Project Business Foundation

The way we do projects in the 21st century is undergoing a mega-trend from internal, cross-functional Project Management to cross-corporate Project Business.

This is one of the most significant game changers for today’s projects and their managers. In Project Business, projects are no longer just done to support a business. They are the business.

What do players expect?

• Customers: Reliability, agility, and easy access to external know-how. 
• Contractors: A business model and a source of income.

Project Business occurs when two or more organizations come together as customers and contractors for the project. It is not new, but its relevance is rising. Project Business Management brings new opportunities and challenges into project management:

However, organizations and individuals in this field are left alone by education providers, professional associations, literature, academia, and more. Project managers reported that most are insufficiently prepared to manage projects as businesses.

Responding to this support gap, the Project Business Foundation provides a not-for-profit platform for research, discussion, tools, and templates as active help. We will add further functionality in the coming weeks to advance the project business management profession. Stay tuned and come back from time to time.

The management of Project Business adds layers of complexity and risk to project management:

• The commercial layer
• The contractual layer
• The legal layer

The Project Business Foundation, as a non-profit think tank, offers:

Project Customers

Project customers tap into the assets of contractors and turn them into resources for their projects.

They expect reliable performance and agility across the network of contractors and want to be treated as VIP customers.  

Project Contractors

Running projects as profit centers, contractors bring their assets to projects in order to supply valuable goods and services to customers against payment.

The payments they receive matter: Projects are their business and often the only income these contractors have.

Prime Contractors

Prime contractors serve customers as contractors, while they are customers of their subcontractors on whom they have to rely upon.

Project Business is high-risk business for all players, however, prime contractors have the highest risk exposure of all.

Training Providers & Consultancies

There is a dramatic shortage of educated and experienced consultancies and training providers in Project Business Management.

The Project Business Foundation helps these companies expand into this field. 

Project Freelancers

The Gig economy, which is driven by fast-changing clusters of freelancers bringing agility and new competencies to organizations, is the most dynamic form of Project Business Management.

The dependency of Project Business on freelancers is growing. The Project Business Foundations increases the fitness of professionals for this job.

Banks & Insurance Companies

Undertaking Project Business involves considerable risk for all parties concerned.

This opens up an opportunity for banks and insurance companies to step in with a strong helping hand, nurturing trust and offering protection against potential business setbacks.

Find Practical Advice

Project Business often comes with difficult situations, in which decisions can have detrimental effects on the project and the own organizations.

The Project Business Foundation is your capable partner for 3rd-party advice based on decades of experience and real-life research.

Find Training and Consulting Providers

The number of capable education and consulting providers in Project Business Management is small.

Ask the Project Business Foundation for contacts that help improve your Project Business.   

Develop Business Acumen and Mindset

A core pre-requisite for successful work as a project contractor or customer is business acumen and a mindset of project managers that raises them beyond the technical and organizational aspect and include commercial and legal facts that matter for the project.

The Project Business Foundation helps develop that. 

Get Certified as a Practitioner or Expert

A core pre-requisite for successful work as a project contractor or customer is business acumen and a mindset of project managers that raises them beyond the technical and organizational aspect and include commercial and legal facts that matter for the project.

The Project Business Foundation helps develop that. 

Page: Project Business Foundation

Follow the page, hit the bell symbol for “All new posts” and be among the first to receive news about the Project Business Foundation.

Group: I Manage Project Business

Join the group and contribute to discussions by adding posts and commenting to posts of others.

In 2019, Oliver F. Lehmann was a co-founder and President of the Project Business Foundation, a professional association established under Swiss law. Under this name, the association existed until June 2022.

In July 2022, Oliver F. Lehmann readjusted the Project Business Foundation as a think tank with a pure focus on not-for-profit work, such as 

• Research 
• Provision of practical resources (tools, templates, etc.)
• Offering a platform for discussion among experts and practitioners
• Advancing the art of managing project business

Some functionality is already available, but more is in work.

Oliver F. Lehmann is a trainer from Munich, Germany. Click below to see his profile:

Web profile  –  Linkedin profile  –  Downloadable PDF profile

ISBN 9780367522070
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1201/9781315277387
Published 2018, 2020 by Auerbach Publications
362 Pages 50 B/W Illustrations

Description: Roughly half of all project managers lead customer projects as profit centers on contractor side with two big objectives: making the customer happy and bringing money home. 

Customer projects are a high-risk business on both sides, customers and contractors, but the dynamics of this business have so far been mostly ignored in literature. The book fills this gap. 

The book helps project managers better understand the dynamics of customer projects under contract from business development through handover and find solutions for common problems. A central aspect is international contract laws, an often underestimated factor in projects.

Order:

• At the publishers
• At amazon.com

Educators:

• Request inspection copy