July 16, 2007 – Authorized to Manage – In a Matrix Organizational

This is the seventh in a series looking at authority. Focusing our attention on the matrix organization we’ll look at some practical tips for surviving in this environment.

You have officially lost control….

Matrix Organization.
A matrix environment can be a difficult place to manage. As we have seen, it is that fuzzy area between Functional and Projectized organizations. Project Managers that have successfully managed multimillion dollar efforts find they have lost all control when dropped into a matrix organization. At best they share control and at its worst they are little more than coordinators begging different departments to work pieces of the project. Because the weak matrix is the hardest to handle, we’ll center our focus on it.

Positional authority in this environment is held by the functional manager. She owns the resources and represents their security. When the project ends or fails they have a home back in her group; a safety net. In order to effectively manage you need to work through the functional managers. Since you lack positional authority you need to build up the other types.

Reward/penalty authority is your quickest option. As members of your team put in extra effort or make significant contributions send an email to their managers and copy them on it. Ask permission to give input to the team members’ annual review process. Do this at the beginning of the project and don’t keep it secrete. Announce it as a positive and tell them how you intend to use it to provide their management with an accurate picture of their contribution to the company.

Check with the functional manager up front to understand the best means to address performance issues and discussions. She may want to handle issues herself or at least be part of the process. Establish an escalation path from the beginning to resolve conflicts.

As you interact with the team you can develop referent authority. Through your actions they should begin to see that you are fair, trustworthy and willing to work through difficulties with them.

You can also demonstrate your expert authority by the way you manage. A solid, well communicated scope builds confidence in the project. Creating and tracking to a realistic schedule based on the resource availability shows foresight. Holding time conscience meetings using agendas and producing minutes lends credibility to your management abilities. All of these add up to the team having more confidence in your ability to lead.

To ensure the success of the project you also need to address two issues from outside of the project. First, without the hierarchical positional authority your project may lack a strong sponsor. If your company uses Portfolio Management, each of the projects will be ranked according to their priority. How does it compare to other projects? Can you leverage the project’s importance to obtain more commitment from the various groups?

The second problem is resource availability. Find out from the functional manager the percentage of time each resource is committed to the project. Then ask the individuals what other projects they are currently working and have them rank the importance of each. Rework your project estimates based on the reality of sharing the resources. Work with the other project managers to determine peak resource needs and coordinate the resource usage to fit everyone’s schedules.

As conflicts arise from resource availability or other areas, inform upper management and allow them to prioritize the projects and help resolve the issues.

July 12, 2007 – Authorized to Manage – Organizational Types Matter

This is the sixth in a series looking at authority. Here we switch to practical uses of the four authority types within an organizational. This session will describe the difference between Functional, Projectized and Matrix environments.

Understanding your organization
puts the fun back in DysFUNctional

A Functional organization is divided by areas of specialization or function. There is the server group, the web development group, the legacy systems group, the security group and every other group you can imagine. Each group is managed by an expert in that area and their responsibility is to their silo of the company. Projects within a functional organization rely on using people from each of those groups as their individual managers make them available. The resources on the project still report to their functional managers and the project manager has little direct authority over them. When completed they fold back into the group they were in prior to the project.

The Projectized organization focus is on delivering projects. Project managers have full authority over priorities, resources and the effort of the people on the project. The team is created to perform a specific scope of work. When the work is completed it is dissolved. In some cases the same team may move intact to another project but usually they join other projects where their skills are needed. A good picture of this is a consulting company. As a project is awarded, a team is put together to complete it. When done they move on.

Somewhere in the middle of those two extremes lives the Matrix organization. It is a graduated scale authority from Weak to Balanced and then Strong where weak is next to the functional side and strong is closest to projectized.

In a weak matrix organization the project manager has very limited authority. Resources are on loan…and know it. Their loyalty remains with their functional manager and they understand that no matter how the project ends they have a home back in their group. Budgets are generally controlled by the functional manager and the project manager role is usually only part time. Even though most of the variables are out of the project manager’s control he will probably be fully responsible for the outcome. Sometimes the role isn’t even recognized and involves more coordination between groups than actual management.

The strong matrix swings the control more to the project manager. The positional authority level is closing in on high. Resources may still be shared but the majority of their activities are controlled by the project manager. Responsibility for the budget belongs to project manager and the role is full time.

In the balanced matrix responsibility is shared between the functional manager and the project manager. Positional authority becomes less of a factor between the two and there needs to be more give and take, which can become yank and shove if left unchecked by upper management.

Understanding where your company falls on the scale will show you where the real authority lies and allow you to manage accordingly. Trying to exert too much power in a weak matrix organization will cause friction with the functional manager and frustrate you. Fail to “own” your resources in a strong matrix and they end up on someone else’s project.