The Case for Chartered Status
By Mike Nichols, Chair, APM
Back in the January 2007 issue of Project, following my election as Chairman of the Association for Project Management (APM), I was asked to outline my vision for the organisation and the profession as a whole. It was a vision that would build on the development work of my predecessors. It reflected the profession I see around me: one that is of increasingly crucial importance for most organisations, but also for the successful development of the country and to tackle the big global challenges, such as climate change.
A key challenge for APM is to promote growing recognition of the importance of professional competence and awareness that effective project management requires a discrete set of professional skills.
Project professionals, such as APM members, are pioneers in their field. They are the first to recognise the value which project management offers. The central role project management plays has created an urgent need for recognition as a profession and increased competence of its practitioners. That is why we have decided to seek chartered status as soon as is practicable, as I had the privilege of announcing at the APM Project Management Conference in November.
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About the Author:
Mike Nichols
Chair APM
Mike Nichols is Chairman of the Association for Project Management (APM) in the UK, Board Member of the Major Projects Association and Member of the Standards Policy and Strategy Committee of the British Standards Institute. His ‘day job’ is Chairman & Chief Executive of the Nichols Group, a firm which specialises in advising on and managing major capital projects and business change initiatives. Mike has extensive experience of project and programme management in the transport, telecommunications, automotive and power industries. In particular, he directed a management contract for the first phase of the Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway and project managed the initial phase of the Docklands Light Railway in London, both completed on time and within budget. Last year Mike completed a strategic review of the Highways Agency’s £12 billion Major Roads Programme for the Secretary of State for Transport in the UK. Prior to forming the Nichols group in 1975, he had a number of senior management jobs, including Executive Director of British Leyland and General Manager with British Oxygen Company. He has also led developments of new approaches in project, programme and risk management. Mike has a degree in Economics, is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers and Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries.
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Innovation and the Curse of Knowledge
By R. Max Wideman
In an article in The New York Times, December 30, 2007, titled: Bright Ideas - Innovative Minds Don't Think Alike, Janet Rae-Dupree observes:
"It's a pickle of a paradox: As our knowledge and expertise increase, our creativity and ability to innovate tend to taper off. Why? Because the walls of the proverbial box in which we think are thickening along with our experience.
The so-called curse of knowledge, a phrase used in a 1989 paper in The Journal of Political Economy, means that once you've become an expert in a particular subject, it's hard to imagine not knowing what you do. Your conversations with others in the field are peppered with catch phrases and jargon that are foreign to the uninitiated. When it's time to accomplish a task — open a store, build a house, buy new cash registers, sell insurance — those in the know get it done the way it has always been done, stifling innovation as they barrel along the well-worn path.
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About the Author:
Max Wideman
PMI Fellow
PMForum Global Advisor
Mr. Max Wideman, FCSCE, FEIC, FICE, Fellow PMI, is a global PM advisor for PM World Today. A globally-recognized author, consultant and expert on the subject of project management (PM), Max is widely recognized as one of the world’s leading authorities on modern project and program management. The Wideman PM Glossary is one of the most widely-referenced lexicons of PM terms and terminology in the world today. Max Wideman has 40+ years of PM-related experience in a wide range of projects and industries. He is a registered professional engineer specializing in project management consulting. Max is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers (UK), a Fellow of the Engineering Institute of Canada, a Fellow of the Canadian Society of Civil Engineers, a Fellow of the Project Management Institute (PMI®) and a long-time member of the Institute of Management (UK). Max served on the PMI Board of Directors as VP Member Services (1984), President (1987) and Chairman of the Board (1988). In the mid-1980's, he led a team of PMI volunteers to document the PM Body of Knowledge for the Institute, published by PMI in 1987. Max won PMI’s Distinguished Contribution Award in 1985 and Person of the Year Award in 1986. Max Wideman is the author of A Framework for Project and Program Integration (PMI, 1991) and Project and Program Risk Management: A guide to Managing Project Risk and Opportunities (PMI, 1992). He contributed chapters to Project Management Handbook (PMI/Jossey-Bass, 1998); Field Guide to Project Management (Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1998, 2004) and Project Management for the Business Professional - A Comprehensive Guide (Wiley, 2001). His latest book is A Management Framework for Project, Program and Portfolio Integration. (Trafford Publishing, Victoria, BC, Canada, 2004). A resident of Vancouver, British Colombia, Canada, Max Wideman’s personal website can be found at www.wideman.com. Max can be contacted at max@wideman.com.
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Project Management and Senior Managers:
A Russian Perspective
By Professor Viatcheslav Poznyakov
Abstract
This short essay discusses the status of professional Project Management (PM) in Russia today and some problems with its spreading, mainly the role of senior managers and the need to increase attention to Strategic Project Management within PM methodology. The author does not pretend to be a pioneer in raising this problem. The point is that the problem still exists and is rather sharp for many PM application arias. Some proposals to overcome the difficulties, based on experience of International Development Organizations, are made. The author hopes that the problems under consideration are common for other countries and the discussion will be helpful for the PM community.
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The status of PM in Russia and shortcomings of PM methodology
The demand for PM in Russia is great. The major driver of it is stable and fast growth of the national economy with the rate about 7% per year.
The good thing is that PM in Russia is growing rather fast. There are two principal professional PM organizations, active within the country. These are the Russian Project Management Association, named SOVNET, and a few chapters of the American-based Project Management Institute (PMI). SOVNET is a member of the International Project Management Association (IPMA) and supports IPMA’s PM approach, as well as IPMA’s PM Competence Certification System.
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About the Author:
Professor Viatcheslav Poznyakov
Professor of Project Management
State Academy for top managers in
Investment Area
Moscow, Russia
Viatcheslav V. Poznyakov, PhD, Dr.Sc., is professor of Project Management and Information Systems at the State Academy for Top Managers in Investment Area, Moscow, Russia. He holds a Doctor of Science from University of Dnepropetrovsk. Before joining the State Academy for Top managers in Investment Area he was the Head of Department for Computer-aided Management Systems at the Moscow Civil Engineering University. He has been a visiting professor at the University of London, UK and the Leipzig High Engineering School in Leipzig, Germany. He previously headed a project management training department for the World Bank in Moscow for the Russian construction industry. He has experience with various Russian consulting companies, and the Ukrainian Academy of Science. He has practical experience in International development projects, construction, transport, and the space industry. Professor Poznyakov has published a number of books and articles on information technology, systems development, project management, risk management, contracting, project preparation and evaluation, and management in general. He is one of the founders and a Vice-president of the Russian Project Management Association SOVNET. Professor Poznyakov lives in Moscow and can be contacted at: vpozniakov@ihome.ru.
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