This paper provides avenues for a broader engagement with the conceptual considerations of projects and project management with the aim of creating new possibilities for thinking about, researching, and developing our understanding of the field as practiced. Attention is drawn to the legacy of conventional but deeply rooted mainstream approaches to studying projects and project management, and implications of the specific underpinning intellectual tradition for recommendations proposed to organisational members as best practice project management. The identified concerns and limitations are discussed in the context of project management evolution where taken-for-granted advantages of project management as a disciplined effective methodology and its popularity are reexamined. The paper sheds light on a variety of voices from both scholarly and practitioner communities that have attempted to respond to this paradox and move the field forward. Taking issue with conventional labels of project success or failure, and drawing attention to alternative theoretical and methodological propositions, the argument turns toward critical management studies, outlining the implications of this intellectual tradition for studies of projects, project management, project performance, and individual skills and competencies to cope with social arrangements labelled "projects."
Keywords: project management theory; project management methodology; research and development ®2oo6 by the Project Management Institute Vol. 37, No. 3,111-122, ISSN 8756-9728/03 AUGUST 2006 PROJECT MANAGEMENT JOURNAL "3SVETLANA CICMIL, BSc (Civ. EngO, MBA, PhD, is the head of research in operations and information management and director of MBA Programmes at Bristol Business School, University of the West of England, U.K. She has an extensive international teaching, consultancy and industrial experience in the field of project management. Svetlana's specific research interests lie in the areas of complexity theory and sociology of project based work, project management education, and the development of project management skills, competencies, and knowledge. She is also interested in the global aspects of management education, and the international transfer of management knowledge. Svetlana is actively involved in Project Management Research Networks, regularly speaks at conferences and has published widely. Recent articles written by Svetlana have appeared in International lourr^al of Project Management, Building Research and Information, and Intemational Journal of Diversity in Organisations, Communities, and Nations. In collaboration with Dr. Hodgson, Svetlana published an influential book Making Projects Critical (Palgrave), drawing on a series of distinctive workshops with the same name with contributions from a range of international researchers. HODGSON BA (HONS), MA, PhD is senior lecturer in organisational analysis at Manchester Business School, University of Manchester. His key research theme at present is the phenomenon of projects in work organisati...