Research On Adaptation Of Project Organization Form And Decision-making Authority Configuration

Project management has become a vital way for enterprises to cope with complex internal and external environment, since the application of project organization forms enhanced the flexibility and adaptability of enterprises. Owe to the different organization forms, the projects'internal operation can instantly adapt to the external environment, and consequently meet the personalized needs of customers immediately. Due to the immature application of project organization forms in China and the lack of relevant theory and case research, it is necessary to study the project organization forms and operation mechanism systematically. The decision-making authority configuration, which is one of the core contents of project organization forms, influences how the project operates. On the one hand, scientific decision is the key to achieving the project objective within reasonable schedule, quality and cost. On the other hand, behaviors of decision-making subject lay the foundation for scientific and reasonable project decision-making. However, the confused project decision-making subjects and the unreasonable decision content configuration have been the common problems in enterprises'project management practice. Therefore, it is of great significance to exploring the adaptation of project organization forms and decision-making authority configuration.To solve the above critical issues, this study proposes the adaptation research model of the project organization forms and decision-making authority configuration on the basis of the literature review. First, according to the project features and previous researches, the project decision-making subjects are divided into three types, namely high-level managers, functional managers and project managers. Second, based on the working characteristics of different stages of the project life cycle and the decision-making subjects'responsibilities,13 items of project decision-making content are extracted through the procedure of identifying the configuration content of the project decision-making in depth by using the Delphi and survey interviews method. Then, by means of multiple case research method, this study selects DLXS, ZYJN and ZYHJ as cases, and prove how the decision-making authority configuration operate in different project organization forms by discussing the distribution of decision-making contents in the decision-making subjects. Finally, the adaptation of project organization form and decision-making authority configuration get realized based on the contingency theory and resource dependence theory as well as comparative analysis of different decision-making authority configuration modes.Through the literature review, Delphi and multiple cases, the conclusion that different forms of project organization match different type of decision-making authority configuration can be got from this study. First, when the enterprises choose functional project organization form to implement project management, centralized project decision-making authority configuration mode is proper, namely the high-level managers and functional managers'joint decision-making program mode, in which the regulation of whole process project management relies on high-level centralized decision-making and unified action. Second, when the enterprises use matrix project organization form to manage the project, the centralization decision-making authority configuration mode should be taken as far as possible. This mode is also called the project managers and functional managers'joint decision-making project. Finally, when the enterprises choose project type organization form to implement project management, the decentralized decision-making authority configuration mode is taking. This mode is also called project managers leading decision-making project. In this mode, the project managers should attain the decentralized authority.