Trust in Project Management

I am delighted that ICB 4.0 recognizes the importance of trust in project management. This is an important change introduced into the last version of this document. For instance, Section 4.4.4. entitled „Relations and Engagements“ argues as follows: “Personal relations build the foundation for the productive collaboration, personal engagement, and commitments of others. This include […]

Decoding leadership and its application to projects

A few days ago McKinsey&Company published an interesting article “Decoding leadership: What really matters”, highlighting results of an intensive research on leadership.

Sharing and Learning through Megaprojects: Building bridges on knowledge and competence

The project world that we live in is becoming megaproject world. Megaprojects are big investment projects whose purpose is to make the “mega” for client and contractors, from one side, but also for the community itself from the other side. In the megaproject world megaprojects experts explore their performance, why they fail often and what […]

Helping – how to offer, give and receive help

We are project management professionals, dedicating a lot of our precious time to the advancement of our profession, on regional, national or global level. However, I often think that we are not yet contributing enough to society and those, who are in need. Who is in need? Besides all the professionals working in a business […]

Facilitating dialogue – overcoming one-way communication

Whilst travelling around the world I often experience conferences, where a presentation is the only way of communication. We can learn a lot from those presentations, especially if they provide insights in a real case and show a way to transfer the learning into our own situation. However, often the presenter exceeds the time dedicated […]

Effective escalation in projects

Sometimes we have to escalate in projects, in order to overcome problems. Typically, the escalation is done by the project manager and is directed towards the next decision making body. This might be the project sponsor, a steering committee or a senior executive. It is one of the most important accountabilities of a project manager, […]

Project Legacy – What is it, why is it important and can it ever really be planned for?

Legacy is something I hear often being talked about, but is it really understood by those that speak it? And more than that, can it ever really be understood or a common definition ever be found and can legacy ever really be planned for? Before establishing my own consulting business in 2013, I worked at […]

Projects require improvisation

The concept of nowadays project management was born in the 1950s in the USA, mainly in the aerospace and defence sector. It was based on Operations Research , which is an analytical approach for solving technical problems and decision-making. Network planning techniques were in the focus for the first decades of our discipline with methodologies […]

Projects require virtuosity

We experience an increasing number and importance of projects in our society. One of the most important characteristic of a project is the uniqueness, which means that a project differs from routine tasks and other projects through distinctive features, such as the complexity, volume, risk exposure, stakeholder involved or specific requirements. This requires a project […]

Projects and project management in Panama

This year´s IPMA World Congress offered a great opportunity to us, visiting Panama and experiencing the spirit of Central America. The Republic of Panama is a key country of the region, bridging the Northern and Southern parts of the Americas. Panama is situated between Costa Rica and Columbia and sits between the Pacific and the Caribbean Sea.