This paper examines the relationship between corporate strategy and project management, arguing that while project management is an operational tactic rather than a strategy in itself, it serves as a critical enabler of strategic execution. Drawing on Michael Porter's concept of competitive differentiation, Kaplan and Norton's Balanced Scorecard (BSC), and Duke University's classification of strategic frameworks into integrative, customer, and competitor categories, the paper demonstrates how effective project management intersects with all four BSC dimensions. It also evaluates which strategic framework best supports a project management culture, concluding that the BSC's multidimensional approach — encompassing human capital, information, and organizational culture — is most conducive to aligning daily project activities with long-run strategic goals.
Considered the "father of the modern strategy field" (Harvard Business School, Faculty and Research, n.d., p. 1), Professor Michael Porter contends that over the past several decades, amid globalization, intense competition, dynamic markets, and changing technologies, "management tools have taken the place of strategy" (Porter, November–December 1996, p. 1). Much like productivity enhancement tools, total quality management, benchmarking, and change management platforms, project management is a tactic designed to positively impact operational effectiveness — but it is not to be confused with competitive strategy.
"The essence of strategy is in the activities — choosing to perform activities differently or to perform different activities than rivals... to deliver a new mix of value" (Porter, November–December 1996, p. 6). These unique or differentiated competencies provide the cornerstones of a strategic framework "defining a company's positioning, making trade-offs, and forging fit among activities" (Porter, November–December 1996, p. 19), driving long-run profitability.
As strategy is built on differentiated, value-added propositions, project management provides the functionality and process needed to facilitate maximum levels of operational effectiveness. Succinctly, project management as a tactic or tool augments strategic value through productivity and efficiency gains, concomitant with lower operating costs and higher gross margins. A firm's core competencies — which define its competitive advantage — are the activities, projects, and efforts conducted by management and employees.
"Project management, then, is the application of knowledge, skills, and techniques to execute projects effectively and efficiently. It is a strategic competency for organizations, enabling them to tie project results to business goals — and thus, better compete in their markets" (Project Management Institute, n.d., p. 1).
It is the concatenation of strategy and operational effectiveness through project management that provides cohesiveness to a firm's organizational blueprint. Among the many strategic frameworks circulating in the global corporate environment, the Balanced Scorecard (BSC), originated and designed by Robert Kaplan and David Norton, is "used extensively in business and industry, government, and nonprofit organizations worldwide... to enable organizations to clarify their vision and strategy and translate them into action" (Balanced Scorecard Institute, n.d., p. 1).
At its core, the BSC was crafted to more effectively measure an organization's success in achieving its strategic goals, acknowledging that "financial measures are inadequate for guiding and evaluating the journey that information-age companies must make to create future value through investment in customers, suppliers, employees, processes, technology, and innovation" (Balanced Scorecard Institute, n.d., p. 1). The BSC acts to "align business activities to the vision and strategy of the organization, improve internal and external communications, and monitor organization performance against strategic goals" (Balanced Scorecard Institute, n.d., p. 1).
"PM intersects all four BSC functional benchmarks"
"Integrative, customer, and competitor strategy frameworks compared"
"BSC best supports flat, information-sharing PM culture"
Corporate strategy and project management may initially seem like bifurcated opposites — one dealing with broad themes of growth, vision, and strategy; the other dealing with internal processes and controls of day-to-day operations. Yet upon closer inspection, these two concepts are connected by the reality that strategy must be implemented — a task achieved by project managers throughout the value chain. Likewise, the human capital of those project managers must be accounted for in the creation of any strategy framework.
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