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CBL LMP - Leading and Managing Projects*

Faculty
Robert Austin, others to be announced
Course Coordinator
Robert Austin
Prerequisite/progression of the course
Bachelor degree. Knowledge of corporate strategy, management theory, and organizational behavior is an advantage, but not a precondition for participation. The course is offered as required component in both the first year of the CMI concentration in Leadership and Management Studies and the first year of Cand. Merc. (Psyk.), but is also open to students in other graduate programs at the CBS, including international students.
Course content, structure and teaching
This course will prepare students to design, manage and evaluate projects by exploring both the conceptual foundations and the practical tools for successful project management. At the same time, the course will go beyond simple how-to or best practice approaches to the subject by taking a close look at the assumptions behind the conventional wisdom about project management, and by exploring what it means to organize work as a series of individuated tasks. The course also will consider how to manage the uncertainty and risk associated with project work, and explore how the human elements of power, politics, and interrelationships play into the success and/or failure of projects. In this regard the course will explore how concepts and practices introduced in other areas of the CMI curriculum—such as strategy, stakeholders, diversity, culture, and sensemaking—play into the project management process. The analysis of several case studies in both successful and unsuccessful project management will provide students with practical examples of the themes and principles under discussion. The course will highlight in particular cases that explore the management of projects in transnational and intercultural contexts.
Class time will feature case discussions, and will also include lectures and discussion groups in which students will explore practical and theoretical perspectives and apply them to specific case studies.
Learning Objectives
At the end of the course students should be able to:
  • Define the concept of a “project” and the practice of “project management” from multiple perspectives, and explain the differences between those perspectives.
  • Define the similarities and differences between projects, on the one hand, and programs, initiatives, or general management operations on the other, in order to specify the particular challenges, responsibilities and opportunities that confront project managers.
  • Describe and account for the differences between, for example, change projects, innovation projects, and other kinds of projects, and draw on these differences to critique universal theories of project management.
  • Explain the origins and define the major characteristics of the mainstream “project management body of knowledge,” and specify the conventionally accepted tools that have been developed to help project managers meet the challenges they face.
  • Employ alternative and critical perspectives on project management to underscore the assumptions and potential shortcomings behind mainstream approaches to projects and project management.
  • Define and compare the concepts of project risk, uncertainty, and complexity, and present the key conventional and alternative approaches to managing risk, uncertainty, and complexity in projects.
  • Specify the roles, task, and interests of project participants and stakeholders, and specify the centrality of team dynamics, organizational politics, and power relations to the task of managing projects.
  • Apply these concepts and perspectives to the analysis of a range of cases chosen to exemplify the nature of various kinds of projects and the particular challenges that confront contemporary project managers.
Type of examination, exam aids and assessment
Exam form:Forty eight-hour, take-home, written case exam graded by the course instructors and internal censors, in which students display an understanding of the materials covered in the course, and an ability to apply that understanding to the analysis of a case chosen to exemplify themes and issues covered during the semester.
Exam aids: Take home exam.
Recommended literature
  • Harvard Business School Press, Managing Projects Large and Small (HBS Press, 2003) 192 pgs.
  • Loch, DeMeyer, and Pich, Managing the Unknown: A New Approach to Managing High Uncertainty and Risk in Projects (Wiley, 2006).
  • Johann Packendorff, “Inquiring into the Temporary Organization: New Directions for Project Management Research,” Scandinavian Journal of Management. Vol. 11, No. 4, 319-333.
  • Lundin, Rolf A. & Söderholm, Anders (1995) “A Theory of the Temporary Organization.” Scandinavian Journal of Management. Vol. 11, No. 4, pp. 437-455.
  • Kristian Kreiner, “In search of relevance: Project management in drifting environments.” Scandinavian Journal of Management. 11/4 (1995) 335-346.
  • Online case pack.

Last updated by The electives Office 24/11/2009