Abstract
In the field of Project Management (PM), there have been calls for the profession to move beyond technical functions to embrace the principles of sustainability and responsibility for well over a decade. This transformation requires a change of focus from tools and techniques to incorporate mindsets, knowledge and skills that empower project professionals to deliver environmental and social benefits. The new concepts of Sustainable PM and Responsible PM have been widely discussed and yet there is little agreement about what these terms mean in theory or in practice. The issue is particularly challenging for aspiring and early-stage practitioners who find it difficult to reconcile their personal sustainability values with project workplace requirements. Our research aims to identify gaps in expectations of knowledge, skills, and competence to integrate professional practice of RPM and SPM into the PM workforce by uncovering expectations from those in the early career stages of project management, including those studying and supporting aspiring practitioners. The research will take a sequential mixed methods approach of knowledge elicitation interviews with representative stakeholders from each group, the creation of an RPM expectation gap model from the interview findings and subsequent validation with interviews. The validated model will then be used to identify potential competence requirements and competence gaps that exist in current PM education to support development of new learning activities.