A society, which applies frequently projects and programmes, and which provides project management-related education, research and marketing services, can be perceived as a project-oriented society (POS). More projects and programmes are performed in industry but also in new social areas, such as (small) municipalities, associations, schools and even families. "Management by Projects" becomes a macro-economic strategy of the society, to cope with complexity and dynamics and to ensure quality of the project results. In order to ensure international competitiveness through professionally managed projects and programmes more individuals and more organisations in the society have to be familiar with project management principles. Project and programme management competences are required not only in the industry but also in these new areas of application. A "project management cross-over" between business life and private life can be organised explicitly, to develop project management competences in families, schools, small municipalities, etc. Universities, PM associations, consulting and training companies, etc, have to take on responsibilities for the know how transfer from industry to individuals and organisations, representing these new areas of project management application. programm I austria - The Austrian Project Management Initiative promotes on the one hand the professionalisation of project and programme management, and of project portfolio management in the Austrian industry and on the other hand the application of project management in families and schools, in small municipalities and associations, in politics, in churches, etc. By that the maturity of Austria as a POS shall be further developed. First experiences were made with family projects, school projects and projects of small municipalities. (author's abstract) / Series: WU-Jahrestagung 2002

Companies working on safety-critical projects must adhere to strict rules imposed by the domain, especially when human safety is involved. These projects need to be compliant to standard norms and regulations. Thus, all the process steps must be clearly documented in order to be verifiable for compliance in a later stage by an auditor. Nevertheless, documentation often comes in the form of manually written textual documents in different formats. Moreover, the project members use diverse proprietary tools. This makes it difficult for auditors to understand how the actual project was conducted. My research addresses the project mining problem by exploiting logs from project-generated artifacts, which come from software repositories used by the project team.

The basis of success of today's organization can be determined by their ability to win contracts and fulfil the requirements of these contracts satisfactorily within the time scale agreed. For non-manufacturing project oriented organization it is important to obtain the optimal number of projects and to have sufficient human resources to carry out the work efficiently. This thesis aims to a possible solution for the bidding policy and optimal use of human resources in project oriented-organizations within the legislative environment of the Czech Republic. It is trying to find and recommend appropriate solutions of fluctuations in the need for human resources by using a system dynamics approach (developed model and its testing).

The monitoring of project-oriented business processes is difficult because their state is fragmented and represented by the progress of different documents and artifacts being worked on. This observation holds in particular for software development projects in which various developers work on different parts of the software concurrently. Prior contributions in this area have proposed a plethora of techniques to analyze and visualize the current state of the software artifact as a product. It is surprising that these techniques are missing to provide insights into what types of work are conducted at different stages of the project and how they are dependent upon another. In this paper, we address this research gap and present a technique for mining the software process including dependencies between artifacts. Our evaluation of various open-source projects demonstrates the applicability of our technique.

Although there has been rich research conducted into the interrelated issues and factors among change management (ChM), knowledge management (KM) and project management (PM), most existing studies attempt to understand the role of KM in ChM and PM in general. Given the fundamental role played by KM in supporting IT project-oriented change management, the topics of knowledge networks and mobilisation across knowledge boundaries are relatively unexplored. Recent developments in KM have heightened the need for more understanding on four main issues: 1) insufficient knowledge traceability based on the relationships between knowledge elements and key factors; 2) most decision issues in PM are related to uncertainty, complexity and implicit ambiguity, particularly with regard to systematics and interrelatedness within project decisions; 3) lack of procedural knowledge to provide strategic direction for managing multiple IT projects; 4) lack of ‘lessons learnt’ documentation in knowledge bases. To address these issues, this research attempts to analyse KM, ChM and IT project management from a more integrated perspective, and investigates the development of a change management knowledge network model (CMKNM) in IT projects to facilitate knowledge mobilisation across organizational boundaries. The study employs a practice-based perspective by adopting both deductive and inductive approaches using an exploratory case study strategy. Empirical data were collected from semistructured interviews and company documents. A combination of thematic analysis and comparative analysis has been employed to analyse the data collected across seven public organisations, private organisations, and international companies. Results are obtained from the empirical study on the key factors influencing knowledge mobilisation in IT projectoriented change management, knowledge networks and connections. The results identified organisational factors and their influence on knowledge channels and knowledge networks. The CMKNM allows key knowledge mobilisation factors to be aligned with each other. Connections between knowledge networks allow knowledge to be mobilised by tracing knowledge channels to support ChM decisions. The study contributes to organisational and KM theories regarding organizational strategy, organisational culture, organizational capacity, knowledge network externalities, knowledge network intermediaries, and knowledge network infrastructure.

La thèse porte sur le développement d’une nouvelle approche pour améliorer la performance des projets d’une organisation. Cette approche est basée sur un modèle conceptuel donnant une représentation cognitive permettant à l’organisation de construire et d’adapter les éléments ayant un impact dans la performance des projets. Le modèle est formé de trois parties. Les principes sont les préalables auxquels doivent adhérer les dirigeants de l’organisation et les personnes ayant des activités de coordination. Les concepts sont des définitions, idées et représentations mentales servant de bases au modèle. Les domaines de progression sont formés de problématiques et sous-problématiques qu’il convient de parcourir de manière équilibrée. Ce modèle a été décliné en une méthode destinée aux organisations entreprenant de manière régulière des projets internes. La durée de la thèse n’a permis de tester la méthode dans des conditions réelles. / The thesis focuses on developing a new approach to improve organizational project performance. This approach is based on a conceptual model giving a cognitive representation that enables the organization to build and adapt the items affecting the project performance. The model consists of three parts. The principles are the prerequisites that the leaders of the organization and people with coordination role must comply with. The concepts are definitions, ideas and mental constructs intended to be the model basis. The progress areas are made of issues and sub-issues that should be treated in a balanced way. This model has been used to create a method for organizations undertaking regularly internal projects. In the duration of the thesis, the method cannot be tested in actual situations.

The topic of what HRM (Human Resource Management) responsibilities are devolved from the HRM department to line managers has attracted much interest in recent years. We report findings from a study on the devolution of HRM practices in four POCs (Project-Oriented Companies) and argue that although HRM practices are carried out beyond the HRM department, they are also carried out beyond the line. While the literature on devolving HRM responsibilities to line management is burgeoning, the HRM responsibilities of managers beyond the line organization are neglected. We make two contributions to the literature. Firstly, our study reveals that some HRM practices are the domain of the project manager rather than either the line manager or the HRM department. The complex interplay of the roles of the HRM department, line management and project management creates challenges and pitfalls where people are managed across the boundaries of the permanent and temporary organization. We identify a potentially powerful role for the HRM department in both monitoring and guiding the different players from the line and project organizations, and in protecting the well-being of employees whose work traverses these organizational boundaries. Our second contribution is that we map the diversity of practices in different POCs for managing the interplay between the three main parties delivering HRM practices and offer project-orientation as a contextual indicator that contributes to diversity in HRM practices.

The construction and real estate industry are project-oriented where companies success depends on individual projects performance. To determine the efficiency of operations, performance can be measured through key performance indicators (KPIs), which are metrics used to analyze, measure and compare a company’s performance. Project-oriented businesses face challenges implementing successful projects and the industry is affected by cost and time overruns, lack of quality and unmet customer requirements, which can be linked to inefficient project management and inadequate follow-up. Furthermore, companies in the industry find it difficult to identify suitable KPIs that best show changes in performance and result as well as KPIs that are linked to strategic business goals and projects. The purpose of the study was to investigate how KPIs are used in the construction and real estate industry and how management of KPIs can be developed to carry out successful projects. In order to fulfill the purpose, a case study was conducted. Initially, a literature study was performed to gain knowledge of the problem area. The data collection was qualitative where a document analysis, observations, interviews and a focus group were conducted. This resulted in an understanding of the case study company´s project operations and KPIs. The study´s method of analysis consisted of a thematic analysis and comparative study. The result indicates the importance of a long-term perspective where successful projects involve work from an early stage, which includes resource allocation and project processes where subsequent project management must include efficient communication and sharing of knowledge as well as collaboration among departments and participants. During the project process there should be an exchange of experience and knowledge in order to avoid that mistakes are repeated and to enable organizational learning. The analysis showed that there are opportunities within the case company to improve a number of factors and the current follow-up of KPIs as well as how the business’s KPIs relate to strategic business goals and success factors. There is a link between success factors, KPIs and challenges within the industry. An understanding of success factors is important in order to design KPIs that align with strategic company goals and individual projects. The result may be of interest to other project-oriented businesses and industries where increased understanding can result in efficient processes and increased motivation regarding the project process and follow up, which can result in successful projects.

The purpose of the study was to examine how teachers and children interpreted the project and understood its values. To this end, it was necessary to focus on four defining parameters which affect the investigation: structure of pre-school project work, content and delivery, the methods used by teachers during the project, which pedagogical documentation was used (and how), and how the project determined the approach, the curriculum goals and values. Using a qualitative approach, regular unsystematic observations were made over five days, during which three teachers, two pedagogues, two pre-school teachers, and one nanny from the same kindergarten were interviewed regarding children in three age groups: 1-2 years old, 3 years old, and 4-5 years old. The results of my investigation showed that the teachers were divided on how to apply the project as a working method. Children's active role in the pre-school project varied depending on the extent to which teachers adopted children perspective in everyday practice. The teachers used the documentation to evaluate, make visible processes of learning in children and reflect on the educational work of the projects. / Reggio Emilia

As more organisations apply project management to perform projects in order to deliver high quality products and services, the demand for project managers grows, and thus more research is required on the effectiveness of project managers (Crawford, 2005). Hence, this research project aims to provide an in-depth understanding of the effectiveness of project managers within project-oriented organisations.The purpose of this research project is to fill the research gap by bringing the practical perspective of the effectiveness of project managers, from different informants in various fields, into the theoretical perspective in the form of a conceptual model (i.e. the combination of the constructs: core categories, categories, and concepts) through in-depth interviews and the grounded theory method. This qualitative study attempts to provide a fresh insight into the leading and managing projects, and hence into the effectiveness of project managers in project-oriented organisations.This research project is one of the very rare studies investigating the matter of an effective project manager, particularly within project-oriented organisations. It is also one of the very few studies investigating the role of leadership in the effectiveness of project managers, particularly within project-oriented organisations. In addition, it is one of the very rare studies providing the conceptual model as the criteria for project managers to become effective within project-oriented organisations. Furthermore, it is one of the very rare studies providing the practical model as the tool to evaluate the effectiveness of project managers within project-oriented organisations. The research project provides an insightful understanding of the notion of leadership, management, and emotional intelligence, and uncovers their roles in the effectiveness of project managers within project-oriented organisations.The research project highlights the value of qualitative inquiry for exploring individuals’ perceptions and lived experiences, as well as investigating phenomena which have been relatively under-investigated to date. It also highlights the usefulness of grounded theory, which builds concepts grounded in empirical data.