Future Challenges in Project Management

This article discusses the future challenges in project management, including the need for project managers to adapt to changing business priorities, technologies, and stakeholder demands. It also highlights the importance of continuous learning and the emergence of new methodologies. The article emphasizes the need for project managers to develop skills in areas such as technology, cultural understanding, people management, and change management. Additionally, it explores the growing importance of risk management and the need for project management methodologies to evolve to meet the demands of advanced technologies.

Future Challenges in Project Management
Business priorities are changing with the rapidly pacing world and these changes will bring
complexities for project managers. While earlier, organizations resisted changes,
organizations of today keep change management on priority in order to achieve their
development and growth objectives. Companies are increasingly becoming aware of the fact
that in the fast changing world, employees have to be prepared to become the future leaders.
This futuristic view presents difficulties before a project manager who is also expected to
exhibit leadership qualities that are going to remain effective in the long term. Upgrading
ones knowledge has become important. Just having an experience would not be a sufficient
thing for the growth anymore and the project managers at every levels would have to keep
learning and keep adapting to changes happening in business world [1].
Technologies are increasingly being used for project management also so a project manager
would need to keep well versed with these technologies. Project management would not just
remain the management job but also would need project managers to develop more technical
and technology driven capabilities. Software like Microsoft Project already are used in major
organization as tools for collaboration and in future, would come more advances in the
features pushing project managers to learn more. However, this would cause dependence of
project managers on technology such that in the case of difficulty in accessing technological
solutions or facing other issues like security, the project managers would face complexities
that are difficult to manage.
There is an increase in the uncertainties in business due to changing face of business with
technological developments, virtualisation, globalization, urbanization, regulatory
developments, and changing demands and preferences of consumers. Project stakeholders
today are more demanding and in future would have newer priorities and preferences.
Satisfying the needs of all stakeholders that are important to a project is already a big
challenge and in future, it is only likely to become more complicated [2].
Consumers wants faster deliveries and with more advances in technologies, these
expectations will only increase. With increase in demand for speed, project managers would
have to make way for faster delivery and work with tight schedules. With new connected
technologies used in project management, the data generated across project management
cycle coming from different participants and users would expose them to companies. This
data can be used by project organizations for marketing and other purposes. An ethical
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Future Challenges in Project Management
question arises on whether the company should use the consumer or user data for marketing
or other benefits without the consent of users [3].
New methodologies have been devised and there have been modifications in popular
methodologies that are adjusted to changing business landscape. In order to be able to make
use of latest best practices, a project manager would be required to have current knowledge
for which one would need to keep oneself updated and keep learning. Modernized project
management methodologies like Agile, Lean, Six Sigma, and Scrum are likely to gain
prominence as they have the capability to manage changes on projects resulting from VUCA
(Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity) environment [4].
Projects of tomorrow would need more close collaboration and coordination because of fast
pace delivery needs, changing priorities, and needs for efficiencies. Thus, project manager
would need to work more on the people side and keep the team together, motivated and
effective. With globalization, the projects would be managed by multicultural teams coming
from across globe and from different countries. This would increase the need for
understanding multiple cultures for the project manager. Even in the case a project manager
is operating form one region, he or she would still have to learn how multicultural
communication works to achieve good level of coordination across teams. However, chances
of getting conflicts between people from different cultures is not uncommon and thus,
conflict management would become a bigger challenge for the project mangers of tomorrow.
A project manager would need to develop a higher emotional quotient to be able to deal with
such situations [5].
Besides the technical project management skills, project managers of tomorrow would need
more skills like technological understanding, cultural understanding, people management
skills, and change management skills. Moreover, even within project management
disciplines, single methodology would not suffice anymore and a project management may
have to deal with situation there hybrid of different project management methodologies has to
be used. For this to happen, a project manger would need to have knowledge of multiple
project management methodologies. While traditional project managers could see growth
with one certification completed, newer project managers would require to keep upgrading
their knowledge and skills to keep growing. Experience of project management would
become more important alongside the theorical knowledge gained from these studies of
methodologies [5].
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Future Challenges in Project Management
The changes and modifications in existing project management methodologies and even
emergence of new methodologies would become the trend in future as project management
discipline itself would need to cater to new challenges that the future would bring. To be able
to deal with the challenges of future, project manager would require to have higher skill sets,
multiple disciplinary knowledge, higher acumen, updated knowledge of project management
methodologies and more practical knowledge [3].
Organizations that have been handling business without using project management
methodology are also driving towards its adoption such that more and more project based
work would be the future. The competition would increase and so would the opportunities. A
project manager can take the benefit of these opportunities only by learning and adopting the
changes. Project management methodologies would have to grow to become adaptable to
new priorities and needs arising from the adoption of advanced technologies. Project
management methodologies can no more remain generalized but would need to have strong
consideration for the rapid pace of technological advancement that the world is facing [6].
While earlier projects were managed following a reactive approach such that problems
occurring in the projects were solved by the project managers after they occurred. However,
future projects would have higher cost of rework and strict deadlines that would demand
more stringent regulation. This would increase importance of risk management which will
become the mainstream of project management to keep projects protected from possible risks
[6].
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Future Challenges in Project Management
References
[1] S. Percy. (2019, Feb. 9). The Top Three Business Priorities For Leaders Over The Next
Three Years [Online]. Available:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/sallypercy/2018/11/27/the-top-three-business-priorities-for-
leaders-over-the-next-three-years/#34a75d304ec9.
[2] PMI. (2019, Feb. 9). Future of Project Management – 3 Emerging Trends [Online].
Available: http://www.projectmanagement.ie/blog/future-of-project-management-3-
emerging-trends.
[3] B. Fournet, "PM unusual: the three key challenges facing project managers over the next
five years," TX., Newtown Square, PA, 2011.
[4] S. Koranne and V. Ajankar, "Adapting Change: Project Management for 21st Century,"
PMI., 2017.
[5] Harmalingam.N. (2019, Feb. 9). Latest Project Management Trends in 2019 [Online].
Available: https://www.whizlabs.com/blog/project-management-trends/.
[6] B. Gleeson. (2019, Feb. 9) The Top 6 Priorities For Building High-Performance
Organizations Of Tomorrow [Online].
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