Technology in the Workforce and the Rise of the Nontraditional Work Environment

Posted on June 19, 2013June 24, 2013 by emmyr598

Technology is changing the way people do business. With applications that create faster overall processes and improved communication, the key to success is often accomplished through the use of the right technology. Managers must be aware of what these changes are and how technology is facilitating them. There are a number of growing trends that demonstrate how the workforce is shifting towards nontraditional work environments and which technologies are being used to support these environments. Remote employees working in virtual work environments are becoming more commonplace in today’s workforce, whether it is through outsourcing work to other countries or US employees based in different geographic locations than their teams/managers. No matter which type of nontraditional work environment, it is clear that technology is a crucial key to success.

There are a number of different tools that a remote or virtual employee can use. Working in teams with people located in different geographic locations requires extra attention on communication. Managers must make sure that remote employees feel included and equal to their non-remote peers. In order to do so, there are a number of technologies that help bridge the geographic gap. Video conferencing allows individuals who are in different physical locations to interact as if they were all in the same place. Having a round-table meeting over video conference allows individuals to express themselves through gestures and expressions. It also creates a sense of familiarity amongst employees since it is a social environment. Another tool is web conferencing, which allows people on different computers to simultaneously view one person’s screen. This allows individuals to host a meeting where they can present to a large group and not have to send out loose documents. Another online tool that allows people in different locations to communicate is Instant Messenger. AIM (AOL Instant Messenger), Gchat (Google Chat) and Facebook Chat all allow you to communicate in real time via text with many other individuals simultaneously.

While these technologies have many benefits, a word to the wise is to be aware of everything that comes along with the use of technology in the workforce. On the positive side, technologies like video conferencing and web conferencing allow many different people to get together in one virtual location. Being able to type at the rate of a normal conversation (through an instant messenger program like AIM) also allows people from far distances to communicate. However, both of these positive benefits have the potential to be negative as well. Video and web conferencing can sometimes be difficult to set up and if the Internet is down you often lose access to many of those tools. Typing a conversation can also lead to things taken out of context because you lose tone and expression. Overall, technology can be used successfully as long as individuals are mindful of the potential roadblocks.

Have you seen nontraditional roles emerging in your work environment? What technologies does your company use (or have you personally used) to help you stay connected to your peers?

11 Years to complete a project, plenty of time…maybe not.

Posted on June 14, 2013June 14, 2013 by mikef598

The World Cup is arguably the largest sport event in the world. Most argue that not even the Olympics have the same amount of popularity world-wide. Being honored to be the host nation comes with huge benefits; money from tourism, publicity across the globe, and a free birth into the tournament. Not unlike the Olympics, FIFA (the governing body of soccer internationally) awards the location many years in advance to make sure the country is ready. However with this great honor also comes a lot of risk, the preparation costs billions that the country may not guaranteed to recoup. In 2010 South Africa held the World Cup, however as the event approached there were doubts if they would actually be ready. As late as February 2010 FIFA and South Africa announced they still were not finished with the main stadium and still had 300,000 tickets unsold for the June tournament. During South Africa’s planning rumors were common about other countries England or the United States hosting at the last minute. This tarnished their reputation and could have been an underlying cause of a lower than expected attendance during the tournament. South Africa did successfully host the tournament however, it is very doubtful that they made a profit on the event.

In 2011, Qatar was announced to be the host country for the 2022 world cup. Since the announcement, Qatar has had to deal with tremendous pressure. With many nations watching, any slip in schedule or wrong steps will make front-page headlines. Project management for the event has proven very critical throughout the process. Since Qatar received the announcement, there has been little headway in infrastructure and building. Many of the projects that have had little progress will affect others for instance the infrastructure needs to be completed before other projects, such as stadiums, can start. Keeping projects moving forward has shown to be one of the issues that have plagued Qatar. It appears the government has realized one of the issues; in March, they held project management training to try to help the situation in scheduling and planning. It is good to see that Qatar is identifying problems early and addressing them quickly. As many are worried about this after living through South Africa’s struggles and Brazil’s (who host next year). I am confident that Qatar will in fact rise to the occasion. The benefit to Qatar is its wealth; they will be able to spend more money to assure the projects get back on track as opposed to the last two host nations. With Qatar realizing the issues with schedules, and wiliness to work on underlying issue such as project management skills Qatar will be ready for 2022; However, the jury is still out as to whether the event will actually generate any profit for the nation. The years leading up to the event will be critical assure the public, that the projects are on track and the event will live up to its hype.

http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article-22793-qatar-first-signs-of-progress/#.Ubocb-fVDTo

What do “Great Projects” have in Common?

Posted on June 13, 2013 by denizc598

The article, “What Great Projects Have in Common,” gave a great overview of the common characteristics of highly successful projects. The overview was based on research and initially included the following selection measures.

It was a major undertaking of strategic importance to the initiating organization.
Its outcome contributed substantially and for an extended period of time to the performance of its organization and the well-being of customers and users.
It was highly innovative from a scientific, technological, design or operational perspective.
The project’s outcome had a major impact on its industry and stimulated others to follow in its footsteps.

(Dvir and Shenhar, 2011)

With the selection measures listed above, 46 projects were selected from various industries. The list was then narrowed down to 15. This was based on a survey from five experienced executives, and the projects ranged from the construction of The Sydney Opera House to the launch of the extraterrestrial spacecraft into the Milky Way (NASA’s Kepler project). Interesting enough, out of the 15 great projects, 12 of them shared the following common characteristics listed below.

A great project involves creating a unique competitive advantage and/or exceptional value for its stakeholders.
These projects began with a long period of project definition that was dedicated to defining a powerful vision and clear need and selecting the best execution approach.
Great projects create a revolutionary project culture.
A great project needs a highly qualified project leader who is unconditionally supported by top management.
Great projects maximize use of existing knowledge, often in cooperation with outside organizations.
These projects have integrated development teams with fast problem-solving capability and the ability to adapt to business, market and technology changes.
Great project teams have a strong sense of partnership and pride.

(Dvir and Shenhar, 2011)

From this aspect, I think that the “Configuration Management” project that I am currently co-leading with my manager displays most of the common characteristics of great projects. This project is a multi-year global project, and the goal is to develop an end-to-end product life cycle solution that includes designing and implementing a combination of best practice processes, procedures and tools. It also includes creating a systematic and controlled environment of configuration management that is scalable for the entire company. Most of all, the project displays common characteristics #1, #2, #3, #6, and #7, and will be changing the company culture and the way Baxter Healthcare does business. Similarly, my manager is a highly qualified project leader that has top management support for this highly visible and strategic project. However, one area that we need to work on is common characteristic #5. We need to benchmark with other companies to learn more about best practice processes, procedures and tools for configuration management.

Overall, what do you think great projects have in common? Do you agree with the initial selection measures and seven common characteristics? What examples can you provide from your previous project experience as great projects?

References

MITSloan Mgt Review_Spr 2011_What Great Projects Have in Common

Mobile Age – Take it or leave it.

Posted on June 8, 2013 by mopea598

Mobile Age – Take it or leave it.

One of the things I have noticed recently is how everything is shifting to mobile. The younger generations don’t even know how to use any other device to communicate outside their cell phone or other hand held devices. Base on a post by Stephen Pierzchala on January 15, 2013, titled Mobile Commerce Has Come of Age. Are You Ready? It is obvious that there is a paradigm shift to mobile devices for personal use and commerce. Which made me think if there will be more mobile projects targeting mobile users of all ages. The mobile apps in the US have doubled in the past years. Stephen Pierzhala noted that “Mobile is the fastest-growing segment of the online commerce world”.

Figure 1. Figure 2

This fact is backed up the Global Association of Mobiles companies (GMSA). See the figure below. Universities lecture are available online. Many students are used to listening to class lectures on their mobile device. There are several factors leading to this growth. There are so many apps for mobile devices. Almost all major banks, insurance companies and supermarkets have a mobile app to buy products and/or services online.

The cultural shift to mobile life style is global in nature but not at the same rate globally. The US is leading the paradigm shift followed by Europe. In the 2013 report by GSMA (link 2 below) shows that mobile wireless data use per connection in the U.S. is significantly higher than in the EU. In 2013, Cisco projects U.S. customers will use nearly twice as much data per connection as customers in the EU. Figure 3 in this blog show how much data US mobile consumers are using compare to European mobile consumer.

gsma2

The mobile space will continue to grow there are endless providers of mobile devices and services. One of the major problems is the quality of service. The mobile space quality of service varies from one provider to another, even within the US which has the highest rating globally. Mobile users in the US still complain about poor quality of service depending on where you are located. While the mobile industry has grown significantly especially with products such as I-Phone, I-pad, etc, there are still room for a lot of improvement. With respect to project management it is interesting to know which of the project management principles or philosophy will not work very well when developing mobile products, applications (apps), or services. I have seen many DePaul students especially the undergrad playing video games on their mobile devices. Which make me to also wonder the type of problems these mobile devices introduces to our society and what educational project will be needed to build awareness against the dangers it poses. I believe don’t text while driving is clearly established as an example. ATT has developed an app to solve this problem see reference 4.

Reference

Happy Competitors

Posted on June 8, 2013June 8, 2013 by spr1323kpatel

On June 27 BlackBerry will launch its BBM messaging application for both iOS and Android smartphone platform users for free. BBM has been of one the key features in all BlackBerry smartphones. According to blackBerry there are currently more than 60 million monthly active users of BBM, who send and receive more than 10 billion messages each day. This equivalents nearly twice as many messages per user per day as compared to other mobile messaging apps.

Few years ago BBM was the most active messaging application in the market and the reason for many people not to switch to an iPhone or Android cellphones. It was also very secure, reliable and was also equipped with voice, video calling and screen sharing and was on its way to become into a new type of social network. Even to this date there is nothing else that comes close to such service. This gave Black Berry the edge over all the smartphones in the market and had established a very loyal fan following.

But soon blackBerry will make BBM available on both IOS and Android devices and this might just take away its edge. As BBM was the main platform for people to interact on their BlackBerry smart-phones, this new service will give its consumers the ability to use this application onto any one of those devices of their choosing and I think this will create a big problem for BlackBerry in the near future.

I think BlackBerry should have hold on making this move and should have seen how their new smartphones will perform and on based on that they should have made the decision of what to do with their BBM application on whether or not they should put in the hands of their rival smartphone companies like Apple and Google. To me it also seems weird that they would launch this application on other IOS and android devices before launching it on to their BlackBerry PlayBook. Does this mean that they have completely given up on their tablet market? If so what kind of message would this send to their consumers and investors?

Another thing that BlackBerry has done is that they will be providing the BBM application for free to its both IOS and android users. I don’t think this was a smart move from a management standpoint. If you know that so many people are using your application and that it is one of the best one out in the market then they should have charged some sort of a purchase fee for the application knowing that people will pay for it no matter what. This would have given some sort of extra side revenue that they could have applied to their operations.

I also believe that if they would have acted on this sooner when the demand for application was even greater couple years earlier then what it is today, it might have still worked out to their benefit.

Do you think that this move will prove profitable for BlackBerry or will it backfire? Also should they have acted earlier on this when other applications like What’s App, iMessage were not as popular?

Sources:

http://n4bb.com/multiplatform-bbm-blackberrys-play-biggest-social-network/

http://www.yolevski.com/blackberry-bbm-for-iphone-and-android/

http://bgr.com/2013/06/05/blackberry-bbm-android-iphone-preloaded/

Don’t Lose Your Project Inside Your Backpack

Posted on June 7, 2013June 11, 2013 by w13david

What comes to mind when you think about project management? Planning, organizing, budgets, constraints, deadlines, etc. are all typically taken into consideration to complete a project. Technology vendors such as Microsoft all seem to have the latest and greatest software to coordinate project management activities, but is there a simpler way?

Kevin Purdy wrote an article on Lifehacker, a website providing software and personal productivity recommendations, and discussed how the “good old” whiteboard helped him successfully plan a major conference. Purdy references that he unintentionally set himself up as the only person that really knew every task that had to be completed to put on the conference. The conference was rapidly approaching, and he had “110 nervous thoughts” that needed to be acted upon to make the conference a successful reality.

Purdy decided to gather the appropriate members that were helping to plan the conference, and they marched off to a room with nothing more than some desks and a whiteboard. He states that they accomplished more in that room than they had in their last 6 to 8 meetings combined, and he credits it all to the whiteboard. He indicated that the whiteboard reduced time in the overall decision making process. Purdy says in his article, “You write something, add a question mark, and people in the room can decide on it right then, instead of across days in an email thread.”

So how else can a whiteboard solve a project management dilemma? First and foremost, writing things down is always helpful, and whiteboards are big enough for everyone on the project management team to see. Whiteboards tend to make it feel less like you’re committing to something and more like you’re throwing out an idea for consideration. Whiteboards also inspire you to fill all of the space, and therefore expand and branch out your thoughts.

As Purdy also references, “Whiteboards are nearly impossible to lose inside your backpack.” This seems like somewhat of a sarcastic comment at first, but think about it some more. It actually makes perfect sense. It becomes very difficult to lose sight of your goals and objectives when they are as big as life on a board right in front of you. By putting everything on a whiteboard you can motivate others to complete tasks and you can really start to control your resources. The whiteboard becomes the project management plan.

Not every project is overseen by someone with a project management background either. For those people that aren’t very good at explaining what tasks need to be completed, the whiteboard may just be your savior. Software, risk analysis, implementation plans and other project management tools might be needed for more complex and sophisticated projects; however, the next time you’re stuck on a project, consider the simple, cheap whiteboard as an alternative.

Click the link below to view the article.

http://lifehacker.com/5950957/how-a-whiteboard-helped-a-terrible-delegator-keep-a-team-on+task

Find a Beauty Expert at Your Local Target!

Posted on June 2, 2013 by spr1314jvillagomez

Target is one of our go-to stores when we are in need of practically anything you can think of-a hair brush, a summer dress, groceries, a plasma tv, makeup, face cleansers and much more. Recently, an article in the Chicago Tribune reported that Target would soon be expanding its “beauty concierge” within the Chicago area. The company’s goal is to expand this program from 28 to 44 stores. The uniqueness of this program is that associates are dressed in black aprons equipped with iPads, as well as mirrors and product samples to provide shoppers with guidance and expertise when they are browsing through the aisles of the beauty section looking for beauty products. According to this article, Chicago was selected as the test market for this program due to its shopping population. Specific locations Target is hoping to expand this program include Cicero, Vernon Hills and West Schaumburg while shutting the program in other locations such as Palatine, Bedford Park, Joliet, Villa Park, Oswego, Plainfield, North Aurora and Romeoville. Further, Target is also expected to expand its program into three additional markets: Los Angeles/Orange County, Minneapolis and Washington, D.C

The implementation of Target’s Beauty Concierge program is part of a trend in the beauty industry in which department stores and specialty retailers are helping and giving customers the opportunity to try their products before buying them. Since the skin care market grew 10 percent in 2012, Target is anticipating this program to boost sales. This new personalized beauty service is allowing Target not only to compete with stores such as Walgreens, who offers most of these products, but also to beauty retailers such as Sephora and Ulta Beauty. Hana Ben-Shabat, a partner at a global management consulting group commented on Target’s strategy by saying that at the end of the day fashion is a product and department stores are competing with beauty retailers and vice versa.

Operation managers at Target are certainly trying to keep up with the industry by coming up with these unique strategies. I think that the implementation of this new service can be a great success in very populated Target stores across the city, for example in downtown Chicago. As this program matures, I think Target will gain a competitive advantage over other popular department stores such as Wal-Mart, Walgreens and CVS. The success of this program will largely be dependent on the type of associates that are being hired and the level of training they receive. Customers nowadays are always looking for advice when they are shopping for products, especially make up because not everyone is a beauty expert. Having someone to help you choose which specific foundation matches your skin, which mascara would help your lashes stand out, or which lipstick would look nice with an outfit, is certainly a service customers will appreciate. In my perspective, operation managers should place great emphasis on the increase of sales from beauty products to ensure that this project is being managed efficiently and can perhaps be used as a basis to provide a reasonable forecast to other Target stores across the nation.

What is your opinion? Do you think this program would attract more customers?

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-target-beauty-concierge-program-20130524,0,7813736.story

Preventive Vs. Corrective

Posted on June 2, 2013June 2, 2013 by spr1334msoroka

While flipping through Pharmaceutical Manufacturing magazine at work, I found an article about what pharmaceutical companies are doing in order to improve quality. The author, Doug Bartholomew, gives reasons why he believes pharmaceutical manufacturing companies are resistant to making changes in the article, “Proactive Compliance: Putting the “P” in CAPA”. CAPA is short for corrective and preventive action, the different processes and systems that are used in the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry in order to ensure quality by providing basic guidelines on identifying, fixing, and preventing the problem in the future..

A lot of the topics that are covered in the article are related to what we have gone over in class. Continuous improvement is difficult for pharma manufacturing companies because of the regulations that are to assure quality. Just like it is time consuming and expensive to be certified, or registered, to meet one of the quality systems we have learned about in class, the same applies to the different quality standards that are set up in the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry. Pharma manufactures shy away from making changed to their processes because every little change that is made has to be re-certified.

Over the past decades, pharma manufacturing companies have started to realize the importance of continuous improvement. Bartholomew quotes K.R. Karu, who is the industry solutions director at the quality management and CAPA system distributer, Sparta Systems; on what the manufacturing companies need to do to ensure high quality levels. One of Karu’s suggestions was to consider Juran’s quality thinking of having quality already built in to the process. Since quality is already built into the process, companies only need to monitor the process. Through inspection manufacturers should be able to find or come up with possible problems, and make changes to prevent them from ever happening.

The definition on CAPA is not completely understood the some throughout the industry. Every company interprets the guidelines differently. Preventative measures would be easier to accomplish if there were more guidelines were more descriptive. In the article it says that the problem is the “preventative” measures have all come about because of a “corrective” actions. A pure example of a preventative measure that is given is the installation of “state of the art” production line equipment so the number of errors can be reduced. A corrective action would be to update, and/or repair, older equipment after a problem arises, in order to reduce the number of manufacturing errors. They are working on coming up with preventative measures that are truly preventative, making sure something that is unforeseen does not go wrong.

What are some ideas that you have that could improve the confusion between “corrective” verses “preventing” for CAPA?

http://www.pharmamanufacturing.com/articles/2013/1305_Proactive_Compliance.html#

Under Armour looking to be BIGGER and BETTER!

Posted on June 2, 2013 by spr1314bwashington

Under Armour is one of the newer brands of athletic apparel and are well known for their “moisture wicking” shirts. They are adjusting their plans and goals to increase their sales. North America has been their major contributor to their sales. Their toughest competitors are Nike and Adidas, which both generate at least 59 percent of their revenue outside of North America. Under Armour’s sales outside of North America is only 6 percent, with a new strategy they will increase their sales internationally.

Under Armour has noticed the need to improve their sales outside of North America and have hired a market manager to focus on their international sales. Analysts suspect that Under Armour will introduce their new products at the 2016 summer Olympics held in Brazil to gain international awareness and support. Their competitors have also use this strategy in the past with successful results. The Olympics could be the perfect stage for Under Armour to introduce their products because they are different from their competitors’ products. The Under Armour selection of products are known for their moisture wicking and light weightiness.

The strategic importance of location is definitely being recognized by Under Armour. If their products is on trend, the summer Olympics could have great sales. Location, cost, and innovation will be a major factor in deciding where to place their products at the Olympics. The location is great and well tested. Costs of shipping their products to Brazil will be pricy but has greater sale benefits. Innovation is something Under Armour has in abundance since they are such a young company, they have the ability to be creative.

The Under Armor President said that they have focused on their supply chain to ensure they can deliver their product more widely. They are prepared for the influx in sales internationally. This is a good sign because they are prepared to last, in the long run, and deliver their products across the world.

Expansion of the Under Armour brand will include yoga fans, women, and sports bras. Designing new products in many different areas will be tough but if they can produce a new trendy design people will notice. Under Armour has the ability to be a major competitor in the athletic apparel industry. Right now, they are only 2.5 percent of the athletic apparel market. Success of gaining new customers at the Olympics will make Under Armour a major contender in the athletic apparel industry. With such a huge number of people taking notice of their product, their sales have the ability to by far surpass, their current number, 6 percent.

Is Under Armour spreading themselves too thin by focusing on growing too many different products? Will the Summer Olympics be a good stage for Under Armour to reintroduce themselves to the international market?

Source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324866904578515513925827852.html?mod=WSJ_hp_EditorsPicks

Domestic Flight Leaders Only

Posted on June 2, 2013 by spr1313perna

The airline carrier line of business has been a very popular topic in the last few years. Many changes have taken place such as bigger and better planes, new competitors, mergers, and some not so good news. The U.S. carriers have been dropping in their ranking internationally over the last several years. Asian and Middle Eastern competitors have been dominating the international market. However, it was recently noted that the U.S. seems to be switching its gears and is taking a position to head into the international game stronger than it ever has. The bigger U.S. carriers have closed their mergers and have adjusted their managerial approach and are on the rise again.

While all of these mergers were going on with the U.S. carriers, Asia and the Middle-East took advantage of the time to take over the international air traffic. Both Asian and Middle-Eastern airlines dominated the international markets while all of this was going on in the U.S. Also because of all of the mergers that the U.S. carriers have been going through, it has been noted that they have fallen a bit behind on the aircrafts they are using although this may be changing quickly with Boeings new product.

The chart below shows the ranking of airlines done by the World Airline Awards. The first U.S. airline in the ranking was Virgin America ranked 26th.

2012		2011	2012		2011
1	Qatar Airways	1	11	Garuda Indonesia	19
2	Asiana Airlines	3	12	Virgin Australia	32
3	Singapore Airlines	2	13	EVA Air	16
4	Cathay Pacific Airways	4	14	Lufthansa	15
5	ANA All Nippon Airways	11	15	Qantas Airways	8
6	Etihad Airways	6	16	Korean Air	24
7	Turkish Airlines	9	17	Air New Zealand	7
8	Emirates	10	18	Swiss Int’l Air Lines	13
9	Thai Airways International	5	19	Air Canada	21
10	Malaysia Airlines	12	20	Hainan Airlines	23

The issue now is for the U.S. to enter the international market and make its presence known. Latin America and Africa both had an increase in demand for air traffic but the U.S. missed the opportunity to enter the market during that team. It seems that with all of the upgrades to the U.S. carriers, they should be able to hit the international market much more effectively the next time an opportunity like that arises. It would be interesting to see how the U.S. carriers choose to enter the international market considering the different routes they can take to do it. One of their many options is to rush into the situation to try and make an impact as soon as possible. The concern with this is that they may try to cut corners to enter the market quicker. This type of strategy usually comes at the cost of the customer. Another option they have is to upgrade their fleets and then enter the market. The downfall with this is time. While they are upgrading their fleets, other international carriers may be upgrading their own fleets and pulling farther ahead which would make it more difficult for the U.S. to enter later. They would also have to take into consideration the opportunity cost of taking an even longer time than they already have been.

If you were a U.S. carrier, what strategy would you use to enter the international market? This does not have to be one of the methods listed above and can be your own idea.

Would you even consider waiting any longer to enter the market considering the state of carriers currently?

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-02/u-s-carriers-ready-to-go-on-attack-after-mergers-iata-predicts.html

http://www.worldairlineawards.com/Awards_2012/Airline2012_top40.htm

Operations and Project Management in Today's Competitive Environment

Extending our classroom to the world!

3 Project Management

Technology in the Workforce and the Rise of the Nontraditional Work Environment

11 Years to complete a project, plenty of time…maybe not.

What do “Great Projects” have in Common?

Mobile Age – Take it or leave it.

Happy Competitors

Don’t Lose Your Project Inside Your Backpack

Find a Beauty Expert at Your Local Target!

Preventive Vs. Corrective

Under Armour looking to be BIGGER and BETTER!

Domestic Flight Leaders Only