Financial and project management
OMW year 2, block 3
Grading
- Written exam 70% -> April 4th 2024, 45 questions (mainly MC)
- Group assignment 30% -> march 29th 2024, 17:00
- -> the final grade needs to be a 5.5 or higher
See syllabus for course timetable
Lecture 1 – Introduction to the course and to financial management
Course content
- Financial AND project management
o Financial management involves planning, directing, monitoring, organizing, and
controlling of the monetary resources of an organization
▪ Specific topics:
• Finance: capital budgeting, financial ratios
• Management accounting: cost structure and calculations, budget
and variance analysis
• Financial accounting: financial statements
o Project management is the practice of initiating, planning, executing, controlling and
closing the work of a team to achieve specific goals and meet specific success criteria
at the specified time.
▪ Specific topics:
• Project scope, stakeholders, work breakdown structure, cost & time
estimation, scheduling, project management methodologies
- -> organizations more and more become project-based, so their financial performance is
more and more the product of project performance.
Financial management vs. project management
- Both serve related functions during project
o Example: sub-projects for building a subway
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,Course objectives
The general aim of this course is to increase students’ basic knowledge and understanding of financial
and project management. After taking this course, students…
1. Have basic knowledge about financial management of organizations and have projects
(finance, management accounting and financial accounting);
2. Know what intra- and inter-organizational projects and project-based organizations are;
3. Have basic understanding of the core elements of project management;
4. Are able to apply their knowledge of financial management through doing assignments;
5. Are able to apply their knowledge of project management through doing assignments.
Guest lecture 1
Project (Management) and Financial Management
We underestimate complexity, there are hardly any projects done within time and/or within budget.
Projects are everywhere, they come in different shapes and forms: inter- & intra-organizational
projects, project-based organizations, etc.
Even one-person companies need to work in projects at some point.
Aim of this lecture: ‘connecting the dots’, the project form and financial management.
Organizational form has consequences for financial management.
A project is time-bound! Limited in time, this has consequences for how people behave. Social
behavior matters, it has financial consequences.
Inter-organizational projects = collaboration between multiple different organizations -> construction
projects. They work on-sight.
Projectification, project-based -> shipbuilding -> = from fully intra- to fully inter-organizations. The
shipbuilder doesn’t actually build the ship anymore, the director does, a big outsource network to
build the ship.
Project-based -> temporary, like movie productions. Sometimes the actors don’t even meet during
the movie production, but they meet each other for the first time at the premiere of the movie.
ADE is a project because it’s every year, it’s time-based, and every time it’s an unique event.
Oppenheimer -> the first atom bomb was a highly-secret project.
Work is done more and more in projects.
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,Intuitive approach:
Think-pair-share:
- What is a project? = based on teamwork, tasks, transitions, temporary, organizations have
goals -> projects try to accomplish a task.
o = an organizational form: distinctions among organization forms reflect social
processes and boundary creation
o An organizational form is an entity comprising multiple people and resources with a
particular collective purpose/goal/aim.
o In any organizational form, mainly two aspects of work exist: ongoing operations and
projects.
o Projects are defined as unique, temporary endeavors with a specific beginning and
end (thus they are time-bound)
o Operations constitute an organization’s on-going, repetitive activities, such as
accounting or production
o Permanent versus temporary
o Routine versus unique
- What is/are difference(s) between a project and an organization?
o Projects are there to dissolve, when the task is done the project disappears. But
organizations are in principle forever. Normal organizations can do projects, but
overall organizations do routine-based stuff, operations.
Operations (routines) Projects (thinking on the design)
Taking class notes Writing term paper
Daily entering sales receipts into the accounting Setting up a sales kiosk for a professional
ledger accounting meeting
Practicing scales on the piano Writing a new piano piece
Manufacturing Apple iPods Designing an iPod that is 2x4 inches and can
carry 10,000 songs
- What is project management? = the practice of initiating, planning, executing, controlling
and closing the work of a team to achieve specific goals and meet specific success criteria at
the specified time.
o The process and activity of planning, organizing, motivating and controlling
resources, procedures and protocols to achieve specific goals
o The primary challenge of project management is to achieve all the project goals and
objectives while honoring the preconceived constraints. The primary constraints are
scope, time, quality and budget (+ stakeholder satisfaction).
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, Project management & social sciences?
Scope = what we will do in the project and what we won’t do in the project.
Temporary systems: Project based organizations and projects
- A temporary system in business, science, and society is typically defined as a collaborative
endeavor (umbrella-term) that is carefully planned to achieve a particular aim/task. They can
be further defined as temporary rather than permanent social systems that are constituted
by teams (people/organizations) within or across organizations to accomplish particular tasks
under time constraints.
- Temporary
o Pre-defined end point in time
o They end once completed (goal/task accomplishment)
- Intra-organizational: project & project-based organization
- Inter-organizational: IO temporary organizations
Types of temporary systems
What is a PBO (intra-organizational)?
PBO = Project-based organization
- What is it?
o An independent organizational form (an organization) in which the project (and not a
functional department) is the primary organizational unit for economic or societal
activities (e.g., production, innovation, change, and competition).
- Where can we find them?
o In private manufacturing enterprises, also in other organizations public and private
(legal profession, consultancy, marketing, film industry, advertising, aid).
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