The other side of projects: the case for critical project studies

© 2008, © Emerald Group Publishing Limited. Purpose – The purpose of this research note is to articulate the limitations that project management (PM) currently faces by outlining the PM literature’s frequent neglect of political, social and ethical dimensions of PM work in order to raise a number of important themes that can be usefully integrated into mainstream PM literature. Design/methodology/approach – Extensive research note which updates us on where PM research is heading. Findings – PM is a highly complex, political and social process. The paper challenges readers, PM academics and practitioners to view PM more critically and to expand their appreciation of PM work as being more complex in its social context that merely delivering instrumentalist and mechanistic functional management processes. Originality/value – This paper triggers a debate using critical PM research to engage with all levels of the project hierarchy with the aim of initiating some transformation in how actors perceive themselves, their voice, their broad responsibility and their influence in shaping their own social place

Making Projects Critical 15 years on: A retrospective reflection (2001-2016)

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to review the formation and evolution of the “Making Projects Critical” movement in project management research.Design/methodology/approachRetrospective and discursive paper.FindingsReflections on tensions and challenges faced by the MPC movement.Originality/valueThe paper establishes the historical trajectory of this movement and clarifies the tensions and challenges faced by MPC

Responsible forms of project management education: Theoretical plurality and reflective pedagogies

The paper aims to revive an interest in the notion of responsible project management education (RPME) in the context of related contemporary debates about the integration of reflexivity, ethics and sustainability in the business schools’ curricula; the purpose, values and effectiveness of university education; and practical relevance of business and management courses, to mention only a few. We offer an interpretation of what RPME at university level may mean concerning the practice of curriculum design and pedagogy of project management courses in light of a perceived nature of project management theory and the field as practised. We argue that responsible project management education should make the theorising of the process of projectification, relational complexity and practical wisdom (combining prudence, instrumental and value rationality) accessible and appealing to all involved and should pursue experiential reflective learning. To illustrate how it may work in practice, we reflect on our longstanding experience with designing and delivering a PM module for an MBA programme. Apart from the challenge with maintaining the requisite diversity of the teaching team and practitioners’ input into the course, we illuminate some benefits and challenges as perceived by the participating students. These are: discomfort caused by encountering a different ‘project management’; excitement in embracing the unexpected; light-bulb moments in redefining one's own understanding of PM practice and in finding a new way of understanding and dealing with a specific situation in the workplace

Knowledge, interaction, and project work : from instrumental rationality to practical wisdom

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The logic of projects and the ideal of community development: Social good, participation and the ethics of knowing

© 2016, © Emerald Group Publishing Limited. Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between project-based organizing and the initiatives labelled as “development” by critically engaging with some unchallenged assumptions inherent in the notion of both projects as a means through which social change can be achieved and the wider possibility of delivering social good as an objective of development. Design/methodology/approach – From a phenomenologically informed critical participatory perspective the authors focus on contradictions within the practices of community development (CD) by attending to the interplay between the dominant project form of organizing that frames those practices and the rhetoric of “development”. Findings – Drawing on two CD examples, the authors illustrate and discuss the contradictions and damaging consequences of the developmentalism-projectification double-act. The position is that social good is local and contextual and draws expediently and contingently on the means through which it can be achieved by the collective action of those who co-define and co-create the social good. Social implications – The authors propose that there is a need to open the dialogue with development practitioners, funders, project managers, project workers, and the recipients and stimulate multiple participation. Originality/value – The authors believe the critical participatory approach that the authors have taken to CD project management could be both novel and useful as it refocuses attention to non-performative aspects of CD, arguing for de-naturalization of project organizing logic and encouraging emancipation from dominant epistemic inequalities. With an uncompromising focus on embedded practices, the authors hope to spur further debate on the important issue of CD and the possibilities of creating “social good”

Insights into responsible education for sustainable development: The case of UWE, Bristol

© 2017 Elsevier Ltd In this paper, we argue that it is opportune to revisit profound questions about the purpose, nature and value of higher education in society at a juncture where the context of higher education has been significantly influenced by the global sustainability agenda and responsible management education imperatives (United Nations (UN) Principles of Responsible Management Education (PRME), UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), UN Global Compact, UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), etc.). We take Holman's (2000) work on models for management education and his recommendations as our point of departure in critically examining the practice of embedding ESD and UN PRME (as two complementary schemes) in our institution. We explore the nature and interrelationships of Holman's 5 axioms of management education (epistemic, pedagogical, management-as-practice, social, and organisational) in order to provide a reflective account of our experiences and elucidate deeper understandings of what responsible education for sustainable development may mean in practice. The arguments presented here are grounded in both practical theorising stemming from related literature and concrete empirical illustrations generated through our observations and reflections as participants (in our roles as PRME Leader, ESD champion and SD programme leader) in the PRME/ESD initiatives. We have demonstrated that embedding ESD responsibly across a HE institution is a complex, emerging, evolving and non-linear process of addressing simultaneously the curriculum content, power, structures, identity, values, and external checks and balances. Therefore, a critical attention is needed to all 5 axioms and assumptions that are at play and has to be facilitated by a combination of educational activism, informal academic collaboration, formal measures and reporting, and practical skills of maintaining legitimacy and ownership of creative and innovative pedagogic models while negotiating the meaning of those to align with the institutional priorities

The wisdom of conversations: Existential Hermeneutic Phenomenology (EHP) for project managers

© 2017 Elsevier Ltd, APM and IPMA This paper introduces Existential Hermeneutic Phenomenology (EHP) as an approach to reflecting on and studying the lived experience of project management practice. We argue that an EHP way of being is an effective approach for any practitioner confronted by significant existential disruptions to their practice. We develop our proposition of ‘the wisdom of conversations’ as an EHP enabled way for project managers' practical coping with otherwise potentially inhibiting existential disruptions. We understand EHP as a holistic philosophical practice which: 1. allows making the ‘lived experience’ of project management practice explicit for reflection, and 2. is available and useful to practitioners in the field. Heidegger provides the theoretical base through a language of existential categories, which are dimensions of being-in-the-world. Gendlin offers a practical method for accessing the states of being that Heidegger describes. Rorty offers promise, the ability to disclose new possibilities or ways of being-in-the-world through irony and practices of re-description

An existential hermeneutic philosophical approach to project management

The philosophies of Martin Heidegger and Richard Rorty are used to redescribe the fundamental assumptions underpinning project management. Rather than viewing project management as merely a science, the significance and value of philosophy for project management are developed. The philosophical practice of redescription as a way of responding to existential disruptions of the lived experience of managing projects is seen as vital not only to being a project manager but to describing project management

A toolkit for living in a new building: A visual post occupancy evaluation of Bristol Business School

The Bristol Business School building – that houses both Bristol Business School and Bristol Law School – is situated on the University of the West of England (UWE) Bristol Frenchay campus, and has been occupied since April 2017. It is a flagship space that aims to attract international, EU and home students, facilitate links with businesses and foster a collaborative space for staff to work together. The strategic aim of the building was that it should be ‘generative’ (Clegg and Kornberger 2004) and was designed to link with the faculty strategic vision and mission: a building to support a community that is professionally engaged, vocationally relevant, internationally connected and academically strong. Translated into architecture, this means considerable open, shared space not formally designated for particular activities. Walls and partitions are largely glass, with space arranged around a full height atrium, and central staircase affording expansive views through the building and the activities going on within it. Staff, students and visitors can access, and work from, the majority of the building, which is technologically enabled to support location-independent working and learning

University-industry collaboration through Knowledge Transfer Partnerships in the UK: An extension of activity theory

The mechanisms for stimulating innovation are perennial subjects of concern. Despite the recognition of their importance they remain troublesome undertakings for individual organisations and national economies. The literature has only recently begun to recognise the importance of the micro-relations that exist between individuals and their effect upon the efficacy of these mechanisms. However, the intricacies of these micro-relationships remain underexplored. Through an extended period of immersion of around two years in each of three organisations this study identifies the nature of the tensions that beset the micro-relations between individuals in Knowledge Transfer Partnerships in the United Kingdom. The research proffers an extension to the Activity Framework in order to explicitly recognise the dimension of ‘Tacit Skills’