Operational research (OR) is an interdisciplinary branch of applied mathematics that uses advanced analytical methods such as mathematical modeling, statistical analysis, and optimization to arrive at optimal or near-optimal solutions to complex decision-making problems. It is often concerned with determining the maximum (of profit, performance, or yield) or minimum (of loss, risk, or cost) of some real-world objective. With this in mind, the Guest Editors undertook a special issue of this journal to examine how OR is used with project management, with an emphasis on deriving pragmatic solutions for real life problems. Project management is a useful application for many OR tools; it seeks to achieve project goals and objectives while honouring preconceived constraints. Typical constraints are time, cost, quality and risk. The secondary—and more ambitious—challenge is to optimize the allocation and integration of inputs necessary to meet pre-defined objectives. While there have been a plethora of papers written that have developed novel and improved algorithms and the like to improve decision-making, very few have practical application to real-life problems that project's manager face on a daily basis.
This special issue attracted more than 30 high calibre submissions, but sadly most did not address the fundamental theme of the special issue and were subsequently rejected or considered for a standard issue of the journal. In our opinion, this demonstrated that many OR researchers simply did not understand how their work could be applied in practice. A gap between theory and practice clearly existed. Fundamentally OR researchers need to look at how they can effectively address everyday problems faced by project managers rather than developing tools that simply have no or limited application in real-life.
Papers that were considered for publication focused on an array of OR tools such as are statistics, optimization, probability theory, queuing theory, game theory, graph theory, decision analysis, mathematical modeling and simulation. Many papers used different techniques to examine the same problem, though the solution varied. Justification for using the identified approaches appeared to be lacking in many instances. After reading many of the papers submitted, we believe that OR researchers need to justify in a rigorous manner why the technique they identify is the most appropriate for the system they are analyzing, as well as the goals for improvement, and constraints on time. Nevertheless, the accepted papers addressed a range of issues and a variety of techniques were used to examine issues central to the theme of the special issue.
It is widely recognised that project management has become a major strategy for managing change and technological and process innovation in organizations. Today there is a concern over the relevance of the more conventional project management approaches to problems which are increasingly complex and constrained and involve large numbers of interested parties or stakeholders. Addressing this issue White et al's paper examines the relevance of problem structuring methods to project management, focusing on the front-end of managing complex projects and discusses stakeholder involvement using Hierarchical Process Modelling methodology.
In the next paper, Pastor-Fernando et al consider the bidding conditions for a new public works contracts in Spain and suggest contracting authorities should use objective criteria and weights to evaluate their tenders. They obtained evaluation criteria and weights from official contract documents and develop a new approach for the selecting and measuring bidding criteria using Analytic Hierarchy Processes and Analytic Network Processes. A hierarchy and a 21-criterion network model are developed and applied to two real-life projects.
Irani seeks to make a contribution to the special issue by exploring project management from the perspective of information systems (IS) investment evaluation. Organizational investments in IS are significant in financial terms and, as a result, managers scrutinize such expenditure through tighter forms of decision-making and corporate governance. This has increased the motivation of project managers to appropriately evaluate the impact of their IS before, during and after the investments are signed off. This perspective is not restricted to any one-industry sector, with Irani seeking motivation for a better understanding of investment evaluation within a project management context. Irani explains why and how investment evaluation should be embedded in project management to support an increase in the effectiveness of project management, thereby increasing the prospects of project success. While doing so, we are provided with several touch-points that serve to outline the purpose and challenges facing those seeking to evaluate their investments. Irani provides a contextualization of project management and its phased activities to provide an understanding of the contribution that investment evaluation plays within robust project management. The perspective of investment versus consumption is examined using a novel classification system. Irani then discusses the life-cycle evaluation process, where evaluation is classified into four distinctive phases, and so ensure that evaluation is viewed as a process that runs through the life-cycle of a project rather than as a hurdle that needs to be cleared to ensure financial approval.
In the final paper, Sharif et al continue with the theme of IS evaluation within the context of eGovernment. It is now becoming increasingly well understood that the investment and evaluation of eGovernment projects is determinant on a number of organizational, policy-making and decision-making factors. Such factors can influence the success or failure of such projects. Given the increasing interest in the techniques, tools and methods by which public sector projects are implemented, as well as evaluated, Sharif et al attempt to synergise contemporary eGovernment project management components and with the extant principles of IS evaluation. This is carried out in order to model and understand the underlying constructs and determinants of decision-making and operational dynamics within an eGovernment case study. Sharif et al seek to advance and apply the cognitive mapping technique of Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping (FCM), through the use of an interpretive, empirical enquiry technique that is melded with an exploratory simulation of the key factors involved in eGovernment project management issues. The FCM allows the identification of the inter-relationships within this context and provides a basis for identifying those constructs of project management that drive the case study decision-making agenda. Correlative relationships are also highlighted alongside causal inter-relationships between the dynamic interacting nodes of the digraph representation, to fully explore the schema of project evaluation in eGovernment.
Each of the presented papers has examined real-life problems with which organisations are confronted on a daily basis. The papers have sought to address the identified problem using a variety of qualitative and quantitative techniques. By combining such techniques it is suggested that we are better able to understand the scope of the problems that are typically occur in projects and therefore provide an optimal solution.
The Guest-Editors would like to thank all the reviewers for their time and effort is reviewing the submitted manuscripts, and Sarah Parry and Professor Terry M. Williams for their support and encouragement. We hope readers of JORS enjoy this special issue.