Document Type

Closed Project

Publication Date

Summer 2014

Instructor

Timothy Anderson

Course Title

Engineering Management Synthesis

Course Number

ETM 590

Subjects

Project management -- Study and teaching (Higher), Project managers -- Training of -- Evaluation

Abstract

The field of project management (PM) is growing rapidly in the technology driven world we live in today. Companies use projects today more than ever before as a method to achieve the many complex goals in line with their missions. Project managers play a key role as they are ultimately responsible for all phases of projects. In spite of the extensive effort and resources that are devoted to the development of project management, projects are still failing at a surprising rate. To combat this issue, the education and training of project managers needs to be evaluated for strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities to ensure it suits the needs of today’s industry demands.

Our research and analysis includes a survey of ranking project management skills from an industry point of view, research into existing project management curriculums at universities throughout the nation, and a review of literature related to project management education. We look for important aspects of PM training that can support or recommend the current university project management certificate curriculums. Through analysis of industry feedback, literature findings and project management curricula, we discuss the important aspects of project management curricula and provide a recommendation for a curriculum suited to the industry.

Our findings suggest that a major weakness in existing training methods lies in a lack of focus on transferable soft skills. We discuss the cause and effect of this issue, and suggest some critical changes that should be implemented. The specific skill that we propose for Project Management curricula is an increased focus of soft skills.

Rights

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Comments

This project is only available to students, staff, and faculty of Portland State University

Persistent Identifier

http://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/21551

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