Case Study Who Owns the Portfolio? Case Studies in Project, Program, and Organizational Project Management p.385
ICC Background Makes custom - made interconnecting cables for the health, computer, and other industries Annual sales of $ 140 million Three kinds of services: big projects—develop platform cables medium projects—color, major changes of materials, and length small projects—color and small changes of material Profit pattern: Platform cables — costly to develop Buyers share the cost with ICC — ICC prefer small and medium projects(“ bread and butter ” projects)
Situation For six-month report, completed none of the big projects A frequent issue in companies Change: four - hour workshop (engineering and marketing department) Discussion on the responsibility for managing ICC ’ s project portfolio
Issues Unbalanced project mix or project portfolio Engineers would not be up for the challenges of the big projects in the future Unclear responsibility for managing ICC ’ s project portfolio (Marketing department, Ian Plachy, portfolio interdepartmental committee……)
Discussion items 1. Who should manage project portfolio? Marketing? Engineering? Both? Some other groups? 2. How does project portfolio management influence engineers ’ skill sets, a company ’ s competencies, and market position? 3. Does the use of only NPV as a project selection method carry certain risks? What are they? 4. Why is it risky if ICC ’ s portfolio consists of 80 percent of the bread and butter projects?