Creativity and Innovation in Project Management Training – An Empirical Enquiry into two German Middle-Sized Companies

Author(s):

Beatrix Palt(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2013

Network:

02. Vocational Education and Training (VETNET)

Format:

Paper

Session Information

02 SES 04 C, VET-Teacher Education and In-Company Training

Paper Session

Time:

2013-09-11

09:00-10:30

Room:

A-104

Chair:

Martin Mulder

Contribution

Adult education in Germany is changing for several reasons: Firstly, the European Union calls for education to strengthen creativity and innovation. Secondly, companies want project managers who are able to face the challenges of complex, creative and innovative projects. Hence, they must be prepared to take the responsibility for successfully leading a project team.

The current scientific discourse criticises that project management trainings do not consider the role of personality (Steeger 2011a). Although there is an existing DIN standard that defines a project as a creative and innovative process, there is a lack of research. Scientific research is geared towards project managers who have a strong personality and recommends trainings. (Kolodny 1981)But training measures that fulfill the requirements have not been developed yet. (Adcic 2006) Nonetheless, personality development is regarded as an important part of human resources development in pedagogics (Tippelt/von Hippel 2011). But project management and project management training are predominantly discussed in the context of business administration.

In this regard, current concepts of project management training seem to be insufficient. The analysis of current trainings (Palt 2012) and my empirical study show that they mainly teach methods. In addition, specialised trainings aim at strengthening social skills. Creativity and innovative skills have been identified as a part of the personality (Roth 2003). My empirical findings deny, however, that these skills can be acquired through the current type of education.

It is, therefore, useful to empirically analyse the current concepts of project management training from the perspective of neurobiological personality research (Roth 2003). Relevant questions in the empirical enquiry are: How is project management taught? Which kind of training do we need to strengthen personality development? Which role do creativity and innovative skills play? Which role might experiential learning and informal learning play? The assumption is that we need a new configuration of project management training involving experiential learning to facilitate creativity and innovative education. (Göhlich/Wulf 2007)

These research questions will be answered on the basis of an empirical case study on further education courses for project managers in two different companies. In these companies, workshops were conducted on executive level concerning the performance of their project managers, the effects of current project management training and the requirements with regard to future concepts. Six workshops were monitored and additionally 32 interviews with the management circle and project managers were conducted in two middle-sized companies based in Germany in 2011. The workshops and interviews took place in the course of projects in both companies aimed at improving the performance of their project managers.

The data were analysed by reference to qualitative methods. In the presentation, these results will be presented and theoretically discussed on the basis of three assumptions of neurobiological personality research (Roth 2003) that seem to confirm the empirical findings. The role of personality will be discussed with special focus on creativity and innovative skills. The discussion will reveal the limitations of a neurobiological perspective on that topic.

Method

To answer the research question, it was necessary to apply qualitative investigation and analysis procedures. My empirical enquiry is based on qualitative interviews that gave an insight into the connection between the role of the personality and the development of creative and innovative trainings that foster creative competencies and innovative skills. To this end, I developed an interview guide and asked open-ended questions. The sample consists of managing directors, heads of department and project managers from the two companies under scrutiny. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and finally paraphrased following the summarising qualitative content analysis of Mayring . The data have been reduced so that the results retain the essence. The data analysis aims to provide a basis for further (more specific) analyses, and to provide and to test hypotheses on the data.

Expected Outcomes

The results of the study provide the possibility to develop a concept of project management training that focuses on experiential learning (e.g. Göhlich et al. 2009) and on informal learning (e.g. Overwien 2007; Molzberger 2008) in organisations, referring to the ideas of neurobiological personality research results. It shows that it might be fruitful to include these perspectives into the practices of further education and into the theoretical and conceptual perspectives on further education in project management. Nevertheless, the discussion will reveal the limitations of a neurobiological perspective on that topic, too. This will be outlined within the presentation. Hence, the discussion of the empirical findings shows that there is a need of further theoretical and applied research. Further research for example could broaden the focus from neurobiology to scientific anthropology. Thus, studies could take into account research on the five-stage skill model “from novice to expert” to strengthen the theoretically based legitimation of new project management training concepts. Further research is needed with regard to experiential and informal learning in the field of continuing vocational training to improve the development of training concepts that take into account creativity and innovative skills.

References

Adžić, M., (2006), Matrixstrukturen in multinationalen Unternehmen. Anwendungsfelder, Informationsfluss und Erfolgsfaktoren. Wiesbaden. Göhlich, M./Wulf, C./Zirfas, J. (Hrsg.) (2007), Pädagogische Theorien des Lernens, Weinheim und Basel. Göhlich, M./Weber, S. M./Wolff, S. (Hrsg.) (2009), Organisation und Erfahrung, Beiträge der AG Organisationspädagogik, Wiesbaden. Kolodny, H. F. (1988), Führung in der Matrix, in: Reber, G./Stehl, F., (Hrsg.), Matrix-Organisation. Klassische Beiträge zu mehrdimensionalen Organisationsstrukturen, Stuttgart. Molzberger, G. (2008), Rahmungen informellen Lernens: Zur Erschließung neuer Lern- und Weiterbildungsperspektiven. Dissertation, Wiesbaden. Overwien, B. (2007), Informelles Lernen, in: Göhlich/Wulf/Zirfas (Hrsg.) (2007), S. 119-127. Palt, B. (2012) Das Konzept des nicht-formalen lebenslangen Lernens. Die Ausbildung von Projektleitungen aus Sicht der Persönlichkeitsforschung, in: St. Petersburg Academy of In-Service Pedagogical Education, SPb APPO (Hrsg.), Current Trends in the Concepts and Strategies of Lifelong Learning, St. Petersburg, S. 131-134. Ebda. (2013), Führung in der Matrix, in: Weber, S.M./Göhlich, M., Oragnisation und Partizipation, Wiesbaden, S. 229-237. Roth, G. (2003), Fühlen, Denken, Handeln. Wie das Gehirn unser Verhalten steuert (neue, vollst. überarb. Aufl.), Frankfurt.

Author Information

Beatrix Palt (presenting / submitting)

FOM Hochschule für Oekonomie & Management

Hamburg

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