QUESTION
- Assess and explain the advantages and disadvantages of the different methods for evaluating projects and rank portfolios. Discuss how project evaluations can be used to make decisions on individual projects—especially in the termination of projects.
- Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the methodology outlined in the Sharpe and Keelin article. How were these individuals able to gain buy-in to the approach which they used for this portfolio evaluation within the SmithKline-Beecham organisation?
SOLUTION
The project evaluation and ranking the portfolios is an important process of the strategic project decision making and can be carried out by various available techniques and methods. Some of these available methods have better advantages and others have lower while few of them are with low level disadvantages while the others are with higher grade ones (Guba, 1981).
Surveys are an effective and useful technique to analyze the project and rank the portfolios available for implementation across the organization. These are usually implemented as a tool when the information to be captured from a huge number of respondents or the requirement of the project evaluation is of clearly defined answers. This method of analysis is useful for obtaining and deciding on information from a wide topic range.
The advantages of this method of analysis are that it is a good method for colleting the descriptive kind of data for project evaluation, it can be used for covering an extensive range of subject matter, these are comparatively cheaper for use, and they can be scrutinized and interpreted using a range of already present and new computer programmes.
The disadvantages of this method of project analysis include that the since it uses the self-reporting method and hence it may lead to biased reporting, the sampling may be acting as a source of bias and hence the generalizebility of the data may be less effective, data may be able to show a general picture but it may even lack the deeper perspectives to it, and might not be able to show the enough information on subject (Fetterman, 1989).
Another method which is useful for the analysis of the projects in their evaluation and in the ranking of the portfolios feasible for a project before its implementation is interviews. And this method of project evaluation is useful when the perspective is that the participants or individual perspectives are meaningful and important.
The advantage of using this method is that they are capable of yielding good quality data, provide inside details, give new insights of the project , allow the in person contact with respondents, offer prospect to discover subject lines in higher accuracy and variety of stratified fields, allow to gain the emotional as well as cognitive characteristics of the answers, makes feasibility for the interviewer to elucidate or simplify the questions, escalating the probability of constructive reactions, make the interviewer to be possible to administer discussion to individuals or to situations of specific origin (Yin, 1989).
The disadvantages of the method are that they are costly and requires long times, require highly skilled and qualified personnel, highly trained interviewers, the interviewee have the chance of altering the information because of recall bias or error, different opinions, aspiration to gratify the interviewer, elasticity can result in variation across interviews, amount of data can be very large to handle, it may be even tough to write down and reduce the data (Patton, 1990).
Another method to evaluate the projects by strategy is by observations wherein the person or people responsible for the task first gather the information on the individuals, process, programs, behaviors, environment and other influential factors of the project. They allow the feasibility to the evaluator for obtaining data on a huge range of aspects which may influence the project success and termination.
The advantages of this technique is that they can capture direct data for the behavior of respondents, individuals and even the groups of them, they allow the observer to gain the entry for the situation to better understand it and the various factors related to it, they also offer the chance to identify the unexpected outcomes, they also are present in the regular situations and even in the flexible unstructured positions.
The disadvantages of the method include that they are costly and require long time for evaluation, require highly skilled and qualified personnel, highly trained observers, the observant have the chance of altering the information through recall error or bias (Lincoln, 1985).
Question2.
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In the Sharpe and Keelin organization article, Smithkline Beecham pharmaceutical company is shown to be in crisis for the resource allocation process. The organization had a core department which was using most of the resources and funding and its products were not valued. Now the organization developed a plan for effective communication and resource allocation between the strategic decisions and the organizational goals after the crisis of funds in the organization.
The advantages of this type of approach included effective communication between the interested parties, division of management teams and project teams and hence allowing the people from different capabilities to have different responsibilities, developing more meaningful alternatives to do a task and valuing all the alternatives, this gave an equal chance for the appraisal of all the possible alternatives and selecting out the best out of them. Then allocation of resources was done more suitably after the pros and cons of all feasible alternatives were accessed and agreed upon by the management and the project teams.
The disadvantages of this method included the chances of class between the two types of teams i.e. management and project teams, lengthy procedure for the resource allocation for a project, termination of the projects took a longer time who were not fruitful, and initiation took longer time also.
These individuals were able to get the buy-in approach because of the data driven approach of project evaluation and portfolio ranking, and this led to better defense for a project which needed the resources. This made way for the approach which was realistic and applicable to most of the situations of the strategic decisions of the organization.
References:
- Fetterman, D.M. (1989). Ethnography: Step by Step. Applied Social Research Methods Series, Vol. 17. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
- Guba, E.G., and Lincoln, Y.S. (1981). Effective Evaluation. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
- Lincoln, Y.S., and Guba, E.G. (1985). Naturalistic Inquiry. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
- Patton, M.Q. (1990). Qualitative Evaluation and Research Method, 2nd Ed. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
- Yin, R.K. (1989). Case Study Research: Design and Method. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
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