Abstract
As more organisations adopt project management approaches and the demand for project managers grows, there is increasing interest in the competence of project managers and in standards for development and assessment of project management competence. Project management standards are being used extensively throughout the world in training and development, professional certification programmes and corporate project management methodologies on the assumption that there is a positive relationship between standards and effective workplace performance. However, there has been no empirical research reported that supports or indeed questions this assumption. This paper reports on research that explores the relationship between performance against standards and the effectiveness of project management performance in the workplace, as perceived by senior managers. Results suggest that there is no statistically significant relationship between performance against the widely used standards in their entirety, and senior management perceptions of effectiveness of workplace performance. Results suggest different perceptions and expectations of project management competence between project managers and their supervisors, senior management.
1. Introduction
Project management has emerged as a field of practice that is being used increasingly by organisations to achieve their business goals. As organisations define more of their activities as projects, the demand for project managers grows, and there is increasing interest in project management competence. Competence of project management personnel is important as they are seen as having a major impact on project performance and therefore on business performance [1–4] (Fig. 1). As one senior manager says: ‘‘The key to project success is to pick the right project manager’’ [5].
5. Conclusions
Project management standards are being used extensively throughout the world in training and development, professional certification programmes and corporate project management methodologies, based on the assumption that there is a positive relationship between standards and effective workplace performance. However, there has been no empirical research reported that supports or indeed questions this assumption which is inherent in the way the standards have been developed by expert practitioners. Research was undertaken to explore the relationship between performance against standards and effectiveness of project management performance in the workplace as perceived by senior managers.
