拉爾夫·穆勒：軟技能是項目管理的核心

尉艷娟

人物簡介

他是《項目管理期刊》（Project Management Journal）主編，多家項目管理學術期刊的編委會成員。

他是工商管理博士，挪威商學院項目管理教授，悉尼科技大學兼職教授，中國復旦大學客座教授、大連理工大學“海天學者”，歐洲治理學院（European School of Governance）研究實驗室主任。

他出版學術論文200余篇，學術著作13部。他參與制定了“PMI項目集和項目組合管理標準”和“OPM3”等標準。他曾獲“2016 PMI 榮譽會員”“2015 PMI終身研究成就獎”“2012 IPMA研究獎”“2009《項目管理期刊》年度最佳論文”等殊榮。

他研究的領域包括項目管理、項目集管理、項目組合管理、項目治理、領導力、PMO、研究方法論。

他就是項目管理學術圈的頂尖學者之一——拉爾夫·穆勒（Ralf Müller）教授。

穆勒教授學者風范十足，卻是“半路出家”。加入學術圈之前，他曾是行業(yè)精英，為全球50多個國家及地區(qū)的公司和政府機構提供過咨詢服務。穆勒教授第一次做項目經理有點像“趕鴨子上架”，后來他發(fā)現做項目經理能夠支持的項目有限，遂決定轉戰(zhàn)學術圈，期許將項目管理的聲音傳遞給更多的人。

美國管理技術大學（UMT）的教務長戴維森·弗雷姆（Davidson Frame）曾這樣評價他：“他的研究提高了項目管理的學術水平。與眾不同的是，他能夠打破傳統的項目計劃、預算、風險等界限，從廣泛的、跨學科的角度來研究項目管理”。

觀點概覽

在中國，學習項目管理并取得專業(yè)認證的人越來越多，人們對項目管理的認知日趨成熟。穆勒教授建議，中國的項目管理從業(yè)者應更多地關注組織級項目管理。

穆勒教授曾做調查研究挑戰(zhàn)了已有的領導力理論。在他看來，在團隊成員頻繁變動的情況下，團隊還能表現出色是因為項目進展中及時將領導權授予項目特定時刻的最佳領導者。因此，他推崇“平衡領導力”。

全球化時代，也許我們會不自覺地偏愛自己的文化價值，但是，穆勒教授呼吁，項目管理從業(yè)者要有文化敏感性，退后一步審視全局，做判斷要基于事實而非情緒。

穆勒教授的研究表明，97%的項目都存在道德問題，如透明問題、關系問題、優(yōu)化問題。其中，在基于控制的項目治理環(huán)境中，透明問題尤為突出。成功的項目都是在基于信任的項目治理環(huán)境下開展的，因此，項目治理機構應該給予項目經理更多的信任。

穆勒教授指出，無論采取何種工具、方法或流程，項目最終還是由人來完成的，因此，我們要重視軟技能。10年前，穆勒和特納教授通過研究證明了軟技能的重要性。其中，領導力風格這一因素對項目成功的影響占比是9% ～ 43%，而每一項硬技能占比大概是7%。穆勒教授的近期研究結果顯示，治理心理（治理的人性方面）比項目治理本身對項目結果的影響更大。

Interview

Project Management Is an Accidental Choice

Q1： Why did you choose project management as your career Do you enjoy this profession

Ralf Müller： Well， I guess my "choice" is typical for many in the "accidental profession". I was working as a UNIX specialist in the department for major clients in a large worldwide IT company. One day our department manager returned from a meeting at Corporate Headquarters and said， "All people in this department are project managers from now on." We were hesitant to accept this in the beginning， but then decided to give it a try. Having led several projects of increasing value， I took over international and global projects. Later， during my time as worldwide Director of project management in this company， I travelled around the world to rescue troubled projects. I learned that my efforts could only help one project or project manager at a time， so I decided to change to academia to spread my word to many people simultaneously. I have never regretted being a project manager or switching to academia. Both are exciting and challenging roles.

Q2： As a professor， editor-in-chief， editorial board member for a number of academic journals， contributor to some PMI standards， book author， researcher， etc.， you have a busy schedule. Would you please share your secrets of time management

Ralf Müller： I do not know if there is some secret in what I do. As an academic， my schedule is first and foremost determined by the dates when I have to teach at universities. The gaps between these dates I fill with research projects， conferences， PhD supervision etc. When it comes to priorities， I try to balance the achievement of short-term deadlines with work on activities with long-term deadlines. Prioritization typically follows the old 2x2 matrix of urgent （high or low） versus important （high or low）， where I prioritize high/high items but from both short-term and long-term perspectives.

Q3： Youve been awarded PMI Research Achievement Award and IPMA Research Award. What do the awards mean to you

Ralf Müller： Obviously it shows that my studies are seen as relevant and that the results are recognized as credible. It also tells me that my research topics are not only of academic interest， as the awards are primarily given by practitioner organizations. Besides the awards for specific studies， I especially value the lifetime research award. It gives a feeling that most of what I do is valued， not only one particular study.

China Needs to Focus More on OPM

Q4： Project management is thriving in China. As a visiting professor of Fudan University and Dalian University of Technology， do you think so

Ralf Müller： Certainly. When I taught in the BI-Fudan Executive MBA program in Shanghai， I saw more and more students with a professional certification or a good education in project management. When I did research in China， together with the teams from Dalian University of Technology or others， I saw the same effect. People now talk more proficiently about their projects and their management. Still I think the sheer magnitude and number of projects that are going on in China requires many more people with a solid education or professional certification in project management. While the understanding of project management is thriving in China， I think there is a need to expand the view to organizational project management. As I said， people are getting better in understanding projects and their management， but I do not see growth in the understanding of how projects are embedded in the organization and how to adjust the organization for efficient project delivery. While some of the students I see know what portfolio management is， other very important aspects of good organization-wide project management are often unknown， including themes like benefits realization management， portfolio optimization， governance of projects， governmentality and organization-wide PMOs.

Performant Teams Shift Leadership Authority

Q5： Youve initiated a survey on leadership in projects to understand the interaction between the leadership by the project manager and the possible leadership by team members in projects. What does the survey result show

Ralf Müller： The study， of which this survey was one of many ways to collect data， gave a number of new insights and proved some of the existing leadership theories as inappropriate for project settings. Existing theories， such as the Tuckman model of form， storm， norm and perform， or the Hersey & Blanchard Theory that leadership styles need to be adjusted to team members experience in working together， do assume that teams become performant after a period of time working together， and that if a new team member joins， the whole team has to go through the entire development cycle again in order to become performant again. If this was true， most of the project teams would never become performant. Team members frequently change in projects. We showed that these teams are performant anyway. They do it by shifting leadership authority to the best leader at any point in time in the project. Sometimes leadership emerges from within the team （which is known as shared and distributed leadership）， or the leadership comes from the project manager （which is known as vertical leadership）， or in other cases the project manager appoints a leader from within the team and let him/ her lead the project temporarily under the project managers supervision （which is known as horizontal leadership）. The balancing of these three leadership approaches over the duration of the project is named "balanced leadership". In other words， depending on the situation of the project， the project manager decides to either let the team lead itself， or appoint a leader from the team， or lead himself/herself. Through that the best possible leader is in charge at any time and in any situation in the project. This contributes to the best possible performance at any time in the project.

Q6： In the era of globalization and digitalization， which leadership styles would you recommend Balanced leadership

Ralf Müller： Leadership is situation dependent. Balanced leadership is an observed reality in projects. Globalization and digitalization add to the need for cultural understanding and sensitivity in virtual interaction. So project mangers and teams need to become more sensitive to the differences in cultural value systems to better understand each other in terms of behaviors and thinking patterns. That includes the ability to question whether their own value system is the best in a given situation. As we are all ethnocentric and inclined to prefer our own cultural value system over that of others， globalization can only work if we go back a step to overview the situation and then decide which values are most appropriate in a given situation or project predominantly based on facts and not on emotions.

Trust Is Characteristic of Successful Projects

Q7： Youve written papers on Ethics and Governance in Temporary Organizations， so in your opinion， what should we pay special attention to in leading temporary organizations

Ralf Müller： The studies on ethics in projects showed that 97% of all projects suffer from at least one of the top three ethical issues： transparency issues， relationship issues， or optimization issues. It also showed that transparency issues（i.e. the project manager not reporting the real status of the project） are dominant in control-based governance settings. However， successful projects are typically in trust-based governance settings. So steering committees （as project governance institutions） should give more trust to their project managers. Projects that are launched with a steering committee that trusts the project manager are typically quite successful. Projects launched with a steering committee that predominantly controls the project manager are heading towards a vicious downward circle of hiding mistakes and performance issues， which lead to more control， which leads to even lesser transparency etc. These projects can never get to a level of trust that is characteristic of successful projects.

Organizations with a PMO Perform Better

Q8： What are the principles of building efficient and highperformance PMOs

Ralf Müller： Flexibility. PMOs are responsible for improving organization-specific issues. Every organization is different and so are their issues to be solved. Moreover， after PMOs have solved an issue， their mandate changes to solving another issue. This new mandate might require different skills and different people in the PMO. So PMOs change constantly. Our studies show that PMOs are quite successful in solving the issues they are tasked with and then take on very different issues after that. This requires different skills and different people over time. This change in people is often misunderstood as a reaction to poor performance of the PMO. This is wrong （but seen quite often）， and leads to false conclusions， such that most PMOs will be closed after two or three years. They will not be closed， but their mandate changes. And this is not because of poor performance， but because they performed so well that the issue they were supposed to solve is now solved. On average， PMOs are good in what they are doing. This is not only shown by academic studies but also in studies by the big consulting firms. Organizations with a PMO have significantly fewer projects with cost or time overruns.