Boundary activities and readiness for ... - Projekti-Instituutti

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scope of the project in a way that did not cover all parts of the original
plans. The third project had been in serious trouble and was running a year
late. As one cause for the delay, the project team claimed that the division
of work between the project and the line organization was unclear. The
team also claimed that they did not have clear enough specifications to
work with, nor the skills or knowledge required for the project. They had
spent almost a year searching for an external contractor to take
responsibility for planning, which had heavily delayed the project. The
troubles in this third project had affected the related fourth project that was
planned to be implemented based on the experiences gained during the
previous project. Personnel from the third project were supposed to move
to the fourth project, and thus the delay had escalated.
During the time of the interviews, the problems related to the third
project were recognized and the program management board had made
some corrective actions to help the project meet its revised deadline.
Overall, the program was seen to progress quite well despite the delays, and
most of the interviewees expected it to eventually be at least somewhat
successful.
In the analysis, program initiation in case Bureau is seen to start when the
soon-to-become program manager was requested to sketch a plan on how
the IT management of Bureau could be developed. Program initiation in
Bureau includes the first two program phases, i.e. the analysis of the
current state and the development of the guidelines for the solution, and
also the beginning of the third phase, detailed planning, during which the
key projects were initiated and planned. The program initiation is viewed to
end when the first projects reached implementation. Altogether, program
initiation in case Bureau lasted for almost three years, and the
implementation was planned to take four years.
4.1.3 Case Chain
The third case program was implemented in a large private service sector
organization here called Chain. The company provides services for both
consumers and business customers. Chain has three main business areas,
many regional units across Finland, and some operations in almost ten
other countries. During the past decade, Chain has invested significantly in
developing project and portfolio management practices and processes, and
the project management culture in Chain is relatively mature. Although
some programs have been implemented in recent years, there are no
separate guidelines for program management established in the
organization.
The change program under investigation was related to transforming the
company’s central service processes in the company’s largest business area,
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