Personnel Management in Multi-Project Management in the profession of Technical Writing

Content

1 Introduction

2 Term definition
2.1 Technical Writing
2.2 Personnel Management
2.3 Project
2.4 Project management
2.5 Multi-project management
2.6 Program

3 Multi-project management as a complex socio-tech-system

4 Personnel management in multi-projects of Technical Writing
4.1 Manpower planning process
4.1.1 Content of a project
4.1.2 Manpower for one project
4.1.3 Creating an effective project group
4.2 Planning of a project team
4.2.1 Education and position in the company
4.2.2 Function roles for multi-projects
4.2.3 Behavior type in a team role for projects
4.2.4 Availability of manpower for a project
4.3 Concept of a project team structure for multi-project situations
4.3.1 Structur of the manpower for one project
4.3.2 Structure of manpower in multi-project situations
4.3.3 Correlation of manpower and projects in multi-project situations
4.3.4 Detailed correlations of one persons’ roles in different projects
4.3.5 Relations between the behavior types in one project group

5 Conclusion

List of Figures

List of Literature

Abstract

The concept of the personnel management in multi- project situations is based on the definition of personnel management that says that a person should work in positions and functions of a project team to achieve his/her best performance. In the same way the definition is focused on the well-being of every individual which insures his/her best performance. It is crucial to put the person in a frame that fits to the psychological experiences and socialization of this person. The presented concept is aligned with the “team role theory” of Belim (1993) which deals with the organization and the combination of the manpower in a project group.

The given paper is focused on the multi-project situations that can occur in technical writing projects.

1 Introduction

Technical writing is somewhat a new field of professional occupation. Even though it has high importance for many types of industrial companies, it is still in its initial development, thus its eminence spread only within a rather small group of specialists. Technical writing is an interdisciplinary profession. Therefore project management is an important discipline in this area. Normally people who work in project management work in more than one project. Concerning the fact that technical writing is a new profession there is only small amount of literature about personnel management in technical writing. Using the ideas of personnel management is important for the field of technical writing. The leading people could get ideas for coordination of the manpower in an efficient way in multi-project situations.

The second chapter of this paper begins with all definitions that are important for this topic. In the third chapter project management is represented as a socio-tech system. The reader is confronted with a concept of a structuring the coordination of the manpower in multi-project situations in the profession of technical writing. The first part of chapter four includes several questions one should be aware of before and during the planning of a project team. The second part of chapter four is about the elements that should be considered by in a project team. The third part deals with the creation of the concept for a project team structure for multi-project situations.

2 Term definition

In this chapter the reader is confronted with all the definitions that matter for the following paper.

2.1 Technical Writing

On the website of the University of Applied Sciences Karlsruhe the field of occupation of technical writers is defined as follows:

… for example research and administration of information, conception and production of product information, developing of teaching and training documents in the classical way and for the area of e-learning, comprehensible preparation of results of science and research and the public relation. Technical writing is an innovative and contemporary occupational image of our information society “ (Hochschule Karlsruhe, o.A.).

The following subchapter defines „Personnel Management“.

2.2 Personnel Management

In EMP (1985) Personnel Management is defined as:

„… that part of management concerned with people at work and with their relationships within an enterprise “ (Bennett/Pratt, EMP, p. 6).

The target of personnel management is to organize all employees, who represent a company in an effective way focusing on the well-being of every individual and of working groups to assure that all employees work in the most effective way for the best interest of the company. (cf. Pratt/Bennett, EMP, p. 6).

In the following the definition of „Project“ is shown.

2.3 Project

In literature there are a lot of definitions for the term project. Nevertheless none of them is universal. All definitions of the term project are not focused on accuracy, they are focused on pragmatic approach because of its special use in the practical field. For this paper the definition from Kerzner is chosen because of its simplicity and conciseness. Project is defined as “any series of activities and tasks” (Kerzner, PCM, p. 2). It has

- a specific goal that can be reached with defined specifications - a defined start and ending point
- a defined budget
- “consume human and nonhuman resources (i.e. money, people, equipment)”
- multiple functions (Kerzner, PCM, p. 2).

2.4 Project management

Even though the term “Project” has no consistent definition, project management can be defined with some characteristics that are found in majority of the definitions in literature: Project management is limited in time, is complex and unique (cf. Corsten, PKM, p. 2). In the majority of literature about administration complexity is defined as the variety of elements in a system and their relations to each other. The complexity of a project is mostly focused on activities and interdependencies which are hard to plan. Most of these consequences transcend the borders of one corporate department. Often one project needs specialists of different scientific disciplines and of different fields of knowledge to find the solution for a special task. (cf. Corsten, PKM, p. 2). Depending on how many different specialists a project needs, each project could have different degrees of complexity. This is why the complexity for all projects cannot be defined (cf. Corsten, PKM, p. 3).

2.5 Multi-project management

Multi-project management indicates the planning, overall steering and controlling of more than one project. In new publications this term is seen as a hypernym of integrated shaped management of an amount of projects that includes an organizational and operational structure and a degree of utilization of defined methods. In the practical field there are two different forms of multi-project management: the multi-portfolio management and the program management. The target of the portfolio management is to focus on the right projects. The program management is focused on efficient application of complex and important project programs (cf. Seidl, MPM, p. 9).

2.6 Program

A program is defined as the amount of coherent projects and organized processes of change. These projects and processes are created to reach a special goal and to get an expected benefit for the organization (cf. Seidl, MPM, p. 7). This graph shows a random program.

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pic.: 1 Definition Program (MPM, 2011, p. 8)

In the following chapter the multi-project management will be defined as a complex sociotech-system.

3 Multi-project management as a complex socio-tech-system

Seidl supposes that the multi-project situation with more than one coherent project should be called program management. Compared to portfolio management program management has a defined time frame (cf. Seidl, MPM, p. 9). In this context program management is defined as a determind management task that includes planning, overall leadership and controlling of an amount of coherent projects to reach one comprehensive goal (cf. Seidl, MPM, p. 10). In context of project management all this programs, project portfolios and projects could be seen as systems, because all of them consist of different parts. All the parts of the system are related and correlated with each other. This is why one can use systematic thinking in this matter. The described approach can be defined as project management system. Parts of this system are actors, communicational connections and informal relations and technical system components (cf. Seidl, MPM, p. 13f.). Normaly the technical components are not the most complex components of a project. The most difficult part of the management of projects is the human resource, because every person has personal affinities, experiences and interests (cf. Seidl, MPM, p. 14.). These factors of personal differences are responsible for a very complex project situation that is hard to predict (cf. Seidl, MPM, p. 13f.). The reason why the higher management is interested in multi-project management is that it has to lead and coordinate different projects parallel (pic. 2).

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pic.: 2 Higher management interested in multi-project management (MPM, 2011, p. 21)

In these higher management positions (pic.2) multi-project management is important, because the leaders have to coordinate people from different scientific departments, different departments of a company and people of different companies. The reader can find an attempt to answer the following question. How it is possible to organize the human resources in the situation of multi-project management considering the personal factors such as interests, behavior and education?

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