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HA.E82 - Project Management*

Faculty
Kjell Tryggestad & Karin Strzeletz Ivertsen
Course Coordinator
Morten Thanning Vendelø
Prerequisite/progression of the course
It is advantageous, but no prerequisite, to have some basic social science knowledge i.e., economics, sociology and organization theory.
Course content, structure and teaching
Projects have become an increasingly important form of organizing core business processes such as product development. Yet, projects also require particular project management competence. The course aims to provide students with analytical tools and capabilities that will allow them to comprehensively examine the challenges of managing innovative projects under high uncertainty. Incomplete knowledge of alternatives and consequences is assumed to be a prevailing condition.
Students will first be introduced to the project and its particular organizational form. What are the important project management tasks? What does the project require in terms of managerial actions and dispositions? What are the ‘tools of the trade’? These are some of the relevant questions that this course will address. Students will also be introduced to different project management tools and trained in evaluating their assumptions and practical relevance. Lat but not least, the important question of evaluating project success (and failures) will be addressed.
The course consists of three interrelated building bricks. The first brick consists of theories that enable us to analyse and answer the question of what the project is and what it can do. Here we also focus on the link between the project and its main constituencies and stakeholders. The second brick consists of particular project-related topics such as the role and tasks of project management, project management tools, and project evaluation. The third brick consists of analysis and discussions of cases based on the course reading.
The course comprises of lectures and structured class discussion sessions. In the lectures theoretical and analytical approaches are presented based primarily on the readings from the course textbook and a collection of articles. The lectures are intended to be open dialogues about the theories and the project management approaches appropriate to each week’s topic.
Student involvement in investigating the strengths and weaknesses and practical relevance of the different project management tools and approaches is encouraged. The structured class discussion takes their point of departure in the case material and here the students are expected to offer their interpretations, critiques and solutions to the issues and questions arising from the case.
The course's development of personal competences
Students will learn how of analyze and navigate in projects operating under uncertainty and ambiguity.
Learning Objectives
By the end of the course the student should demonstrate ability to:
  • Use analytical tools to examine the challenges of managing innovative projects under high uncertainty.
  • Account for required course reading and to illustrate points from the literature with examples from the case.
  • Understand theoretical-empirical relationship, i.e. demonstrate an ability to establish an explanatory relationship between theory and the case. I.e. using theories to generate and explain issues concerning significant aspects of the case and using the case to discuss fundamental assumptions, possibilities, and limitations in the applied theories.
  • Carry out critical assessments of the scope of alternative theories and compare their relevance to the case.
Type of examination, exam aids and assessment
4-hour written exam, open book. All course readings and lecture notes from both student and teacher.
Students at the HA programme are able to write their bachelor project in connection with this course: Yes
Recommended literature
Paul Gardiner, P. (2005) “Project Management - A Strategic Planning Approach”. Palgrave MacMillan: UK.

Last updated by The Electives Office 10/11/2009