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A193

TECHNOLOGY INNOVATION AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT: BUILDING

BRIDGES ACROSS TRIPLE HELIX WAY

Marcelo Amaral, D.Sc, marceloamaral.com, marceloamaral@uol.com.br

Topic area: technology innovation management

Key words: project management, technology innovation management, university-industry-

government relationships, Triple Helix.

Abstract

This paper discusses subject from the quotidian of regional economic development. The

questions emerge from the insertion of technology innovation or its diffusion in the

environment where actors from three spheres interact - academic, government and industrial.

As a tool viable to identify and analyze these questions was created a theoretical framework

that joins concepts, methodologies and practices from different fields of knowledge. The

paper is structured in three sessions with the objective, from a merger of technology

innovation management concepts and project management practice, to discuss questions about

the application of this methodology in the environment of Triple Helix relationships. The first

session presents a proposed methodology to manage projects oriented to create technology

innovations. The second session identifies three relevant questions in the management of this

kind of project. The final session is a discussion based on initial results of the research.

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TECHNOLOGY INNOVATION AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT: BUILDING

BRIDGES ACROSS TRIPLE HELIX WAY

Marcelo Amaral, D.Sc. 1

marceloamaral.com

Abstract

This paper discusses subject from the quotidian of regional economic development. The

questions emerge from the insertion of technology innovation or its diffusion in the

environment where actors from three spheres interact - academic, government and industrial.

As a tool viable to identify and analyze these questions was created a theoretical framework

that joins concepts, methodologies and practices from different fields of knowledge. The

paper is structured in three sessions with the objective, from a merger of technology

innovation management concepts and project management practice, to discuss questions about

the application of this methodology in the environment of Triple Helix relationships. The first

session presents a proposed methodology to manage projects oriented to create technology

innovations. The second session identifies three relevant questions in the management of this

kind of project. The final session is a discussion based on initial results of the research. This

discussion, based on the observation of real projects, brings some orientations to managers

and tries to point some routes to the next researches.

Key words: project management, technology innovation management, university-industry-

government relationships, Triple Helix.

Introduction

This paper discusses questions from the quotidian of regional economic development. The

questions emerge from the insertion of technology innovation or its diffusion in the

environment where interact actors from three spheres – academic, government and industrial

1 Marcelo is economist, M.Sc. and D.Sc. in technology management by Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

Marcelo has ten years of experience in many organizations as Electric Energy Research Center – CEPEL,

Industrial Association of Rio de Janeiro – Sistema FIRJAN, Petrópolis´s High Technology Park Foundation –

FUNPAT. Nowadays, he is independent consultant in project management and associated researcher of Centre

for Mineral Technology – CETEM. Email: marceloamaral@uol.com.br

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2. As a tool viable to identify and analyze these questions was created a theoretical framework

that joins concepts, methodologies and practices from different fields of knowledge.

It's relevant the comprehension that technological innovation in the actual stage of economic

development is the result of an activity of research and development (R&D) organized and

not from an accident or a simple observation of the nature facts (Miller & Morris, 1999;

Geles, et al., 2000). This organized activity has the project as a cell of analyses. The project is

defined as a allocation of resources by a limited period of time with the objective to create a

unique and singular result. In the USA there is a theoretical school led by Project

Management Institute - PMI, a professional association that organizes and validates the usual

and best practices in this field of knowledge 3 (PMI 2004, 2000, 1996; Kezner 1995; Lewis

1997).

The tools and techniques to manage projects have evolved quickly in the whole world in the

last twenty years. This affirmation is corroborated by the creation of many national and

international professional associations. The most relevant of them - PMI - was created in 1969

and his great contribution is the publication of the Project Management Book of Knowledge -

PMBOK. Originally published in 1996 and reviewed in 2000 and 2004. This book organizes

the accepted techniques of a wide and generic methodology that could be denominated as

conventional (Amaral, 2003). In this period, were developed and diffused softwares that

automate most part of functionalities from the tools, as MS Project from Microsoft and

Primavera from Primavera Systems. In the quotidian of industry, during the same period, has

been widely disseminated the vision of an enterprise oriented to execute projects. A relevant

technique of this new vision is the Project Management Offices - PMO as a strategic unit to

manage projects.

When we say project as an action that introduce new technologies was created a particular

field of knowledge in the project management universe. It works with the specificities of

2 Technological innovation can be defined as: 1) the introduction of a new product or a new quality or a new

application of a product; 2) the introduction of a new production or commercialization method; 3) the

introduction of a new product in a new market; 4) the introduction of a new supplier in the productive chain; and

5) the organization of a new industrial structure inside the productive chain creating or breaking a monopoly

configuration. 3 The Project Management is relatively new as a profession. There's not complete consensus about terms used

however there's a reasonable concordance about activities executed. As any other profession the set of

knowledge is based in the contribution of the professionals and was developed in his daily activities and include

proved knowledge based on traditional and widely diffused practices but also knowledge from new, advanced

and practices not tested. The PMI has nowadays 140,000 members across the world. In Brazil, PMI has many

chapters and relevant number of specialist, more than 1,000, certified as a Project Management Professional -

PMP.

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technological innovation process, since the concept of technical change in the relation

between capital and labor, (Nelson & Winter, 1977, 1982; Rosenberg, 1982; Hall, 1994) until

the idea of technological paradigm (Dosi, 1988) and the impacts in the innovation systems

(Lundval, 1992; Edquist, 1997) and in the public policies.

The figure was developed to support the understanding of the dynamic from the environment

where technological innovation projects are inserted. In an initial moment (T0) there is in the

market a dominant technology to manufacture a product or a productive process consolidated

4. In a second moment a technological change occur as a result of the innovation introduction.

This technological innovation is diffused inside the productive sector where it was created and

many times outside this sector. As result the relationship between capital and work was

changed and the productive process is carried to a superior stage of productivity. By this way,

the dominant technology was changed (T1). The technological innovation introduced in the

market is result of an R&D activity, organized in projects and executed inside an organization

specialized in this kind of activity. This organization manages a wide set of projects searching

to attend latent demands and discover necessities not revealed from consumers. This model

presented assumes the technological innovation as a result of an organized activity of R&D.

However, it is known that technology innovation can emerge from others activities. The

learning by use or learning by doing are relevant mechanisms, a quality program, a system

implementations, the capacity of technical team can create new arrangements in the relation

between capital and labor.

FIGURE I – Technology Innovation Model

4 The technology can be defined as a set of tools, mechanisms and knowledge that works on inputs, as capital

and machines, creating significant results. This relation occurs in the process technologies and also in the

creation of new products and services. In a general way, the technology can be characterized as a meeting of

practical and tacit knowledge, know how, methods, procedures, experiences - well succeed and not well succeed

- and also physical equipments and others components.

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Font: Amaral (2003).

It's possible to aggregate the idea of a project management oriented to create technological

innovation with the Triple Helix environment of relationships between University, industry

and government spheres (Etzkowitz, Leydersdoff, 1998, 2000), or between academic,

government and productive sector as proposed by Triple Helix expanded model (Almeida,

2004). The project management methodology oriented to create technological innovation

finds some troubles when applied in the interactive environment of the spheres with an

increasing presence of complexity and dynamism. This complexity and dynamism is a

resultant of the sum of two parts. First of them originated from complex and dynamic of

technological innovation process, another from the complex and dynamic relationships

between the actors from different spheres, with different languages, expectations and

interests.

This article tries to identify and analyze some situations that can occur in this kind of projects

looking for answers and new ways to manage them. For that it was structured in three

sessions. First, a methodology oriented to manage projects that results in technology

innovation will be presented. In the second session some questions related with complexity,

dynamism and uncertainty in the projects of technological innovation inside Triple Helix of

university-industry-government relations would be analyzed. In the last session the first

considerations from author's research will be presented.

Session I – The project management methodology oriented to create technology

innovation

R&D organizations

Dominant technology (T0) Technical change Dominant technology (T1)

Projects

R&D

Technology innovation

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In the first stages of capitalism as production mode, between XVI and XVIII century, the

activities of search and selection of methods, products, procedures and process was similar to

a casual process that sometimes had a new technology as a result. With the increase of

complexity of industrial society it was necessary to organize this process through a

systemization of R&D activity inside the organizations 5.

The technical and scientific activities, as R&D activity, are composed of decisions about

selection, priority, interaction and transference. The technical and scientific activity is

integrated by three main elements: people or the teams that conduct the activities of research

and generate technical and scientific knowledge; financial resources; and potential users of

R&D results (Hasenclever, 1996).

The expansion of R&D activity brings the concern with management of this activity as a

function of the firm and with the impact of technical change in the stages of product life

cycle. In the first moment a new technology transform the market and in the second moment

is assimilated by others participants and lose its competitive advantage because the

competitors will copy this technology or find another way to reach the same situation. This

way, the development of methodologies to map or to forecast new technologies supports how

to adapt the evolution of technology in products and services to each type of business.

From middles of the century XX, financial risk context, strategic planning and technological

forecast were included as part of the practice of technological innovation management. The

management equilibrates between marketing department, which determines consumer needs

through studies of demand from markets, and R&D department, which creates technology

through products and processes. In this balance effort between marketing and R&D only well

articulated demands from consumers are transformed in products and services.

However, this explicit needs from consumers it is only a visible and conscious part of a whole

set of needs. Most part of the latent needs will not be satisfied. The innovation based on the

explicit part of consumer desire can be only incremental. In this environment, consumers must

suppose what products, services and infrastructure will be available in the future. However,

the planning it is not enough accurate about investments and capacity which they would like

to develop or will require. The sellers also must foresee about market demand of new

5 Research can be defined as an investigation or a minute search to inquire reality or a detailed and systematic

study with the objective to discover or establish facts and principles in relation to any particular field of

knowledge. Development is related with grow, increase or progression of the economic, social and political stage

of the community characterized by high revenues indicators originated from production factors.

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products and services. An alternative for this limitation is to share the information obtained

through experiments with sellers, consumers and others stakeholders. This process of to share

could be transformed on practice when all participants which would not make suppositions

test a new product. As a result, the latent needs will be exposed and will be useful to other

technological innovations because individuals from different kind of communities and

organizations will participate together in the learning process about what is possible and what

is useful to each one of them.

The learning process must be without restriction or limits (open-ended) or it is not learning.

And, how innovation is the base of knowledge it is consequently an open and not restricting

process. However, many organizational methods decisions are oriented by a rationality based

on explicit knowledge, which is limited and limiting. For example, financial practices which

came from mathematics knowledge as investment return rates cannot be calculated to the

most part of technological innovation investments because the R&D results cannot be

foreseen before it happen. Soon, the methodologies of entrepreneurial finance must be

changed if technological innovation will be included as an active of the firm.

The new practices that constitute relevant changes in the way of doing business must lead the

determination process of how the new technical and scientific knowledge must be applied

with the objective of to identify and bring satisfaction to the needs not explicit from

consumers. This R&D management model is designated from the fourth generation (Miller &

Morris, 1999) because is the base of the conception that consumer need and technological

capacities evolves one related to the others in a learning process mutually dependent. In the

place where are accessed and refined technological capacities and concepts in a context of

real consumer needs. The practice of fourth R&D generation defines a wide mission to R&D

as a leader of discontinuous technological innovations. With the objective of execute this

mission a new R&D management by projects in a complex and dynamic context is a need.

It is possible to affirm that R&D management is much more related with the steps or phases

of technological innovation process (basic research, applied and experimental development)

than with phases of a project (identification, design, development and test). This fact has

created a distance between conventional project management methodology and R&D project

management (Amaral, 2003) because scientists tend to not respect management as scientific

field of knowledge similar to the hard sciences, sociology or economics (Geles et al., 2000).

Since last decade the distance is being reduced because the result of research project is

leaving to be done in an independent way and passing to be done in an integrated way

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adjusted to an organizational strategy based in a fourth generation view. In this way, R&D

project management methodology oriented to create new technologies needs to incorporate

elements from conventional project management methodology.

A proposal to review the structure of organizations that works with technology innovation

with the objective to increase the efficiency of its projects is based on three kinds of activities:

administrative, activities related with fields of knowledge and projects. (Amaral, 2003). The

administrative activities centralize all tasks related to the infrastructure and support to the

main activity of the organization, as: human resources, equipments maintenance, general

services as security, procurement and storage, accountancy and others. Specialist in specifics

knowledge fields and technicians with the objective to create facilities to the researches must

execute these activities. Knowledge in R&D process it is not relevant.

These administrative activities include also the highest hierarchic level of the management

and the external communication. These groups that define the direction of the organization

and the strategic planning must be integrated by specialists in science and technology

management and by senior researches. The organization can qualify these specialists and must

qualify the researches. Consultant councils with external members are also important in the

oxygenation of organization faiths with external visions 6.

The knowledge area can be understood as departments where researches are allocated

according his competences. In these departments, research groups or cells are created and the

researches are self-organized inside these groups through a light hierarchy related with

qualification and scientific experience. The most important action is the constant mapping and

improvement of the research competences through partnerships with universities or creating

internal development programs, for example. These cells or groups are not related directly to

the main activities of the organization. However they execute studies to the improvement of

researches competencies. For this, it is not necessary an expressive number of managers, but it

is enough a group of coordinators subordinated to an executive director. A council of senior

researches integrated by group coordinators could aid the top management in a translation of

the strategic planning in a plan of action. It is important also some plans that orient the active

management of knowledge, physical documents and the dissemination of information.

6 A general assembly, a fiscal council and an executive directory with a general director and three directors for

each area are suggested (Amaral, 2003).

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The project area must be more flexible because projects are structured based on the needs of

clients. Project is a temporary activity with start and end well defined. A specialized manager

must lead whole project from selling to delivery. This manager needs a set of competences, as

wide managerial skills, good technical skill and ability to negotiate. It is not desirable a senior

research in the manager position.

Consultants defined as professionals with skills about project management and researches

must organize project teams. The R&D project has specifics and well-defined tasks according

his stage, what will reflect on the composition and balance of project team. A basic research

project in cooperation with another organization and supported by public funds will have

almost all team composed by researches. Some few consultants take care of documentations,

contracts and accounting. Researchers and technicians will do an applied research project with

laboratory work and prototype development. In other way, a project to develop a new product

or process and implement this in the industry will be done in two parts: first, during research,

by researches; second, in the implementation, by consultants. Finally, a project to customize

software will have few researches and a lot of consultants, which probably will work with

client information technology team. In the case of many research groups involved with the

project, a senior research or the other researches are considered as a technical manager and

also responsible together the project manager.

In the organization of R&D project the researches are responsible for the core work while

consultants are responsible by support activities as data mining, sell, customization,

implementation and operational support. The administrative work, as contract elaboration,

financial control, procurement and others must be done by technicians from administrative

area of organization. If necessary this administrative staff should be allocated part of his time

in the project and dislocated to the client office.

In the relation between knowledge area and administrative area the organization qualification

process are created. The top management defines the main objectives and areas of work.

Consequently, the required skills must be related with the structure of research groups. New

objectives represent new groups or multidisciplinary groups. The relationship between

projects and knowledge areas is a matrix that shows the core activity of the organization. It

means in what projects the researches are allocated. In the relationship between projects and

administrative activities there is a support or aid with an objective to create facilities to the

core activity of the organization and save resources because researches costs are more

expensive and availability of people with particular skill are little.

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A construction to analyze the relationship between these three areas - projects, knowledge and

administrative - is a three-dimensional matrix. In each area (vertexes) or in each space of

relationship must be applied the adequate method of management.

FIGURE II – Three-dimensional matrix

The management of administrative activities and in the relationship between administrative

area and knowledge area the management procedures from general theory of business

administration must be utilized because this activities are routine in the organization. In the

management of knowledge area and in the relationship between this and project area is

common to use a traditional R&D management that organizes projects in basic research,

applied research and experimental development.

The great lacuna is in the management of project area and in the relationship of this area with

administrative area. According the organization culture and trajectory, a relationship between

project and administrative areas is managed in the conventional administration way, which

creates projects excessively bureaucratic, or with traditional R&D management creating an

inadequate control. Since last decade, research institutes are incorporating tools and

techniques from conventional project management methodology. However, without adequate

tools and techniques to the specificities of R&D project.

Font: Amaral (2003).

Knowledge areas

Administration

Projects

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A proposal is to do a management of project area and between the relationship of knowledge

and project areas as well as administrative area and project area that applies tools and

techniques from project management in a coherent form with the stage of R&D (Amaral,

2003). However, only the proposition of a model where tools and techniques are adjusted in a

flow of processes and phases similar to PMI or conventional model is not enough to satisfy

the specificities of project management oriented to create technological innovation. Only are

attended internal elements without a correct balance between the influences from the rest of

the organization and from outside them.

What is more realistic is the overlap of phases where activities from one phase are being

executed during the planning and execution of the next phase, for example. Is normal a

confusion between results from a predecessor activity with inputs of a posterior activity.

However, this vision is based in a clear sharing between activities what is not evident in a

project, particularly if it is more complex. The most adequate vision is shown in the next

figure where a Project Management Office - PMO is created during whole project and the

activities are organized with focus on the main targets, and consequently, processes and

phases are interpolated.

Can be suggested a model shared in three main phases denominated design, development and

delivery. Four process groups compose each one of them: initiation, planning, execution and

closing. Each group of processes has a set of activities to be done. The project plan, the main

output of planning activities, for example, includes activities, resources, team, risks, quality,

communication and acquisitions as PMBOK knowledge areas but to a R&D focus.

Additionally, a PMO must be created to manage the project or a group of projects that use

similar resources or result in a similar product, process or service.

An stylization of proposed model assuming each phase as a triangle, as presented below,

allow visualize a project as a set of three linked triangles which could be denominated 3D

Model to manage R&D projects . The line under the triangles (baseline) is the PMO. This

figure is also suggestive to represent the project life cycle, particularly about required

resources. In an initial phase an increasing need of resources occur. According new

technology or product is being specified the execution activities are started. After this, there is

stabilization of resources because the specification is done, the design phase is closed and the

execution group of activities of development phase is started. In a third moment,

development phase is in his closing and delivery planning and execution is started. In the end,

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there is a moment when development phase ends and just delivery phase process are

happening. The resources are dislocated to other projects.

FIGURE III - 3D Model

Font: Amaral (2003)

Session II – Questions from complexity, dynamic and uncertainty

However, even with advances in the project management theory and in the diffusion of

comprehension of project management oriented to technological innovation there are three

kinds of projects those are difficult to be managed by the conventional methodology and also

by 3D model. The first one is the small projects of technology development where the costs of

introduce a methodology and software is significant part of the total cost of the project.

The second one is the problem to manage complex and dynamic projects of technology

development integrated by actors from different spheres, as universities, government and

industry. An example of this kind of project is the Brazilian local productive arrangements

experience. In the same category can be included projects started with an inadequate planning,

a common practice in the public sector. The complex projects can be defined as a project with

a large number of stakeholders with wide and different interests, sometimes opposite interests.

According the project resources are utilized the management lose efficiency because

stakeholders influence managers to devote project resources to attend his interests, not to the

execution

closing

closing

initiation

initiation

planning

planning

execution

execution

planning

initiation closing

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planned project activities. The question it's not only about interests but also about concepts

and languages that create a complex arrangement to manage multi-institutional projects.

The third category of projects could be denominated as non-projects. Projects structured to

create new technologies have several management problems due mainly to the technological

uncertainty (Amaral, 2003). It is not the risk treated by conventional methodology but a

perception that the planned and executed activities cannot generate the expected results. A

real example is a R&D project to develop a medicine to a health problem, an extreme example

is HIV. The project chronogram of an applied research can't tell to the project manager and to

the stakeholders when the solution will be founded. A conventional project is a reunion of a

set of resources for a limited time to create a unique result and it can be considered well

succeed when the previewed result is obtained with the budget and time adequate. Analyzing

the requisites of a project well succeed, the non-project is the one that follows all the

characteristics of a conventional project but his result is uncertainty, not a technological

innovation in the sense of market relevance and diffusion. In a lot of situations a complex and

dynamic project is transformed in a non-project.

Some studies have been done to verify the applicability of 3D model in the nets of interaction

between actors of each spheres of Triple Helix expanded model (academic sector or

knowledge creator sector, productive sector and government) with the following objectives:

1) To small projects, where the cost of introduce a methodology is high when related with

total cost of the project, is intended to define what is high (management cost and project total

cost) and define viable alternatives to implement a minimal set of tools; 2) To complex and/or

dynamic projects, particularly those between actors of the spheres of Triple Helix expanded

model, is intended to investigate how 3D model could be applied; 3) In the case of non-

projects or uncertain projects is proposed to define and structure the concept; and 4) To

investigate the main causes and motivations of transformation of complex and/or dynamic

projects in non-projects 7.

7 These questions came from the author’s experience as researcher and manager of many project executed in

Brazil as: 1) the implementation of a new department in the Electric Energy Research Center (CEPEL); 2) the

development and implementation of a computer systems to the Brazilian Power Exchange; 3) the development

and implementation of a system to monitor technical services from National System of Industrial Apprenticeship

(SENAI); 4) the implementation of department responsible for studies and projects in the Petrópolis´s High

Technology Park Foundation (FUNPAT); 5) the consultancy to the Business Councils of Industrial Association

of Rio de Janeiro (FIRJAN); 6) the work as a member of Technical Groups of many Local Productive

Arrangements; 7) the strategic planning of Petrópolis Tecnópolis; 8) the implementation of an technological

firms incubator to FUNPAT/SerraSoft; 9) the implantation of a Technology Transfer Office to Centre for

Mineral Technology (CETEM); 10) the coordination of a project to develop an integrated system to manage

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Session III – Initial Considerations

This session should be called final remarks but as the research is not complete until this

moment is possible to do some initial considerations. About projects with small budget some

cases was studied. This projects has values around US$ 20,000 and the objective was to verify

the cost of introduce tools and techniques of project management methodology. In this case

was not relevant if is a traditional PMI methodology or 3D model. The research suggests that

the cost can be considered high when is more than 5% of total cost of project. In a

commercial relationship the client will not agree to pay for management methodology. It is a

competitive differential that should be included in the operation cost of the R&D

organization.

A suggested alternative is an implementation of tools for a set of projects. In a business

environment, a tool that aid projects of the whole organization will have the cost shared

between projects. Something similar is happening in the most part of organizations, not only

in the R&D management or conventional project management but also in all knowledge areas

with the implementation of integrated management systems as Enterprise Resource Planning

(ERP), Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) and others. This tendency can be explored in

R&D organizations through project management software, which could be disseminated by

PMOs. The real question is for three situations. First, activities not planned or planned

incorrectly. Second, is in the case of several small projects with the same team or in the same

department. Third, is in the case of a set of internal projects as team qualification or

development of a computer system. It is normal not compute some activities that create

negative impacts, not in terms of cost but in term of time. The internal projects are executed

with the rests of team hours and because this should be planned but exactly the contrary

happen. A bad evaluation about scope, an internal deficient communication and a pressure

from top management for results could create great losses of time and many management

problems. These internal project are transformed in a quasi-project or a semi-project and stay

lost between teams without be effectively executed. Many examples were identified in all

organizations researched.

Another serious problem identified in the organizations is the conflict between rigid

hierarchical structures, represented by departments, divisions and others, and an execution of

activities by projects. In this conflict, the project coordinator does not have control of the team

incubator; 11) the coordination of a research about management model of Brazilian technological parks, and 12)

the consultancy in many workgroups.

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member. The hierarchic manager always has to be consulted in a structure that impedes the

emergence of a leader. An information management system that disseminates the right

information for adequate levels of the firm can be an important tool. In the case of quasi-

projects or semi-projects a specific module where a project planned incorrectly can be

corrected during execution. The module would contain a form of request service through

which project coordinator creates a new activity. This action actualizes automatically the rest

of activities not executed and adjusts the allocation of resources. So that will be possible to

identify the total cost of internal projects, what many times is not measured, and the impact in

other projects.

In environments not oriented to business a similar suggestion is given to representative

associations. These associations can assume a paper as protagonists of this history. For

example, the Association of Brazilian Enterprises of Software and Informatics Services

(ASSESPRO) or The Society for the Promotion of Excellence in Brazilian Software

(SOFTEX) could create programs to disseminate the use of projects management tools in the

development of new products. Another example is in the R&D institutions from the Science

and Technology Minister. A suggestion is to develop a multi-institutional project to

implement a web tool exclusively to manage all R&D projects and disseminate the

methodology 8. With similar logic in each University there is an aid foundation that could

implement a web tool as a condition to accept projects. Finally, the public agencies as

Brazilian Innovation Agency (Research and Projects Finance Agency) - FINEP, National

Council for Scientific and Technological Development - CNPQ and local foundations that

finance R&D could create a national program to disseminate tools and techniques of projects

management. Other examples well succeed are electronic form to submit projects and Lattes

Curriculum, an integrated platform of researches data 9.

In a wide perspective it is possible to suggest that Federal Government create a national

program of project management diffusion in the public and private spheres, for example, with

the creation of a public software library and financing the qualification and consultancy

services. This program would disseminate also conventional project management and R&D

management. The Federal Government could use in his building programs. Something similar

8 This tool should be based on server provider architecture and open source.

9 The Lattes Platform is a set of information system, database and internet portals to manage science and

technology information. It was created to integrate the information systems of federal agencies. Created in 1999

it has 500,000 curricula in his database.

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was made during the last decade in the Brazilian Program of Quality and Productivity

resulting in a great growing of certifications ISO 9000.

To exemplify a complex and/or a dynamic project it was chosen a kind of project called Local

Productive Arrangement - APL 10

. These APLs in few cases bring technological innovation

but in the most of them permit a diffusion of technologies in a geographic region where an

economic vocation or a similar condition of firms from the same productive chain are present.

Not only in the APLs but also in every projects where occur an interaction between cultures,

languages and interests the situations analyzed in this topic as dynamic and/or complex are

relevant.

The projects to support APLs are always composed by a large number of actors. University,

research institutes and centers for technology education, National System of Industrial

Apprenticeship (SENAI) and others organizations are the suppliers of knowledge by

developing or accessing them. In the productive sphere beyond firms there are business

associations as industrial and commercial associations, class union, Brazilian Service to Aid

Micro and Small Enterprises (SEBRAE) and associations to promote exportations. In the

government sphere there are some public agencies in the three levels, municipal, regional and

federal, without coherence in his actions. In whole of these organizations there are different

degrees of legitimating. Also, sometimes an internal logic of preservation of the organizations

and leaders are more important than to execute a real function in the net with positive effects

to the all members.

The problem of APLs or any project with this level of complexity is the leadership. A dispute

for power and consequently to access financial resources and political prestige carry to many

trials of appropriation of the good results from the project. This movement has moments

where the forces are in balance and other moments of evident confrontation that turns the

speech of technological innovation or economic development in a flag without content.

In many projects oriented to create new technologies the success was related with the leader.

A person that concentrates all the decisions and work isolated with his beliefs. It could be

exemplified by the traditional representations of a scientist inside laboratory and disconnected

from the rest of the world. It is real that the success occur by the decisions assumed but

analyzing this kind of behavior is possible to argue that there is no lack of information or

10

The APL is a regional economic development project based in the introduction of new technologies. In the

most of the situations only diffusion and adaptation are made with positive impacts in the social and economic

context. But in some few situations it has been the propeller of relevant incremental innovations.

17

communication problem inside the project because all relevant information are concentrated.

However, this kind of scientist is each time more substituted by a network of relationships

with different kind of specialists with many diverse interests and expectations.

What occurs is a great diversity of interest from stakeholders and the models of interaction in

Brazil do not have capacity, until this moment, to work with these questions in an adequate

way. The Science and Technology Ministry - MCT and the Brazilian Innovation Agency -

FINEP when gives financial support to the APLs should impose a minimal set of management

tools. Only the creation of a technical chamber integrated by the members of APLs was not

enough. In the case of Petrópolis Tecnópolis, for example, the chamber of technology

information arrangement cannot develop the work because there was a lot of conflict from

others environment that was brought to this. At many moments this chamber had conflict with

deliberative council of Petrópolis Technopolis and because of this motive it was deactivated.

In spite of the members has been almost the same, the focus, governance and leadership was

distinct. The relevant consideration is that there were two management environments with

many work groups without any basic management tool as a chronogram of activities or a

planned budget. This cannot be understood as defect or mistake of regional development

projects but as a cultural characteristic of the organizations that participates of these projects

and does not work with this management tools.

In the case of APL of dimensional stones in Santo Antônio de Pádua (Rio de Janeiro State)

there is a power balance inside the technical chamber because each of the actors has a

different vocation and because they work together against an external power which are the

environmental organs and Public Ministry that tries to stop the activity. However there are

few moments where organizations lose the collaboration spirit and start to compete. It occurs

much more by internal policies and needs than by dynamic of partnership. There is not any

effective suggestion of how manage this kind of projects. But it is clear that the traditional

management model based on strategic planning and a set of projects is not being well

succeeded in complex and dynamic environment of the nets.

The third and the most interesting case are the non-projects. For a better understanding some

concepts will be reviewed. Project is defined as a mixture of resources for a limited period of

time to create a unique and singular result. (Duncan, 1996, 4; Geles et al., 2000). Temporary

projects have a finite duration with start and closing well defined. It is not relevant if is short

or long time. The end occurs when the previewed objectives are reached or when they can not

be reached. It is important to observe which temporary is not about the product or service

18

created by the project. Most part of them is done to create a long-term result. Temporary can

be applied to other project aspects as market opportunity and a project team or availability of

skills resources. Singular means that the product or service is different of any other; even if is

a development of a new thing or something similar to other because a repetitive factor does

not change the uniqueness of global effort.

The project management can be understood as the answer for a question "how to manage

many aspects of a set of knowledge as scope, integration, cost, time, risk, quality, human

resources, communication and procurement". The project management oriented to create

technological innovation treats of whole these themes and also about technological

uncertainty. The concept of uncertainty is different from risk because risk can be measured

and managed and uncertainty not. The only inference that can be done is so much more in the

basic research direction, thinking in a linear model with basic research, applied research and

experimental development, more uncertain is the result of the project. The typical example is

shown by Geles et al. (2000) to exemplify the difference between conventional project and

R&D project when ask if a chronogram of a project can foresee the moment where the cure of

HIV will be found. The research project can have all administration tools, to accomplish the

chronogram inside of previewed periods and costs besides assist others success requirements

and even so the result won't probably be the cure of the disease.

If the management methodology doesn't guarantee the result of the R&D project, particularly

with respect to the reach of final objective, as a technological innovation, why then to develop

and to implant a projects management methodology oriented to create technological

innovation? This is a question at this time without answer that needs to be considered. The

initial argumentation is in the fact that science many times moves forward through incomplete

roads. An incomplete analysis today further can take to new discoveries. If it didn't go like

this the planet Earth would be still a square.

The last theme is to study the causes of the transformation of complex and/or dynamic

projects in non-projects. What initially was a project where multiples interests, languages and

different cultures are involved becomes a group of actions without coordination, or a semi-

project or a quasi-project or, on the other hand, when a leadership is imposed creates a

situation where the premises of a project well happened are assisted but the result is not the

expected, as in the case of a regional development project based in technological innovation

and diffusion.

19

This work is not conclusive in the solution of projects problems that look for the

technological innovation. On the contrary it looks for to identify such problems and analyze

them. The proposition of a nomenclature and an initial analysis based on the relationship

among the actors of Triple Helix spheres is a first approach, mainly in the case of complex

and dynamic projects. A way for the investigations already in course besides the empiric

observation (passive and reflexive) as scientific method is the development of documentation

tools and sharing of information of projects that can be joined to existent tools. An example in

the platform Windows would be the integration among MS Project with MS Outlook through

the creation of specific forms. Another solutions are new approaches for the project

management in net, as socio-technical and one that can be denominated pragmatic, structured

as a group of practical actions from the leader.

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