Investigating the Sources of Difficulties in Managing Project Interdependencies : A Study of IT/IS Project Portfolios

• Interdependencies between projects can take a major role in IT/IS project portfolios. However, managing these interdependencies can be a difficult task, especially when the number and diversity of projects grow large in scale. In times of unexpected events, extra management efforts are inevitable for treating the subsequent effects on the projects and their interdependencies, and for maintaining high-performance portfolios. Complexity is also a concern for managers, and a growing complexity level may threatens the project portfolio from achieving its final goal. This paper investigates the managerial issues and difficulties in handling project interdependencies. For a closer look at these interdependencies and to gain more understanding of the problem area, a qualitative study was conducted based on semi-structured interviews with managers from four leading organizations in different industries in Saudi Arabia. The findings reveal three main sources of difficulty in managing project interdependencies in IT/IS project portfolios: 1) Insufficient understanding of human responsibilities in the whole portfolio, 2) Environmental change and 3) Technological constraints.

Ämnesord

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Data- och informationsvetenskap -- Systemvetenskap, informationssystem och informatik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Computer and Information Sciences -- Information Systems (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Project portfolio management

project interdependencies management

IT/IS projects

multi-project management

complexity

Computer and Systems Sciences

data- och systemvetenskap

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)