Project Management

The advisory structure of ODP/TAMU has stated that the Program will incorporate the principles of project management as an operational paradigm. The incorporation of project management will be phased in over approximately 2½ years and started summer 1996.

The ODP/TAMU Administration Department hosted a two-day programming workshop with the assistance of consultants from the American Management Association. Attending were JOI and NSF representatives, senior management from the science operator, and administrative support personnel. The purposes of the meeting were:

• to develop an appropriate project management implementation program,
• to define ODP/TAMU activities and how they will be grouped into projects, and
• to develop a course of instruction related directly to the needs of ODP/TAMU employees.

At the conclusion of the workshop, legs were divided into three categories characterized as

• Project A: Pre-cruise proposal ranking with development of operational parameters and costs.
• Project B: Operational legs.
• Project C: ODP leg publications.

Additional projects were identified and fixed budget services were defined. Initial efforts were made to identify project managers for the three categories of a leg, the responsibilities of each of these project managers, and the persons to whom these project managers will report.

Project A

Project A began soon after the August 1996 PCOM meeting and was devised to provide PCOM with cost and feasibility estimates of proposed legs enabling them to effectively evaluate drilling proposals. Each year the highest ranked scientific drilling proposals will be evaluated by the Project A team prior to the December PCOM meeting. In this meeting, PCOM will select about 6 of these to be scheduled for the next year of drilling operations. Pivotal in the evaluation process is the concept of the "standard leg." A "standard leg" is a minimal definition of leg costs and, as such, creates a financial base to which the additional costs for more sophisticated operations can be added (Table 1). Note: Table 1 reflects the old organizational structure and is currently being revised in the light of the recent changes. In addition, the costs associated with providing the full range of laboratory services have also been broken down into their component parts in line with EXCOM Motion 96-1-14: Component Costs.

When evaluating a proposal, its deviation from the standard leg in terms of costs and the resources it requires will be considered. The project A team must also weigh parameters such as proposed area of operation, site locations, and estimated number of days in port/transit in order to produce a cohesive FY plan maximizing the operational usage of the ship and scientific results, and satisfying the demands of the FY budget. The first report by the team (for FY98) will be submitted to PCOM for consideration at its December 1996 meeting (this will be PCOM's last meeting; in future, the ship's schedule will be determined by OPCOM in August).

In general, a standard leg of scientific drilling operations consists of 4 to 10 drill sites with 1-3 holes drilled per site. Typically, sites are in water depths ranging from 1000-4500 m of water and penetration depths of the holes will vary between 100 and 1000 mbsf. Core recovery of 2500 m of unconsolidated sediment and sedimentary rock is anticipated. A deviation from this norm does not necessarily imply a non-standard cruise. However, holes drilled deeper than 1000 mbsf or in water depths larger than 4500 m tend to increase the likelihood of technical complexity, higher usage of expendables, and accordingly the potential for higher operational costs.

Specifically a standard cruise can be defined as follows:

1. Only basic "operational" coring systems are used including the Advanced Piston Corer (APC), Extended Core Barrel (XCB), and rotary core barrel (RCB). Other operational wireline tools such as Tensor electronic core orientation hardware, Adara temperature measurement tools, and the Kinley wireline crimper/cutter capability should also be considered routine for standard cruises.
2. No seafloor structures or casing strings are required for standard cruises with the exception of a free fall funnel (FFF) which may be the result of a planned deployment (to save operational time) or an unplanned deployment as required by the operational situation.
3. Standard cruises do not require special drilling/coring hardware, instrumentation packages, complex/or novel operational techniques, or additional technical expertise during the planning stages or onboard ship during cruise operations. In addition these cruises do not require the use of a support vessel or consultants.
4. Table 1 shows standard leg costs based on 2500 m of recovery of unconsolidated sediment and sedimentary rock.

Table 1. Standard leg costs

Note: this table was constructed before the reorgnaization, and reflects the old departmental structure.

Project B

Once the ship's schedule has been determined by PCOM (OPCOM) each leg will then be identified as a separate project (Project B). Each leg will have its own project manager, probably a staff scientist or drilling operations specialist. The job of the project manager will be to oversee all aspects of the leg, from the planning stages to the end of ship operations at sea, and the production of IR volume content at the first post-cruise meeting.

Project C

An implementation plan for Project C will not be developed until current publications issues are resolved.

[ Contents of the Semiannual Report, No. 2, June-November 1996 |
| Program Updates | New Initiatives | Project Summaries | Laboratory Working Groups |
| Panel Recommendations | Appendixes |
| Semiannual Report, No. 1, December-May 1996 ]