Project success as a topic in project management journals

This article highlights the characteristics of articles on project success published between 1986 and 2004 in the Project Management Journal (PMJ) and the International Journal of Project Management (IJPM). The analysis covers references, concepts like project management success, project success, success criteria, and success factors; features of the samples, data collection, and analysis techniques used; and professional disciplines. The results show that research on project success is characterized by diversity except in epistemological and methodological perspectives. The article suggests a shift to project, portfolio, and program success and concludes with a discussion on the traditional state of the research, criticizes its assumptions, and offers alternative metaphors and recommendations for future research.     

Project success and project team management: Evidence from capital projects in the process industries

Efficient project execution is a key business objective in many domains and particularly so for capital projects in the process industries, but existing project management research gives little direction about how project team factors influence three important capital project outcomes: cost, schedule, and operability. After an extensive cross-disciplinary review of the general team and project management literatures, we constructed and tested a theoretically based, five-dimensional model of organizational context, project team design, project team leadership, project team processes, and project outcome factors. We examined the model by means of an empirical study of 56 newly completed capital projects executed by 15 Fortune 500 companies in the process industries. The results indicate the value of disaggregating project outcomes for research purposes. Different bundles of project team factors were found to drive project cost, schedule, and operability. Project team efficacy, cross-functional project teams, autonomous project team structure, and virtual office usage were the strongest predictors of project cost effectiveness. Continuity of project leadership, cross-functional project teams, and project manager incentives were the strongest predictors of project construction schedule. In contrast, clear project goals and an office design to facilitate effective communication were the main predictors of plant operability. Implications of these findings for researchers and project practitioners are discussed. One major practical implication of our findings is that project managers need to clearly focus and prioritize their goals for each project so they can adopt the appropriate bundles of project team practices that will facilitate their goal achievement.     

Career success across 11 countries: implications for international human resource management

This qualitative study examines perceived meanings of career success across 11 countries. The results show that people define career success in ways that enrich and illuminate the basic dichotomy of objective and subjective career success and establish their relative strengths across countries. Juxtaposing our data with human resource management (HRM) practices, we contribute to the universalist versus contextualist debate in HRM by adding the career management angle. We shed light on the relative importance of cultural and institutional factors for HRM in the area of careers and add a global perspective to the discussion about agentic careers. In our discussion we offer practical suggestions for multinational companies including how to individualize HRM to address diverse views of career success.     

Project management systems: Moving project management from an operational to a strategic discipline

This article illustrates one aspect of the concept of “fit” between an organization's implementation of project management and its organizational context by exploring how the underlying drivers of an organization's strategy might influence not only the nature of the projects that it undertakes, but also the appropriateness of the arrangements that it makes to manage those projects. Using a model conceptualized from the literature on strategic management, an analysis of four organizations that have made significant investments in project management over the past 5 years supports the hypothesis that the degree of “fit” between an organization's strategic drivers of value and the configuration of its project management system influences the value it obtains from project management.     

创新人才管理--企业成功的孵化器

从创新、人才、管理三个方面介绍了宝供物流的成功经验与体会，比较详细的述说了宝供物流从“传统储运”到“现代物流”蜕变过程及其制定的发展战略。     

Project management for new product development

This article examines the intersection of the project management body of knowledge with new product development (NPD). The area under examination is the development of consumer products that have a significant engineering production content. It is concluded that the project management method, with its structured task definition and software tools, is generally useful for managing NPD projects. However, in some areas, project management incompletely meets the needs of NPD. Specifically, NPD is characterized by complex interrelated activities and large uncertainties about precisely which solution path will be taken, such that the full scope of the project can often not be anticipated beforehand. The article identifies that more research is required to validate the stage‐gate and lean project management methods. Whereas cost is the primary focus in project management, with NPD there is a need to consider both cost and income (from product sales) in making strategic decisions. Communication and human resource management are important factors in NPD success, but existing project management perspectives have little to say about the social and behavioral aspects, such as organizational culture, team dynamics, and leadership styles, especially not for NPD. Current project management practices are very much based on “output control” (targets, appraisal, rewards, management by objectives), which the human resource management literature identifies as inhibiting innovation. There is also likely to exist an intersection, as yet poorly understood, between project management and knowledge management, particularly for innovation processes such as NPD. For practitioners, the main message is that the project management method provides a basic, but imperfect, tool for managing NPD. The relevance for researchers is that gaps have been identified in the project management method as it is currently applied to NPD. Several places are identified where further research is required to (a) better understand the causality between factors (e.g., human resource management) and project success and (b) adapt project management methods to better serve the NPD process.     

Integration of management systems: A methodology for operational excellence and strategic flexibility

Organisations employ various management systems (MSs) to systematically address the needs of their stakeholders. As the number of MSs is mushrooming, the need has arisen to integrate them into one holistic business management system that addresses various stakeholder requirements in an integrated manner. However, the dynamics of the integration process are not yet fully understood and research has yet to establish how the integration of MSs gives rise to various types of organisational improvements. This paper focuses on how the integration process unfolds in practice to give rise to a number of socio-technical changes essential to the integration of MSs. This research is based on four cases; it reveals that integration streamlines operational processes through a number of structural, functional, and operational changes. Integration reforms bureaucratic structures, further giving rise to operational excellence and strategic flexibility. The research also provides the extension of lean production practices bundles, and an operationalisation of Adler’s concept of enabling bureaucracy.     

Project management: break through or bust

Making a wrong choice can severely affect even the best-managed implementation (and project manager's careers). There is simply no margin for error, so getting it right the first time is not merely an option--it is a prerequisite for success. This article will first review why projects fail, then highlight the project management process used by McInnes Steel to specify, choose, and implement MRP II software that was "right" for them. Insights and experiences will also be shared to assist others in their project management activities. Project ultimate measurement is the successful integration of new technology into the culture of the organization. The first and most crucial step in any implementation is the specification and subsequent selection of the equipment or technology. It is important to make the right choice--one where the technology provides value-added services to the users to help them do their jobs better, now and into the future.     

成功始于意识：中国企业家十大经营意识解析

意识是一种被忽视的无形资源.中国企业家素质的提升重在提高自身的经营意识,其中包括市场意识、竞争意识、创新意识、管理意识、战略意识、客户意识、变革意识、公共关系意识、危机意识等等.     

异类的成功:没有管理的公司

巴西的塞姆勒公司是一个典型的家族企业,又有着国家扶持的产业背景,他与传统的拉丁美洲企业一样,曾经有着严密的机构体制,金字塔式的等级管理模式。在受到80年代经济萧条的重创之后,这家公司开始从两个领域改革:多元化与下放权力。他们开始推行由员工自己给自己定工资等制度。事实证明,集权式的管理阻碍人的动力和创造性,自发的管理和有效的沟通,可以为传统的公司带来活力。     

Fund-raising gala: a glittering success

Calgary District Hospital Group used the opening of a shopping/entertainment center as a fund raiser. The event made everyone a winner.