A Study of Competency Model for a Project Portfolio Manager: Triangulation Approach

Abstract

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Among various tools to track the implementation of changes and innovations, one of the top places is occupied by project portfolio management (PPM). With the enhancing importance of PPM, the attention to the person actively manages this process – a portfolio manager (PfM) – is increasing respectively. Organizations strive to have competent PfMs. Although the role is formally defined in professional standards, there is still a lack of description and ambiguity in needed PfM competencies. This research was aimed to offer the competency model of PfM by triangulating three sources: literature, job descriptions, and opinions of the professionals in the PPM area. The framework of the study was built according to the purpose and involved such methods as content analysis and corpus analysis. The research findings reflected the primary purpose: were analyzed corpora of competency-related textual information, each corpus was checked on the representativeness and used in topic modelling. The experts verified the international intersectoral competency model for PfM. The proposed competency model for PfM contains six competencies: business focus, diverse expertise, expedient communications, process stewardship, self-management, and transformational demeanour. Each element contains six to eight indicators divided into two levels – critical and desirable. Hence, the introduced competency model could be used to clarify PfM roles in the organisations and for the individual professional development of the PfMs.