First analogue, now digital

Project management actually existed back in the times of the Egyptian pyramids and the Great Wall of China. In its more recent form, things all began with the development of Gantt charts in the early 20th century. Since then, the world has become increasingly more complex and project management has also adapted over time. Project management at PSW is still relatively new. In 2016, the company carried out a strategic realignment to be better prepared for the numerous challenges facing the automotive industry.

Erhard Dörr, Head of Project Management, joined PSW in 2017 and was tasked with introducing project management in the company. He remembers: “Back then a kind of PM existed, but was decentralized. Each department handled the projects based on its own experience. Of course, large vehicle projects couldn’t be developed in this way, but that was exactly what PSW wanted to accomplish.”

But where do you start? Which processes and tools do you introduce first? Erhard and his team took a pragmatic approach: “There are actually two pillars: On the one hand, there are generic processes and tools that are available as per the textbook. On the other hand, there were specific needs concerning the Audi e-tron GT, which we prioritised depending on their urgency. So we helped ourselves to existing PM tools and adapted the methods to PSW as required.”

In order to ensure ideal cooperation between Audi and PSW, the team first introduced a series manufacturing management tool along with a matrix structure similar to that used by Audi. After this, they implemented the most important processes, for example risk management, which is based on the IPMA standard. One tool after the other was chosen and put to use in parallel with the vehicle development.

PMT/Processes employee Markus Götz, responsible for the implementation of procom, is convinced: “We are much faster with the new software and we create maximum transparency in the project. This applies to in-house stakeholders as well as to our customers. We can create project reports that are right up-to-date with just a few mouse clicks” he says. “We achieve this because procom accesses real system data. In the case of an amber traffic light, for example, this is backed up by system data that is automatically highly aggregated and thus leads to this status report”. In addition to daily reporting, procom also provides many other functions: calculations, risk management, resource planning and much more – all from a single source.

“In theory, it is even possible for us to connect customers and external partners to the system and give them direct access,” explains Markus.
Moreover, the process landscape in vehicle development is becoming increasingly complex: ASPICE (Automotive Software Process Improvement and Capability Determination) and Systems Engineering will soon be binding standards that a development partner such as PSW must reliably fulfil for customer projects. In the “old” world, it would have hardly been possible to meet these standards with Excel and the like. Using procom, however, means these project management requirements can also be managed on a centralised basis.