Project control in multi-project environment in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Managing several projects simultaneously within an organization is common phenomena faced by managers in construction organizations. However, the conflicts are being usually occurred in managing of more than one project simultaneously within an organization due to constrain in sharing resources. Responsibility of managing more than one project usually is entrusted on the middle management of the organizations. This can be considered a multi project environment. This research is aimed to investigate and discuss the status of the management in multi-project environment in the construction industry. Various researchers try to address the issue with different approaches. According to the literature available and the initial study carried out by the researcher in this regard conclude, that the above specific situation is close to the Project Management Office Concept (PMO) described by the experts. This paper attempts to discuss project management status of the middle managements in construction organizations with cross reference to the PMO features. Project Management Office is defined as an organizational entity established to assist project managers and teams throughout the organization in implementing project management principles, practises, methodologies, tools and techniques. The features of the Project Management Office were distilled from the literature reviewed. The presence of the PMO in the middle management level was statically analysed by using the t test. Furthermore, the status of the industry was analysed and discussed with the rating of the PMO features in the organizations. The questionnaire was designed to take response from the mangers who handled more than one projects in the Grade- 1 category of the Contractors. The findings reflect that the middle management divisions of the organisations may not give adequate support to the Project Management at implementation level. The results were discussed with the field experts to find out reasons and suggestions for improvements.