آیا رضایت از زبان مدیریت پروژه واقعی بر جا مانده است؟

The bodies of knowledge that serve project management as a practice and academic discipline provide a potentially useful organizational resource. However, coordinating bodies of knowledge and keeping pace with changing concepts create a challenge. Overall, many believe that we have a generally accepted body of knowledge for use in managing projects. However, practitioners filter and critically interpret information that in turn shapes their perceptions and generates knowledge to either support or challenge what seems to be “true” from book learning or practical experience. This paper purposely questions whether project-based terminology and definitions are actually as widely accepted as believed. The scope limits the presentation to a summary of two exploratory pieces of scholarly work. The initial literature review from the first source [C. Delisle, Success and communication in virtual project teams, Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation, Dept. of Civil Engineering. Project Management Specialization, The University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, July 2001, pp. 1–442], follow up literature review, web-based search and in-class experiment from the second source [D. Olson, Is a common vocabulary lacking in project management? Final assignment for Information Technology Project Management, Athabasca University, 2001] provide key information on where we are in terms of investigating assumptions around project management language use. The authors conclude that coordination of glossaries and dissemination of information about project management terms and definitions lack coordination on a broad scale.

Many practitioners and academics see the bodies of knowledge that serve project management (PM) as being generally accepted. The term generally accepted according to the PM BOK Guide®[23] “means that knowledge and practices exist that apply to most projects most of the time, and that widespread consensus endures about their value and usefulness” (p. 3). However, the growing incidence of failed projects and case law citing communication breakdown as a cause begs the question about the degree to which those managing and studying projects share their understanding of related project concepts, terminology, and definitions. As a matter of course, those involved in any quasi or true profession share only parts of terminology and conceptual systems at any one time. Thus, expecting a sustained high level of consensus may be unrealistic. Rather, understanding what level of consensus exists concerning how we talk about and manage projects may help organizations better address ways to share their knowledge about the process of managing projects, such that it may enable the achievement of successful projects. To this end, this paper presents foundational work done to investigate language use in managing projects as a necessary step in raising awareness and building our understanding of challenges inherent in fostering a shared project management language. The first part of the paper provides insights from a literature review. Next, the paper presents an overview of what practitioners, associations, and academia have done in terms of addressing language use in project management. Attention shifts to the latest academic work specifically about project management language use, providing a condensed overview of the rationale, methodology, analysis, results and discussion. This work represents the first of its kind to investigate a Common Language Problem (CLP) in managing projects. The CLP, coined by the author [19] refers to the difficulties inherent in and surrounding language use because meaning appears to be assigned, understood, and communicated in social contexts. Thus, “individuals create their own meanings and only through [social] agreements do parallel personal meanings develop” [10] p. 3. Ultimately, “what we agree to standardize or treat as if it were shared and constant, [and] to create procedures for” helps us to generate commonly accepted vocabulary [10], p. 5. The following section of the paper provides practical suggestions about how to work toward creating a common project management language instead of assuming that we have generally accepted meanings about “project management” concepts, knowledge and practices. Finally, the authors suggest several areas of future research in the area of language use in the practice of managing projects.

Exploratory work in this paper provides evidence that highlights the need for more discussion around the issue of PM language, vocabulary, and glossaries. However, current efforts seem headed in the direction of creating more glossaries, lists and web sites with “better” definitions rather than consolidating or coordinating existing resources. The major difficulties seem to be that individuals tend to assign different terms to similar or the same definition (View the MathML source) or they use the same term, but define each term differently (View the MathML source). Overall, there seems to be a lower level of View the MathML source than assumed when defining common terms such as “risk management” for example. Overall, the findings from the two pieces of exploratory work presented in this paper support the proposition that implicit in building a common language should be consideration of the level of View the MathML source along with the relative degree of View the MathML source, View the MathML source and View the MathML source. Ultimately, those sharing and reusing knowledge in managing or studying projects may benefit greatly from reducing or even eliminating communication problems stemming from vocabulary issues. More definite, continuing to assume a high level of consensus in PM language use on any project creates the potential for mis-understandings or even serious communication breakdowns. The following section provides a brief overview of practical steps in approaching a common PM vocabulary.