Project management bodies of knowledge; conjectures and refutations
Authors: Shepherd, M. and Atkinson, R.
Journal: Electronic Journal of Business Research Methods
Volume: 9
Issue: 2
Pages: 152-158
eISSN: 1477-7029
Abstract:The traditional view of a profession is that of a discipline with a distinct set of skills and knowledge that define the area of practice and characteristics of the practitioners. This nature and area of practice of a profession is sometimes defined as its body of knowledge or "BoK". In the case of project management, as the discipline moves towards professional recognition, this BoK becomes a significant device that serves the needs of many stakeholders in addition to those of the practitioner or academic. The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of research in the development of project management Bodies of Knowledge. As project management emerges from the ghetto of engineering and develops its trajectory towards recognition as a profession, its knowledge area becomes even more significant because it needs to be seen to define a distinct knowledge domain that sets out the limits of the "profession". However, the knowledge domain can be said to have shifted so that it is still under constant review and improvement to respond to continual change. New areas of practice have emerged, such as programme management and portfolio management, that are considered to be part of the discipline hence the knowledge area requires refinement. In this paper we show that current versions of project management BoKs are poorly served by underpinning research. We contend that evidence based research should play a part in the construction of BoKs, and that other research approaches should be also seen as relevant and effective. This paper draws on experiences of updating a formal Body of Knowledge, reviews the context of a range of project management bodies of knowledge and identifies a number of issues concerning the nature of project management knowledge and how it can be represented. We conclude that BoKs serve a valid purpose but conflicting priorities affect the development process and undermine their usefulness. From the epistemological issues identified, we add our conjecture that the capacity of bodies of knowledge to represent the broader understanding of the discipline is limited.. The paper concludes with a review of some methodological implications of the interaction of stakeholder interests and BoK development practice. © Academic Publishing International Ltd.
Source: Scopus
Preferred by: Miles Shepherd