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Delivering Better Outcomes Through Customer-Led Project Management: The Case of the Major Project BT 21st Century Network in the UK

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Problem Structuring Approaches for the Management of Projects

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Abstract

Traditional approaches of major project management take the strategy of selecting a supplier-led prime/systems integrator. Although this strategy pushes a significant amount of risk to the supplier, project performance may suffer due to lower engagement of the customer in the anticipation of potential issues involving a major project. Thus, this research investigates the implications of the customer, as opposed to a selected external supplier, assuming the role of systems/prime integrator, as a problem structuring method (PSM) to better deal with the soft side and uncertainties of the project. A case study approach is conducted on the major project British telecom (BT) 21st century network (BT21CN) to demonstrate that customer-led systems integration projects may provide more balance in the relationship and distribution of risks between supplier and customer, having a positive impact on project performance, accelerating the development of BT’s organisational capabilities, and producing better project outcomes in the long term.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    This chapter draws heavily from Sato (2017).

  2. 2.

    BT issued a press release on 09th June 2004 announcing its plan to build BT21CN.

  3. 3.

    BAA, now Heathrow Airport Holdings, is the owner of London Heathrow Airport.

  4. 4.

    The participant observation was variant in the sense that, although I was attending conferences as I normally did in my previous job, I was not employed by any of those firms, which helped me ‘to retain some critical subjectivity about the situation’ Maylor, H. and Blackmon, K. (2005) Researching Business and Management, New York, Palgrave Macmillan. Thus, the research objectives and the participants’ objectives were not co-determined, and had a high level of independence. On the other hand, the participants may be less willing to cooperate or may give less information than expected. I address these issues and how I tried to avoid or overcome them in the section ‘Research Methodology’.

  5. 5.

    Interview with Deutsche Telekom Technical Manager, March 2005; interview with Lucent Technical Manager, March 2005; interview with Nortel Senior Technical Manager, March 2005.

  6. 6.

    Interview with BT Senior General Manager, November 2005; interview with Deutsche Telekom Project Manager, November 2005; and interview with France Telecom Technical Manager, November 2005. These different approaches were also mentioned in the interview with KT (Korea Telecom) Business Development Manager, November 2005.

  7. 7.

    For this paper, NGN is viewed as ‘a multi-service network based on IP technology’ OECD (2005) Next Generation Network Development in OECD Countries. Paris, OECD http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/58/11/34696726.pdf accessed on 01 November 2005. It is based on the premise that voice, video, and data services are digitalised and transported using packet-switching technology based on the IP.

  8. 8.

    Notable examples of conglomerates are GE and EasyGroup. Further discussion on conglomerates and unified view of the firm can be found in Doz and Kosonen DOZ, Y. and KOSONEN, M. (2008) Fast Strategy: How strategic agility will help you stay ahead of the game, Harlow, Pearson Education Limited.

  9. 9.

    OFCOM (Office of Communications) is the communications regulator in the UK.

  10. 10.

    This claim is made in the BT press release on 09th June 2004, announcing officially the plans for BT21CN. And the claim was repeatedly propagated in trade conferences, such as the Supercomm 2005 in Chicago, on 06th June 2005 by Matt Bross, BT’s CTO.

  11. 11.

    Complex Products and Systems (CoPS) are defined as ‘high cost, engineering-intensive products, systems, networks and constructs’ (Hobday 1998, p. 690). CoPS are usually highly customised, require skills across a variety of disciplines, and are produced in small batches or in one-off modes for business-to-business transactions and relationships (Hobday 1998; Hobday et al. 2000; Davies and Hobday 2005).

  12. 12.

    BT issued a press release on 28th April 2005, announcing the preferred suppliers.

  13. 13.

    From the same BT press release on 28th April 2005.

  14. 14.

    Paul Reynolds, CEO BT Wholesale, introduced BT’s 21C Global Venture at the ITU Telecom World in Hong Kong on 05th December 2006.

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  1. University of Sussex Business School, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK

    Carlos Sato

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  1. Carlos Sato
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Correspondence to Carlos Sato .

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  1. University of Sussex Business School, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK

    Gary Bell  & Carlos Sato  & 

  2. Faculty of Business and Law, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK

    Rosane Pagano

  3. Faculty of Business, London South Bank University, London, UK

    Jon Warwick

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Sato, C. (2019). Delivering Better Outcomes Through Customer-Led Project Management: The Case of the Major Project BT 21st Century Network in the UK. In: Bell, G., Pagano, R., Warwick, J., Sato, C. (eds) Problem Structuring Approaches for the Management of Projects. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-93263-7_5

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