Managing Fuzzy Projects in 3D: A Proven, Multi-Faceted Blueprint for Overseeing Complex Projects

From one of today’s leading project management experts comes the first resource of its kind—a multi-disciplinary method for handling the largest, or the most complex projects in business today.

All too often, we’re carrying out projects that come with high levels of complexity or uncertainty, and conflicting or unstated expectations from stakeholders. The authors of this groundbreaking guide refer to such projects as “fuzzy projects.”

In Managing Fuzzy Projects in 3D, project management guru Lavagnon Ika and organizational strategy expert Jan Saint-Macary walk you through a three-pronged approach for successfully managing such projects:

Addressing the constraints of time, cost, and quality

Assessing the needs and expectations of sponsors and other stakeholders

Applying a proven psychosocial approach to deal with the human aspects of the project and its team

The authors provide a multi-disciplinary approach to project management (Ika’s area of expertise) and organizational strategy (Saint-Macary’s area of expertise). They draw on several examples, shedding light on why even well-managed projects can fail to meet business case and strategic expectations, and showing how their methods work in the real world.

Throughout, they provide illustrative case studies, including Boston’s “Big Dig,” the Golden Gate Bridge, the Ford Edsel, Olympic Games, Indian Tata Nano Car, Microsoft Campus Renovation Project, the U.S. moon mission, and Apple iPhone. In addition, they provide specific questions you can ask stakeholders in order to build clarity from the start of the project – Ten questions to ask about stakeholders in a fuzzy project.

With Managing Fuzzy Projects in 3D, you have everything you need to successfully guide the most complex, unclear projects beginning to end.

About the Author

Lavagnon Ika is professor of project management and former director for the Master of Science in Management at the Telfer School of Management (University of Ottawa). He is the founding director of their Major Projects Observatory. Ika has been a visiting professor at the Skema Business School in France, the Swinburne Business School in Australia, the Institute of Public Project and Cost Engineering of the Tianjin University of Technology in China, the CESAG Business School in Senegal, and the World Bank. He is associate editor for the International Journal of Project Management and a member of the Academic Boards of both the Project Management Institute (PMI) and the International Project Management Association (IPMA).

Jan Saint-Macary is professor of strategy and project management at the University of Quebec, where he developed and directed two MBA programs and was department head for three terms. He has held various managerial positions in international and commercial banking at the First National State Bank of New Jersey and at the Royal Bank of Canada. Saint-Macary has taught and consulted in banking and project management in Canada, China, Belgium, Poland, Lithuania, and Ivory Coast.