FEATURE ARTICLE

How Hard Can It Be?

Actively Managing Complexity in Technology Projects
The complexity assessment tool offers a framework for articulating, assessing, and managing sources of complexity
in technology projects.

Harvey R. Maylor, Neil W. Turner, and Ruth Murray-Webster

OVERVIEW: The business of technology firms depends on the successful delivery of projects. These projects can be complex
and, some say, increasingly so. Assessing and proactively managing that complexity can benefit project delivery. Based on
a systematic literature review and multistage field research, we sought to understand the nature of different dimensions of
complexity and how they affect the development of a project. Working from that research, we generated a complexity as-
sessment tool, which was tested initially with a global technology firm and then with a wider network of large organizations
in other sectors. The result is a complexity-based view of project management that enables greater specificity in articulating,
assessing, and coping with both generic complexities and particular context-dependent challenges.
KEYWORDS: Project management, Complexity, Active complexity management

There are significant opportunities for organizations seeking Group 2009; Flyvbjerg, Bruzelius, and Rothengatter 2003).
competitive advantage through their approach to managing Understanding and actively managing project complexity has
projects, since despite considerable investment in project the potential to identify better processes, staffing, and train-
management systems and training, projects are still reported ing practices, thereby reducing unnecessary costs, frustra-
to have variable success rates across all sectors (The Standish tions, and failures.
Managing complexity is becoming a more urgent concern
for many companies because the complexity of projects and
Harvey Maylor is director of the industry-funded International Centre for management systems appears to be increasing. Jelinek et al.
Programme Management at Cranfield University in the U.K. Prior to this he (2012) note the “perfect storm” of increasing complexity for
was founding director of the Cranfield MSc in program and project manage- managers and organizations, induced by increased outsourc-
ment. He earned his PhD in new product development from University of
ing and offshoring of R&D, greater market uncertainty, and
Wales, Cardiff. His research interests are in complexity, capabilities, and
(non)adoption of promising practices. [email protected] greater technological uncertainty; 57 percent of the 3,018
Neil Turner is a senior research fellow at Cranfield University. Before joining global respondents to IBM’s Essential CIO Survey (IBM
the International Centre for Programme Management in 2008, he was an 2011) expected more complexity and change over the next
R&D manager in the telecommunications industry. His current research in- five years. This is a problem that is not going away.
terests center around organizational learning in the context of complex pro-
A number of publications have claimed that complexity
jects and programs (in which he obtained his PhD), with a focus on how
managerial practices and organizational strategic choices can improve de- can be beneficial (for instance, see Stacey 1996). These au-
livery performance. He is also the deputy director of the MSc in program thors argue that innovation happens in systems with a com-
and project management at Cranfield. [email protected] plexity level “on the edge of chaos.” Pascale, Millemann, and
Ruth Murray-Webster is an organizational change consultant. She serves as Gioja (2000) explain that “the edge of chaos is a condition,
director of Lucidus Consulting Ltd and a visiting fellow at Cranfield School
not a location. It is a permeable, intermediate state through
of Management. Her professional interests and experience center on the
competencies required for individuals to manage change and the capabil- which order and disorder flow . . . The edge is not the abyss.
ities organizations need to improve and advance. Ruth earned her MBA It’s the sweet spot for productive change” (61). While this is
from Henley Management College, where she researched the effect of cul- an attractive notion, especially in a world where growing
tural differences on business success in international joint ventures. She is
currently studying for an Executive Doctorate at Cranfield School of Man-
complexity seems unavoidable, it is disconnected from real-
agement, researching planned change to organizational routines from the ity in two regards. First, complexity cannot be objectively
perspective of change recipients. [email protected] quantified; rather, it is subjectively experienced and handled,
DOI: 10.5437/08956308X5602125 or suffered, by managers. As a result, it is not possible to see

Research-Technology Management • July—August 2013 | 45

where this mythical point, the edge of chaos, is in practice. believes he or she is personally responsible for something
Second, our combined 60 years of experience has shown us that may be challenging. Complexity assessments also ex-
that the greater the complexity posed by a project, the lower hibit association bias, expressed by one manager as, “My
the chance that any successful outcome, let alone an innova- project will always be more complex than yours.” The com-
tive one, will be achieved. plexities identified by managers in our study tied in closely
We were motivated by these observations to find a way of with their roles and responsibilities. Managers on the same
understanding and actively managing complexity in projects, project could describe the work quite differently—there was
both to reduce its risks and to access its potential benefits. If little shared understanding of its complexity. For example,
complexity can be better understood, our studies show, then when three managers involved in the development of a
it can be removed or reduced and managed to ensure that new financial system were independently asked the same
the levels and kinds of complexity in play fit with organiza- questions about the complexity of that project, their re-
tional capabilities. To that end, we have developed a com- sponses differed considerably. The project manager focused
plexity assessment tool that allows managers to identify and on the problems of the system’s architecture. The project
assess early in the process the kinds of complexity in play in management office manager focused on the particular inter-
a given project. nal process challenges. The program manager characterized
the complexities in yet another way: “Everybody sees it as
What makes your project complex to manage? a technical system . . . but in actual fact it’s much more of
“What makes your project complex to manage?” is a deliber- a change project because it is going to significantly change
ately specific question: it is about your experience. Complex- the way people work.” While this kind of divergence is not
ity is a subjective notion, reflecting the lived experience of itself surprising, it does significantly affect the reporting of
the people involved. The complexity of projects can be lik- complexity.
ened to risk in projects—highly dependent on perception and At the same time, any project rating is unstable, based on
influenced by conscious, subconscious, and affective factors what is perceived at the time of the rating. The complexity of
(Murray-Webster and Hillson 2008). Perception influences a project might be expected to decline over the course of the
the judgment of whether something is complex to manage project’s life, as unknowns become known and the period to
or not and the degree to which a manager believes he or which any uncertainty refers shrinks. We found, however,
she can influence the situation. Furthermore, project com- that events such as major changes in requirements, aban-
plexity is a dynamic, not a static concept (Geraldi, Maylor, donment of work by delivery partners, and technical difficul-
and Williams 2011), and there is no single best way to manage ties arising in integration emerged within the cases we
it (MacCormack et al. 2012). studied, increasing complexity as the projects developed. We
Why then is complexity assessment difficult? We believe conclude that assessments of complexity must be explicitly
that this is in large part because of the subjectivity of assess- time bracketed, with the project considered in its entirety or
ments of complexity. For any given piece of work, there will for the next phase only, with the understanding that the as-
be multiple possible assessments of its complexity, depending sessment will need to be revisited.
on the individual rater. One person might view something as
complex based on his or her knowledge or lack of knowl- Not complexity, but complexities . . .
edge. One manager may recognize how challenging a partic- As our initial studies progressed, we identified another factor
ular task can be, having done it or seen someone do it before; making it difficult to assess complexity: it became clear that
another manager might not view the work as complex at the there is more than one dimension to complexity. Our origi-
outset because of a lack of understanding of what it actually nal empirical study identified the items that made projects
involves. Perceptions and knowledge are intertwined with complex to manage (see “Methodology,” p. 47). Combining
complexity and the subsequent assessment of risk. A low this information with the findings of a systematic literature
level of domain knowledge may be acceptable if the work is review and further field research, we moved from a binary
straightforward, but an accurate assessment of a difficult understanding of complexity in projects (the work is com-
piece of work requires significant understanding. plex, or it is not) to thinking about three dimensions of
Individual assessments of complexity are dependent on complexity:
whether the manager believes he or she can deal with that
particular complexity. This is linked to whether that manager • Structural complexity
• Sociopolitical complexity
• Emergent complexity

Structural complexity is associated with size, variety,

Complexity is a subjective notion, breadth of scope, the level of interdependence of people or
tasks, or the pace of the work. It is the most easily recognized
reflecting the lived experience of the
of the complexities by both practitioners and researchers and
people involved. is also described as complicatedness or the level of intercon-
nectedness. For instance, one of our cases described the
development of a new product for a large firm, where the

46 | Research-Technology Management Managing Complexity in Technology Projects

 technology or process (Wouters, Roorda, and Gal 2011), a
lack of experience, a lack of availability of information, or
Methodology some combination of these. Change, on the other hand, ap-
pears to be inherent in R&D projects—including changes in
We began by grounding our understanding of complex- requirements, in technology, in stakeholders, and in the or-
ity in a thorough review of the literature. An initial review ganization itself. We identify emergent complexity as a
revealed little empirical evidence for the definitions pre-
challenge caused by a potential or actual change in either a
sented by many authors (see, for instance, Jafaari 2003;
structural or sociopolitical element. As an example, one of
Shenhar and Dvir 2007). As a result, we broadened our
search, starting from a deliberately naïve question: “What
our cases had considerable uncertainty. The project man-
makes a project complex to manage?” We set out to an- ager reflected, “We’ve got a balanced scorecard which we
swer this question through interviews, workshops, and fill in and [the clients] fill in, and we said, ‘In terms of tech-
focus groups that solicited the views of over 120 man- nical direction we haven’t got a clue which way you’re go-
agers from multiple sectors, producing more than 1,000 ing.’ And they said, ‘No, you’re right, because we really
individual statements. These were coded as 160 separate don’t know either.’” One complexity of managing this proj-
concepts that provided the basis of our initial framework, ect came from the certainty that requirements were going
which has been published separately (Maylor, Vidgen, and to change, yet without predictable timing or direction. In
Carver 2008). This work was elaborated through a system- this third dimension, we identified the overlap between
atic literature review of previous studies of complexity us-
emergent complexity and risk; that is, uncertainties that
ing the process described by Tranfield, Denyer, and Smart
would affect project objectives should the uncertain situa-
(2003). The results of the literature review have also been
published separately (Geraldi, Maylor, and Williams 2011).
tion or event become a reality.
This preliminary work informed our subsequent fieldwork. With this fuller understanding of complexity in mind, we
In parallel with the development activities, we under- aimed to develop a practical way for managers to integrate
took case study research to explore the perceptions of, and active diagnosis and management of all of these complexities.
responses to, complexity in development projects. Eight The three complexities provide a useful high-level classifica-
technical project cases from diverse settings (three from tion, but greater granularity was needed to guide discussions
the finance sector, two from telecoms, two from govern- about specific complexities and their management. Our ob-
ment services, and one from healthcare) were prepared. jective was to capture the results of the fieldwork and litera-
Assessments involved interviewing three to five managers ture analysis in a list of potential complexities sufficiently
individually for each case and gathering extensive organi-
large to be comprehensive, yet not so large as to become a
zational data. As a result of this work, together with further
barrier to use. Over a period of several years of testing and
development and testing through workshops, interviews,
and observed trials with a range of major organizations
revision, we combined and reduced elements from an origi-
from several sectors, we produced the final classification of nal list of 160 items, gleaned from literature and our own
complexities, a tool for identifying and assessing sources work. The result was the Complexity Assessment Tool (CAT),
of complexity—the Complexity Assessment Tool (CAT)— an assessment tool designed to identify the elements of com-
and an approach to actively managing complexity. plexity in a project and guide discussion of those elements.

The Complexity Assessment Tool (CAT)

The result of this work is the Complexity Assessment Tool
program manager commented, “We’re talking about 450,000 (CAT). The purpose of the CAT is to enable the early identi-
end users, which doesn’t necessarily make it complex, but fication of complexities so that they can be managed to min-
when all of those 450,000 have different requirements, then imize their negative impact on the project and the team. The
that does make it quite complex.” The complexity associated tool comprises a set of 32 statements that encompass all 160
with pace can be particularly challenging as the faster the of the themes identified in our foundational work (see “The
pace, the greater the resource intensity and therefore the Complexity Assessment Tool,” p. 48). The 32 statements are
more complex the project is to manage, albeit for a limited complete and generically applicable to a broad range of proj-
time. This may be the case, for instance, in a project develop- ects, although the statements may be tailored to fit specific
ing a new piece of consumer electronics. scenarios better.
Sociopolitical complexity is associated with the proj- For the purposes of a practical tool, the original 160 con-
ect’s importance, its people, power, and politics, both within cepts were too unwieldy. Questions as to the presence of
the project team and in the wider stakeholder communities. each particular element of complexity could be covered in a
In one of the cases, the program manager noted, “You’ve got facilitated discussion of about 40 minutes, but there was con-
multiple relationships within the bank. They’ve all got their siderable overlap between the elements, and the effective-
own agendas, they never look at the thing as a whole.” The ness of the process was highly dependent on the facilitator.
number of stakeholders represents a structural complexity, Through a series of trials within Hewlett Packard Enterprise
but their different agendas cause sociopolitical complexity. Services and with senior management teams from a range
Emergent complexity comprises uncertainty and of public entities (including the U.K. Government, National
change. Uncertainty is typically the result of novelty of Health Service, and Police Service) and private-sector

Managing Complexity in Technology Projects July—August 2013 | 47

 The Complexity Assessment Tool

Areas of complexity Do you agree with Do you expect this

• Structural Complexity (1–21) this statement? situation to remain
• Sociopolitical Complexity (22–32) (Y/N) stable (i.e., NOT to
• Emergent Complexity (defined by expectations for stability) change)? (Y/N)

Structural Complexity
1 The vision and benefits for the work can be clearly articulated.
2 Success measures for the work can be defined in agreement with the client.
3 The technology is familiar to us.
4 The commercial arrangements are familiar to us.
5 The scope can be well defined.
6 Acceptance criteria for quality and regulatory requirements can be well defined.
7 A schedule and resource plan can be well defined.
8 The supply chain is in place.
9 Lines of responsibility for tasks and deliverables can be defined.
10 Accurate, timely, and comprehensive data reporting is possible.
11 Existing management tools can support the work.
12 Sufficient people with the right skills are available.
13 Managers have adequate control of human resources (i.e., direct reporting).
14 Key people are wholly allocated to the work.
15 Integration across multiple technical disciplines is not required.
16 The budget is sufficient for the task.
17 The budget can be used flexibly.
18 The work will be carried out in a single country/time zone/language/currency.
19 The work is independent of other projects and business-as-usual operations.
20 The pace is achievable.
21 Resources (e.g., test facilities, equipment) will be available when needed.
Sociopolitical Complexity
22 The work has clear sponsorship consistent with its importance.
23 The business case for the work is clear.
24 The goals for the work align with the organization’s strategy.
25 Your own senior management supports the work.
26 Team members are motivated and function well as a team.
27 Managers are experienced in this kind of work.
28 The work involves no significant organizational/cultural change.
29 The work will be unaffected by significant organizational/cultural change.
30 The external stakeholders (i.e., not immediate team members) are aligned,
supportive, and committed to the project and have sufficient time for the work.
31 The external stakeholders (i.e., not immediate team members) have a realistic,
shared understanding of the implications of the work.
32 The core team has the authority to make decisions.

organizations (a major national infrastructure provider, a de- could use it in their work. The final version was tested with
fense contractor, a financial institution), we sought to stream- live projects, initially administered by facilitators, and gener-
line and simplify the tool. Examination of responses to early ated positive feedback from participating project teams. Par-
versions showed where different complexities had the same ticipants noted that the tool allowed them to reflect upon
effect on the management task and so could be combined. their projects and identify the most important areas to focus
Various versions also provided the opportunity to trial mul- their time on, as well as allowing teams to discuss issues
tiple versions of items and different presentation formats (as openly. As one senior manager told us after using the CAT
questions or statements). Over time, the feedback from prac- with his team, “One comment I got back was that it’s nice to
titioners participating in trials gradually evolved from sugges- have somebody to appreciate that there are problems out
tions for improving the tool to thoughts about how they there, and not just try and paper over them.”

48 | Research-Technology Management Managing Complexity in Technology Projects

 In use, the benefits of the CAT arise not directly from the
questionnaire but from the subsequent conversations be-
tween managers involved in the project. In our trials, manag-
ers responded positively to the tool, as it offered a structured
approach to thinking about a project, highlighting issues they
may not have considered previously. This is the major benefit
of the approach—as a tool to bring to light individuals’ con-
ceptions of the project, allowing them to be shared to pro-
mote a broader, more holistic, and common understanding
among the team. The CAT is, in other words, a tool for sense-
making. Participants admitted that before using the CAT
they might have been making decisions at cross-purposes
to their colleagues, due to dissimilar perceptions of the work.
In addition, participants in the trial suggested that external
facilitation would be helpful, not only in providing guidance
and structure, but also to alleviate power or status differences
between participants. Managers reported this to be a power-
ful technique; even those who had worked together closely
for years valued the insight the process gave. FIGURE 1. A complexity summary diagram
The framing of the elements as statements facilitates the
discussion with colleagues. All of the items are phrased as the nature of the complexities being faced in the project. For
particular challenges, designed to identify real, significant instance, in the example, Project 1 has very high structural
sources of complexity. For instance, a negative response to an complexity—as we would expect from a big technology proj-
early framing of a question as “the scope is well defined” had ect. On the other hand, Project 2 is lower in structural
the effect of prompting the team to go back and define it bet- complexity but high in both sociopolitical and emergent
ter, a relatively trivial solution that may or may not diminish complexities. This would be typical in a major organizational
complexity. We asked, instead, if the scope can be well de- change, such as restructuring.
fined. A “no” in response to this item represents a nontrivial
challenge. Each of the statements regarding structural (21) So what? And what now?
and sociopolitical complexities (11) is traceable back to the Our work has three main implications for organizations. The
systematic literature review and to particular elements in our first, following from the assessment of complexities via the
original thematic list. CAT, is that complexity can be actively managed; the project
Emergent complexity is a result of potential or actual team can work to remove, reduce, or proactively address
changes in the state of one or more of the 32 items captured sources of complexity. The second is that projects can be se-
by the CAT’s list of statements. As a result, the tool measures lected based on their complexity. Third, project personnel
emergent complexity differently, capturing it as the number and processes must be fitted to the particular residual com-
of expected or possible changes in structural or sociopolitical plexities a project faces (Figure 2).
sources of complexity. For example, managers might agree
with the statement that “the budget is sufficient for the task” Actively managing complexity
at the beginning of the project but express uncertainty over Our approach recognizes the subjective nature of complexity
potential funding changes that may cause the budget to be and encourages conversations around complexities. This is nec-
insufficient for the task at a later stage. That uncertainty rep- essary but not sufficient to benefit from taking a complexity-
resents a potential emergent complexity, tracked in the right- based view of projects. Having identified and agreed on the
hand column of the tool by an indication that the element complexities within a piece of work, managers must next
may be unstable and therefore subject to change. identify what can be done about each.
Having identified the complexities and their potential in-
stability from the list, we now look for some overall assess-
ment of the project. For each of the dimensions, a qualitative
assessment of “high,” “medium,” or “low” may be assigned In use, the benefits of the CAT arise
based on aggregate responses and subsequent discussion. A
not directly from the questionnaire
“high” rating is given where many of the items in one dimen-
sion have evoked negative responses or a few specific items but from the subsequent
(or just one) are seen as particularly challenging. The result
conversations between managers
of such rating may be a complexity summary diagram illus-
trating the dimensional nature of the complexities for a given involved in the project.
project (Figure 1). This diagram provides an indicator for dis-
cussions with, for instance, clients or senior managers, about

Managing Complexity in Technology Projects July—August 2013 | 49

 counter to the culture of
both organizations, had the
effect of reducing the socio-
political and emergent com-
plexities, as assessed by both
sides, to a lower level.

Project selection, staffing,

and systems
Even when complexities can
be managed, either by remov-
ing sources of complexity or
reducing their impact, some
residual complexities almost
FIGURE 2. Active complexity management always remain, requiring re-
sponse. The first response is
One of our cases, a large multiyear government project, active selection of projects. For instance, a firm with advanced
illustrates the benefit of the dialogue that the CAT promotes capability in the delivery of projects with high structural com-
and demonstrates how the complexities identified in the plexity may be wary of taking on a project that has very high
CAT process can be managed. The challenges included mul- sociopolitical complexity. The CAT assessment provides input
tiple agendas for the project within the client organization to guide such a choice.
(high sociopolitical complexity) and a contract that assumed The second response is in project staffing, specifically in the
certainty for the duration of the work. In reality, right from selection and development of the project management team.
its inception, the project changed considerably (high emer- Understanding the dominant complexities within a piece of
gent complexity). Additionally, the supplier’s assumption work allows the allocation of a manager with the appropriate
that the primary objective was low cost was at odds with experience and skills. For example, if the complexities are pri-
the client’s requirement for on-time delivery and a specified marily structural, a more planning and control-oriented “man-
minimum level of performance, with some flexibility in the agerial” approach may be warranted; to address sociopolitical
available budget (high sociopolitical complexity). The se- complexities, a skilled relationship builder who takes more of a
nior managers on both sides were constrained by their or- “leadership” approach may be preferable. And where emergent
ganizational procedures and had limited (formal) flexibility complexity is anticipated, flexibility in management is key, and
to accommodate the other’s difficulties (additional sociopo- the manager must have an ability to work with uncertainty and
litical complexity). change; a more “entrepreneurial” style is called for.
Recognizing that the complexities were benefitting nei- Understanding complexities can also lead to better tar-
ther party, the two most senior managers involved met off geted learning and development activities for managers. In
site (neutral territory) to identify and acknowledge the high a teaching session on complexity, we asked 246 project
sociopolitical and emergent complexities of the project. managers, “In your work, which of the three complexities
They removed some elements of complexity through nego- are the most difficult to manage?” We then asked the same
tiation, and reduced others through acknowledgement of group, “In your own formal training and development,
their existence and a joint effort to resolve them (at least which of the three complexities has received the most at-
partially). The remaining elements had to be lived with but tention?” The contrast between the complexities they faced
at least with a shared understanding of the difficulty. There and the organizational response through learning and de-
was an agreement that any changes could be discussed fur- velopment was clear—the area most project managers (68
ther with explicit give and take. This openness, which was percent) found most difficult to deal with was sociopolitical
(Figure 3A), yet a great majority (87 percent) said their
training and development had focused on structural issues
(Figure 3B). Having this language for discussion enabled
the identification of a significant area for development by
Even when complexities can be the firm. The capability to manage sociopolitical complexity
can be enhanced by development activities that focus on
managed, either by removing sources
stakeholder engagement, project leadership, and change
of complexity or reducing their impact, and communications management. Many elements of this
complexity can be turned to benefit through focusing on
some residual complexities almost always
relational rather than procedural aspects of management.
remain, requiring response. The third response is a process choice. More robust for-
mal processes may be a suitable response to high structural
complexity, but may limit the possibilities for responding to

50 | Research-Technology Management Managing Complexity in Technology Projects

 “Structural complexity is hard. The rest
of it, now that’s proper hard.”

Our initial question was, “How hard can it be?” In the

words of one chief executive involved in this study, “Structural
complexity is hard. The rest of it [sociopolitical and emergent
complexities], now that’s proper hard.” The complexity-
based view provides an organization’s leaders and project
teams with a way of describing how hard their projects are
to manage, and most importantly, how they can be supported
better and hindered less by the organization.
How hard can it be? A simple notion or just too complex?

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