Modern project management was developed in the 1970s. The methods were taken over to more and more industries. Today project management is found in all parts of industry, in public administration, in education and in sports. The global trend of “projectification” that comprises all areas of professional and private life is ubiquitous.
First studies in Germany, Norway and Iceland show that the national projectification level is around 33% of the country´s GDP. But is the projectification level different in developed or emerging countries? Is the level higher in economies that are based on the service sector or the manufacturing industry? What are the key drivers for projectification? Does the economic cycle have an impact on projectification of a national economy? And if this is the case, how does it work: as a leading indicator or as a lagging indicator?
And what are the consequences of the global trend of projectification on our societies? In times of increasing automatisation and digitalisation of the standard line processes in organisations, more and more people work in projects to realize the strategies of the executives, to create innovations and to further develop these ideas into new products and services, to develop marketing campaigns or to improve internal processes in organisations. Employment contracts are becoming increasingly limited to the duration of a project. This seems to give greater flexibility both to the employer and the employee. Long-term or even life-long employment will become an exception. But what does this mean for the individual, for an organisations and for the societies? What is the impact for the social security systems like unemployment insurances or pension systems? What does it mean for the planning of the private life and family planning, or for decision making processes e.g. for private mortgage lending?
Projectification leads to the fact that public projects like infrastructure projects become more transparent as project management leads to more transparent project governance structures in public administration. The approval and execution of major public projects like streets, public transportation, schools and universities, hospitals or high-speed data networks can lead to better way of value creation for a country for the sake of its citizens and a better life for everyone.
The IPMA Research Conference 2018 from September 3-4 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil aims to discuss these urgent questions. The Call for Papers is to encourage a broad range of submissions. The authors are encouraged to reach beyond the usual boundaries of the project domain and to embrace innovative approaches for further developing our understanding of project management.
The following subtopics and workshop streams are planned:
- Status of projectification of societies
- Consequence of the global projectification trend for individuals, organisations and societies
- Public administration based on transparent project governance structures
- National project maturity levels / index measurement
- Value creation through projects/ project management for the society
Authors are invited to submit proposals for short presentations of their work in progress, new ideas or recent results. We encourage submissions from all areas related to project management. Short papers should be of no more than 500 words by April 21, 2018. Authors of accepted short papers will be expected to provide a full paper by June 21, 2018 and to present their ideas in a presentation at the IPMA Research Conference.
- Short outline of the content (500 words)
- References
- Biographical details of the author
Please submit a pdf file of your short paper by April 21th 2018 to: research@ipma.world.
All selected papers will get published by IPMA, the best papers will be selected a special issue in the International Journal of Managing Projects in Business (https://www.emeraldinsight.com/journal/ijmpb).
The IPMA Research Conference was founded in 2013 and as a Think Tank it aims to bring researchers, experts, scholars and practitioners in project management together who share a common passion for their discipline. During the conference, they discuss and exchange research ideas and achievements on the topic of projects and its management. The distinctive feature of this small in size conference is the intense dialogue between practitioners and academics which can neither be found at scientific or professional conferences. The annual international conference was held in Germany, China, South Africa, Iceland and South Korea since its beginning and aims to bring together experts from all countries worldwide to increase the mutual understanding of the global challenges of project managers in diverse environments and industries.