The Portuguese Construction Company discussed in the case successfully used project management to improve their operations that resulted in supply chain management gains.What is interesting about this case is the organization worked to change many of their operations to improve their business overall. In general, having such a large scope can result in serios delays and possible failures but this construction company worked very hard to reduce problems that resulted in successful project results.

The objectives of the case are:

• To introduce new project and/or operations management practices that would help the Portuguese Construction Company improve their operations.
• Make improvements using project management methodology to change and optimize the Portuguese Construction Company’s operations.
• To reengineer some of the Portuguese Construction Company’s operations to increase their supply chain management efficiencies.

The case study shows what resilient planning, effective project management, technology and decision making can do to enhance the supply chain management capabilities of an organization. The name of the organization isn’t disclosed but there is a significant amount of information about the current and new operations and supply chain management capabilities as well as their project management practices.

Assignment Questions

• How would you characterize the construction company’s process, organization, culture, and management based on the facts of the case?Also, based on the facts of the case what else would you propose to improve the operational system to increase the Portuguese Construction Company’s supply chain management practices. (Note: Consider more than just the internal operations of the organization, stakeholders, etc.)
• Decision point:The construction company is planning a future development of the ICS to integrate a dynamic project management module where the activities will be linked together in a way that any change made in the plan version of any given project can easily be reflected in all the other construction site plans.
• Imagine one of Portuguese Construction Company’s project is broken down into the following 10 activities:

Using a project management plan how you would go about implementing this plan and what would you recommend the organization do from an operations management standpoint to ensure the project is a success.

(cont’d. – see question 3 below)

A. Draw the network diagram (identify each activity and its duration inside their respective nodes, and include ES, EF, LS & LF numbers outside each node – see sample for activity 1 below)B. Identify the critical path and list the activities in it. Based on this, how many weeks will it take to finish the project?

C. If activities 1 and 10 cannot be shortened, but activities 2 through 9 can be shortened to a minimum of one week each at a cost of $10,000 per week, which activities would you shorten to cut the project by four weeks?