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Case 1: When Professional Standards are Lax: The CONFIRM Failure and Its Lessons (Chapters

3 and 10). This case is available on Bb in the “Course Documents” area.

Question 1: What were the objectives of the CONFIRM project? What factor did communications play

in the project failure?

CONFIRM was a large-scale IT venture aimed at creating a unified computerized bookings

system/global supply system that would be utilized by airlines, car rental firms, and hotels [ CITATION

OzE94 \l 1033 ]. The system was developed to generate collaborations between Hilton Hotels corporation,

AMR, Marriott, as well as Budget Rent-A-Car, as well as entirely integrate then consolidate the firms'

booking scheme. It is frequently cited as a case study to demonstrate a serious project management

breakdown.

This project had a high level of technical difficulty. 2 IBM 3090 mainframes power CONFIRM.

The fundamental booking system is housed in one of the buildings, which is administered by the

Transaction Processing Facility. In an MVS (IBM mainframe operating system) scenario, the other

mainframe hosts a DB2 relational database. Customer histories and price data are among the decision-

supporting data in the database. For about 60 applications, the scheme needed application-to-application

linking among the 2 mainframes (CPUs/IBM 3090). The key issue was connecting CONFIRM's

transaction-processing facility-based centralized booking system to its decision-making system. Users of

the Hilton system discovered that the user interface, mainframe money transfers, and mainframe

repository did not interact well with each other. Other issues included a variety of programming

languages and difficulty with database recovery in the case of a crash. These issues were not

overwhelming, but they would add two years to the project's timeline.
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Question 2: What performance measurement techniques should be used to assure that proper status

reporting is forwarded to the various CONFIRM consortium members?

Employee performance metrics can influence an employee's pay, job status, and growth

possibilities. As a result, quality management plans must include methodologies that allow for objective

and truthful evaluations of work performance. Employers must first create performance criteria in order to

measure employee performance. Employees must fulfill or outperform the corporation's performance

requirements, according to performance criteria.

Graphic rating scales are appropriate for production-oriented workplaces as well as other fast-

paced situations like those seen in the food and beverage sector. A rating scale consists of a description of

job responsibilities, performance requirements, and a scale for assessing employee performance,

generally from 1 to 5. This way of evaluating employee performance, like others, necessitates

preparation; nevertheless, it can be accomplished reasonably quickly, which is a benefit for supervisors

who oversee big departments or several tasks in a time-constrained setting.

MBOs, or management by goals, are a valuable tool for evaluating the performance of

supervisory and managerial workers. Employee goals are identified first, and then the employees and

their managers define the resources needed to attain those goals. The timescales for attaining each target

are the next element of MBOs. Employees and their supervisors meet periodically during the assessment

period – quarterly is recommended – to review the employee's progress and to reset goals for which the

individual requires extra time or resources. The employee's performance is judged by how many of her

objectives she met within the allotted period.

Case 2: Boeing Spares Distribution Center:

A World Class Facility Achieved through Partnering (Chapters 6, 7 and 11). This case is available on

Bb in the “Course Documents” area.

Question 1: What were the internal and external risks that the SDS project faced?

External Risks

The SEPA checklist was the first official project document developed to secure project clearance

by a new municipality. Before reaching a choice, all government entities must assess the environmental

consequences of a proposition, according to this legislation [ CITATION McM94 \l 1033 ]. For any plans

that are likely to have major negative effects on the environment, an environmental impact statement

(EIS) must be submitted. The checklist, which is presented to the agency with jurisdiction (AHI),

specifies the extent and extent of the owner's proposed development in broad terms.

Considering SeaTac just became a municipality a few months before the project began, it was

unclear if the municipal or King Country would conduct the checklist examination. Secondly, the town

had at no time evaluated as well as given a construction permit, much less one as complicated as the SDC,

which added to the authorization as well as construction projects assessment process's complexities.

Reception by the local community. Throughout construction and even during the facility's

operating life, a facility of this size would undoubtedly have an influence on the neighboring

neighborhood's character. The very last thing the initiative required was to antagonize the community and

produce adversaries who would protest to it, causing it to be delayed or even cancelled. It was critical to

establish friends with the neighbors, understand the needs, reduce the facility's influence on the

surrounding community, and keep the locals up-to-date concerning the venture's progress and

development.
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The FAA has given their clearance. The project was located quite near to the flying line of

SeaTac Airport's eastern airstrip. As a result, several of the facility's physical characteristics have to meet

FAA requirements. The height limit of the high bay, the external building color, site illumination,

reflective qualities of the structure siding, and the elevation of the construction crane were all considered.

Internal Risks

One of the project's core ground rules was to have a low-risk start-up mechanism. The design and

deployment of the control system was viewed by Boeing project management as posing a significant

menace to the venture [ CITATION McM94 \l 1033 ]. Tradition software development with a high level of

intricacy and complexity might have raised design expenses and put the project's timetable in jeopardy.

To reduce this risk, project team members and Boeing management struck a fine balance, which

was sustained via aggressive communications plus team-building abilities. To achieve this balance, the

relevant personnel inside the Boeing corporation have to be enthusiastically engaged all through the

original formulation of the control structure specifications to gain their buy-in. The control schemes were

designed and technologically advanced by the control schemes vendors, which reduced mission risk. To

ensure rigorous adherence to the performance standards, the project team's system specialists oversaw

these providers. Boeing managers were kept up to date on project developments on a regular basis

through the implementation phase.

Handling of materials. To satisfy the project's performance goals, the mechanical and

communications mechanisms of the material handling systems had to be up and running 98 percent of the

time. There was a lot of doubt because of the poor performance on recently finished projects. On the first

day of operation, the storage system had to be completely functional. Because of the limited budget and

construction timetable, there was minimal room for mistake in the design phase. All considerations had to

be addressed, every person’s demands had to be addressed, plus each system as well as process had to

work well from the start.

Running a successful amount of operator input. From the start, it appeared that the project was

flooded with considerable user feedback. These responses were late in coming, conflicting, and frequently

perplexing. At any given time, it appeared as if they may have a significant influence on the project's

schedule and budget.

External consultants are used. The employment of outside consultants was met with varying

degrees of acceptability by user groups (Boeing facility) and other support organizations, as with any new

initiative. Each believed it was capable of going it alone. Establishing legitimacy, confidence, then

acceptability was difficult yet crucial to the success of the project. Communication was the actual key to

addressing the situation in all of the situations mentioned above. Sure, there were technical issues to

overcome and implement, but continual communication helped everyone understand each other. The

walls were pulled down piece by piece, with such a sustained dedication to constructive communication

skills.
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References

McMichael, J. R. (1994). Boeing spares distribution center: A world-class facility achieved

through partnering. PMNETwork, 8(9), 9-19.

Oz, E. (1994). When professional standards are lax: The CONFIRM failure and its lessons.

Communications of the ACM, 37(10), 29-43.