Project Governance

Without a governance structure, an organization runs the risk of conflicts and inconsistencies between the various means of achieving organizational goals, the processes and resources, causing costly inefficiencies that impact negatively on both smooth running and bottom line profitability. However, the frequency of projects failing to meet these corporate objectives has focused attention firmly on the process of project governance. In this book, Ralf Müller provides a well-researched framework to explain the different preferences organizations have in goal setting, along with the best-practices, roles and responsibilities related to governance tasks. This concise text is an important guide for project and programme managers, those managers concerned with corporate governance such as risk managers and internal auditors, project sponsors and project board members, as well as academics researching organizational and project performance. Project Governance is part of the Gower Fundamentals of Project Management Series. Practising professionals and project students will find in the fundamentals a definitive, shorthand guide to each of the main competencies associated with project management; a book that is authoritative, based on current research but immediately relevant and applicable.

Effective project decision making is recognised as a key feature of successful projects. Ineffective decision making leads to project delay and failure. Project Governance takes readers through the logical steps required for the establishment of a project governance framework for a project or organisation. Starting with problems typical of ineffective project governance, it develops a set of principles designed to overcome these problems and builds a framework based on these principles. This comprehensive guide explains how to populate the framework effectively, provides the accountabilities and responsibilities of the main roles , and describes how to integrate the project governance framework into the organisation. Whether you are a project management practitioner or a student of project management, the lessons learned in this valuable handbook make for essential reading.

In our increasingly competitive global economy, companies in all industries are struggling to survive and seeking new ways to do more--and this places unprecedented pressure on project managers to take on and govern multiple efforts simultaneously. Enterprise Project Governance reveals proven techniques for dealing with the multiplicity of projects and ensuring that programs and initiatives create the value needed to help your organization prosper. Through enlightening examples and case studies, readers will learn how to examine new project proposals and align them with the priorities, resources, and strategies of the organization. But this isn’t a one-person job. As its title suggests, Enterprise Project Governance takes a more systemic approach to the important work of managing projects, teaching practical methods for incorporating enterprise project governance into an organization's culture, synchronizing it with corporate governance, and maximizing efficiency and results across departments. Whether you’re a boardroom exec, an experience project manager struggling to keep up, or someone working in the trenches and hoping to advance, this go-to guide will help you manage your workload--and even increase it--with ease.

Understanding governance as it applies to portfolios, programs, and projects is growing in importance to organizations, because appropriate governance is a factor in the success or failure of strategic initiatives and portfolios, as well as an organization’s programs and projects. Implementing an effective governance framework can be challenging due to factors such as increasing business complexities, regulatory requirements, globalization, and rapid changes in technology and business environments. Many organizations do not have a consistent approach to portfolio, program, and project governance. PMI’s Governance of Portfolios, Programs, and Projects: A Practice Guide, developed by leading experts in the field, provides guidance to organizations and practitioners on how to implement or enhance governance on portfolios, programs, and projects. This practice guide provides definitions for governance in an effort to distinguish the different levels of governance and to identify their common elements.

This book unveils a gap in the governance of development projects that ultimately hinders effective, transparent and accountable usage of resources. Illustrated with entertaining examples, the book develops a Project Governance model. The models six modules build an integrated, strategically oriented and ethically reflected platform for a more truthful and efficient cooperation in difficult projects or programs such as in development.

In Project Risk Governance, Dieter Fink breaks new ground in two ways. Firstly, he places project risk management in the context of today’s organisations in which objectives are increasingly implemented through projects to better respond to fast-changing markets. Secondly, he applies a governance perspective to examine project risk at the project and corporate levels, an approach which is significantly under-researched and for which theoretical knowledge and professional practice are at an early stage of maturity. Project risk governance falls between corporate governance and project governance and is attracting increasing attention. The author argues that there are two reasons for this. The first is the ‘projectisation’ of organisations, in particular within organisations conforming to the Project-Based Organisation (PBO) model. The second is the prevalence of a strategic approach to managing risk for the purposes of protecting organisational values and creating competitive advantage. The book addresses governance, strategy, value management and building enterprise-wide Project Risk Governance (PRG) capabilities. Chapters examine the role of projects in organisations and the need to integrate project and business strategy within the framework of the Project-Based Organisation. PRG is introduced via its links with corporate and project governance and its scope is covered in chapters that identify relevant processes, structures and relationship mechanisms. Contextual influences such as the professionalisation of project management are recognised and insights provided to increase readers’ understanding of uncertainty, risk events, and probabilities and of the essential requirements of managing risks at project level. The final chapter provides a roadmap to the stages and dimensions of a PRG maturity model.

Projects and programmes are approved and funded to generate benefits. Project Management for the Creation of Organisational Value proposes a complete framework that seeks to support such an objective – from project selection and definition, through execution, and beyond implementation of deliverables until benefits are secured. Because it is preoccupied with deliverables, accepted project management practice is flawed. Project Management for the Creation of Organisational Value proposes an alternative approach, which seeks a flow of target outcomes for the organisation investing in the project. Project Management for the Creation of Organisational Value provides support for all those who play a role of leadership in projects at different levels. Senior executives, practitioners and academics will find in this book a comprehensive guide to the conduct of projects and programmes, which includes robust models, a set of consistent principles, an integrated glossary, enabling tools, illustrative examples and case studies. A companion workbook to this text for instructors and students is available online at http://extras.springer.com. The workbook illustrates project management concepts using the approach presented in this book and contains a range of exercises.

The Oxford Handbook of Project Management presents and discusses leading ideas in the management of projects. Positioning project management as a domain much broader and more strategic than simply 'execution management', this Handbook draws on the insights of over 40 scholars to chart the development of the subject over the last 50 years or more as an area of increasing practical and academic interest. It suggests we could be entering an emerging 'third wave' of analysis and interpretation following its early technical and operational beginnings and the subsequent shift to a focus on projects and their management. Topics dealt with include: the historical evolution of the subject; its theoretical base; professionalism; business and societal context; strategy; organization; governance; innovation; overruns; risk; information management; procurement; relationships and trust; knowledge management; practice and teams. This handbook is of particular relevance to those interested in the research issues underlying project management.