In an increasingly complex world, organizing by projects seems to be a phenomenon of growing importance. Project management as a way of thinking and organizing is extended beyond the usual applications; beside contracted projects there are internal projects, beside industrial projects there are administrative projects and service projects. An expanding scope of the project concept thus indicates an expansion of the issues or assignments organized as projects.

In this new era of organizing by projects, the traditional theories of Project Management (i.e. theories on project planning and control) have several shortcomings. One important shortcoming is that organizational dynamics in project organizations often are overlooked, and so are the inherent uncertainty in any project endeavor, the social construction aspects of project work and the project embeddedness in its environment, context and stakeholders. By investigating different types of projects, we try to develop a sociology of temporary organizations overcoming these shortcomings and adding portfolio, general management and strategy issues to the body of knowledge.

Recently we have also started a new website http://www.project-as-practice.org where new ideas on how to study project as practice will be posted. Directions for further research in the area will also find a place there.

For a more detailed account of people and research on projects at USBE, please follow the links below.

Active researchers:

• Annika Andersson, PhD-student
• Thomas Biedenbach, PhD-student
  
• Tomas Blomquist, PhD, Associate professor
  
• Thommie Burström, PhD, Assistant professor
  
• Markus Hällgren, PhD, Associate professor
  
• Mattias Jacobsson, PhD-student
  
• Henrik Linderoth, PhD, Assistant professor
  
• Anneli Linde, PhD-student
  
• Ralf Müller, DBA, Associate professor
  
• Christopher Nicol, PhD-student
  
• Andreas Nilsson, PhD, Assistant professor
  
• Tim L. Wilson, PhD, Professor
  

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Research projects:

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Activities:

8:23
Every Tuesday at 8:23 the researchers interested in research on temporary organising and projects at USBE meet to discuss recent developments in our reseach. The purpose of the meetings are to make relevant research and to have fun while doing it.

Umeå Winter Workshops on Projects and Temporary Organizations
Annually a project research workshop is arranged in the snowy darkness of the north. The workshop focus on discussions on present research followed by typical winter activities of the northern Sweden, in the evenings. The Winter Workshops has been held in Bjurholm (2001), Hällnäs (2002), Olofsfors (2003), Umeå (2004), Umeå/Bjurholm (2006), Holmsund (2007), Umeå (2008), Umeå/Bjurholm (2009), Umeå (2010).

IRNOP - International Research Network on Organizing by Projects
IRNOP was founded in 1993 as a loosely coupled network of researchers mainly in Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Norway and Sweden. Since then, friends in Australia, Canada, Fiji Island, Japan, Netherlands, United Kingdom and USA joined us. Most associates are academic researchers working on schools of business, economics and engineering. 

IRNOP is an acronym for the International Research Network on Organizing by Projects. IRNOP was initiated in 1993 by the former Umeå professor, Rolf A. Lundin. The intention was to support and enhance efforts aiming at the development of a theory on temporary organizations. We consider the "mainstream" Project Management approach, as it is expressed in textbooks and PMI's PMBOK, to be highly advanced in prescribing how projects should be organized. But the theoretical models for planning and control do not provide accurate descriptions of what actually happens in project organizations. From the beginning, IRNOP therefore set out to develop theories on what we called "temporary organizations", theories departing from concepts such as leadership, motivation, learning, renewal and quality of work life. In order to support this a research conference is held biannually. 

For further information on IRNOP, please visit: www.irnop.org

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