Sustainability in Project Management Practice

Abstract

The study focused on the application of sustainability in project management, with reference to attendant difficulties experienced, which affect the goal of achieving sustainability outcomes in project management. As such the study explored the nature and occurrence of challenges to the integration of sustainability principles with PM practice. A review of purposively sampled literature was complemented with fieldwork, which involved an online questionnaire with eighty-nine participants, to collect qualitative data, using South Africa as context. The major limitation was the purposive use of professional project managers as a sample population. The findings reveal that project managers experience significant challenges when implementing sustainability in their practice. While confirming deductions from the literature review, findings suggest that the most significant challenge may be the lack of information among participants and other stakeholders. One major implication is that other identified difficulties may be traceable to the same lack of knowledge in the subject area. Identified consequences include delayed projects and complete abandonment of the sustainability principles in projects. The integration of sustainability principles with project management practice is a growing niche area of project management knowledge. The study contributes a unique exploration of nature and occurrence, and dynamics of attendant challenges, through a comparison of experience and perception. The comparison has highlighted the differences between the experience and perception of project managers, with reference to the application of sustainability principles.