Establishing a management by projects approach for service delivery

Abstract

Increasingly public institutions are making use of project management to implement service delivery programmes. Through the delivery of various non-formal certificate courses in Project Management at various public institutions, at local, provincial and national levels, it became evident that public managers to a considerable degree, fail to infuse project management as part of the functional operations, processes and structure of the institution. Furthermore, there is an apparent lack of understanding on how to utilise project management on an ongoing basis for the operationalisation of institutional strategies and objectives. This article proposes a process to address these two issues. The main recommendation is that senior management should establish a Management by Projects approach whereby all functional activities for service delivery are seen as projects. Guidelines will be proposed to implement this approach in public institutions.