assessment tool (Du Plessis and Hoole, 2006b) to determine an organisation’s cultural affinity with project management, with the aim to establish a more project-centric organisational culture and deliver more successful projects within projectised organisations. Morrison, Brown and Smit (2006) developed a theoretical model to address the same issue, which places project management at the centre of projectised organisations. The researcher intends to study the impact that organisational culture has on project management, to supplement the works of Morrison, Brown and Smit (2006) and Du Plessis and Hoole (2006a; 2006b) inter alia, and propose ways in which to harmonise the hypothesised critical relationship between organisational culture and project management, not only within the researcher’s environment, but also the broader project management community as a whole.
According to Suda (2007), “understanding the culture of your organisation is critical to running successful projects”. The researcher will attest that this is true, however, project success, as defined by an organisation’s cultural style, is not necessarily congruent with the gospels of internationally recognised project management standards (PMI, 2013; Axelos, 2017). The observed consequences of this are multiple:
The role of a project manager is diminished, in that it becomes an administrative, instead of a leading, function. Morale is negatively affected (Banister-Hazama & Hazama, 2014), especially amongst formally trained and more experienced project managers. Less experienced project managers are taught that organisational culture is the main driving force behind project success, neglecting project management principles (PMI, 2013:35; Axelos, 2017:24-25), leading to project managers managing the organisational process, instead of the project. Finally, the role of the PMO and programme managers becomes ambiguous within the organisation (PMI, 201
