Course-PM TEK366/DIT846 Project management 2021-2022

Last updated 2021-12-06 (see change log in the end of the page for changes).

Contact details and general information

Course leader
Ksenia Onufrey (ksenia.onufrey@chalmers.se)

Other faculty
Per Svensson (per.svensson@chalmers.se)
David Loid (david.loid@chalmers.se)
Lars Hallin (lars.hallin@chalmers.se)

Course assistant
Lisa Winberg (lisa.winberg@chalmers.se) 

Merit points
7.5 ECTS

Division
Innovation and R&D Management at the Department of Technology Management and Economics. 

Course texts
Pinto, Jeffrey K., Project Management: Achieving Competitive Advantage, Pearson (5th International Edition) ISBN: 9781292269146. Other texts available in the Chalmers Library databases or made available under ‘Hand-outs’ on course home page. 

Course schedule
Published in TimeEdit under the course code TEK366. 

Course content and aims

This project management course deals with the issues of organizing and managing projects with the aim to provide an in-depth understanding of projects and practical management of them. You will obtain a broad knowledge of project management and project organizing in different types of organizations and inter-organizational settings. The course also places emphasis on understanding contractual issues of projects.

This means that the course contains general knowledge on project management and reflects such knowledge in contingences occurring when dealing with projects in technology-based firms. Thus, less emphasis will be put on specific project management tools. The course is designed so that understanding rather than knowing is prioritized. This means that the course will focus on perspectives and alternatives rather than on clear-cut answers and ‘hands-on’ knowledge. Thus, the course aims at introducing project management theory and present insights on project organizing and project navigating in technology-based firms.

Learning outcomes, assessment and examination

At the end of the course students will be able to:

• Describe basic project management concepts and tools
• Apply project management theories to analyze the specific characteristics of industrial projects and based on this suggest appropriate ways to manage the
• Frame, analyze and solve managerial problems in project settings using appropriate
• Find, retrieve, and use literature to critically evaluate project management
• Structure and organize projects of a not too complicated

The examination includes actively participating in the four Case Seminars as well as passing the Project Management Basics Test, the Case Seminar hand-ins, and the Home Exam.

The aim of the home exam is to create a state of reflective learning and not to test by rote. Knowledge from the whole course should be integrated, by working with the questions and themes of the course. Theory and practical knowledge should be integrated, and various theories reflected against each other. Proven understanding of concepts and ability to build syntheses are encouraged as well as a structured reasoning.

A total amount of 100 points that can be gained from the different parts of the course: 20 points for the basic test, 10 points for each of the four Case Essays, and 40 points for the home exam. To pass the course, participation in compulsory activities and a minimum level of points (40%) on each of (a) the Project Management Basics Test, (b) the four Case Thesis hand-ins, and (c) the Home Exam. Grade 4 requires a total of 65 points. Grade 5 requires a total of 85 points.

Activity	Points	Grade	Required for G/3	Required for 4	Required for 5
Basic test	20	U/G	8	-	-
Case A-D	10 each	U/G	4 each	-	-
Home exam	40	U/G	16	-	-
Total	100	U/3/4/5	40	65	85

Schedule

The course schedule is available in TimeEdit. Any changes to the schedule will be shown there. 

KO = Ksenia Onufrey, LH = Lars Hallin, PS = Per Svensson, DL = David Loid

Study week	Date	Time	Room	Content	Teacher
1	1/11	13.15-15.00	Gamma	Course introduction	KO
	4/11	8.15-12.00	(Svea 228)	Self-study: PM basics	---
2	8/11	13.15-15.00	(Jupiter 243)	Self-study: PM basics	---
		15.15-17.00	ZOOM https://chalmers.zoom.us/j/69702861477 Password: TEK366	Q&A PM basics with Lars Hallin	LH
	11/11	8.15-10.00	Gamma	Case lecture A	PS
		10.15-12.00	Gamma	MS project intro	LH
	12/11	15.15-17.00	---	Self-study	---
3	15/11	13.15-17.00	Alfa	PM basics continued	DL
	18/11	8.15-10.00	(Svea 228)	Self-study	---
		10.15-12.00	Jupiter041 and Jupiter024	Basic test	KO
4	22/11	13.15-17.00	Jupiter 243	Case lecture B	DL
	25/11	8.15-10.00	Svea 228	Case seminar A (Group 1)	PS
		10.15-12.00	Svea 228	Case seminar A (Group 2)	PS
	26/11	15.15-17.00	Svea 240	Case seminar A (Group 3)	PS
5	29/11	10.15-12.00	Svea 121	Case seminar A (Extra group 1)	PS
		13.15-15.00	Jupiter 243	Case lecture C	PS
		15.15-17.00	Jupiter 243	Case seminar A (Extra group 2)	PS
	2/12	8.15-10.00	Svea 221	Case seminar B (Group 1)	DL
		10.15-12.00	Svea 221	Case seminar B (Group 2)	Dl
	3/12	15.15-17.00	Svea 228	Case seminar B (Group 3)	DL
6	6/12	13.15-17.00	Gamma Zoom: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89524966928?pwd=SWNPQWtndmIvU0JFNEdVMENuZ0RrQT09	Case lecture D	DL
	9/12	8.15-10.00	Jupiter041	Basic Test retake	KO
		8.15-10.00	Svea 129  Zoom	Case seminar C (Group 1)	PS
		10.15-12.00	Svea 129 Zoom	Case seminar C (Group 2)	PS
	10/12	15.15-17.00	Svea 130 Zoom	Case seminar C (Group 3)	PS
7	13/12	13.15-15.00	Gamma Zoom https://chalmers.zoom.us/j/68476814404 Password: 131221	Course sum-up	KO
		15.15 - 17.00	Zoom	Case seminar C (Group 4)
	16/12	8.15-10.00	Svea 215 Zoom	Case seminar D (Group 1)	DL
		10.15-12.00	Svea 215 Zoom	Case seminar D (Group 2)	DL
	17/12	15.15-17.00	Svea 215 Zoom	Case seminar D (Group 3)	DL
Exam week	7/1	10.00	---	Home exam questions published	---
	10/1	10.00	https://chalmers.zoom.us/j/68603770378 Password: Homeexam	Zoom Q&A home exam questions	KO
	14/1	13.00	---	Home exam hand-in	---

Course design

The course consists of two parts: Project Management Basics and Mastering Project Management.

Part one: The Project Management Basics

This part is aimed at a general understanding of project management. You will be provided with insight of the prevailing vocabulary and perspectives of the project management movement profession, and this is core to the second part of the course.

The Project Management Basics consists of a series of pre-recorded lectures and two supplementary on-campus lectures in the first reading weeks of the course. Pre-recorded lectures are further supported with on-campus Q&A session.

The Project Management Basics part is finalized with a two-hour on-campus test. A re-test is scheduled week 6 in the current study period.

Part two: Mastering Project Management

The teaching of Mastering Project Management consists of lectures and four thematic cases. This part aims at providing you with an increased understanding of what mechanisms keep mankind from perfecting project management. To achieve this, Mastering Project Management includes theories from different research disciplines outside of project management such as organization theory, leadership research, organizational politics, contract theory and organizational learning.

Course literature and reading guidelines

The textbook for this course is Pinto, Jeffrey K. "Project Management; achieving competitive advantage", (2020; 5th edition) Global Edition.

The 2013 Global edition is available as an e-book in the Chalmers Library and differs only slightly to the 2020 Global edition. The Project Management Basics lectures are designed to support the student in the reading of the textbook, and as the book is rather comprehensive, we believe it will be difficult to get high marks on the PM Basics test without having access to a copy of the book.

Lecture presentation material will (when possible) be made available on the course page.

The assignments for each of the four cases will be published in a Case PM.

The lectures series aims to explore different aspects of project management theory and serves as a basis for own work and reflection. This may mean that individual lectures do not cover exactly what is published in the course literature, but rather the subject/theme in general. The lectures during the first weeks will concentrate on the basics of project management. The knowledge provided on the lectures could be integrated with practical experience when working with the case assignments.

The case assignments, the case essays, and the case seminars

Each case regards a Case PM and a number of texts. Each case with related articles is further introduced during a Case Lecture that will be followed by a Case Seminar later the next week.

You will be allocated into a Case group, and each Case group is required to write a text, the analytical Case Essay, to be handed-in on Tuesday the week after the Case Lecture. The Case PM and articles are made available the day of the Case lecture. The case essays are graded.

The structure of the cases are as follows:

Study week X	Monday	Case Lecture A and Case PM A published
	Thursday & Friday	-
Study week X+1	Monday		Case Lecture B and Case PM B published
	Tuesday	Case essay A hand-in
	Thursday & Friday	Case seminars A
Study week X+2	Monday	Essay A graded		Case lecture C
	Tuesday		...and so on	...and so on

The hand-ins and active participation on each of the Case Seminars are mandatory. Your own work with each of the four Case Assignments is core to your learning from this course. We encourage you to start this work early.

The Case Groups

Case groups, consisting of 3-4 students each, will be created by the examiner during study week two.

The Case Lectures

The aim with the Case Lectures is to provide you with theoretical and practical insights that you are expected to use when writing your analytical case essay. Roughly, the following “case specific” themes will be presented:

• Project planning. What is meant by steering a project and what different tools are there to support? What are different methods for planning and control? What characterizes project start and end? What various bases for project prioritizations are there?
• Organizing projects and organizational characteristics. What are the notions to consider when understanding projects and project-based organizations? Are there different models on which to base a project organization? How are project activities coordinated? How do project stakeholders’ impact on project managing?
• Managing stakeholders and contracts. Stakeholder management is dealt with in the Project Management Basics textbook, and thus is an integral part of that module. This case theme deals with stakeholders by extending the analysis into organizational politics and organizational behaviour to make the student able to recognize also covert politics in and between the organizations
• Leadership - a summary will be provided shortly.

 

The analytical Case Essay

The aim with the analytical case essay is to provide an opportunity to apply theoretical knowledge on case problems (i.e. to apply project management techniques in practice). Instructions are provided in the Case PMs.

The Case Seminars

Participants’ involvement is at the heart of the four Case Seminars: participants are responsible for their own investment in the learning process. It is the active participation in the discussions and preparation of all class members that will enhance learning. This means that your participation is giving the other student a chance to learn as well as you. The purpose of reading and proposing questions and discussion topics is about starting a joint analysis and understanding of the articles and chapters and apply this to a case.

Groups have to sign-up for the case seminars. This will start as soon as the groups are settled (week 2-3 of the course).

Referencing, copying, and academic honesty

In this course you are required to use a Harvard referencing style (’author/date’), either the one stated in the Chalmers Library Reference Guide (The Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition) or the APA style (by the American Psychological Association).

You are encouraged to use a reference managing system, as it is important to get your references right. There is a built-in referencing system in recent versions of Microsoft Word, which can produce APA-compliant referencing. Many academics prefer the EndNote system, which stores your references in a database separated from your documents. EndNote is available for downloading by students in the Student Portal.

Aiming to become a future Master, you are encouraged to make use of the works of others. However, you must avoid plagiarism – if your writing is inspired by someone else’s text, you refer to it, and if you copy it, you quote it. Please download and study Academic Honesty and Integrity at Chalmers – What Are the Rules of the Game?

Please note that lectures are copyrighted by the lecturers. Thus, you can not record a lecture (even for your own use), unless you have received authorization by the lecturer.

Course evaluation 

A Course Evaluation Committee will be organized, consisting of the course leader and two to four students, during the Introductory Lecture. The committee will meet three times. Tokens of appreciation will be rewarded those three students who participate.

Students are encouraged to respond to the on-line Course Evaluation Questionnaire, which will be open after the Closing Lecture. All responses to the questionnaire are kept anonymous.

Student representatives

Oshan Siriwardena kathri@student.chalmers.se

Hadis Shirkosh shirkosh@student.chalmers.se 

Karl Öqvist karloq@student.chalmers.se

Changes made since the last occasion

As the teaching activities at Chalmers are getting back on Campus after the Corona outbreak, the course PM is adjusted to a return from fully online mode last year back to mostly classroom mode.

Basic Project Management part is changed as a preparation before larger changes in course organization planned for 2022. In 2021, the pre-recorded lecture series will be used together with a Q&A session and two supplementary on-campus lectures. The maximum number of points for the Basic Test is set to 20, and 40 for the home exam.

Change log

2021-10-26	Re-designed the case structure table.
2021-10-28	Added schedule to the syllabus.
2021-10-31	Corrected room and time for the basic test. Updated GU course code from DIT844 to DIT846 Corrected lecture time on 15/11 (from 13.15-15.00 to 13.15-17.00)
2021-11-03	Names of student representatives added Changed the location of Q&A on 8/11 to zoom
2021-11-08	Basic Test Retake atted to the schedule
2021-11-17	New rooms for the basic test
2021-11-22	New room for the seminar on 3/12
2021-11-26	Re-scheduling of case seminar A.
2021-12-06	Lecture 06.12 moved to Zoom. Room for basic test retake provided. Date revised for case seminar D, group 3.
2021-12-09	Moving last two weeks of the coursse to zooom
2022-01-10	Added the zoom link for the Home exam Q&A