NICHOLAS G. HALL

NICHOLAS G. HALL

NICHOLAS G. HALL

INFORMS President and Professor, Fisher College of Business, Ohio State University

Research and Teaching Opportunities in Project Management
One-quarter of the world’s economic activity, with an annual value of $18 trillion, is organized using the business process of project management. This process has exhibited dramatic growth in business interest in recent years, with a more than 1000% increase in Project Management Institute membership since 1996. Contributing to this growth are new applications, for example IT implementations, research and development, software development, corporate change management, and new product and service development. However, the very different characteristics of modern projects present new challenges. The partial resolution of these challenges by industry over the last 15 years presents numerous interesting opportunities for academic researchers. These research opportunities make use of a remarkably broad range of methodologies, including robust optimization, cooperative and non-cooperative game theory, predictive analytics, and behavioral modeling. Furthermore, the $4.5 trillion that is annually at risk from a shortage of skilled project managers, and the 15.7 million new jobs in project management expected by 2020, provide great opportunities for contributions to project management education. These educational opportunities include the integration of case studies, analytics challenges, online simulations, in-class games, self-assessment exercises, videos, and guest speaker presentations, which form an appealing course for both business and engineering schools.