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Project management research has evolved over the past five decades and is now a mature disciplinary field investigating phenomena of interest to academics, practitioners and policymakers. Studies of projects and project management practices are theoretically rich and scientifically rigorous. They are practically relevant and impactful when addressing the pursuit of operational, tactical and strategic advancements in the world of organisations. We want to broaden the conversation between project management scholars and other scholars from cognate disciplines, particularly business and management, in a true scholarship of integration and cross-fertilisation. This Manifesto invites the latter scholars to join efforts providing a foundation for further creative, theoretical and empirical contributions, including but not limited to tackling grand challenges such as climate change, pandemics, and global poverty. To this end, we identify five theses:1) Projects are often ‘agents of change’ and hence fundamental to driving the innovation and change required to tackle grand challenges.2) Much project management research leverages and challenges theories across disciplines, including business, organisation and management studies, contributing to developing new theories, including those specific to projects and temporary organisations.3) ‘Projects’ are useful units of analysis, project management research is ideal for scientific cross-fertilisation and project management scholars welcome academics from other communities to engage in fruitful conversations.4) As in many other fields of knowledge, the project management research community embraces diversity, welcoming researchers of different genders and various scientific and social backgrounds.5) Historically rooted in ‘problem-solving’ and normative studies, project management research has become open to interpretative and emancipatory research, providing opportunities for other business, management and organisational scholars to advance their knowledge communities.

PurposeThis paper aims to provide insights into the role of project management associations for the projectification of society from an institutional theory perspective.Design/methodology/approachThe paper is based on a mixed methods approach. It draws on the research propositions of a recently conducted qualitative study and builds on them by analyzing the empirical data of a quantitative case study.FindingsThe results indicate that the projectification of society in Germany is well advanced and continues growing. The economy plays a leading role, which resonates with other sectors of society. The actions of project management associations have only an indirect influence on the projectification of society, which cultural–cognitive institutions are mediating. Both findings are novel compared to the literature.Practical implicationsTaking an overall view of the findings, project management associations gain a better understanding of the projectification process and important guidance on their role.Social implicationsThe results offer all people interested intriguing insights into the contemporary phenomenon of the projectification of society, along with its current state and future evolution.Originality/valueThe application of institutional theory to the projectification of society in the framework of this case study enables an in-depth analysis of the underlying social processes and interactions between the regulative, normative and cultural–cognitive activities of project management associations on the one hand, and institutions on the other hand, at the societal level. This opens up new and promising perspectives for further research.

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We develop a model of practices undertaken by project managers to address the challenges of organizational fields in an emerging economy context. We anchor the model in a qualitative study of project managers’ activities in a major construction industry firm in India. We make three contributions. First, our study illustrates how the micro activities of project managers, in coordination with the actions of senior management, address the emerging economy challenges, and project managers’ responses hold lessons for the emerging literature on “projects as practice.” Second, we augment the dominant cognitive orientation in the discussion of organizational fields in project management literature with a practice perspective. Finally, we enrich the institutional theory stream in project management. In addition to the mechanisms identified in that stream of literature, our data suggest that the activities of project managers in major construction projects may act as a mechanism of transition in emerging economies. While the project managers in the Indian construction industry firm undertook numerous field building activities that were crucial for their projects’ success, these activities were simultaneously addressing major gaps in the economic infrastructure of India. Thus, our data portray construction industry managers as not merely engaged in project execution, but as active participants in the economic transition of a country. Similarly, labor and supplier markets in India were underdeveloped, and the projects had to bear the cost of this development.

Sustainable social responsibility (SSR) toward multiple stakeholders is proclaimed as an obligation of firms rather than a voluntary deed. Keeping in view the stipulation of sustainability, this paper examines the influence of SSR on sustainable competitive position (SCP) and firm performance (FP) in the context of 307 Chinese small‐ and medium‐sized enterprises. The results indicate a significant influence of aggregated and segregated SSR on SCP and FP. With the exception of SSR toward owners, the dimensions of SSR toward employees, the environment, the community, suppliers, and customers exhibit a significant positive influence on SCP and FP. Simultaneously, the results show that SCP has a mediating role in the relationship between SSR and FP. The findings of the study inculcate the managers to stretch substantial consideration to the interests of multiple stakeholders rather than owners only. Based on the evaluation, theoretical and practical implications are presented for managers, owners, and local governments.

Am Mittwoch, 2. Juni 2021, nahmen 50 Teilnehmer*innen an der ersten virtuellen D-A-CH Forschungswerkstatt teil. Dieses Kooperationsevent der drei deutschsprachigen IPMA® Vertretungen, pma – Projekt Management Austria, GPM – Deutsche Gesellschaft für Projektmanagement und spm – Swiss Project Management Association fand bereits zum 7. Mal statt. Heuer wurde die Netzwerkveranstaltung aufgrund der COVID-19-Pandemie erstmals online durchgeführt. Rund 50 Teilnehmer*innen aus Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz folgten der Einladung der Organisatorinnen Martina Huemann (pma), Yvonne Schoper (GPM) und Katrin Reschwamm (spm), um sich nach einem Jahr Zwangspause – 2020 konnte das Event aufgrund der Pandemie nicht durchgeführt werden – wieder zu vernetzen und in spannenden Workshops miteinander zu arbeiten. „Es ist wichtig, dass die durch dieses Eventformat geformte Community endlich wieder zusammenkommt. Deswegen hat pma beschlossen, diese Veranstaltung heuer online durchzuführen“, erklärte Martina Huemann in der Begrüßung.

Project managers experience unique careers that are not yet sufficiently understood, and more people than ever before are pursuing such careers. The research on project management and careers is therefore urgently needed in order to better understand the processes and systems shaping the careers of project managers. We address this gap by reviewing several key career theories and constructs and examining how these are mobilized to understand project managers’ careers in existing research. Our main conclusion is that boundaryless career theory has been the dominant career perspective in project management research, whereas other career theories—specifically protean career theory, social cognitive career theory, career construction theory, and sustainable career theory—are far less often mobilized as a basis for studies. We also find that some of the most popular constructs in careers research, such as career success and employability, have been used in recent project management research. However, their use in these studies is often implicit and does not necessarily leverage existing work from the careers field. We argue that there is strong potential for further and more systematic integration between project management and careers research in order to enrich both fields, and we offer a research agenda as a starting point.

This exploratory research examines who supports what aspects of career development on projects. Our main finding is that, although project professionals receive support from formal and informal sources, a compensatory mechanism is at play. When support does not come from direct line managers, project professionals are compelled to initiate informal practices, including mentoring, buddy systems, and communities of practice. Practical implications arise for organizations regarding how to ensure sufficient mechanisms are in place to compensate for lack of line management career support and to allow project professionals to access the development opportunities they need by supporting their self-initiated efforts. Project Management Institute

We explore publishing trends regarding HRM and PBO in the main journals in the field of project management to highlight key empirical and theoretical contributions during the period 1996–2016. We offer three contributions to the field of project management. The first is theoretical where we analyze twenty years of research in key project management journals by adapting and extending the framework of Wright and Boswell (2002), and identifying categories of HRM research at three levels of analysis. This analysis provides an overview integrating exemplary research to date on the HRM-PBO link at different levels, showing areas where research is well-developed and also areas that, while promising, have not been examined in a systematic manner to date. Our second contribution is that we highlight a variety of theoretical as well as methodological resources from the HRM field that can be applied in project studies and in so doing promote cross-fertilization of ideas and approaches between these two fields. Finally, a key managerial contribution is that we introduce the project as a temporary organization level of analysis, explicitly making visible HRM practices on the project. This can guide both HRM practitioners, and project managers, in terms of the importance of projects as sites for human resource management and employment activities including careers, employee participation and employment relations all of which are critical issues and deserve more attention.

In this interview with Aaron Shenhar, Jeffrey Pinto and Graham Winch, we probe the influence of Rodney's work on the field as it is, in terms of how it is developing now, and how it will develop into the future. Based on three questions asked by the interviewer Martina Huemann we get insights about 1) What these three leading scholars consider to be Rodney Turner's major contributions 2) How their work intersects with or has been influenced by Rodney's, and finally, 3) Which important issues and trends they see for the future of the field?

This chapter began by providing an explanation of what the literature has to say about stakeholder engagement and the entities that may be considered legitimate stakeholders. It went on to present a stakeholder spectrum in Figure 14.1, ranging from those with direct to those with indirect impact and interactions, and the discussion led towards stakeholder legitimacy, with Table 14.2 describing differences between stakeholder approaches and Figure 14.2 illustrating the stakeholder-engagement spectrum. The discussion then moved from a general to a specific IPD-stakeholder perspective. The chapters aim in shaping the discussion of current best practice in stakeholder engagement was focussed by posing two questions: 1 What processes best facilitate stakeholders engagement and action with both external and internal stakeholders to successfully realise a project? 2 How are these stakeholder-engagement processes enacted in practice within an IPD alliancing context? The first question was answered by analysis of the general stakeholder-engagement processes reported upon in several case study examples. This last section of the chapter answered research question 2 by providing examples of how stakeholder practice takes place in alliancing with case study insights from both Australia and Finland. The chapter provided a valuable new contribution to stakeholder literature with its specific focus on stakeholder engagement from an IPD-alliancing perspective

In this special issue on project stakeholder management, the aim is to advance the understanding of this topic by looking into theory outside the project management field and by presenting findings from case studies. In this overview article, we identify the theoretical roots of the stakeholder concept and the current state of the field. We point to early proponents of stakeholder thinking. In addition, we point to recent concepts and developments outside the project management field that are relevant in the project management context; then, we introduce the articles included in the special issue; and, finally, we identify other relevant publications.

According to research, stakeholder disappointment is a root problem within projects. In this article, the dilemmas related to stakeholder inclusiveness, in other words, engaging a broad range of stakeholders, are discussed. Based on a longitudinal case study, three propositions are offered: Applying stakeholder inclusiveness in a project (1) increases the likelihood of more engaged and satisfied stakeholders; (2) increases the danger of losing focus on those stakeholders who possess the most critical resources for the project's survival and progress; and (3) increases the danger of inducing stakeholder disappointment due to expectation escalation and impossibility of embracing conflicting requirements and wishes.

It is increasingly common for work activities to take place in projects, and projects are therefore of growing importance as sites for career development, for leading and managing professional workers, and for individual and organizational development. Links between human resource management (HRM) activities that occur on projects, and their broader implications for project-based organizations in terms of knowledge, learning, and competence development, are therefore important foci for research. Projects are also important from the perspective of the well-being, ethical treatment, and motivation of workers. Projects are established within and between organizational functions (Bredin & Söderlund, 2011) but also span organizational boundaries (Lundin & Steinthórsson, 2003; Swart & Kinnie, 2014). Projects involve people from within and between organizational departments and also within and between disciplinary specialties. The implications of project-based organizing for managing human resources would appear to be significant (Huemann, 2015; Keegan, Huemann, & Turner, 2012; Palm & Lindahl, 2015; Söderlund & Bredin, 2006; Vicentini & Boccardelli, 2014), and yet traditional HRM models, where projects are not a key consideration, continue to dominate mainstream HRM theorizing (Swart & Kinnie, 2014). In mainstream HRM theorizing, traditional long-term and stable employment relationships are assumed and focal organizations are those with clearly defined internal and external boundaries. Project management literature has also traditionally downplayed what could be called the human factor – human capital or people aspects of project organization and management (Keegan & Turner, 2003). A shift from the mainly technical to increasingly people-focused aspects of project management has, however, been discernible in the past decade (Huemann, Keegan, & Turner, 2007). Project management researchers have started to explore more systematically HRM issues and their possible contribution to the performance of organizations that do most of their work in projects (Bredin & Söderlund, 2011). The systematic study of project professionals’ careers has developed recently, reflecting an increased appreciation of the importance of projects as a major part of many organizations (Crawford, French, & Lloyd-Walker, 2013; Hölzle, 2010) and the resulting increased importance of HRM issues and “people capabilities” (Bredin, 2008) required of project-based organizations is slowly increasing. Similarly, even though HRM theorists have not, to date, fully embraced the importance of the project context for practices, processes, and outcomes, this too appears to be changing as studies of HRM become more contextually sensitive.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to analyze how various approaches to stakeholder management, as well as sustainable development principles, are included in internationally‐used project management standards; and to consider the demands these approaches and principles place on project stakeholder management.Design/methodology/approachAn analytical framework was developed based on stakeholder theory within general management, as well as on sustainability research. Desk research was carried out by applying the analytical framework to three project management standards: ICB, PMBOK and PRINCE2.FindingsThe research findings suggest that stakeholder issues are treated superficially in the project management standards, while putting stakeholder management in the context of sustainable development would ask for a paradigm shift in the underpinning values. The current project stakeholder practices represent mainly a management‐of‐stakeholders approach, i.e. making stakeholders comply to project needs, whereas a management‐for‐stakeholders approach may be beneficial.Research limitations/implicationsAs the analysis is based on document studies of bodies of knowledge, the authors cannot be sure to what extent the standards represent real‐life practices. However, the standards are developed by practitioners agreeing on common practices. Further, they are used to certify project managers worldwide. Therefore, the authors find it safe to claim that the findings are relevant when discussing project management practices.Originality/valueThe value of this paper lies in the enrichment of the understanding of project stakeholder management by applying concepts from general stakeholder theory and sustainable development research.

This paper debates upon the adoption of a social learning platform to support the highly dynamic industry of consumer electronics' providers, acknowledging the role of emerging technologies on the delivery of efficient lifelong learning solutions. The discussion is based on mixed research methods, in which structured interviews and online questionnaires were used and customized for various stakeholders of such a social learning platform within the Danube region: students, professors, representatives of career development centers of universities and private companies. Having a clear regional value, the conclusions can still easily be extended to the world-wide current context, in which individuals are challenged to constantly further develop, to stay attractive on the labour market and aligned with continuously changing trends of digital age.

The chapter describes the importance of balancing risk reduction and “taken risks” and what role a holistic risk identification plays in the context of Sustainable Development (SD). It provides a theoretical background on SD, Risk Management and the Environmental Impact Analysis (EIA). It discusses the implementation of SD in the EIA as one example for a holistic risk identification. The link between SD and risk management is discussed and the identified learning potentials for further developing traditional risk identification methods are explained. A risk identification explicitly considering SD as well as considering project and stakeholder risks is presented within a case study. The case study project is Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) of a wind park farm in Brazil from the supplier perspective. Based on SD both, the risks of the project as well as the risks of the project stakeholders are considered. Whereby the chapter shares the risk identification as such as well as the process for which a systemic board constellation was applied.