Revisiting the project management knowledge framework

Abstract

Purpose This paper highlights that extant project management (PM) bodies of knowledge have not fully addressed organisational transformation enabled by information systems projects. The purpose of this paper is to examine the transformation context in the PM disciplines. The authors argue that the execution-oriented PM bodies of knowledge are limited, as they place too much emphasis on the delivery outputs by the supplier rather than the achievement of beneficial outcomes by the project owner. Design/methodology/approach As a conceptual paper, this paper reviews extant PM bodies of knowledge, life cycle models, the context of organisational transformation and benefits realisation, and the distinction between a project owner’s and the project supplier’s capabilities. Findings A new PM knowledge framework is provided as an advanced research frame for future works by enhancing Peter Morris’ Management of Projects framework by employing the conceptual lens of Winch’s Three Domains of Project Organising model. Originality/value The advanced model emphasises the necessity of distinguishing a project owner’s and a supplier’s PM capability and knowledge to achieve successful IS-enabled organisational transformation. Through this effort to resolve the fragmentation and specialisation problems in PM disciplines, the model can be used as a theoretical groundwork for the advancement of PM research.

Internal projects as strategic tools: an organisation-level perspective and a research agenda

“…Moreover, the project life cycle and the associated front-end and back-end activities represent the organisational processes and outcomes that define this cross-level interaction: before, during and after the project. The resulting framework bears semblance to recent dynamic models of organisational project management, such as Cha et al. ’s (2018, Figure 3, p. 1036) project-management knowledge framework for organisational transformation.…”

“…Second, by insisting on the importance of intended organisation-level strategy, viewing the internal project as a tool, giving prominence to the project's life cycle and emphasising parsimony and causality, the present perspective runs counter to topical discourses in the project-management literature, even to the extent of questioning the hegemony of the temporary-organisations perspective (Lundin and S€ oderholm, 1995;Packendorff, 1995) as such. This challenge has a precursor in the work of Winch and colleagues (Cha et al, 2018;Winch, 2014;Winch and Cha, 2020), who by pointing to matrix organisations, project ecologies and firm-level projectification call for broader, organisation-level perspectives in project research, cautioning that the lens of the temporary organisation cannot alone define the field of project studies. Indeed, despite occasional noncommittal nods to an outside organisational context, the original notion of temporary organisations (Lundin and S€ oderholm, 1995;Packendorff, 1995) explicitly points towards a single-level focus, whereas this article argues that "micro phenomena are embedded in macro contexts and [.…”

“…A focus on causality may be particularly timely as project studies as a field is arguably over-reliant on taxonomies and deficient in identifying, describing and explaining organisational processes (S€ oderlund, 2004). Furthermore, the notion of the project life cycle with its emphasis on temporality by and large defines the professional and academic fields of project management (Bakker, 2010;Cha et al, 2018; Internal projects as strategic tools Project Management Institute, 2017b). The idea was refined but never discarded by the pioneers of the temporary-organisations tradition (Lundin and S€ oderholm, 1995;Packendorff, 1995).…”

“…Although the literatures on value creation and benefits management appear to evolve apart from each other, we concur with Laursen and Svejvig (2016) that the two foci are best considered as one. Benefits management is complex and insufficiently conceptualised (Cha et al, 2018;Ika, 2009;Lepak et al, 2007). Moreover, empirical enquiry into the domain suffers from methodological challenges (Breese et al, 2015;Keeys and Huemann, 2017), notably cross-level considerations, measurement and datacollection issues.…”

“…Although the literatures on value creation and benefits management appear to evolve apart from each other, we concur with Laursen and Svejvig (2016) that the two foci are best considered as one. Benefits management is complex and insufficiently conceptualised (Cha et al. , 2018; Ika, 2009; Lepak et al ., 2007).…”