Common project management problems and how they can be avoided through the use of self managing teams

As a result of observations and discussions, the authors realized that there were classes of problems common to product development efforts of many companies. In general, the participants recognized the problems while they were occurring but felt that they could not contribute to their resolution. This research was instituted to determine the specific nature of some of these problems. It was expected that analysis of the data would point out the most critical problems facing product development teams, and provide a basis for using some existing concepts of organizational structure and project management to effect their resolution. A discussion is presented on how a system may be established in which these problems can be resolved easily or avoided entirely.<>