The Wiley Guide to Managing Projects (Morris/The Wiley Guide to Managing Projects) || Professional Associations and Global Initiatives

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CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

PROFESSIONAL ASSOCIATIONS ANDGLOBAL INITIATIVES

Lynn Crawford

Communities of practice (Wenger, 1998) are formed when people doing similar thingsrealize they have shared interests. They recognize that there are opportunities to im-

prove both their practices and their performance by sharing knowledge and experience. Theproject management professional associations as we know them today began in this way: asinformal gatherings and forums for networking and exchanging ideas and information.

INTERNET, now known as the International Project Management Association, IPMA,was initiated in 1965 (IPMA 2003; Stretton, 1994) as a forum for European network plan-ning practitioners to exchange knowledge and experience. The Project Management Insti-tute originated in North America in 1969, as ‘‘an opportunity for professionals to meet andexchange ideas, problems and concerns with regard to project management, regardless ofthe particular area of society in which managers function’’ (Cook, 1981). The UK nationalproject management association began in 1972 as the Association of Project Managers andwas subsequently renamed the Association for Project Management. The Australian Instituteof Project Management was initially formed as the Project Managers Forum in 1976. Theearly focus of these project management professional associations on exchange of knowledgeand experience between practitioners clearly illustrates their origins as communities ofpractice.

Recognition of shared interests results in fairly informal gatherings, often referred to asa forum for meeting, networking, and exchange of ideas. At some point members of thiscommunity of practice express a need or desire to define their areas of common interest orpractice. They begin to think of themselves as a community, and then sometimes, as in thecase of project management, as a profession, and to attempt to define and delineate thatprofession in order to make it visible and acceptable to those outside the community. This

The Wiley Guide to Managing Projects. Edited by Peter W. G. Morris and Jeffrey K. PintoCopyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

1390 The Wiley Guide to Managing Projects

is the point when the community begins to put in place the building blocks of a profession,which include the following (Dean, 1997):

• A store or body of knowledge that is ‘‘more than ordinarily complex’’• A theoretical understanding of the basis of the area of practice• An ability to apply theoretical and complex knowledge to the practice in solving human

and social problems• A desire to add to and improve the stock or body of knowledge (research)• A formal process for handing on to others the stock or body of knowledge and associated

practices (education and training)• Established criteria for admission, legitimate practice, and proper conduct (standards,

certification and codes of ethics/practice)• An altruistic spirit.

From this list it is easy to identify a number of the issues that have preoccupied the variousnational project management professional associations as they have emerged from the moreinformal forums of practitioners with shared interests. Primary preoccupations have been asfollows:

• Definition of a distinct body of knowledge• Development of standards• Development of certification programs

In focusing on these areas, project management professional associations have tended todevelop proprietorial or vested interests in the products they have produced. This has re-sulted in a proliferation of competing project management standards and certification pro-grams, largely local in their origin, if not in their application. By the second half of the1990s, members of the project management community began to realize that the nature oftheir community was changing and that a more unified approach would be needed topromote project management as a practice and profession and to meet the needs of increas-ing numbers of corporate adopters of project management with increasingly global scopeto their operations.

From Local to Global

Modern project management may be considered to have had its genesis in the internationalarena when, in the 1950s (Stretton, 1994; Morris, 1994), companies such as Bechtel beganto use the term ‘‘project manager’’ in their international work, primarily on remote sites.Communities of project management practice, however, with their focus on interactionsbetween people, developed locally, becoming formalized in national project managementprofessional associations. Even international projects were considered as endeavors con-ducted by national organizations, offshore. During the period in which project managementprofessional associations were emerging, the focus was on techniques for planning, sched-

Professional Associations and Global Initiatives 1391

uling, and control. Practitioners who were forming these local and essentially national com-munities of practice were primarily involved in major projects in the engineering,construction, defense, and aerospace industries, and the interests of these practitionersstrongly influenced the activities and focus of project management professional associationsfrom their emergence in the 1960s through to the early to mid-1990s.

A change of focus became evident in the early 1990s. For some time the applicationof project management had been spreading beyond its traditional origins, to a wider rangeof application areas, particularly information technology. In a rapidly changing and respon-sive environment, where more and more of the endeavors of organizations are unique andcould benefit from being identified and managed as projects, interest in project managementgrew progressively stronger, extending to project management as an approach to enterprisemanagement (Dinsmore, 1996). However, these ‘‘projects’’ are often internal, without phys-ical end products or clearly identified ‘‘clients,’’ although they will often have many inter-ested stakeholders both internal and external to the parent organization. In an era ofnetworking, alliances, and partnerships, there may not even be a single or clearly identifiedparent organization, and resources are often shared across multiple projects and, in somecases, multiple organizations. Further, the application of project management extended be-yond international projects, managed offshore by nationally based companies to use byglobal corporations through globally distributed operations and projects. Hence, the com-munities of project management practice, formalized in primarily local or national profes-sional associations, faced, and continue to face, a dual challenge.

One aspect of this challenge is that the expertise that underpins the development anddefinition of project management practice is founded primarily in the management of clearlyrecognized and defined stand-alone projects such as those in engineering and construction.These practices were first transferred and minimally transformed in application to infor-mation systems and technology projects, but they retain a strong and identifiable legacyfrom their origins in major engineering projects. They do not recognize or offer a responseto the systemic and complex nature of business projects, including implementation of cor-porate strategy, management of organizations by projects, and enterprise innovation.

The other aspect of the challenge facing project management as a community of prac-tice, with aspirations to being a recognized profession, has been fragmentation throughinternal competition between the professional associations as the formal manifestations ofthe community, which have tended to remain locally focused and proprietorial about theknowledge created by their communities. In contrast, aided by the development of infor-mation technology; easier, faster, and less expensive travel; and an increasingly global econ-omy, informal communities of project management practice have developed through onlinecommunities of practice, attendance at an increasing number of project management con-ferences and other initiatives for exchange occurring outside the official channels. This de-velopment has a distinctly global dimension, encouraged by global corporations andfacilitated by global communication technologies.

The movement toward globalization, like modern project management, is consideredto have begun in the 1950s, and by 1996, international business had become ‘‘the fastest-growing field in the business world, just behind technology’’ (Lenn, 1997, p. 1), leading tothe suggestion that ‘‘to be successful in the twenty-first century, global professionals will


require an education that guarantees their competence in their individual country and com-petitiveness in an international marketplace’’ (Lenn and Campos, 1997, p. 9). Indeed, theNorth American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA, 1993) and the World Trade Organiza-tion’s General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS, 1994) removed many barriers toprofessional mobility and required the ‘‘development of policies that evaluate professionalcompetence based on fair, objective criteria and transparent (publicly known) procedures’’(Lenn, 1997, p. 2). These agreements have put pressure on established professions and theirprofessional associations to consider mutually acceptable standards in cooperation with othercountries and to actively plan for reciprocal recognition as a minimum.

By the mid-1990s, these wider external economic and social pressures, as well as internalpressures from the increasing number and range of users of project management, lead tothe emergence of a number of initiatives aimed at enhancing the global communication andcooperation between the professional associations as formal manifestations of the projectmanagement communities of practice and providing a more globally relevant and rationalframework for the definitions of practice and recognition of professional competence throughstandards and certification.

This chapter briefly identifies and describes key project management professional as-sociations and provides a review of initiatives relating to enhancement of global communi-cations, research, education, standards, and certification in project management.

The Professional Associations

There was relatively little growth in membership and in number of project managementprofessional associations from their emergence in the mid-1960s and 1970s through to thestart of 1990s, which heralded a decade of unprecedented growth. The most significantmembership growth was that of the Project Management Institute, which experienced agrowth from 8,500 members in 1990, located primarily in the United States, to nearly110,000 members in 2003, of which 69 percent were located in the United States, 11 percentin Canada, and 20 percent in other parts of the world (Project Management Institute,2003a).

At the start of the twenty-first century, the majority of people who want to participatein project management professional associations can do so through national associations,many of which are members of the International Project Management Association, whichdescribes itself as an ‘‘international network of national project management societies’’ (In-ternational Project Management Association, 2003); through one of the 207 Chartered and52 Potential PMI Chapters located in 125 countries (Project Management Institute, 2003a);or through one of a number of online project management communities.

Only a few of the project management professional associations will be briefly describedhere: the two organizations that purport to be global or international in their reach (PMIand IPMA), a few of the more influential or active of the associations that are neither PMIchapters nor members of IPMA (AIPM, PMSA), and a small number of other nationalassociations and/or PMI chapters that have characteristics of particular interest or have


made specific contributions to the promotion and development of project management prac-tice.

International Project Management Association (IPMA)

The International Project Management Association began as a discussion group comprisingmanagers of international projects and has evolved into a network or federation comprising30 national project management associations representing approximately 20,000 members,primarily in Europe but also in Africa and Asia (International Project Management Asso-ciation, 2003). The International Project Management Association has developed its ownstandards and certification program (see my chapter earlier in the book), which maintainsa central framework and quality control process but encourages development of conformingnational programs by national association members. The International Project ManagementAssociation and member national associations promote their standards and certification pro-gram in competition with those of others, primarily the Project Management Institute. TheIPMA is hampered by its structure as a federation, by vested interests and priorities of itsnational association membership, and by lack of funds available for international and globaldevelopment, which is a particular issue regarding the large number of member associationsrepresenting transitional economies who require subsidization of their membership and ser-vices.

As membership of the IPMA is subject to change, anyone interested in current mem-bership should refer to the IPMA Web Site—www.ipma.ch.

Project Management Institute

The Project Management Institute began as the national project management associationfor the United States. By the late 1990s the Institute realized that with over 15 percent ofits members and a number of chapters located worldwide, it was rapidly becoming aninternational organization. In September 1997 the PMI Board established a GlobalizationSubcommittee and then a Globalization Project Action Team (PMI Globalization ProjectAction Team, 1998) to assist the board in establishing its position on globalization. It hassubsequently refocused its activities as a global organization rather than a national associ-ation with international or offshore chapters. PMI’s headquarters continues to be located inthe United States (in Philadelphia, PA), and the organization remains subject to the law ofthat state. However, in May 2003 the Institute held its first Global Congress in Europe (TheHague) and in June 2003 opened a PMI Regional Service Centre for Europe, Middle East,and Africa (EMEA Regional Service Centre) in Brussels, Belgium (Project ManagementInstitute, 2003b).

The PMI approach, positioning itself as a global organization, plus its significant mem-bership—109,117 individual members as of July 2003 (Project Management Institute,2003a)—suggests that it is the organization that provides the primary representation andvoice for the project management community, globally. The Institute itself claims to be‘‘the leading nonprofit professional association in the area of Project Management’’


(www.pmi.org, June 2003). However, while headquarters and nearly 70 percent of mem-bership remain located in the United States, its products and services, despite recent effortsto increase globally representative involvement are, or are perceived to have been, primarilydeveloped in the United States to suit the needs of that market, and there is considerablereluctance on the part of project management professionals in some countries outside theUnited States to relinquish their independence and genuinely national representation. Afurther issue is economic. Practitioners in many countries cannot afford professional mem-bership fees that are acceptable in the United States. In many cases it has been necessaryto establish fully national associations in order to meet the needs of local jurisdictions and/or to provide a more affordable alternative. A notable example is South Africa, where projectmanagement practitioners were for many years represented by a PMI Chapter. The PMISouth Africa Chapter continues to exist, but a separate national association (Project Man-agement South Africa) was established in 1997 to satisfy local economic and regulatoryrequirements.

American Society for the Advancement of Project Management (asapm)

While project management practitioners in some countries outside the United States preferto retain local representation through national associations rather than having their profes-sional interests addressed through a local PMI chapter, a number of those in the UnitedStates took the view that if the Project Management Institute is a global organization, thereis no longer any national association representation in the United States. As a result, theAmerican Society for the Advancement of Project Management (asapm) was formed in July2001.

PMINZ: PMI New Zealand Chapter

The Project Management Institute, New Zealand (PMINZ) is an example of a PMI chapterthat has been accepted, to date unopposed, as the national project management association.It was established in 1994, as a chapter of the Project Management Institute and by 2003had 850 members (www.pmi.org.nz, June 2003).

Association for Project Management, UK (APM)

The Association for Project Management (UK), although a member of the IPMA, deservesmention in its own right, as it has more members (14,000) than any of the other memberorganizations of IPMA and has done considerable influential work in definition of the projectmanagement body of knowledge and development of certification programs. The APM Body

of Knowledge was one of the key documents referenced in writing of the ICB: IPMA Competence

Baseline, as well as in the development of certification programs.A PMI chapter was established in the United Kingdom in 1995 and reported mem-

bership of 2,000 by 2003, claiming that many of their members ‘‘are also members of localUK project management associations and groups’’ (UK PMI Chapter, 2003)


Australian Institute of Project Management (AIPM)

The Australian Institute of Project Management, begun in 1976 as the Project ManagersForum, is the Australian national project management association and by 2003 had 4,000members distributed over eight state and territory chapters. As AIPM is not a member ofthe International Project Management Association, it has been well placed to offer an in-dependent voice and in some cases act as an intermediary between the Project ManagementInstitute and the International Project Management Association in the interests of globalcooperation. The AIPM is also notable for having secured government support for devel-opment of performance-based competency standards for project management, recognizedwithin the Australian Qualifications Framework (see my earlier chapter). Another role ofAIPM has been to encourage development of national project management associations inthe Asia Pacific Region and cooperation among them. AIPM has cooperative agreementswith a number of Asian professional associations and has participated in a fairly loose AsiaPacific Forum for some years. In 2002 the AIPM took a leading role in the formation ofthe Asia Pacific Federation for Project Management (APFPM), an umbrella organization ofnational project management institutes.

The Australian Institute of Project Management remained unopposed as the nationalproject management association until 1996, when the first of a number of PMI chapterswas chartered in Australia. By 2003 there were PMI chapters established in Sydney, Mel-bourne, Canberra, Adelaide, Queensland, and Western Australia (Project Management In-stitute, 2003c), with a total membership of 1,500, with 700 of these being members of theSydney Chapter (Project Management Institute, 2003d). Relationships between the Austra-lian Institute of Project Management and the Australian PMI Chapters varies from time totime, and from state to state, between friendly cooperation and active competition.

Project Management South Africa (PMSA)

Project Management South Africa (PMSA) has already been mentioned in discussion of theProject Management Institute. It is worthy of separate mention because, like the AustralianInstitute of Project Management, it is not a member of the IPMA and therefore also hasthe opportunity to offer an independent voice in the global arena. However, because thePMI South African Chapter was formed first (1982) and was very active for a long timebefore formation of PMSA and because PMSA was essentially formed by members of thePMI South Africa Chapter (which continues to exist), there is a far closer and more con-sistently cooperative relationship between the two organizations. Membership of PMSAincreased from 400 at formation in 1997 to over 1,200 in 2003.

The drive to create PMSA came from a need for a cross-sector forum for practitionersto meet and work together and for a national body to work with local organizations andthe South African government in developing effective project management within SouthAfrica. Another argument in favor of formation of the national association was that PMImembership fees had become prohibitive for many in South Africa with the decline in thevalue of the South African rand relative to U.S. currency.

PMSA has taken an active role in working with the South African government indevelopment of performance-based competency standards for project management, similar


in format to those developed in Australia and recognized within the South African NationalQualifications Framework.

Japan Project Management Forum (JPMF)

Japan is another country that embraces both a national association, the Japan Project Man-agement Forum (JPMF) and a PMI chapter (Tokyo), both established in 1998. The JPMFis a division of the Engineering Advancement Association (ENAA), which was founded in1978 as a nonprofit organization based on corporate rather than individual membership,dedicated capability enhancement, and promotion of the Japanese engineering services in-dustry. ENAA enjoys government support through the Ministry of Economy, Trade andIndustry (METI), and membership encompasses 250 engineering and project-based com-panies. Since inception, ENAA has had a Project Management Committee, and 46 membercompanies are involved in this committee. While ENAA engages and addresses the needsof industry and corporations, JPMF acts as the professional association for individual prac-titioners.

To advance the use of project management approaches in Japan, the ENAA was com-missioned by the government (METI) over a period of three years from 1999 to develop a‘‘Japanese style project management knowledge system,’’ which has been developed andpublished as a standard guidebook under the title P2M: Project and Program Management for

Enterprise Innovation (ENAA, 2002). Subsequently, in April 2002, the Project ManagementProfessionals Certification Center (PMCC) was established, to widely disseminate the P2Min Japan and beyond and to establish a related certification process (see my earlier chapter).

Project Management Research Committee, China (PMRC)

Established in 1991, the PMRC was the first, and claims to be the only national, cross-industry project management professional association in China, supported by over 100 uni-versities and companies and 3,500 active individual members form universities, industries,and government.

In 1994 the PMRC initiated, with support from China Natural Science Fund, thedevelopment of a Chinese Project Management Body of Knowledge (C-PMBOK), which was pub-lished together with the China-National Competence Baseline (C-NCB) in May 2001. Over160,000 copies of this document had been issued by the start of 2003.

PMRC supports both the IPMA, of which it has been a member since 1996, and theProject Management Institute. It helped introduce the PMP certification into China andstarted an IPMA certification program in July 2001 (Yan, 2003).

In 2003, there were three PMI Potential Chapters in China (Project Management In-stitute, 2003c). Also active in China is the Project Management Committee (PMC), estab-lished in November 2001 as a branch of the China Association of International EngineeringConsultants (CAIEC), an organization guided by the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Eco-nomic Cooperation, China (MOFTEC). The PMC promotes project management trainingand certification among the 255 member companies of CAIEC (Yan, 2003).


Society of Project Managers, Singapore

The Society of Project Managers, Singapore is worthy of separate mention because of itsactive role in the Asian region, strong links with other parts of the region, notably Japan,and as it purports to be ‘‘an amalgam of learned society and a professional body.’’ TheSociety was formed in 1994 by a group of professionals as a vehicle for advancing thedevelopment of project management. It has held a number of well-regarded research-basedconferences in the region (The Society of Project Managers, 2002).

Global Initiatives

As outlined in the previous section, there is strong evidence of considerable and increasinginterest in project management from individuals, corporations, and governments. Responseshave originated at the local level, giving rise to many competing membership opportunities,conferences, standards, and certifications, not only between countries but often within asingle country. Two key organizations have attempted to achieve a more unified and globalapproach: the International Project Management Association, as a federation of nationalassociations, and the Project Management Institute in taking an active stance as a globalorganization. To a large extent this has merely increased the dilemma of choice for indi-viduals and organizations, especially as national governments such as those in Australia,South Africa, the United Kingdom, and Japan have recently begun to take an active rolein support and recognition of project management standards and certifications. The Inter-national Project Management Association, on behalf of member associations, promotes theICB: IPMA Competence Baseline and aligned National Competence Baselines, along with its 4-Level Certification Program. At the same time, the Project Management Institute promotesits PMBOK Guide, PMP Certification, and a range of other standards and certificationproducts, globally. Individuals and organizations must therefore not only decide betweenone national and one ‘‘global’’ or international membership and set of standards and as-sociation certifications, but between several products available at both the national andglobal levels.

A frustration for the ‘‘users’’ of the products of professional associations, primarily inthe form of standards and certification, has been the apparent unwillingness or inability ofthe project management associations, despite the signing of ‘‘cooperative agreements,’’ toreally work together to enhance global cooperation and communication and to bring a senseof global unity to the profession, resolving the dilemmas of decision in terms of investmentin project management association membership, standards, and certification. As a result,efforts toward global communication, cooperation, and alignment of standards and certifi-cation have primarily been informal and unfunded, occurring outside the project manage-ment professional associations. Some of the primary initiatives are reviewed here.

Global Project Management Forum (GPMF)

A response to the independent and largely local development of standards and certification,as well as research and education, first came to a head in 1994. At the PMI Symposium in


Vancouver, Canada, there was a meeting of representatives of PMI, IPMA, APM, and theAIPM, at which ‘‘formal cooperation on several global issues, including standards, certifi-cation and formation of a global project management organization or ‘confederation’’’ werediscussed (Pells, 1996, p. ix). Another, informal meeting, of individuals from about a dozencountries, also gathered, intensely discussing cooperation and communication among projectmanagement professionals around the world and formulating a declaration of intent. Thefirst of a series of Global Project Management Forums, held in association with the PMISymposium in New Orleans in 1995, was the result.

There were nearly 200 attendees, representing over 30 countries, at the first GlobalProject Management Forum. There were high hopes that the energy and enthusiasm evi-denced at this meeting would be ‘‘an opportunity for the world’s leading project manage-ment associations to take another major step towards achieving agreements on internationalstandards, recognition of project management certifications, and development of a globalcore Project Management Body of Knowledge’’ (Pells, 1996, p. x). Breakout sessions wereheld to discuss five topics:

1. International project management standards2. Globally-recognized project management certification3. Global communication among project management professional organizations4. Global cooperation and organization of the project management profession5. Development of a global core project management body of knowledge

This first meeting of the Global Project Management Forum was a high point for thisinitiative and will be a lasting and important memory for those privileged to be there.However, by the time the thirteenth Global Project Management Forum was held in Mos-cow in June 2003, little real progress had been achieved. The GPMF had evolved into aninformal association with a slogan ‘‘Toward the globalization of project management’’ anda stated mission ‘‘To advance globalization of the project management profession by pro-moting communications and cooperation between and among project management orga-nizations and professionals around the world’’ (www.pmforum.org). The forums have beenheld as a one-day event associated with the annual or biannual conferences of projectmanagement professional associations. Until 1999 the key venues were the annual Symposiaof the Project Management Institute and the biannual IPMA World Congress, but from1999 onward, the Project Management Institute declined to provide for the forums in as-sociation with their symposia, preferring instead to offer a PMI Global Assembly aimedprimarily at representatives of their globally distributed chapters.

The agenda for each forum has become relatively predictable, with presentations andbreakout sessions on Research, Standards, Education, and Certification. The initial idealthat the initiative would bring together people from all over the world in an open forum tokeep touch with developments in the field of project management has been fulfilled, but itbecame clear within a couple of years of the first GPMF meeting that meaningful cooper-ation between the project management professional associations was far from being realized.Informal cooperation and lip service were possible. Formal cooperation and real progress


in the interests of a strong and unified project management profession were hampered bypolitical issues and vested proprietorial interests.

Recognizing that real achievements were required to maintain the momentum begunby the GPMF, the IPMA established and convened a series of Global Working Groups thatfirst met in East Horsley, UK, in February 1999 (IPMA, 1999).

Global Working Groups

The Working Groups were established in six areas, namely (IPMA, 1999):

• Standards• Education• Certification• Accreditation/Credentialing• Research• The Global Forum

Certification and Accreditation/Credentialing were recognized as related and were merged.The subsequent five Working Groups were tasked with delivering a progress report at thenext Global Project Forum, the last held in association with a Project Management InstituteSymposium, in Philadelphia in September 1999. These five Working Groups have continuedto present progress reports at each of the following Global Forums. The Working Groupon the Global Forum confirmed that it should remain informal, independent of establishedprofessional associations. Because of their nature, Education and Research have generatedconsiderable interest, and breakout sessions have provided excellent opportunities for sharingideas. A research project concerning the benchmarking of the degree of project-orientationof societies was originated in 1999 and has been furthered under the auspices of the IPMAthrough Projekt Management Austria (PMA) (IPMA, 2003). The Certification WorkingGroups and GPMF breakout session have facilitated ongoing discussion of global issuessurrounding certification and credentialing, but little progress is possible without formalinvolvement of the professional associations that ‘‘own’’ the existing certification productsand processes. A global approach to certification also needs, as a prerequisite, a globalapproach to standards.

Progress arising from the Working Group: Standards is reviewed in detail in my pre-vious chapter. The most active and promising of the initiatives generated by the GlobalWorking Group: Standards is the development of a global framework of performance-based standards for project management personnel (see my earlier chapter and http://www.globalPMstandards.org).

Toward a Global Body of PM Knowledge (OLCI)

This initiative, which began in 1998 by bringing together those working at the time onvarious representations of the body of project management knowledge (ICB: IPMA Competence


Baseline, reviews of the APM Body of Knowledge and the PMBOK Guide), has progressedthrough a series of annual workshops hosted by organizations, including NASA, Telenor,ESC Lille and the Project Management Professionals Certification Center, and JPMF. Thisinitiative is discussed in detail in my earlier chapter.

International Research Network on Organizing by Projects (IRNOP)

IRNOP, the International Research Network for Organizing by Projects, is somewhat dif-ferent from the initiatives outlined previously, as it is not directly associated with projectmanagement professional associations but is an important expression of the informal inter-actions of the global communities of project management practice and has been an impor-tant initiative in achieving global communication and cooperation in project managementresearch. It has no formal organization but comprises a loosely coupled group of researchers.It was initiated in 1993 to support and enhance efforts aiming at the development of atheory on temporary organizations and project management. Its main activity is the facili-tation of research conferences, and these have been held in Sweden (1994), Paris (1996),Calgary (1998), Sydney (2000), and the Netherlands (2002). The next conference will beheld in Turku, Finland, in 2004.

Prior to staging the first Project Management Research Conference by PMI in Paris in2000, IRNOP provided the only real impetus and opportunity for students, researchers, andacademics in project management to come together to share ideas and information abouttheir research.

Summary

By referring to the formal manifestations of project management communities of practiceas ‘‘professional associations,’’ we assume that project management is in fact a profession.Although there is a strong sense of aspiration among project management practitioners andtheir representative associations to professional status, this remains a matter of debate andhas been powerfully questioned by Zwerman and Thomas (2001), who have highlighted the‘‘barriers on the road to professionalization.’’ They maintain that although project manage-ment has been moving toward satisfying various criteria indicative of professional status, itis still some distance away and achievement will require significant effort on the part of theprofessional associations and members.

Even recognition of project management as an occupation or field of practice is vul-nerable, as many see it merely as an aspect of general management, and there is a growingview that project management should form part of a wide range of skill sets. Much of theknowledge base of project management is shared with or has been annexed from bodies ofknowledge of other professions, and Turner (1999) suggests that in order to be a matureprofession, project management must develop a sound theoretical basis indicating that con-siderable further research is required to establish a sound foundation for professional status.

A challenge that professional associations are likely to face is the increasing involvementof government in defining practice standards for project management as evidenced by the


project management standards forming part of National Qualifications Frameworks in Aus-tralia, South Africa, and the United Kingdom; government support of project managementstandards development in Japan and China; and active leadership by of the Office of Gov-ernment Commerce in the United Kingdom in developing standards and certification pro-grams for individuals and organizations involved in projects and programs. Influenced bytrade agreements such as the World Trade Organization’s General Agreement on Trade inServices (GATS, 1994), governments are motivated to seek mutual recognition in areas ofstandards, accreditation, and certification. Further, unless project management professionalassociations take the lead, global corporations will do so in order to satisfy their own needs.

Clearly, there is considerable work to be done to establish project management as aprofession, and this suggests the need for project management’s formal representation toadopt a globally unified stance rather than pursue the fragmentation and internal compe-tition that has characterized development to date. It is interesting to note that the majorityof activity promoting global communication and cooperation, the free sharing and exchangeof ideas among members of the global community of project management practice, is oc-curring outside the formal structures, through online discussion groups and through infor-mally structured initiatives.

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Documents

The Wiley Guide to Managing Projects (Morris/The Wiley Guide to Managing Projects) || Professional Associations and Global Initiatives