Date: 01/12/2018

Prepared by: Majed Abdeen

In my experience, I've found that being certified to a particular standard such as PMP, Scrum, Prince2…etc. is not enough if the organisation you work with do not pay attention to any standard. I had an experience working with PMP certified staff, who achieved the certification in order to keep their jobs, but who had to ignore what they had learned in order to keep their jobs, as the organisation actively prevented using any standard which didn't fit the general business mentality. On the other hand, I worked on some international projects, with virtual teams working in other countries. The challenge I faced with the team was with communication, primarily because of the time-zone (8h difference), and managing them remotely. In this situation, we used the agile mindset and scrum standard, particularly daily standup meetings, to reduce the isolation of the virtual teams.

Introduction

Standards are produced by various bodies to improve Project Management success by rationalising the subject. Standards are for "foundational reference", they cannot be considered "all-inclusive" (Ghosh, et al., 2012, p. 2); many focus on methods, which is insufficient, given the effect of human behaviour on projects (Morris, 2013, p. 14), including the effect of culture on standards created within that culture (Aarseth, et al., 2013, p. 125).

Comparison

Standards' focuses

PMBOK emphasises project execution/technical skills (Ghosh, et al., 2012, p. 5), strategic/business knowledge, PM's role, and leadership/soft skills. ICB focuses on program/portfolio management, emphasising soft skills (Ghosh, et al., 2012, p. 5). P2M is more extensive, less technical than other standards (Crawford, et al., 2007, p. 13) focusing on portfolios/programmes (Ghosh, et al., 2012, p. 20). Scrum focuses on stakeholder collaboration/rapid product delivery (Ghosh, et al., 2012, p. 36). PRINCE 2 focuses on business case, key risks, and product, while APM highlights interpersonal skills and the business case, with a more general than technical approach than other standards. (Ghosh, et al., 2012, pp. 12, 13, 24, 36).

Cultural focuses

Culture affects standards (Aarseth, et al., 2013, p. 125). Analysis shows that those produced in the US highlight evaluation/improvement, risk/time/scope/cost management, as well as the overall project lifecycle (Crawford, et al., 2007, p. 16). UK material is more consistent across all aspects of project management, but includes emphasis on interpersonal skills/relationship management, evaluation/improvement (Crawford, et al., 2007, p. 15). Japanese material focuses on the overall lifecycle, programmes, cost/resource management and integration (Crawford, et al., 2007, pp. 13-18).

Impact on Global Projects

Global projects require more consideration of the project environment, and demand leadership and communication skills from PMs (Aarseth, et al., 2013, p. 125). Since PM knowledge and practice varies by culture (Crawford, et al., 2007, pp. 7-8), project management Standards must consider the most effective ways of managing projects in a global world. To evaluate Standards' impacts on Global Projects, it is necessary to examine how they prepare PMs for dealing with the challenges posed by such projects. Communication, Leadership and Building Trust, Stakeholder and Customer Satisfaction, and Planning, Execution and Control were identified as key challenges (Anantatmula & Thomas, 2008). Standards were categorized based on the main focuses outlined above.