Developing an expert system on project evaluation. Part III: The managerial questions raised by the work

This is the third paper to arise from the same piece of research concerned with the development of Expert Systems (ES’s) in the management of R&D. The first paper described the overall approach to the work and summarised the problems encountered, whilst the second focused on the software side of the work and the problems it entailed. In this paper the focus is on the process of project evaluation itself. The simple purpose of creating an ES is to capture the expertise of those well versed in a particular field and try to reproduce it in the ES. In this work, however, the hypotheses on which the development of the ES was based, and their subsequent support by considering actual projects, cast doubt on the theoretical background of project evaluation as reviewed in literature. The basis of these doubts is set out in this paper together with discussion on what is necessary to improve the situation. It was necessary to come to these conclusions prior to the development of a final ES on project evaluation, and is here published not only because of its interest in its own right, but so that others who have already worked in the field might reconsider their data in the light of the criticisms. By this means they would have a contribution to make to a better understanding of evaluation and of the on-going work on a new ES, now developed and operational, which has been designed as a research tool as well as its normal function of giving managerial advice.