Much of the theory associated with project management is explicitly organized according to taxonomic bodies of knowledge (BOK). Although such BOK are conceptually simple and easily disseminated, their generally static and explicit nature is out of phase with the dynamics of critical, tacit knowledge as it flows through the project organization. In this paper, we argue for a more descriptive view of project management theory, one that captures the dynamics of knowledge flows, addresses tacit knowledge and provides new insight into interrelationships between the management of project knowledge and the management of project activities in the enterprise. Introducing a multidimensional model of knowledge flow to describe project management theory, we instantiate this model with a project example from the domain of software development.
This paper provides a comparative perspective of public procurement policies for small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) in the United States and Europe. Public procurement is increasingly recognized as a strategic function of public administration because of the huge amount of resources it consumes, as well as the important policy objectives it seeks to promote, including SME-related objectives. Progress towards meeting SME procurement participation goals, however, remains elusive on both sides of the Atlantic. Policy makers and administrators have little comparative research upon which to draw regarding the effectiveness of various policy approaches, a shortcoming this paper seeks to address. An institutional perspective is adopted which helps explain similarities and differences in U.S. and European SME policies.
This paper proposes a conceptual framework for the study of public procurement policy. It reviews policy-related writings by public procurement scholars and assesses these works from the perspective of their contributions to generalized understandings of public procurement policy. Selected tools and concepts from the policy sciences are applied to propose a model to illuminate unique aspects of public procurement policy in ways that will facilitate its study. The paper concludes by discussing some recent actions, trends, and issues from the U.S defense procurement sector in terms of the framework. Models such as the one proposed in this paper will contribute to enhanced approaches to procurement policy analysis by scholars, as well as to informed and sophisticated policy implementation by practitioners.
Answering the question, "Should public administration adopt pragmatism?" requires some agreement on what pragmatism means and what that adoption might entail. This article argues that such agreement does not currently exist and, without it, calls by administrative theorists for adoption will not receive their intended responses.
Why is public procurement not a major topic in public administration education programs? While many scholars and practitioners acknowledge its importance, most master's degree programs in public administration do not. In this paper we document this discrepancy, investigate its causes, and provide two remedies to place public procurement more squarely in the educational mainstream. The first entails a description of public procurement from wellestablished public administration perspectives, which illustrates how closely public procurement is aligned with the field's traditional functions and issues. The second analyzes public procurement in the context of the "public service values" orientation of NASPAA's accreditation standards, which indicates the extent to which these values are inherently accounted for and manifested in agency procurement policies, processes, and practices. Thus, public administration might achieve a deeper and broader understanding of public service values by paying more attention to public procurement in its education programs. We conclude with recommendations for public administration schools that may want to (a) incorporate public procurement content in existing master's degree courses; (b) add a public procurement course; or (c) adopt a public procurement concentration for the master's degree.Public procurement occupies a problematical position in American public administration. While its importance is evident both in practice and in the scholarly literature, schools of public administration largely ignore it; only a few offer any courses, much less programs, in public procurement. Roughly 30 years ago, Phillip Cooper (1980) noted this condition when he called public administration's attention to the importance of procurement. Twenty years ago, MacManus and Watson (1990) called for procurement to be included explicitly in public budgeting and finance courses. Ten years ago, Khi Thai (2001) noted that, despite its importance, procurement content was not evident in public administration programs. Today, we observe similar conditions and make a similar call. We then conducted word searches on course titles and course descriptions (typically contained in either Word, pdf, or html files) for required and elective courses in order to locate courses with content in budgeting/financial management, public personnel management, information management, and public procurement. The following search terms were used: (a) for budgeting and financial managementbudget*, finance*, fisc*, fund*; (b) for public personnel management-personnel, human; people; (c) for information technology-information; computers; technolog*; and (d) for public procurementprocur*, contract*, purchas*, outsource*, privat*, project manag*. Four programs did not have web pages that listed either course titles or course descriptions. JPAE 18(2), 327-348 328 Journal of Public Affairs EducationFor public procurement-related courses, each time one of the search terms was located, we reviewed the course description to judge th...
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