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What are the key project management organisations?

Project management often refers to key professional bodies and the role they play within the professional arena of project management.

Project management often refers to key professional bodies and the role they play within the professional arena of project management, to develop ‘best practice’.

A good way to start understanding the role these bodies play is to look at the work of three major organisations:

The Association for Project Management (APM)

They describe themselves as:

The chartered body for the project profession.
(APM 2019)
The organisation has 29,000 individual members and more than 500 organisations. These members participate in the association’s Corporate Partnership Programme, making APM the largest professional body of its kind in Europe (APM 2019). You can find out more on the APM website.

The Project Management Institute (PMI)

The institute’s introduction to themselves starts by saying:
We’re the leading not-for-profit professional membership association for the project management profession.
(PMI 2019)
They deliver resources and valuable research to 2.9 million professionals working across the world aiming to enhance careers, improve organisational success and further mature the profession (PMI 2019). More details can be found on the PMI website.

AXELOS

This is a joint venture company created in 2013 by the Cabinet Office of the United Kingdom in combination with the business process outsourcing company, Capita, to manage, develop and grow the Global Best Practice portfolio.
AXELOS say of themselves:
… boast an already enviable track record and an unmatched portfolio of globally-recognized best practice qualification’s’ – this includes the project management approach known as Prince2.
(AXELOS 2019)
See the AXELOS website for more information.

Your task

Select one of the professional bodies we have introduced you to above (APM, PMI and AXELOS) and explore their website. You don’t need to spend more than about 20 minutes doing this.
Write a brief summary of what that organisation offers you, in terms of each aspect of the talent triangle.

References

Association for Project Management (2019) APM – the Chartered Body for the Project Profession [online] available from Web link [22 July 2019]

AXELOS (2019) About AXELOS [online] available from Web link [10 June 2019]

Project Management Institution (2019) Learn About PMI [online] available from Web link [22 July 2019]

© Coventry University. CC BY-NC 4.0
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