Operations and Project Management - Any others?
I was working on my "Ethics v Honor" (http://gordontaras.blogspot.com/2009/03/ethics-v-honor.html) blog post and I realized I must posit my claims on the "types of management." I see two types: Operations and Project Management. This is based on my attempt to identify the types by identifying the first principles of management. Operations Management is concerned with managing ongoing processes. Resources contribute to a flow of activities that generate a stream of results. The operations manager's responsibility is to achieve a positive effect on a flow of resources, i.e. a net positive combination of resource cost and value added by these resources to the finished products. Project Management is concerned with managing tasks. Tasks have a beginning and an end. The Project Manager's responsibility is to achieve a positive affect on scope creep, i.e. a net positive combination of scope, cost, schedule, and quality, i.e. you can have it fast, cheep, or good; pick two (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_triangle#Project_Management_Triangle). I concede that a third type exists: Program Management. Program Management is concerned with managing a stream of interrelated projects. A Program Manager needs the skills of both Operations and Project Management. Since Program Management is nothing more or less then a hybrid of the other two, I don't count it as a third type.
The question is: is there another type of management that falls outside of the first principles of these two? Alternatively, Is my analysis faulty?
Clarification added March 9, 2009:
Hi Donald,
I would consolidate your list below as the majority can be typed as one or the other or a combination of Operations and / or Project Management. The exception that leaps out is Capital Management. Capital Management is concerned with maintaining assets. The Capital Manager's responsibility is to ensure the capital generates more value for the organization than it costs. In military terms capital is a force multiplier. It does not contribute directly to the value chain; however, it facilitates the value chain. Ideally the value of this facilitation is more then the cost. I will analyze the list for an additional type.
Hi Juan,
I would say that both are responsible for change. The operations manager should be interested in continuous process improvement. The project manager is interested in discreet steps of change. Your post made me think that there is an underlying first principle for all types of managers: The manager should strive to realize more value in the combination of resources then the resource's value separately.
Clarification added March 11, 2009:
Hi All,
Bernard has a good point. I agree with Mukund that part of Crisis Management is contingency planning and staging of resources. I would say that part falls under Capital Management. However, these are only "types" of plans and "types" of resources to deal with "types" of crisis. When the actual crisis hits, the Crisis Manager must adjust, and perhaps continue to adjust, until the crisis is over. In military terms, "No battle plan survives contact with the enemy" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helmuth_von_Moltke_the_Elder). These process to make these adjustments, changes, is very similar to Project Management; however, there is much more attention paid to external (uncontrollable) influences and subsequent contingencies.
"The only constant is change" (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Heraclitus). Change is different then Change Management. I keep debating with myself as to how Change Management intersects Project Management so I will leave that for a new thread. Certainly, in traditional matrix organizations, Project Managers are not considered Change Managers.
So far I see three types of management: Process (Operations), Project (Change), and Capital. As far as I can tell, each of the examples in this thread can be classified as some combination of these. Every manager is responsible somehow to generate more value from their resources then the resources' separate value. The technique of the measurement of how the value is obtained is a key differentiator between these.
How does that sound? I welcome additional comments.
Answers (9)
Donald D.
Manager
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Hi Gordon - not sure of the scope of your question, if its enterprise wide.
How about:
Account Management
Change Management
Compliance Management
Ethics Mnagement
Financial Management
Facilities Management
Governance Management
Human Resource Management
Marketing Management
Quality Management
Risk Management
Sales Management
Strategy Management
Technology Management
Should these too be considered?
Juan G.
Project Manager at Provizon Consultores
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Hi Gordon, I think the difference between both types of management is CHANGE".
Operation Managers, as you say, work and ongoing process and if it works, don't touch it. They don't need changes. On the other hand, Project Managers implement changes, they elevate organizations from the actuall situation to new states.
I think the difference between the two types of management is that operation management is about maintaining consistent performance over the time while project management is about achieving unique results in a specific time frame.
Gordon,
Program management can not be just merged as combination of project management and operation management. The simple reason is, operation is for predefined, reusable simple processes, while program and projects by it's nature are unique and has something new. Advantage of having program management is different than that of operation management. The advantage is combined cost-time reduction etc. Operations focus more on process implementation and operational benefits.
There is someother concept used in IT, which typically can betaken from financial institution is Portfolio Management. This is different than program management by virtue of it's nature of diversified project or programs combined to achive bigger goals and advantages of the projects or programs run independently.
Gerry S.
Managing Clients' Projects via Pinion Project Management Limited
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Hi Gordon,
I understand where you are going with this in trying to reduce the number of management categories and I don't disagree with you but I would offer you the following considerations to help you to decide.
One academic definition of a "Manager" is "someone who makes decisions". As you can split organisations into numerous functions you can then use these functions as prefixes to denote different types of functional managers as kindly shown by Donald.
I understand Juan's point about Operations Managers staying with a good process, but it would be unfair to suggest that Operations Managers don't manage change and/or improve their management processes through continuous improvement activities. On that note, you can view Project Managers as managing large "step changes" but you can also have continuous improvement projects that produce small incremental changes which are just as important. Where organisations have too many projects for one Project Manager they may employ several with a "Programme Manager" to ensure that projects are resourced with the most appropriate Project Managers. Some Project Managers with multiple projects may also see themselves as Programme Managers. All managers are able to add value by combining resources. For example, you may want to consider a manufacturing process with using the traditional "4 M's" being Manpower, Materials, Machinery & Money with value-added outputs (combinations) or synergy at the other end. We do need to include womanpower but 4 M's is easier to remember and I would add a 5th input M being employee Motivation)
Hope this helps with your quest,
Kind regards,
Gerry
Bernard G.
Programme, Project & Change expert
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I would agree with your two types, and the only one I would add would be "Crisis management" or "Response management".
This is responding to unusual, one-off (or rare) events (so are not part of operations management) and that cannot be comprehensively planned for (and therefore do not fall within usual definitons of Project Management). Crisis management may lead into either of the other types, but at least initially in an incident stands apart.
Mukund T.
Lifelong Student of Project Management, Occasional Mentor
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Mu answer may sound philosophical.
Project management and operations management balance between long term and short term needs. Projects catalyse long term sustainability but at the same time one should be prepared for failure in some of them. Operations ensure day to day survival, so opertations have to be predictable and should more often than not guarantee success.
So as you say, probably any of the management disciplines, be it manufacturing or marketing or whatever, can be viewed in terms of project management and operations management. One can even view crisis management as being prepared for a crisis by having safety mechanisms (e.g. on a plane - seat belts, life jacket, smoke detectors) as operations. And actually execution, in case a crisis, happens as a project.
Steven Covey has a talked of similar dual model, the production and production capability model. I guess, production is analogous to operations and production capability to project.
My two cents.
Clarification added March 9, 2009:
Spelling error.
"Mu answer ..." should have been "My answer ..."
I agree with the consensus here that if you are trying to simplify we should keep to a discussion of operations vs fixed project managers. A Program Mgr is simply the one who drives the organizational changes by managing the managers & processes of the other two; however there is widespread disagreement on this topic. (second link)
It's not so easy to just dismiss the Program Manager as a category. We can look at the three another way which makes it harder to remove it.
* Project Manager = tactical
* Program Manager = strategic
* Operations Manager = both (remember continuous improvement aligned with corporate goals)
To further confuse the issue, if we are going to keep with the two for this comparison one finds there are more similarities than differences.
1) Both have stakeholders. A steering committee for a project might be the primary difference.
2) Both have tasks / time / budget. Your triangle is correct. However I disagree with the comment that only PM's that deals with these. In operations we find the same issues, but they are continuous rather than fixed. Thus the focus on CANI and other acronyms.
3) Both require similar types of people who can talk to a range of people, manage crisis and keep the momentum of the overall team moving.
This should be a class and more importantly the LinkedIn edit box for typing in answers should be 5 times this size!
Bryan deSilva
Improvizations
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