A Competitive Advantage through Strategic Project Management

 A Competitive Advantage through Strategic Project Management

A number of prominent global PMIs have recently launched campaigns to educate C-suite executives on the value and strategic significance of PMI. Organizational project management, as opposed to individual project management, is the center of attention since it provides a competitive edge to these businesses.

This article features an interview with Professor Sebastian Green, who is Dean of the Faculty of Commerce and Professor of Management and Marketing at University College Cork (formerly of the London Business School), regarding Professor Green's thoughts on strategic project management as a means of gaining a competitive edge. Professor Green was interviewed by Ed Naughton, who is currently the Vice President of the Institute of Project Management and the Director General of the Institute of Project Management.

Dear Ed, Strategic project management is...what?

Strategic project management, according to Professor Green, is overseeing the execution of the most important projects in order to give the company a competitive edge overall.

Dear Ed, So, how exactly is a competitive advantage defined?

Professor Green: A core competence is characterized by three things. There are three qualities that make it stand out: it provides value to customers, it's hard to replicate, and it creates opportunities for the future.

Dear Ed, However, what advantages can project management provide?

Respected Professor Green: Project management is two-pronged. There is the first part, which deals with the organization's choice of projects, and the second part, which deals with the management of those projects.

Ed: Gaining a competitive edge through smart project selection — Deciding which projects to prioritize is no simple task!

Professor Green: In my opinion, the project management literature has neglected to adequately address project selection and prioritization, mostly because the topic has been reduced to financial analysis. A new approach to project prioritisation is provided by the strategic imperative, which states that although some projects may not be financially lucrative, they will be vital if they increase our competency in comparison to others.

To illustrate the point, consider a pharmaceutical company whose competitive advantage is the speed with which it introduces new products to the market. In this case, the projects that help the company achieve this advantage will be of the utmost importance, regardless of whether they are more profitable on their own.

Dear Ed, Before we can choose which projects to work on, we need to establish which metrics and criteria will offer us an edge in the market.

Without a doubt, Professor Green. The organization's ability to identify its current operations and prioritize those that contribute to its competitive advantage is crucial for project selection. Companies aren't great at it, and they might not even be aware what those tasks include. Because of the power system, they will believe it's their fault for everything.

Dear Ed, If a business decides on a course of action, the consensus among PMs is that project management is the best tool for carrying it out. Is there a strategic advantage for the organization if it excels at project management?

In the end, it all boils down to the distinction between the projects selected and the methods used for their management, Prof. Green. It goes without saying that knowing how an organization's capabilities compare to others is crucial for linking and prioritizing projects appropriately.

Dear Ed, Assume for a moment that a plan has been made. It is necessary to deconstruct the approach into smaller, more manageable projects in order to implement it. Consequently, the strategy's delivery depends on your proficiency in project management. Now, according to the literature, in order for an organization to excel at project management, it must implement procedures for project management, provide training on how to apply and do project management, and use the concept of a project office to coordinate the efforts of individuals trained to work integratedly according to these procedures. Are these three actions going to provide this company an edge in the market?

Respected Professor Green: When your project management skills are superior to those of your competitors, you will have a leg up in the marketplace. The "better than" comes from the knowledge, judgement, and experience gained through managing projects for a long period. Here we see the effect of the experience curve. various companies will have various levels of expertise when it comes to managing the parts of projects where the manual isn't sufficient. No matter how thorough the manual is, it will never be able to address all of life's complexities. As a result, you require management discretion and expertise. For project management to reach a strategic level, one must master all three of these areas while also managing their respective learning curves and the amount of information they already possess.

Dear Ed, Now that we've mastered project management, we need to figure out how to apply it to the right projects so we can get a competitive edge. However, I believe there's a missing piece there that needs fixing as well. Could another approach work in place of project management?

Respected Professor Green: Not the less tangible parts, and not the tacit understanding that comes from managing a large number of projects successfully. For instance, Ed, you are better versed in project management than the average person. You have accumulated more practical knowledge in this area, which is why people sought you out, even though you both had a standard book like the PMBoK or the ICB.

Simply put, it may be mimicked up to a point, but it becomes unmistakable if you incorporate the more subtle tacit information gained from experience.

Dear Ed, You brought up the 'experience curve' effect before; how do you think we should perceive organizational project management maturity models, which are currently all the rage?

Professor Green: I think it's time to stop thinking in terms of statistics and stop assuming that organizations can be "painted" with a predetermined set of policies and procedures and textbook practices. To a certain extent, the experience curve's creators ran into the same issue. When you show businesses the cost experience curve, it seems like you're doing nothing to reduce costs for every doubling of volume. So yet, all we can say is that the experience curve is just that—a potential. Its completion is contingent upon the competence of those in charge.

Dear Ed, Are the chief executive officers and other senior executives thinking about how project management might help their company?

Respected Professor Green: Up until recently, project management's marketing relied on technical language. Senior managers would be far more interested if it was marketed in terms of integration at the general management level, at the capacity to manage across functions, techniques, and procedures using judgement. What makes project management so effective, then, is the way in which the hard and the soft, the methods and the judgement and the experience, are blended. Just because upper-level management isn't on board with it right now doesn't mean they're incorrect. This is due to the fact that project management has failed to promote itself enough.

Do we have to convince C-suite executives and other top-level executives that it will give them a leg up in the market?

Professor Green: No, I believe we should demonstrate its operation to them. We must enter that space and demonstrate its true potential, not merely in terms of meeting project deadlines and budgets. We need to show them how technology can help them get past the organizational resistance to change, improve their competitive advantage-generating capabilities and activities, and strengthen the company's tacit knowledge. It has a wide variety of potential applications. They must realize that the evidence of the result is superior to their present approach.