-engineering, crisis management, implementation of strategic planning and management, reorganization or organizational development, etc. – require a purposeful selection of professionals, the formation of management and executive teams and conscious team actions.