Project Management Journal

Project Networks: Governance Choices and Paradoxical Tensions

PAPE
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of project-based organizing in creative industries (DeFillippi, 2015) but deemed to be useful also in other project ecologies, including construction and science-based industries. Although we do not claim that these four R’s cover all dimensions of project and project network governance, they are certainly the more important ones. What is more, these mechanisms interact and serve the purpose of governance to be practiced—governing (Pitsis, Sankaran, Gudergan, & Clegg, 2014).

Given the fact that many project networks, as laid out above, should be conceived as more than temporary systems, all four governance mechanisms are relevant on two levels: the focal project and the broader network in which this temporary form of organization is embedded (see Table 1), contributing to outcomes on both levels in terms of project and network efficiency and effectiveness. Interestingly, project governance is often discussed with relation to corporate governance (Joslin

& Müller, 2016; Müller, 2009), neglect-
ing the fact that projects may not only
put in place to regulate exchange, mini-
mize exposure to opportunism, protect
transaction-specific investments, and
promote the continuance of relation-
ships (Jap & Ganesan, 2000; Jones, Hes-
terly, & Borgatti, 1997). Olsen, Haugland,
Karlsen, and Husøy (2005) described the
use of contracts, relational norms, and
administrative controls as governance
mechanisms for handling complex pro-
curements involving several actors. Their
work highlighted the importance of the
interplay among more than one gover-
nance mechanisms.

Such mechanisms, potentially at work also in project networks as (more than) temporary systems, may be usefully summarized under a “four R’s” classification: responsibilities, routines, roles, and relations. In terms of governance, responsibilities represent more contract-based governance, whereas routines and roles reflect administrative controls, and relationships represent social modes of governance. Previously, the second through fourth R’s of this classification had been conceptualized and applied to the examination

Characteristic 3: Each project is temporally limited and dynamically changing and (partially) reconstructed from one project to the next.

If anything, temporariness is the defining
feature of projects or temporary organi-
zations (Bakker, 2010; Lundin & Söder-
holm, 1995). At the same time, it has
been observed that no project is an island
(Burke & Morley, 2016; Engwall, 2003;
Lundin et al., 2015). History matters and
many single projects seem to be embed-
ded in either project-based organizations
or project networks, as outlined above.
In addition, both such organizations
and interorganizational networks are
embedded within broader institutional
fields (Windeler & Sydow, 2001) or proj-
ect ecologies (Grabher, 2004). Finally,
in the shadow of past project engage-
ment and anticipation of future project
opportunities, managing a focal project
is very different from the idea of manag-
ing an isolated project as an outcome of
temporary organizing. To capture these
particularities, we can only underline
the value of Hellgren and Stjernberg’s
(1995) third characteristic, that projects
are “(partially) reconstructed from one
project to the next (p. 381).”
A recent case study of Dutch film-
making illustrated how a movie produc-
er’s specific sponsorship of sequential
projects affects the permanent and tem-
porary organization’s connectedness
and project outcomes. This research by
Stjerne and Svejenova (2016) suggests
that the shadows of the past and future
experienced in earlier projects in the
sequel sequence indeed impacted the
tensions, boundary work, and bound-
ary roles created in subsequent sequel
projects to address these tensions.

Project and Project Network
Governance—Governing by
Four R’s

Projects and project networks, depending among others on the above-differentiated governance modes, utilize a variety of mechanisms to coordinate their work. More generally, governance mechanisms are safeguards that organizations

Level of Analysis Focal Project Project Network

Network emphasis Internal network of relationships External network of relationships in
which projects are embedded
Governance types Project governance: ( 1) shared,
( 2) project manager, ( 3) PMO
Network governance: ( 1) shared,
( 2) lead organization, ( 3) NAO
Governance
mechanisms
Dominantly designed and
formal, but increasingly reflexive
with regard to unintended
consequences
Dominantly emergent and informal,
despite increased reflexivity
- Responsibilities Project responsibilities Network responsibilities
- Routines Project routines Interorganizational routines
- Roles Project roles, including project
manager
Roles in the network, including lead
organization
- Relations Within project, relations are
temporary
Across project relations more than
temporary
Governance outcome Project success, often measured
in terms of efficiency and
effectiveness (i.e., with regard to
quality, time, and cost)