Critical learning themes in project management education: Implication for blended learning. Why should we study project management?

This article provides insights as to why students are taking project management classes. Students can develop a wide range of skills that require accomplishing successful projects by using “transferable skills” that can be taught in classroom and “e-learning environments”. The popularity of project management is due to the ability to accomplish projects on time and within budgets. In order to survive in today’s world, employees will have fundamental skills that will help maximize performance such as teamwork, problem solving–analytical, research gathering, time management, information synthesizing, and utilizing high technology tools.

Project management is crucial in the development of any organization. Everyone faces project management at one time or another in their careers. Project management consumes large amounts of resources needed to manage resources efficiently. Project management is a multi-complexed skilled discipline. The importance of the field grows larger due to the acceleration of modern organizations that gain competitive advantages.

Students were interested in obtaining skills through transferable skills, skills not specific to any field, for example, writing, communicating, problem solving, and knowing the field of technology. Critical and creative thinking can be applied in classrooms. Communication, leadership, planning and teamwork fall into transferable skills. The results of research categorized “e –learning environments” to be incorporated as practical and dependable methods of learning, where students perform decision –making games. These platforms will become crucial for collaborative and flexible learning that will help to support face-to-face instruction.

Project management is one of the most standard and extensively applied management systems and techniques in many areas. Yet, it is probably the most misused generic term in the business world that vaguely defines terminology. In practice, the focus of project management balances on three elements: resources (people, material, and equipment), time (critical paths, task’s length, and dependencies), and scope (project size, objectives, and requirements). It is the entrepreneurial side of the business, all about allocating resources and managing risks at minimal cost to the organization.

E-learning environments facilitates opportunities to explore technology and encourage students to become independent workers, critical thinkers, and lifelong learners. It also makes students responsible for taking control of their own learning and provides them with access to resources with expertise to facilitate optimum exploitations. Other skills that were also important for students to acquire included planning, controlling, and assessing risks in projects. The class offered a problem-based learning assignment as the most valuable experience.

To my surprise, I am in favor of learning more about project management. Just by being exposed to the practical application of concepts such as Project Review Technique (PERT) and Critical Path Method (CAP), I could see much potential in applications of managerial accounting and benefits of project management. I have my own personal life philosophy of the project management concept which states: “I need to do my homework or tasks at work before the deadline so if I run into any unknown territory or difficulties I can manage them before they are due.”

Ashleigh, Melanie (02/2012)“Critical learning themes in project management education: Implications for blended learning”. International journal of project management (0263-7863)30 (2), p. 153.

One thought on “Critical learning themes in project management education: Implication for blended learning. Why should we study project management?

  1. I agree with you in how important is to develop project management skills. The knowledge we earn at school definitely helps to somehow formulate an idea of how project management works in the real world. Besides attending school, I believe it is really important to try to earn real experience as soon as possible, either by having a job or an internship. This will help to understand how complex can be to deal with a project and the unexpected situations that you might encounter along the way, which may require you to reallocate resources, such as your people, time and cost.

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