Training of project managers: current practice and future developments in Denmark

Jan Lauridsen

An investigation into the training of project managers in Denmark is presented, from the early days of basic school education in the form of project work, through to university and postgraduate training and finally on to on-the-job specific training. Examples are given of typical training programmes encountered throughout a project manager’s education and future developments are assessed.

Keywords: education and training, project manager, training programmes

A formalized training of project managers in Denmark is still a relatively new discipline, hardly more than one or two decades old, although project management of course has been in use for many years. In the 1970s project work became fashionable and the only right thing to do throughout industry as well as in the educational system.

Emphasis was drawn to the soft issues such as organization and group work and to methodology. Project management mechanics were found to be of less interest. During the 1980s things have become more mature and project management training pro- grammes now address the full spectrum of disciplines.

CURRENT EDUCATION AND TRAINING PROGRAMMES

Basic education

Today, the training of project managers is a normal management discipline, which is built into the higher

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levels of the educational system, and a large number of postgraduate training programmes are on offer.

Most young people will come in touch with project work during their basic school education. From the very first grades of primary school, pupils will learn how to work in small groups with particular emphasis on the social behaviour within these groups. They will learn to accept different types of personalities and realize that the performance of groups are not only dependent on the performance of the individuals, but also on the cooperation or lack of cooperation. They will learn how to plan their work, how to organize a group and how to present results orally as well as by use of written texts and illustrations. They will also learn to discuss the pros and cons relating to various controversial subjects.

This group training accounts for a substantial part of the classroom time, and one might of course argue that many, although not all, schools put too little weight on the individual’s performance and training of the elite and too much weight on the group as such. However, results show that many very young pupils possess a good mix of skills as individuals as well as group members and are also able to act with a very high degree of self-assurance.

Later, during secondary school and high school more substantial project work is carried out around various themes and very much in the same manner as actual examination projects during the later university pro- grammes.

Although no actual management disciplines are incorporated in the high school, students should when leaving high school be quite well equipped to continue on their own with project work during their university education, which may comprise project work taking up from one third to one half of their study time depending on the type of university.

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1 Personal development

Management

l How to delegate l Flexible management of meetings l Organizational changes l Negotiation techniques l Quality as a competitive edge 0 Interviews

Communication and cooperation

l Cooperation and communication 0 Oral communication l Techniques for notes, minutes and reports l Planning your personal work 0 Written communication l How to sell your ideas

3 Project management course content

Active project members

l Project methodology 0 Requirements for cooperation l Project phases l How to influence project work l How to get acceptance in the project group l How to establish accept between the project group and

the basic organization of the company

Project management methodology

l Methodology l Phases and decision milestones 0 Objective, scope and requirements l Organizational models l Workflow and communication patterns l Conditions of decisions

Personal development l Composition and start-up of project groups l Situation and role of the project manager

l Know yourself l Development of personnel l Personal development l Transaction analysis

l Work plans l Control of economy, progress and resources

Attitudes and social behaviours

Management tools l Group functions and group processes l Analysis of groups

0 Press releases l Budgets l Strategic development

l Action programmes l Human factor l Impact on success/failure by irrational factors l Methodology for nontechnical aspects

2 Project managers and project members

Project management

l Active project members l Project management methodology l Attitudes and social behaviour l Strategy and organization 0 International projects

Strategy and organization

l Consistent methodology l Selection of ideas for active planning 0 Project start-up 0 Project manual l Relations between strategy and results

0 Computers in project management l Reliable schedules l Reliable budgets

Figure I. Version of a catalogue from a typical post-graduate training programme

For many years, project work has been a natural part of the education in technical universities. However, until the seventies this was to be learnt the hard way by personal experience and with very little formal training on methodology and tools. Nowadays, all technical universities, business schools and humanistic faculties incorporate project disciplines from the very beginning of their courses. In most cases, the educational programme is quite modular in its structure, so the degree of project work may vary from student to student depending on the selected mix of ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ subjects.

In technical universities and in particular in business schools, general management disciplines and project management disciplines are mandatory subjects. This does not, of course, mean that a university graduate is a fully qualified project manager, but at least he or she will be equipped with a good baseline knowledge.

Postgraduate training

More hands-on oriented training of project managers will typically take place in a combination of post- graduate courses and on-the-job training. Many large organizations or cooperations have their own internal training programmes, which are tailormade to the specific circumstances of that particular company. This does not apply so much for the organizational and

social part of project management, where different ‘schools’of management exist, but still most programmes aim at creating an awareness of the ‘soft’ issues.

When addressing tools and techniques, there are substantial differences from company to company. Using one particular project management system can, even for some, become close to a ‘religion’. Many of the company internal training programmes are de- veloped together with a management consultant or they are adapted versions of the seminars which are offered by a large number of private seminar companies.

In order to give an impression of a typical set of training programmes, a slightly scrambled version of a catalogue is illustrated in Figure 1. The courses will typically have a duration of 2-3 days, and can be attended on a stand-alone basis, although it is an advantage to follow a certain sequence.

Application specific training

As a supplement to the more general applicable courses for training of project managers, a large number of very application-specific courses are offered by Danish and international organizations.

Figure 2 illustrates a slightly scrambled example of a very compressed hands-on programme for management of software projects:

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1 Critical issues in software project management

l Software development methodologies - integrating management, development and product assurance

l Life-cycle methology l Metrics 0 Control

2 Software concepts and methodologies

l Software product integrity 0 Software quality l Traceability and visibility l Product assurance l Configuration control and management

3 Integrating project and organizational environments

l Effects of size, nature and complexity of the project on the life cycle

l Interaction of management, development and product assurance during the software life cycle

l Management pre-planning activities

4 Project planning and the control structure

l Guidelines for project planning 0 Project goal interactions - optimizing completion

time, size, data space, user friendliness l Planning documentation l Organization and management structures

o Adjusting your organization to meet project constraints

o People, time - performing scheduling tradeoffs l Scheduling and cost considerations

o Work-breakdown structure o Work package o Activity networks

l Review and reporting requirements l Planning follow-on documentation

5 Carrying out the plan

l Defining requirements accurately o Understanding management’s requirement phase

activities 0 Criteria for effective requirements specifications

l Smooth transition from requirements to design l Modeling, prototyping and subsetting as design

methodologies l Integrating programming and unit test l Software engineering technologies

6 Attaining product integrity l Evaluating software quality

0 Setting meaningful testing goals o Measuring software defects o Software development methodologies - compar-

ative quality data

l Using documentation to find high defect regions l Integrating documentation management, quality

assurance, verification and validation and test and evaluation

l Configuration management and control o Elements of a good software configuration

management plan o Creating and controlling a baseline o Impact on product integrity

l Defining how much product assurance is needed

7 Estimating software costs

l Software cost-estimating techniques o Pitfalls and problems during cost estimation o Cost-estimating methodologies o Tailoring the models

l Developing cost estimates o Using single-factor cost models o Adding time as a cost factor o Devising the optimum technique for your organiz-

ation and project l Effects of staffing strategies on costs l Measuring software quality

o Meaningful measurements o Milestones and reviews

8 Quantitative software management

l Formulating estimates to complete o Avoiding the normal progress reporting pitfalls o Evaluating progress o Tracking costs and performance o Earned value as a progress measurement

0 Performing projections - revising schedule/cost estimates

l Project design reviews o Levels, types and when to apply them o Management responsibilities -where to act o Spotting trouble - and dealing with it

l Controlling change - configuration and interface control boards

0 Utilizing effective methods of checks and balances o Impact of using an independent auditor o Pros and cons of the independent auditor

approach o Summary of lifecycle reviews and audits

9 Summary of principles for successful software management

l Key points to remember l Management’s burden - and how to bear it

Figure 2. Example of a very compressed hands-on programme for management of software projects

Impulses and new ideas for training of project managers may be collected during the short postgraduate courses; however, for newcomers as well as more experienced project managers seminars and conferences are often preferred, mainly because cases from the real world are presented and many opportunities for discussions are offered. Several activities are offered during one year partly through private seminar organizations and partly through the various professional societies. These seminars or meetings will in most cases last either a full working day, or quarter of a day, the latter most frequently as an on-your-way-home meeting.

An example of a project seminar is illustrated in Figure 3.

l New types of project management o an example by company X

l Break and informal discussions l Three working groups for discussion of three differ-

ent cases. l Lunch l How we created a winning team

0 an example from company Y l Break and informal discussions l Three working groups for discussion of three differ-

ent issues l Tools for efficient cooperation in project work l Discussion in plenum l Drinks and informal social get-together

Figure 3. Example of a typical project seminar

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FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS Throughout industry as well as within central and local administration, project management is growing in maturity.

Methodologies are being formalized and new tools including computerized system are now widely applied. From the previous very different sets of tools and techniques, each of which claimed to solve all problems, but in reality only addressed one aspect of project management in one way under one set of circumstances, one can now see a growing trend toward a consistent toolset, which may be applied throughout the project

life-cycle and from project to project with possibilities for solution of the most appropriate bits and pieces for each task and issue without losing consistency. In terms of training, this becomes more formalized throughout the educational system and also as a part of career development within larger companies. It seems that project management is becoming more and more recognized as a professional management discipline, which one can be trained for formally as well as on the job, assuming of course the talent is present - a situation that has been prevalent for many years in general management.

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