Leading and Managing Intercultural Projects

About the course

Emner

Globalisering Internationalisering Projektledelse Forandringsledelse

Course content

This course will take up the leadership tools necessary to design, manage, and evaluate project work by exploring the conceptual foundations for successful project management in today's globalized, complex organizations and societies. We go beyond simple, and simplistic, “how-to” approaches to project management in several respects. First, case analysis will offer detailed study and class discussion on leadership and management of projects. Second, the epistemology of project leadership will be steadily developed from case analysis and research literature on project management. Third, a historical sense of the project leadership and management literature will offer essential context for further specialization in the Diversity and Change Management master's program.

Participants will consider how to manage uncertainty and risk associated with project work. We will explore how the human elements of power, politics, and interrelationships play into the success and / or failure of projects. The course will help student grounding in project leadership and management epistemology as a course end in itself, but also as a preparation for the study of concepts and practices later introduced in the DCM curriculum. Such curriculum-related themes include culture, complex organizations, strategy, stakeholders, diversity, and geo-political regional differences.

Analysis of several project cases that evidence both successful and unsuccessful project outcomes provides students with a range of practical examples in case discussions. In particular cases, the management of projects in transnational and intercultural contexts will refine student sensitivity to the larger genre of case-based studies: what is provided for reflection - and what is left out.

This course aims to help students become reflective and reflexive project managers and leaders, as reflective consumers of project management literature: able to read such material with a proper sense of case literature strengths as well as weaknesses.

See course description in course catalogue

What you will learn

Students completing the course should be able to:

Define the concept of a “project” and the theory of knowledge issue essentials for successful project management leadership in an international, globalized context.
Specify the roles, task, and interests of project participants and stakeholders, and be able to assess aspects of team dynamics, power relations, and organizational strategy for project management.
Define and compare the concepts of project risk, uncertainty, and complexity, and present the key conventional and alternative approaches to these terms in project management.
Explain the financial essentials for project management, when appropriate, as presented and developed throughout the course, cases, and discussions.
Analyze and explain project management functions in contemporary complex organizations. Here, the focus should be on the variance of national or regional employment ecology models and their impact for project leadership and strategic management outcomes.
Demonstrate good academic writing skills. These skills include clear and accurate academic written English, the correct use of relevant terminology, appropriate logical flow, and proper use of citations and references.

Course prerequisites

Knowledge of corporate strategy, management theory, and organizational behavior is an advantage, but not a precondition for participation.

Facts

Level

Kandidat

Type

Obligatorisk fag – også udbudt som valgfag

ECTS

7,5

Code

CCDCO2006U

Teaching periods

Efterår – 1. quarter

Academic year

2024/2025

Status

Available places

Teaching language

English

Teaching Format

Hybrid

Exams

Skriftlig opgave
Individual exam, efterår

Assessment type

7-trins skala