De White has identified a few concerns that contribute to this problem and a few there issues that the organization is currently experiencing. The following will suggest ways that ICC can address these problems. Evaluation of current business situation within Continental Computers Corporation within the various divisions is as follows: Organizational Strategy – misalignment Continental Computer Corporation does not have a single strategy which is aligned from the corporate headquarters division down to all the rest of the divisions.
There is no adequate set of objective defined initially within the Group of companies. The Company failed many times because they couldn’t get corporate agreement or understanding. Each division operates as a seep rate entity. Each division is permitted to have there their own vice presidents and managers who have their own organizational structures as they so please. Co-ordination of efforts between divisions is a huge challenge because of the silos and deferent structures in place. There is no communication between one another except through corporate headquarters.
Operations within each divisions of (ICC) are completely different. Career opportunities and administrative policies are completely different in each division. There different accounting reporting structures are in place at arioso divisions. There are multiple information systems in the various divisions and therefore adding complication to an already complex environment. Other divisions have limited salary structure and this causes a major problem for those divisions. Salary structures and brackets within Continental Computer Corporation are completely different.
Salary structures are causing employees to seek employment in other divisions where salaries are more. There is no room for growth of younger employees to develop and grow into management positions as these are already occupied by people between 35 and 40 years old. There is a limited skills in the disk drive designers and (ICC) have five of those limited skill sets and this poses a challenge in that competitors could lure these off to better prospects. The threat of competitors luring away ;o of these disk dive designers could result in the Ton Division closing because of this threat.
The computer engineers skill set is also shortage and this also poses a threat that these engineers could leave for more money elsewhere outside the company. When a new project comes up, the project is assigned to the functional department that has majority of the responsibility. One of the functional employees is then designated as the project manager. The new project managers have no authority to control resources that are assigned to other departments. People continuously go back and forth between project management and functional project engineering.
There is constant conflict between the project leaders and development managers. When a project is completed, the project manager returns to his or her former position as an engineering member or functional organization. Planning is a major problem for the Elton division and the functional managers lack in commitments. The project office within in the Lampoon Division is staffed with three engineers. Good engineers have been promoted, or laterally transferred to project managers, been paid more and doing the same work.
In the Elton division the project leaders report to one of the business development mangers who are also tracking the projects which causes huge conflict between project managers and functional mangers. People operate at all levels of the spectrum. People that are placed in project management roles do not have management skills to control cost, planning, scheduling and managing resources. Functional staff placed in project management roles do not have the knowledge and management skill to discern when to close off a project or to apply for additional funding for the project.
Functional staff placed in project management roles, always pushes for more funding on the project and always feel that that is the solution to every project. Firstly, to change an organizational structure, senior management need to define the Organizational Strategy for ICC as a whole which should then be implemented across all its divisions to enable alignment and standardization. Management must introduce adequate set of objective throughout the group f companies. The corporate division must set priorities and get agreement and understanding between all division in order to set the tone and direction of the organization.
Communication and channels between all divisions must be open and clear in order to obtain the alignment and standardization of all the division within (ICC). This will increase the co-ordination efforts between divisions especially on large projects across divisions. Operational Management Continental Computer Corporation must standardize operations, career opportunities and administrative policies across all divisions. The group must also standardize information systems in the various divisions and therefore reducing complication to an already complex environment.
To implement a standard organizational structure it would be key for Human Resources Management to follow the steps below: Human Resource Planning In order for a company to remain competitive, keep up with technology, markets trend and legislation; resource planning is imperative as you forecast future personnel needs to ensure that the company has the correct number of employees, with the right skills at the right time to assist the company in meeting its strategic objectives.
Miltonic and Boudoir(1 988:313)- Human Resource Planning- the process that estimates the future demands for employees, both in quality and quantity, compares the expected demand with the current workforce; and determines the employee shortages or surpluses based on the organizations strategic objectives Recruitment is an activity undertaken to attract prospective employees with the necessary skills and qualifications fill positions within the organization who will assist the company in achieving its objectives.
This process enables an employee to find a suitable company and also allows for career growth ND enhancement. Miltonic and Boudoir(1 988:361)- the activities to identify and attract a pool of candidates for changes in employment status, from which some will later be selected to receive offers Selection After the thorough recruitment process (interviews-assessment-case studies- eliminations) and comparison to top candidates that applied for the position the decision is made to appoint a candidate that best meets the requirements of the job as decided by the panel.
Live(1 988:107)- a process of job matching, and must begin with a description of the jobs to be done and the identification of personal qualities necessary for the field of candidates by progressively eliminating those who do not measure up the specification Motivation Some employees are self-motivated because they derive satisfaction from their jobs, where others are motivated by remuneration, recognition, feedback and reward.
It is important that management engage with employees to discern the motivating factors per individual and implement accordingly thus energize them to meet the company objectives. Levy (2006:252)- It is a “force that drives people to behave in a way that energies, erects and sustains their working behavior” Millionth and Boudoirs (1988:165)- the drive that energies, sustains, and directs a person’s behavior.
Motivation derives from perceived relationships between behaviors bad the fulfillment Of values and/or needs Performance appraisals Enables the company to evaluate, measure and document individual and overall companies performance against agreed targets which in return will identify your top performers, average and poor performer and this data will assist the company with identification of gaps(people and processes)future landing and staff development/training and recognition/remuneration for top performers. The process of evaluation and documentation of personnel performance in order to make a judgment that leads to decisions.
Among other things, these decisions relate to feedback about professional development, the appraisal for individual and group training needs, establishing who should be promoted, the taking Of remuneration decisions and the selection of new personnel Managing and Developing Careers This is a function driven by employee with specific career goals and support by management. Management will identify development opportunity with employee thus enabling development laterally and into higher level positions. A formal agreement with employee and organization is done by means of a development plan to track, evaluate and manage progress.
This is a good retention strategy as it enables a pool of good prospective candidates when position become available, allowing for loyalty and long service with the organization. Greenhouse, Calla & Godchild (2000:13)- it is an ongoing process by which individuals progress through a series of stages, each of which is characterizes by a relatively unique set of issues, themes and tasks. Remunerating Employees It is an exchange between the employer and employee for the employees time, talent and efforts towards achieving the organization goals, and In return the employee is paid a salary and benefits.
This enables employees to maintain a lifestyle that caters for their needs and wants. People want to improve their status and grow within the organizations. Burgess(1 989:464)- All forms of formal income, tangible services and benefits received by employees as part of a work relationship Mascots Hierarchy of Needs & Herbert Model Step 1 : Gathering, analyzing and forecasting workforce supply and demand Phase 1- Forecasting Workforce planner estimates the supply and demand of personnel in terms of the objectives that stem from the business plan.
This assists with the prediction of labor surpluses and shortages in the business. Judgmental forecasting method is appropriate in the absence of historical data regarding events occurring in the market place or in an organization. Phase 2- Analysis of the existing workforce in the market This starts analysis of workforce in the market place and/or similar organizations. Identify candidates in the market that you would like to approach with the necessary competencies. Leaner needs to understand roles and design an organism of the forecasted structure, analyses and store all relevant data in a central repository.
Affirmation consideration should be considered for compliance to the Employment Equity Act 1. Phase 3- Workforce demand forecast The demand for employees is determined by the business plan and for similar companies and the accuracy of information to predict events. Phase 4- Budget agreement Reconciling workforce planning and budgeting allows for a financial perspective, thus ensuring accommodation or adjustments for resources and alignment to objectives. Phase 5- Forecasting Step 2: Establishing objectives and formulating plans Workforce objectives are directly related to organizational objectives and strategies.
The impact of organizational strategies, goals, policies and plans on workforce planning are crucial. The focus is on the end result, providing a target to measure the achievement of success in addressing the labor surplus or shortages in the organization. Objectives are defined with timeliness and targets and action plans are formulated to facilitate the achievement. Responsibilities are assigned to people for the execution Of the action plans. Labor shortages can be remedied by taking on temporary employees, subcontracting and working overtime.
Step 3: Implementing and adapting the workforce plan Individuals must be held accountable for planned actions once goals have been set and the necessary resources must be made available. Plans relating to recruitment, training and development, increasing productivity must be executed with professionalism and specified procedure must be followed. Due to changes you must reassess the workforce plan. You must monitor and adapt the plan to integrate affirmative action and E plans with our workforce plan. We must monitor and evaluate our plans as we execute them.
Step 4: Assessing or evaluating workforce planning It is important to thoroughly evaluate the plan when we implement. We can use the following criteria: Actual staffing levels against established staffing requirements Productivity levels against established goals Actual personnel flow rate against desired rates Programmer implemented against action plans Programmer results against expected outcomes Labor and programmer costs against budget Ratio of programmer results to programmer costs The information collated from the evaluation will serve as a basis for fine inning and improving our workforce planning.
Continental Computer Corporation needs to introduce a project management office that will set proper project governance across the organization. The group must hire or up skill one of the employees to run the project office that has sufficient authority to manage resources across the Group. The project office should report directly to the corporate division and to the vice president of the corporate division. The project office must have access to resources across the functional areas in order to have manage, plan, control cost, schedules, quality across all ajar project.
The project office must also introduce best practices and mentoring on project that are run in other divisions. Adequate tools and information systems must be introduced to store project information and proper budgeting facilities must be introduced like earned value management as proposed by one of the divisions. Training and up killing is a key factor for success of this project office in order to intros cue project management standards across the divisions. Introduce and Project Management Office. Please see structure below: Mr..
De White, the ‘vice ‘president need to instruct HER to create a 3 armament Project Manager positions to serve 3 departments. We recommend that 2 positions should be external and 1 be internal. The reason being that the company does not have people with experience, who will immediately start producing results without getting any train ins or courses, but if the company get 2 experienced PM, they will mentor the 1 PM from internal. The company should look into encouraging the young engineers within, to enroll for PM course to ensure that there is a successor readily available should 1 PM leaves the company.
One of the challenges noted in the organization is that the employees don’t have the project management skills required for managing, controlling costs, executing and monitoring project management tasks. In addition, the functional managers don’t have the authority over the resources required execute the project. The project manager is the person assigned by the performing organization to lead the team that is responsible for achieving the project objectives. The role of a project manager is distinct from a functional manager or operations manager.
Typically the functional manager is focused on providing management oversight for a functional or a business unit, and operations manager are responsible for ensuring that the business operations are efficient. MAMBO GUIDE Fifth Edition(Approved American National standard)ANSI Pre-lamination Phase: The project sponsor, Mr.. De White or the executive in charge must ensure that a business case is established so that the project can be justified, approved and funded.
The business case will state in details what is required from the customers point of view. Together with the Project Manager, Mr.. De White must draw up the Project Specification, which may involve several rafts before it is agreed. The project ;specification is essential in that it create a measurable accountability for anyone wishing at any time to assess how the project is going, or its success on completion. The Project Specification includes the following: Describe the purpose, aim and deliverables.
State the parameters (timescale, budge, scope, territory and authority) State people involved and the way the team will work Establish break points at which to review and check progress, and how progress and how the result will be measured. They must then do a project equability study to identify if the project has a future, if the project is realistic and if the project has a purpose in the organization. Taking into consideration the involvement of employees, if the project will be profitable or at least contribute to the organization, as they will be the project sponsor.
If it is deemed that the project will be feasible, this should be seen as any other project. The Project Sponsor needs to submit, the business case and presents to EXEC for approval Initiation Phase Once the project charter is approved by EXEC, the project manager needs identify all the relevant stakeholders. Planning Phase The Project Manager will then compile his project team by identifying employees internally or externally that have the necessary skills and capabilities to perform the required roles. To get maximum results the project manager needs to on board the project team as soon as possible.
At this stage the project manager needs to do the following: Develop a project plan Define scope of work Plan scope management Create a work breakdown structure Define activities Develop a Gang Chart/Network Diagram Project Costing Plan Human Resource Management Project Risk Management Procurement Management Stakeholder Management Execution Phase This is the product development phase and the project manager needs to ensure that the teams complete their activities and communicate all relevant changes to the team.
The project manager will collect together progress information that has been reported by the project team. This will allow compilation of progress reports such as: Activities completed Activity forecast Planned vs. actual expenditure forecast Priorities issues reported By analyzing the above information the, the project manager will be able to get a deeper understanding of the above report with information about which area of the project that are of concern and where problems are likely to occur in the future.
This allows the manager to focus on the critical areas of the project. Post analyzing the project manager can adjust the project plan to reduce risks, accommodate scope changes, accommodate activities that have not occurred on schedule with the support of the project team. The new plan will be communicated to all relevant stakeholders. Closeout Phase When the objectives of the project have been achieved, the project manager will close out the project.
The following steps will have to be followed: Project view(lessons learned, time spent on project, expenditure) It is important that you understand what happened and why to ensure that you know what not to do if similar projects arise. It’s also imperative to archive all project documentation for future reference and for auditing purposes. With the above changes being proposed ICC will have to undergo change management. Change Management is key and a definite requirement when introducing a change of this magnitude.
You cannot introduce a BIG Change all at once without defining the change; the change process and the change implementation plan as well the advantages and disadvantages of that hanger. Communication is key in change management. Below is the change process that we recommend ICC follow: The Eight-Stage Process for Creating Major Change- Process 1. Establish a sense of urgency Examining the market and competitive realities Identifying and discussing crises, potential crises, or major opportunities 2. Creating the guiding coalition Putting together group with enough power to lead the change Getting the group to work together like a team 3.
Developing a vision and strategy Creating a vision to help direct the change effort Developing strategies for achieving that vision 4. Communicating the change vision Using every vehicle possible to constantly communicate the new vision and strategies Having the guiding coaling role model the behavior expected of employees 5. Empowering broad-based action Getting rid of obstacles Changing systems or structures that undermine the change vision Encourage risk taking and nontraditional ideas, activities, and actions 6.
Generating short-term wins Planning for visible improvements in performance, or ‘Wins” Creating those wins Visibly recognizing and rewarding people who made the wins possible 7. Consolidating gains and producing more change sing increased credibility to change all systems, structures, and policies that don’t fit together and don’t fit the transformed vision Hiring promoting and developing people who can implement the change vision Reinvigorating the process with the new projects, themes and change agents 8.
