Acknowledging excellence in project management research

The IPMA Research Awards have become a fundamental activity for the IPMA Research Management Board (RMB). The Research Award is a way for the IPMA to recognise excellence in project management research, not only for established researchers but also for young researchers pursuing their PhD degrees. Last but not least the achievement award is a token of respect and gratitude for a life-time contribution of a researcher in the area of project management.

At the 3rd IPMA Research Conference in Cape Town in December 2015 the IPMA Research Awards were presented in three categories according to the tradition. The winner of the Young Researcher Awards 2015 is Ms. Anna Hulda Olafsdottir. She is in the final stages of her PhD project at the University of Iceland. The title of her project is “A system dynamic approach to quality management in the construction industry.” The research evolved around one particular type of projects, namely construction projects, and aspects of quality management in this type of projects. Ms. Olafsdottir accumulated data through stakeholder group model building sessions and through a quantitative background. A system dynamic model was developed and used to assess the benefits of processes related to quality management systems and the meaning of the term “active quality management system” in the construction industry. The contribution of Ms. Olafsdottir sheds light on the interconnected disciplines of project management and quality management in the construction industry and opportunities for improvement in this industry.

The winner of the IPMA Researcher Award for 2015 is Prof. Dr. Martina Huemann for her study on Human Resource Management in project-oriented organizations. This research offers insight into an approach that is designed to align HR to the needs of projects and the project-oriented organization, in terms of performance systems, recruitment, reward and management structure. The contribution of Prof. Huemann is of great importance in a world which is evolving more and more towards projectification, the application of project management as a general management approach for organisations. Prof. Huemann is a Professor at the WU Vienna University of Economics and Business, she heads the Project Management Group in the Department Strategy and Innovation and is the Academic Director of the Professional MBA Project Management Program at the university.

Finally, the winner of the IPMA Achievement Award 2015 is Prof. Dr. Hans Georg Gemünden who has served as a professor for innovation and technology management at TU Berlin for the last 15 years. In his carrier he has built up project management in research and education in Germany. He has educated thousands of well-known project managers and he has been the supervisor of many award winning bachelor, master and PhD students. For instance, he has supervised 68 PhDs and 32 of those PhD projects were on project management. The contribution of Prof Gemünden for project management is extensive. He has focused on different project management areas such as success factors of single projects, success factors of highly innovative projects, success factors of multi-team projects, and multi-project management. Prof. Gemünden has now retired from TU Berlin at the age of 66 but he is starting a new career and has become a professor at BI in Oslo. We can therefore expect that Prof. Gemünden will continue to contribute to the progression of project management as a scientific discipline.

The IPMA Research Award is a crucial part of the activities of the RMB of IPMA. We really wish to portray the research awards as a way to recognise excellence in research and we wan’t to appeal to researchers in all age groups. We feel that this is an important factor in moving our discipline further, for the benefit of organisations and societies.

[color-box color=”mycustomcolor”]

Schedule for IPMA Research Awards 2016

•  Application forms are available at www.ipma.ch
• Applications are accepted in the period from 01. January 2016 – 15. June 2016
• IPMA Research Award ceremony at the 4th IPMA Research Conference in the fall of 2016.

[/color-box]

Further information on the IPMA Research Awards 2016 can be found: www.ipma.ch and contacts via: helgi.ingason@ipma.ch