Invite a large-scale study to collect lessons of past projects

  • Large corporations, government departments, or industry wide organizations or associations can now learn from past experience of their previous projects.
  • Based on extensive research experience (see below), we use advanced investigation and analysis tools to collect systematic data across all your projects.
  • The data includes both statistical quantitative data as well as qualitative data using structured interviews and data collection methods.
  • We then analyze the data using our advanced analysis tools and provide a detailed report (and an executive summary) outlining our findings, including overall performance, strengths, weaknesses, and areas of difficulty. The report also includes specific recommendations for improvement, growth maturity goals, and plans for correction.

List and References to Our Previous Large Scale Research Projects

  • Government

    R&D Defense Project Management: A large study for the Department of Defense (in Israel). The study involved 110 development programs completed over 15 years. It produced extensive recommendations, which were applied by the government in its future projects and contributed to substantial savings and better project results.

    1. Aaron Shenhar and Dov Dvir, R&D Defense Management in Israel, Institute of Business Research, Tel-Aviv University and Ministry of Defense Israel, 1993, (in Hebrew, 230p).
    2. Asher Tishler, Dov Dvir, Aaron Shenhar, and Stan Lipovetsky, “Identifying Critical Success Factors in Defense Development Projects: A Multivariate Analysis,” Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 51, 2, pp. 151-171, 1996.
    3. Dov Dvir, Arik Sadeh, and Aaron Shenhar, “The Role of Contract Type in the Success of R&D Defense Projects Under Increasing Uncertainty,” Project Management Journal, 31, 3, pp. 14-22, 2000.

  • NASA

    Space Development Project Management: The research was commissioned by NASA’s Center for Project Management Research. It involved over 20 agency-wide space developments advanced projects and programs, including projects run under the previous “Better, Faster, Cheaper” policy. The study presented common findings, offered a unified framework for NASA projects and recommendations for the future.

    1. Aaron J. Shenhar, Dov Dvir, Dragan Milosevic, Jerry Mulenburg, Peerasit Patanakul, Richard Reilly, Michael Ryan, Andrew Sage, Brian Sauser, Sabin Srivannaboon, Joca Stefanovic, and Hans Thamhain, “Toward a NASA-Specific Project Management Framework,” Engineering Management Journal, 17, 4, pp. 8-16, 2005.
    2. Brian Sauser, Richard Reilly, Aaron Shenhar, “Why Projects Fail? How Contingency Theory Can Provide New Insights -A Comparative Analysis of NASA's Mars Climate Orbiter Loss.” International Journal of Project Management, 27 pp. 665–679, 2009.

  • Government

    Defense to Commercialization: The study involved 80 projects that were planned to transform military technologies into commercial use. The research produced an outline of best practices and success factors for transforming defense technology into commercial use.

    Aaron Shenhar, Zadok Hougui, Dov Dvir, Asher Tishler, and Yair Sharan, “Understanding the Defense Conversion Dilemma”, Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 59, pp. 275-289, 1998.

  • SMEs State of Minnesota

    From Military to Commercial Markets: Study of 10 SMEs and how they cope with the decline in defense by switching activities to the commercial sector. Study identified the pitfalls and critical factors that impact the success of such transitions.

    Zadok Hougui, Aaron Shenhar, Dov Dvir, and Asher Tishler, “Defense Conversion in Small Companies: Risk, Activities, and Success Assessment”, Journal of Technology Transfer, 27, 3, pp. 245-261, June 2002.

  • Aerospace Industry

    On Going study on the best aerospace programs and their best practices. We use unique framework built for this award, to assess excellence in aerospace and identify best practices.

    Peerasit Patanakul and Aaron J. Shenhar, “Exploring the Concept of Value Creation in Program Planning and System Engineering Processes.” System Engineering, 13, 4, pp. 340-352, 2010.