rethinking project management_a structured literature review with a critical look_ijpm.2014

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Rethinking project management: A structured

literature review with a critical look at the brave

new world

Per Svejvig , Peter Andersen

Department of Business Administration, Aarhus University, Bartholins All 10, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark

Received 28 September 2013; received in revised form 4 June 2014; accepted 10 June 2014

Abstract

This paper presents the results of a structured review of the rethinking project management (RPM) literature based on the classication and

analysis of 74 contributions and in addition takes a critical look at this brave new world. Through the analysis, a total of 6 overarching categories

emerged: contextualization, social and political aspects, rethinking practice, complexity and uncertainty, actuality of projects and broader

conceptualization. These categories cover a broad range of different contributions with diverse and alternative perspectives on project

management. The early RPM literature dates back to the 1980s, while the majority was published in 2006 onwards, and the research stream appears

to be still active. A critical look at this brave new world exhibits the overall challenge for RPM to become much more diffused and accepted.

2014 Elsevier Ltd. APM and IPMA. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Rethinking project management; Literature review; Project management research; Classical project management

1. Introduction

The management of projects is of considerable economic

importance and dramatic growth has occurred in project work

across different sectors, industries and countries (Turner et al.,

2010; Winter et al., 2006c). Projects have become an important

way to structure work in most organizations (Bakker, 2010) and

constitute one of the most important organizational develop-

ments (Winter et al., 2006c). Despite the substantial increase inthe importance and propagation of projects, the conceptual base

of models and methodologies for project management has

remained fairly static in the past (Koskela and Howell, 2002)

and has long been dominated by a technocratic and rationalistic

viewpoint (Morris et al., 2011b; Packendorff, 1995) hereafter

denoted classical project management which has received

substantial criticism for its shortcomings in practice (Koskela

and Howell, 2002; Sahlin-Andersson and Sderholm, 2002).

Accordingly, several scholars have started to think more

widely about projects and project management as a reaction to

the classical view, but also as a response to the challenges of

carrying out projects in practice and the poor track record of

previous projects (Morris et al., 2011b). This wider thinking

has developed many new insights over the years, such as

moving from the

project as a tool

approach to the idea of theproject as a temporary organization(Packendorff, 1995) and

understanding project management as a holistic discipline for

achieving organizational efficiency, effectiveness and innova-

tion (Jugdev et al., 2001). This more holistic and pluralistic

understanding of project management holds a great deal of

potential for enhancing and expanding the current knowledge

and practice within the field and has been labeled rethinking

project management (RPM) (Winter et al., 2006c). RPM

has evolved over many years, despite the hegemony of the

dominant view and often in contrast to this view. The early

Corresponding author. Tel.: +45 20 82 44 93.

E-mail addresses: [email protected](P. Svejvig), [email protected]

(P. Andersen).

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Please cite this article as: P. S vejvig, P. Andersen, 2014. Rethinking project management: A structured literature review with a critical look at the brave new world...,

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literature dates back to the mid-1980s (Lichtenberg, 1983), and

the recent RPM literature indicates that the research stream is

still highly active (Saynisch, 2010a).

It is time to take stock of what we know about RPM and look

critically at the brave new world and there are several reasons

for such a structured literature review. First, RPM is a diverse

research area and a literature review can offer useful input to theconceptualization of the RPM concept by establishing a more

integrated view and setting boundaries. Second, an understanding

of the development of RPM over time makes it possible to

elucidate RPM with all its sub-versions from a broader historical

perspective, enabling us to see how the components of the current

stock were added and basically how we arrived at the current

situation. Finally, we analyze the past in order to prepare for the

future (Webster and Watson, 2002) with the aim of keeping this

research area viable and stimulating theoretical as well as

professional development. We formulate our research questions

from the above: (1)How can we conceptualize RPM and how has

it developed over time?(2) How can future research expand theRPM research area?

We conducted a literature review consisting of two parts in

order to address the research questions: the first part was an

explorative and less structured literature search for alternatives

to classical project management; this was followed by the

second part, which was a rigid structured literature review

consisting of four phases, starting with the definition of the

review scope, the conceptualization of RPM, literature searches

with key words and finally the literature analysis. In particular,

the scoping and selection represented a challenging process in

order to establish a more integrated view and set appropriateboundaries for RPM, in which we included as examples the UK

RPM initiative (Winter et al., 2006c), the Scandinavian school

of project studies (Sahlin-Andersson and Sderholm, 2002) and

practice studies (Blomquist et al., 2010), but excluded for

instance the making projects critical research stream (Hodgson

and Cicmil, 2006).

This review consists of 74 contributions, which we classified

and analyzed. We set out to provide an overview of the existing

RPM body of knowledge by focusing on the basic principles

behind the RPM literature and how it is differentiated from the

classical view. Through the analysis, a total of 6 overarching

categories emerged: contextualization, social and political aspects,rethinking practice, complexity and uncertainty, actuality of

projects and broader conceptualization. These categories cover a

broad range of different contributions with diverse and alternative

perspectives on project management. A critical discussion about

Table 1

Comparing classical project management with rethinking project management.

Author Classical Project Management Rethinking Project Management

Packendorff (1995, p. 328) Project metaphor: the project as a tool Project metaphor: the project as a temporary organization

Process: linear, with the phases plan, control and evaluate Process: iterative, with the phases expectation setting, actions

and learningJugdev et al. (2001, p. 36) Project management: as a set of tools and techniques used to

achieve project efficiencies

Project management: as a holistic discipline used to achieve

project/program/organiza tional efficiency, effectiveness and

innovation

Success: measured by efficiency performance metrics Success: a multidimensional construct measured by efficiency,

effectiveness and innovation

Practice project management: focus on the project details at

the operational level and tactically

Sell project management: be an advocate and champion of

project management by aligning its value with the firm's

strategic business priorities

Winter et al. (2006c, p. 642,

original emphasis)

Simple life-cycle-based models of projects, as the dominant

model of project and project management with the (often

unexamined) assumption that the life-cycle model is

(assumed to be) the actual terrain

New models and theories that recognize and illuminate the

complexity of projects and project management, at all levels.

The new models and theories are explicitly presented as only

partialtheories of the complex terrain

Shenhar and Dvir (2007, p. 11,

original emphasis)

Approach: traditional project management Approach: adaptive project management

Project goal: completing the job on time, on budget and

within the requirements

Project goal: achieving multiple business results and meeting

multiple criteriaM anag ement sty le: one si ze fit s a ll Man age me nt st yle: ad apt ive appr oac h, one siz e doesnotfit all

Andersen (2008, p. 5, 10, 49) Perspective: task perspective Perspective: organizational perspective

Project definition: a project is a temporary endeavor

undertaken to create a unique product, service or result

(Project Management Institute, 2004, p. 5)

Project definition: a project is a temporary organization

established by its base organization to carry out an assignment

on its behalf

M ain focus: execute the defined task M ain focus: value creation. Create a desirable development in

another organization

Lenfle and Loch (2010, p. 45) Project type and target: routine execution, target given and

defined from above

Project type and target: novel strategic project with a general

vision and direction, but detailed goals not known and partially

emergent

Examples of domain of relevance:

Known markets and customer reactions

Known performance drivers of developed systems

Known environmental parameters

Examples of domain of relevance:

New markets and unknown customer reactions

Unknown technology

Complexity with unforeseeable interactions among drivers

and variables

2 P. Svejvig, P. Andersen / International Journal of Project Management xx (2014) xxxxxx

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the brave new world follows the analysis, in which we exhibit the

overall challenge for RPM to become much more diffused and

accepted.

The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. The next

section describes how we conceptualize classical project manage-

ment versus rethinking project management. The methodology for

the literature review process is then reported, followed by ananalysis of the 74 papers classified into 6 categories. We continue

by taking a critical look atthe brave new world of RPM research

in order to suggest future research areas, and finally we present the

conclusion.

2. Conceptualizing classical project management versus

rethinking project management

We will abstain from defining classical project management

and rethinking project management as both concepts are

understood and used very broadly. We will instead pursue the

conceptualization of both concepts in terms of their importantfeatures and how they supplement each other.

We draw on several scholars who have specified alternative

views and compared them with the classical view. Some of

these are summarized inTable 1:

Table 1 illustrates the understanding of the classical view

as execution- and task-oriented while the rethinking view(s)

reflects a broader and more holistic perspective in which

projects might be conceptualized as temporary organizations

(see alsoBakker, 2010). The relationship between the classical

and the rethinking view should not be interpreted as dichotomic

but on the contrary as dualistic, combining old truths and new

insights(Jugdev et al., 2001).Sderlund (2011)argued, in line

with this, for a pluralistic understanding of project management

and presented seven schools of thought for example, one of

the schools mentioned is the optimization school, which to

some extent resembles the classical view. Although the schools

of thought are interesting, the insight from the pluralistic

understanding is more important in the rethinking context and

can be compared with pluralism in organizational theory (Scott

and Davis, 2007).

One way to describe these multiple perspectives is to use

metaphors. Morgan proposed eight metaphors for an organization

(e.g. machine, organism and brain) and stated that metaphors

implya way of thinking and a way of seeing but also a way of

not seeing (Morgan, 1997, pp. 45). We have to use several

metaphors in order to study organizations as each way of seeing

will provide unique insights with strengths and limitations

(Morgan, 1997, p. 352). Turner and colleagues (Turner et al.,

2010) took up the metaphorical approach and presented nine

metaphors for project management for example, they

characterized the optimization school as the project as a machine,which embeds the view that the project is a system requiring

optimization (in line withSderlund, 2011).

The schools of thought (Bredillet, 2007; Sderlund, 2011)

developed within academia, based on reviews and maps of

project management research this certainly stimulated the

rethinking agenda for research (which also appeared to be the

purpose). However, a UK-based research network followed a

different approach to rethinking project management, involving

many leading researchers in project management and senior

practitioners from industry. The network's aims were: (1) to

develop the field of project management and improve the

real-world practice and (2) to define an interdisciplinaryresearch agenda to enrich and extend the field beyond its

current foundations (Winter et al., 2006b, p. 650).

The main findings from the network resulted in a frame-

work of five directions to develop the area intellectually

(see also Winter et al. (2006c) in Table 1). These areas are

project complexity, social process, value creation, conceptual-

ization and practitioner development. Each of these has an

impact on the themes that were identified as being key:

projectification, programs, the actuality of projects, uncertainty,

business projects, professionalization and practitioner develop-

ment (Maylor, 2006, p. 636). The five directions and associated

themes thus summarize their proposal for rethinking project

management.

We distilled the above-mentioned findings into some important

features representing the classical and rethinking project manage-

ment concepts, as shown inFig. 1below:

Thefeatures inFig. 1are not meant to be exhaustive for the

two concepts, but on the contrary to highlight the important key

characteristics. We adapt the understanding put forward by the

UK rethinking initiative (Maylor, 2006) that the classical

concept is embedded in the rethinking concept, which means

that the rethinking concept enhances the classical concept

rather than discarding it (Winter et al., 2006c). Furthermore, we

understand both concepts as non-monolithic entities, implying

Rethinking Project Management

Learnability, multiplicity, temporarity,

complexity, uncertainty and sociability

Classical Project Management

Executability, simplicity, temporarity,

linearity, controllability and instrumentality

Fig. 1. Important features of the classical and rethinking project management concepts.

3P. Svejvig, P. Andersen / International Journal of Project Management xx (2014) xxxxxx




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multiple interpretations with many sub-versions (inspired by

Meyer and Hammerschmid, 2006).

This conceptualization forms the basis for the paper's

methodological approach to a structured literature review

about rethinking project management.

3. Methodology for the literature review process

3.1. Part 1: Explorative and unstructured literature review

An explorative and unstructured literature search about

alternatives to the classical view initiated this study. We

discovered the rethinking initiative in the UK (e.g. Winter et al.,

2006c) fairly early on in this initial process. We sought out

knowledge about the UK process, as well as other ways to

rethink project management, in an explorative fashion,

which provided us with knowledge about the field and a

foundation for further studies. Through the initial process,

we found 26 different articles, textbooks, etc. to be relevant,offering new alternative perspectives and new insights into

the traditional approach (some of them are referenced in

Table 1).

3.2. Part 2: Framework for the structured literature review

Part 2 followed a more structured and systematic approach.

Conducting a systematic literature review needs an explicit

research method that uses literature as an input, instead of

observations, interviews or questionnaire data in empirical

studies (Mller et al., 2014). Tranfield et al. defined a systematic

review as a replicable, scientific and transparent process that

aims to minimize bias by providing an audit trail of

the reviewers decisions, procedures and conclusions(Tranfield

et al., 2003, p. 209). By consulting literature reviews (Bakker,

2010; Mller et al., 2014; Sderlund, 2011) and research methods

about literature reviews (Brocke et al., 2009; Hart, 1998; Pawson

et al., 2005; Tranfield et al., 2003), it is possible to synthesize a

pattern for the literature review as follows: (1) plan the review,

(2) clarify the scope and conceptualize the topic, (3) search,

evaluate and select literature, (4) analyze the selected literature

and finally (5) report and disseminate. More specifically, we

adapted the approach inFig. 2below (inspired byVom Brocke

et al., 2009):

Fig. 2 presents the four phases used in the structuredliterature review. Although it is possible to separate the phases

analytically, the actual research process was iterative, but is still

presented in a structured manner. The four phases are discussed

in the following.

Phase 1: The study's review scope (Vom Brocke et al.,

2009) focused on the research outcomes and theories of the

rethinking literature. The coverage of the structured literature

review was rather comprehensive with the purpose of including

most of the literature within the defined scope.

Phase 2: As stated above, it is possible to describe the

project management literature as either classical project

management or rethinking project management; however, the

two categories are not monolithic and all-inclusive (i.e. many

project management topics are not included in the two

categories). The present review's intention is to present an

assessment of the alternative perspectives that have emerged

as a result of, for example, the rethinking initiative in the UK

(Winter et al., 2006c). For this reason, the outset of the

current study was the identification of key terms and topics

from the UK study that could be used in further search

processes. Initially, we decided that the key concepts would

be rethinking project management and reinventing project

management.

Phase 3: In part 2, the goal was to create a search process

that, ideally, would both encompass the literature from the

initial search process in part 1 and capture other relevant

literature. Consequently, we identified relevant search strings

for each of the 26 publications found through the initial study,

which was a highly iterative process. The iterative develop-

ment of search strings is listed inAppendix A.Table 2presents

the results:

The next step involved selecting the relevant contributions

(articles and books) from the search result with 1279 entries in

the four databases, as shown in Table 2 above. Each of the

authors separately evaluated the result against the RPM

conceptualization presented in the previous chapter, thereby

performing triangulation (i.e. multiple investigators) (Bryman,2008, p. 379). This entailed first examining the title and, if

necessary, the keywords and the abstract. The authors presented

the selected lists to each other and through a joint process this

1. Definition of

review scope

2. Conceptuali-

zation of topic

3. Literature

search

4. Literature

analysis

Fig. 2. Framework for the structured literature review.

Table 2

Results from the structured literature review process.

Databases Scopus EBSCO ProQuest ScienceDirect

Search results from part 2 425 385 305 164

Coverage of initial 26

publications from part 1

19 16 13 16





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resulted in 110 contributions consisting of included and

maybe included contributions. The authors scrutinized

the maybe included contributions again and selected a net

list of 74 contributions (these are marked in the reference

list with an asterisk). We will discuss the criteria for

including and excluding contributions in more detail in the

following.Inclusions: (1) The core of the conceptualization of RPM

is the UK-based network initiative from 2004 to 2006, which

is documented in the Special issue on rethinking project

management (e.g. Winter et al., 2006c), and it is easy to

identify and include papers in this category. (2) The next area is

the Scandinavian school of project studies, which shares many

ideas with the UK initiative, such as a broader conceptualiza-

tion beyond mere execution (Sahlin-Andersson and Sderholm,

2002) and seeing projects as temporary organizations embed-

ded in permanent organizations and wider environments (the

contexts) (Lundin and Sderholm, 1995; Packendorff, 1995).

The area includes several papers taking temporary organiza-tions as their outset; however, inclusion requires rethinking or

the setting of new directions, and many papers use the term

temporary organizations only as a synonym for projects and

do not provide these new directions, and therefore are not

included. (3) Projects-as-practice papers (Blomquist et al.,

2010) are included as they build on the actuality of projects'

theme from the UK initiative (Cicmil et al., 2006). Blomquist

et al. (2010, p. 7) explained the relationship as follows: We

thus build our thoughts [projects-as-practice] on the following

in both the practice turn in social science and management

research, as well as in the recent rethinking project manage-

ment . (4) A totally different area is the complexity turn in

project management research focusing on complex dynamic

systems (Cooke-Davies et al., 2007) and beyond this has

been coined by Saynisch (2010b) as Project Management

Second Order (PM-2) and sets new directions. (5) There are

finally more scattered inclusions, e.g. reinventing project

management (Shenhar and Dvir, 2007) and perspectives on

projects(Turner et al., 2010).

Exclusions: (1) It was fairly simple to identify and exclude

papers belonging to classical project management (CPM).

However, some of these papers needed more investigation

when they described new methods, tools, practices, etc., but as

long as they built upon CPM thinking, we still excluded them.

(2) A rather different approach involved excluding makingprojects critical (MPC) (Hodgson and Cicmil, 2006). This

exclusion might be less obvious, but in line with Blomquist et

al. (2010)we see this approach mainly as a criticism of both

CPM and RPM; although some writings might be in the gray

zone between RPM and MPC, we decided to exclude MPC

research. (3) Several empirical studies (e.g. with an ethno-

graphic approach) might reach the conclusion that CPM is

insufficient and incomplete, but as with MPC, a criticism of

CPM does not in itself make it a candidate for inclusion. (4)

Finally, we excluded editorials, book reviews and the like as

they lack the level of detail that we were pursuing.

The selection process was challenging, as the discussion of

inclusions and exclusions above entirely illustrates. However, it

is the authors' belief that the final list of contributions is largely

representative and includes relevant sub-versions of RPM,

despite the likelihood of omitting potential contributions.

Phase 4: We divided the literature analysis into two coding

processes. First, we conducted an inductive analysis (Patton,

2002, pp. 453454), with the goal of identifying overarching

topics and then categorizing each contribution within one of theassociated categories. We identified six categories through this

process. Though some contributions touched upon different

categories, each contribution was only associated with the main

category of the contribution. For example,Aritua et al. (2009)

described how new approaches, techniques, etc. are necessary

in relation to multi-project management. Thus, we identified

the main category for this contribution as contextualization

concerned with how projects need to expand beyond the goals

of isolated projects and encourage thinking about projects

in a broader context. However, the contribution also explored

the relationship between multiple projects and complexity

theory; thus, the contribution had complexity as a secondarycategory, which was the case in several other papers in which

the complexity of projects or their environment, for example,

acted as an underlying argument for rethinking, but still played

a secondary role in the paper. This forced the authors to focus

on a narrow set of categories that were distinctively different.

At an earlier stage, a larger number of the contributions were

overlapping. This obliged the authors to reconstruct the

categorization or merge categories. For example, we later

merged two categories, called reflective practice and rethinking

education, into one category, called rethinking practice, since

the two categories were highly linked. For example, some

papers were concerned with the link between practice and

education (Berggren and Sderlund, 2008), others were

concerned with educating reflective practitioners (Crawford

et al., 2006), while still others were related to reflective practice

in general (Kreiner, 2012). After a long discussion about

the categorization, the authors in this case agreed that the

development and rethinking of both practitioners and education

are so tightly linked that another category encompassing both

of the old categories would be more fitting. Second, we

carried out a deductive coding process to classify the

contributions into yearly distributions and their paradigmatic

stance (inspired byChen and Hirschheim, 2004) looking at

whether the identified literature overall could be categorized as

being either subjectivistic or objectivistic; we carried out thistask usingBurrell and Morgan's (1979)distinctions.

Part 1 took place over a long period ranging from autumn

2011 to autumn 2012, while part 2 was more concentrated,

from October 2012 to January 2013 (i.e. determining 74

contributions), although with subsequent revisions. Finally,

the authors finalized the writing up of the literature review in

May 2014.

4. Analysis of rethinking project management research

This section presents the results of the inductive analysis,

followed by the yearly distribution of papers and the categoriza-

tion of papers according to their paradigmatic standpoint.





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The inductive analysis resulted in the six categories shown

inTable 3below. Since these categories are rather broad the

aim was to identify few, but broad categories with little

overlapping they will be elaborated upon in the following.Contextualization covers literature that describes how

projects need to expand beyond the narrow goals of isolated

projects and encourage thinking about projects in a broader

context by focusing on the management of multiple projects, the

organizational strategy and the project environment. For example,

Dille and Sderlund (2011) described how the conventional

analysis of project organizations has neglected the institutional

environment and how institutional arrangements can severely

limit projects. Another example is the work ofAlderman and Ivory

(2010), who examined how the meta-project context impacts

on service-led projects. By existing within the context of a

meta-project, these projects encompass considerations of activities

beyond the normal remits of the project manager. Another

subtheme within this category is the management of

multiple projects. For example, Aritua et al. (2009, p. 72)

argued that the management of multiple projects presents

challenges that are fundamentally different from single

project management. In connection with the management

of multiple projects,Aritua et al. (2009)proposed the use of

complexity theory to understand how it is possible to see

the multi-project environment as being made up of complex

adaptive systems. Yet another example from this category is

the work presented byMaylor et al. (2006), who pointed out

that programs and portfolios are a mechanism for manage-

ment in organizations and that they create issues that reachbeyond the problems associated with single projects. Hence,

project management skills and techniques are not necessar-

ily transferable to the management of multiple projects. A

different example within this category is the use of Kaikaku

project management, which integrates the corporate strategy

into the project by seeing it as an open value system (Ohara

and Asada, 2009).

The categorysocial and political aspects includes literature

with a focus on social and political processes rather than the

traditional focus on specific tools and procedures. For example,

Leybourne (2007) described how the emphasis is changing

from a dominating focus on tools and techniques towards the

social and behavioral elements of the management of projects

and how research within project management is expanding.

On the other hand,Clarke (2010)explored how emotions can

potentially influence project managers' behavior and decisions

when playing their role in relationship management in projects.The author suggested that project managers should use their

understanding and awareness of their emotions and those of

others more actively in projects. Sense (2009), on the other

hand, focused on learning in relation to projects and more

specifically on the importance of social learning within projects

and project teams through an alternative characterization of

projects. Small and Walker (2010) showed how project

complexity is socially derived with differences created from

human plurality. This implies that the project management

strategy should go through continual adaptation in order to

respond to the changing power and politics within project

practice.

Rethinking practice encompasses literature that suggests

alternative methods, perspectives and approaches to rethink the

ways in which practitioners work with projects, for example,

suggestions on how to educate project managers to enable them

to cope better with the increasing complexity and uncertainty in

project environments (Thomas and Mengel, 2008). Berggren

and Sderlund (2008)showed how educational practices can be

developed in order to stimulate knowledge co-production

between practitioners and academia in order to improve project

management education. Louw and Rwelamila (2012) examined a

sample of South African higher education institutions to

determine whether they had incorporated some of the thoughts

and concepts from, for example, the rethinking process in the UKinto their curricula. The different ways of rethinking education

are often linked to the concept of the reflective practitioner or

similar concepts. This is the case forLouw and Rwelamila (2012)

since they, among other rethinking topics, examined whether the

educational institutions linked project managers with reflective

practitioners. Yet another example is the case of Sewchurran

(2008, p. 316), who presented an alternative to the prescriptive,

model based, instrumental approacheswith the aim of achieving

better-educated, self-organizing and reflexive project practi-

tioners. Apart from literature more focused on the educational

side of project management, this category also encompasses

literature dealing with reflective practice in general, improvisa-

tion and contingency approaches and ways to rethink or improve

Table 3

Categories identified through the inductive analysis.

Categorization Description

Contextualization Expanding the conception of the project to encompass elements such as the environment and organizational strategy (e.g.Dille and

Sderlund, 2011)

Social and political aspects How social and political processes shape projects, e.g. power structures, emotionality and identities (e.g.Smith, 2011)

Rethinking practice Offering or suggesting alternative methods, perspectives and ways to rethink practice, e.g. through education or reflective practice(e.g. Crawford et al., 2006; Kreiner, 2012; Thomas and Mengel, 2008)

Complexity and uncertainty Outlining the complexity of projects, their environment, etc. and new methods to cope with complexity (e.g.Lenfle and Loch, 2010)

The actuality of projects Outlining the need to study how projects are actually carried out or empirical studies of the actuality of projects (e.g.Blomquist et al.,

2010; Packendorff, 1995)

Broader conceptualization Offering alternative perspectives on projects, project management and project success or outlining how the field is broadening

beyond its current limits (e.g. Sahlin-Andersson and Sderholm, 2002)





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practice. It is related to the work of authors such as Crawford et al.

(2006), who stressed that increasing project complexity demands

the education of more reflective project practitioners, in touch

with the newest theory and research, rather than solely focusing

on technical skills. Similarly,Thomas and Mengel (2008)argued

that complexity, uncertainty and chaos play an increasingly

important role in projects and project environments. Whileproject management training programs focus on standardization

of the field, the increasing complexity requires other forms of

professional development of project managers. Kreiner argued

thatAchieving desired goals flexibly in unfolding realities, and

implementing prior plans, are both important aspects of the

project manager's work.This dilemma is, according to Kreiner,

important to keep in mind as a project manager since he otherwise

riskstaking the plans literally(Kreiner, 2012, p. 715). Instead,

the project manager should be prepared to adapt the plan since it

might be rendered inadequate and imperfect by a changing and

turbulent environment. In a similar way, Leybourne (2010), for

example, argued in his study that managers within successfulorganizations allow their employees significant freedom to

experiment, for example with task management and unstructured

practices of work.

The category complexity and uncertainty consists of contri-

butions that deal with the increasing uncertainty and complexity

in projects, project environments, etc. These are evident in the

work ofAtkinson et al. (2006, p. 687), who, based on discussions

that took place as part of the RPM network in the UK, identified a

wide range of sources of uncertainty and stated that: More

sophisticated efforts to recognize and manage important sources

of uncertainty are needed. To deal with such increasing

complexity, these authors proposed alternative perspectives and

theories, such as evolutionary management and self-organization

(Saynisch, 2010a), and systems thinking (Sheffield et al., 2012).

As Kreiner (1995) pointed out, people involved in projects

must recognize that the originally intended outcomes will not

necessarily remain relevant over time since the environment often

drifts, thereby risking and undermining the success of the project.

Cooke-Davies et al. (2007) conducted a review of the major

ideas within complexity science and evaluated their potential

relevance to the project management field, focusing especially

on ideas with direct relevance to social complexity associated

with the people who are involved in delivering complex

projects. Though the contributions often did not identify

complexity as a main category, it frequently served as anunderlying argument for rethinking practice (e.g. Sheffield et

al., 2012).

The actuality of projects covers literature that underlines

the need for empirical studies of projects as its own point of

departure. A general argument within this category is that:while

a great deal is written about traditional project management, we

know very little about the actuality of project based working

and management(Cicmil et al., 2006, p. 675).Blomquist et al.

(2010, p. 5), for example, also pointed this out, by stating

that research into projects is [] insubstantial when it comes

to understanding what occurs in projects. For this reason,

Blomquist et al. (2010)outlined the project-as-practice approach

to research. The authors argued that whereas traditional project

research departs from some overall concepts and models from

which action is derived, the practice perspective begins with the

individual actions and asks what overall models and concepts

result from those actions. Similarly, Packendorff (1995)

argued that the research on project management is not

sufficiently empirical. While project management research

generally views projects as similar, these simple classifica-tions are mainly due to the fact that research has only made

empirical observations to a limited extent (Packendorff,

1995).

Broaderconceptualization deals with contributions that offer

alternative perspectives on, for example, projects, project manage-

ment and project success, outline how the field is broadening

beyond its current limits or describe the existing perspectives

within the field. Turner et al. (2010) outlined nine different

perspectives of projects, for example the project as a machine, the

project as a mirror, etc. On the other hand,McLeod et al. (2012)

explored the evaluation of project success from a subjectivist

perspective. Through a longitudinal case study, the authorsinvestigated how different stakeholders perceived the project

outcomes and how they evaluated success, from which

they derived a conceptual framework. Kolltveit et al. (2007)

studied the project management literature and showed how the

dominance of each perspective has changed over time.

Through a case study, Koppenjan et al. (2011) showed how

project managers acknowledge and combine different com-

peting perspectives in practice in order to meet the require-

ments of control and flexibility.

The categorization of the 74 contributions resulted in their

distribution among the 6 different topics, as shown in Fig. 3

below:

Fig. 3 reflects the main categories within the different

contributions. Still, some papers touched upon more than one

category. As mentioned, complexity and uncertaintyandrethink-

ing practice were often related. As also shown inFig. 3, each topic

covered at least six contributions, while the most represented

topics were broader conceptualization followed by complexity

and uncertainty. While broader conceptualization on the one hand

is a broad category in itself, it is also by far the largest, with a total

of 27 contributions. One argument for this could be that the

research stream has been preoccupied with more conceptual and

theoretical research since there was an initial need to define

projects and broaden our understanding of projects and their

setting. On the other hand, social and political aspects togetherwith the actuality of projects were the least represented categories.

It is interesting that while many of the authors within the RPM

research stream argued for alternative approaches to project

management rather than the rationalistic one employed within the

classical approach, only a minority of the rethinking

literature has a primary focus on the social aspects related

to projects. Again, this might be related to the fact that

there was an initial need for the research stream to

establish itself and its view on projects before endeavoring

to undertake further studies of practice. The fact thatsocial

and political aspects together with the actuality of projects

were also rather small themes within the research stream

suggests that a well-grounded empirical understanding of





8/13

pro jects is not particularly str ong wit hin the RPM resear ch

stream and that there has been a primary emphasis on the

theoretical base.

The development of the RPM literature over time is shown

inFig. 4below:

Fig. 4 shows the increase in RPM literature since 2006, and

this is most likely to be a result of the RPM initiative in the UK,

which lasted from March 2004 to May 2006 (Winter et al.,2006c). In consequence, the above figure illustrates that the

research stream has been active since the RPM initiative in 2006.

Accordingly, 59 of the 74 contributions were published after

2005, which amounts to approximately 80% of the identified

literature. While we could argue that the move towards more

alternative thinking is a product of significant efforts by central

actors within the project management community, as the above

Fig. 4 would suggest, there might be other explanations for such a

significant movement within project management research. One

might be a general movement in the field away from objectivistic

views towards a more subjectivistic understanding and enquiries

on projects, which in turn would lead to more heterogeneous

and situated views and concepts on projects in general. Our

analysis in this regard showed that only a small fraction of the

identified RPM literature employed an objectivistic view

we identified a total of 6 papers as objectivistic and 62 as

subjectivistic, while 6 papers from the literature review was

not classified as either objectivistic or subjectivistic. This

seems to relate to the changing nature of project management

from a hard paradigm to a soft paradigm (Pollack, 2007), for which

the RPM literature generally subscribes to the subjectivistic softparadigm.

Departing from the findings from the analysis, the next

section will take a critical view of RPM research.

5. A critical look at the brave new world

Although the rethinking concept might be seen as a

promising road for project management for both research

and professional practice, it is also essential to take a critical

look at the brave new world and use this critical look to

discuss how future research can expand and advance RPM

research.

0

10

20

30

Expanding

context

Social and

polical aspects

Rethinking

pracce

Complexity and

uncertainty

The actuality of

projects

Broader

conceptualizaon

Fig. 3. Distribution of the contributions among the topics.

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

1983

1984

1985

1986

1987

1988

1989

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

Fig. 4. Distribution of the RPM literature since 1983.





9/13

The overall challenge for RPM is to become much

more diffused and accepted as a useful enhancement of CPM.

Although we have a solid body of knowledge for RPM, it is still

lacking wide diffusion into practice, and this is really a major

change for the profession and academia, which will be discussed

in the following.

First, the rethinking literature generally assumes that classicalproject management is the dominant view; for example,Morris

et al. (2011b, p. 2) stated that classical project managementis the

tradition that still dominates many of the textbooks to this day and

whose positivist, normative character arguably underlies the

dominant professional model of the discipline its body of

knowledge (Project Management Institute, 2008),and this view

is supported by others (Andersen, 2008; Packendorff, 1995). This

line of thought is easy to follow and indirectly supported by this

literature review, as most of the literature that we encountered

initially appeared to follow the classical view (we selected only

74 out of 1279 contributions obtained in the search process).

However, it would be surprising if the early studies on therethinking view (Lichtenberg, 1983; Lundin and Sderholm,

1995; Packendorff, 1995) have only had a slight influence on

academia and practitioners.

Furthermore, Fig. 4 indicates an increase in the rethinking

literature from 2006, so the classical view might face increasing

challenges, although it has been in existence since before the

Second World War (Lenfle and Loch, 2010; Morris, 2013) and

is certainly highly institutionalized. There is thus a danger that

the assumption of the dominant view has become a rationalized

myth (Boxenbaum and Jonsson, 2008; Meyer and Rowan,

1977) that is reiterated repeatedly, while both scholars and

practitioners are in fact in motion.

Especially experienced practitioners might be aware of the

challenges of the classical view (Svejvig, 2012) and able to

apply practices that circumvent some of the problems

encountered in the classical approach. One example is a study

byHllgren and Sderholm (2011, pp. 508509), in which the

project plans were obviously a rational part of the project

management toolbox for progress reporting (the classical view),

but they observed that the project plans also fulfilled the

broader purpose of enhancing understanding and facilitating

negotiations (the rethinking view). The findings from the study

indicate that the project plans were used further than in the

classical view and were able to illuminate the complex terrain

in praxis (Winter et al., 2006c). This limited exampleillustrates the potential gap between the dominant classical

view as the majority of the literature (the theoretical view)

has described and presented and how it is enacted in practice.

We thus need to understand the degree to which CPM is a

rationalized myth legitimizing project management as prop-

er (Boxenbaum and Jonsson, 2008), while practitioners

might enact project management in a different way, closer to

RPM thinking.

Second, a natural question that follows concerns the current

status of RPM in practice. The UK initiative was launched back

in 2006, but we do not know much about the diffusion and

acceptance of RPM either in the UK or in other countries on a

broader scale.Pollack (2007)discussed the changing nature of

project management from the hard paradigm (objectivistic) to

the soft paradigm (subjectivistic), and this study clearly

confirms that the RPM literature belongs to the soft paradigm

(62 out of 74 contributions were subjectivistic), but we lack a

better understanding of how the potential paradigmatic change

is reflected in practice.

Several of the papers in this literature review discussed projectmanagement education and practitioner development (Berggren

and Sderlund, 2008; Crawford et al., 2006; Louw and

Rwelamila, 2012). Education is one of the main areas to address

if we want to set RPM on the agenda and to imprint future

and current project managers and project participants. The

senior-level education programs described by Berggren and

Sderlund (2008)seem promising, and the same applies to the

diverse MBA programs with a focus on developing reflective

practitioners, e.g. at Manchester University (Crawford et al.,

2006). However, these are scattered examples, and we need a

more thorough understanding of the share of RPM-inspired

education compared with more traditional project manage-ment education including certification and commercial

training, as well as how to increase this share. To this end,

Crawford et al.'s (2006) paper provides interesting recom-

mendations for practitioner development within project

management.

CPM is highly institutionalized and strongly supported by

de facto standards or best practices, like PMBok (Project

Management Body of Knowledge) (Project Management

Institute, 2008) and PRINCE2-2009 (Projects in Controlled

Environments) (Office of Government Commerce, 2009).

Certification programs are associated with PMBok, PRINCE2

and others, and they retain and reinforce the classical view of

project management. We need to consider how we can

influence the project management associations around the

world in order to critique, contribute to and update this formal

body of knowledge and the associated certification programs

with RPM thinking (Morris et al., 2006), as this might be a

necessary, but also very difficult, road to a higher degree of

diffusion of RPM.

Third, classical project management has been criticized

for being insufficient for praxis and the practices applied

(Koskela and Howell, 2002; Morris, 1994; Morris et al.,

2011b; Winter and Szczepanek, 2009). Morris (1994, p. 2)

argued:

Modern project management emerged between the 1930s

and the 1950s Despite its long development, the concepts

and techniques of project management now available to the

general practitioner, however advanced and specic they

may be, are often inadequate to the overall task of managing

projects successfully.

Morris and colleagues more or less reiterated the statement

in the recent Oxford Handbook of Project Management

(Morris et al., 2011b), thereby indicating that the practices

did not develop much between 1994 and 2011

furthermore, other authors back this up (Lenfle and Loch,

2010; Saynisch, 2010b).





10/13

With this in mind, it would be logical for the RPM research

stream to focus particularly on offering alternative practices,

which have been proven in praxis, showing superiority to

classical project management. However, only 7 out of 74 papers

have this detailed practice focus on researching the actuality of

projects, and this certainly prompts more practice-oriented studies

(Van de Ven, 2007). We need these more practice-orientedstudies in order to convince industry and practitioners about the

potential value of rethinking project management. Classical

project management is so highly institutionalized that changing

the mindset is a real long-term institutional change (Van de Ven

and Hargrave, 2004).

It furthermore appears to be highly relevant to discuss

performance achievements from classical project manage-

ment versus RPM, because a real driver of RPM in practice

could be that it outperforms classical project management.

However, performance, value and success are complex

concepts that can be considered as multi-dimensional,

dynamic and relative (inspired by Berg, 2001), makingthem difficult to compare in a sensible way, and this has to

be taken into account. Multidimensionality might mean

measuring efficiency, effectiveness and innovation (Jugdev

et al., 2001) and have a performance perspective far beyond

traditional value creation and benefit realization (Bradley,

2010; Breese, 2012; Ward and Daniel, 2012). In any case,

RPM in practice and the performance of RPM (compared

with classical project management) are important themes for

RPM research.

This critical look at the brave new world has posed several

questions and highlighted unexplored avenues that can be

used to expand and advance RPM research and practitioner

development.

6. Conclusion

In conclusion, this paper presented the results of a structured

literature review of the published RPM literature based on the

classification and analysis of 74 contributions and in addition

took a critical look at this brave new world. The first research

question regarded how RPM could be conceptualized and how

it has developed over time. The conceptualization of RPM was

distilled into important features representing the classical view

and how RPM embeds the classical view (i.e. enhancing ratherthan discarding it) (seeFig. 1), and this was further elaborated

with the 6 overarching categories from the literature analysis

of the 74 contributions: contextualization, social and political

aspects, rethinking practice, complexity and uncertainty, actuality

of projects and broader conceptualization. RPM has developed

over time, with scattered contributions until 2006, after which it

became more consistently represented with a few yearly

contributions. An important outcome of this paper is thus a

more integrated view with clearer boundaries for RPM. The

second research question concerned how future research can

expand RPM, and this was answered by taking a critical look at

this brave new world in which the overall challenge for RPM is tobecome much more diffused and accepted. This has several

ramifications, such as: (1) a potential misleading assumption

of the dominant classical view embedded in the RPM

literature, in which practice is enacted in a different way,

closer to RPM thinking; (2) insufficient knowledge about the

current status of RPM in practice, the share of RPM thinking in

project management education and the apparent lack of RPM

influence on the formal body of knowledge and certification

programs; and (3) finally, a need for more practice-oriented

studies (Blomquist et al., 2010; Cicmil et al., 2006; Van de

Ven, 2007) in order to convince industry and practitioners

about the value of RPM and to support reflective practitionerdevelopment.

There are some limitations to this paper. First, the

conceptualization of the RPM research stream is broad and

readers should consider it as non-monolithic with many

sub-versions. This implies a great diversity of the literature

reviewed, with the danger of being too inclusive, but also

invites further studies of conceptualizations of RPM and

the positioning of RPM within project management

research, which can bring greater clarity to RPM. A

second limitation is that we might have missed some

potent ially rel evant liter atu re, although we followed a

detailed and structured search process as presented in the

methodology section and appendix. We aimed to present

our literature review in a very transparent way in order to

exhibit any potential shortcomings in our search process

(Tranfield et al., 2003), which can then be addressed in

future studies.

Funding source

The paper has been funded within theIT Project Management

and Innovation, part of Aarhus University, and the funding is

public funding i.e. not conflicting with any private interests

(funding).

Conict of interest

We, the authors, declare that we have no conflict of interest.





11/13

Appendix A

Table 4below shows the iterative development of the search string with the search expressions in bold. The development process

included the 26 contributions from part 1 (the explorative and unstructured literature review) in the search results the number in

brackets inTable 4shows the coverage of publications identified in part 1. The search period was from the database start period to

2012. The search number 11 below makes up the final result, also shown in Table 2:

Table 4

Iterative development of the search string.

Search

number

Additions to the search string (Scopus search format) Scopus EBSCO

Host

ProQuest ScienceDirect

1 ALL (rethinking project) 140

(13)

82

(14)

104

(12)

72

(11)

2 O R TITLE- ABS- KEY (reinventing project) OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (beyond project) 180

(13)

136

(15)

121

(12)

84

(11)

3 OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (project AND competing theories OR project AND competing

perspectives)

194

(13)

173

(15)

133

(12)

86

(11)

4 O R TITLE-ABS- KEY (project management AND relevance AND change) 250

(14)

202

(15)

232

(12)

88

(12)

5 O R TITLE-ABS- KEY (

conventional project management

) 282(16) 219(15) 249(12) 95(14)

6 OR TITLE-ABS- KEY (project management theory AND comparison) 284

(16)

219

(15)

250

(12)

96

(14)

7 O R TITLE- ABS-K EY (project management AND control AND emphasize OR emphasise

AND control AND project management)

338

(17)

237

(16)

270

(13)

99

(14)

8 O R TITLE-ABS- KEY (perspectives on projects) 355

(17)

347

(16)

270

(13)

108

(14)

9 O R TITLE-ABS- KEY (temporary organisation AND project management

ORtemporary organization AND project management)

357

(18)

347

(16)

270

(13)

111

(15)

10 OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (project management AND complexity theory) 376

(18)

363

(16)

281

(13)

114

(15)

11 OR TITLE-ABS-KEY (project management AND second order) 377

(18)

382

(16)

287

(13)

116

(15)

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