Project management qualifications for the global economy

Current and aspiring project managers will soon be able to gain unit standards and qualifications in project management.

NZQA Qualifications Development Facilitator Emmet McElhatton says, "The unit standards and qualifications were developed to meet a need for qualifications that recognised generic project management skills in many work places."

The project management development advisory group worked with a number of Industry Training Organisations (ITOs), training providers, and industry representatives and international consulting firms to ensure the new National Certificate and National Diploma gelled with Australian practice and the international standards that are expected of project management. Existing Australian units of competency in project management were used to form the basis of the unit standards.

Carl Ammon, General Manager of NZITO and a member of the advisory group, says, "The project management standards and qualifications add an important set of business capabilities to the National Qualifications Framework (NQF) menu. Many companies use project management skills at a range of levels, from the basics for staff involved in project teams through to professional practitioners running major projects."

The main ITOs that were interested in the development of the new standards were those in infrastructure, energy supply and the large scale manufacturing such as the dairy industry.

The level 4 standards and Certificate are aimed at project team members working under direction of a project manager and working with other project team members. The level 5 standards and Diploma recognise the specialist functions of a project manager.

The National Certificate in Project Management (level 4) requires 70 credits in all - 55 compulsory credits at Level 4 from domains Project Management and Interpersonal Communication, with the balance of credits at level 4 or above from anywhere on the NQF. The National Diploma in Project Management (level 5) requires 120 credits in all - 76 compulsory credits at levels 4 and 5 from domain Project Management, with the balance of credits at level 4 or above, of which a minimum of 20 credits must be at level 5 or above, coming from anywhere on the NQF.

The construction industry is one that might benefit from new project management qualifications.

Emmet says the qualifications include electives where the project manager or team member can demonstrate competencies across a range of industry, private sector, public sector, and community contexts. The qualifications are expected to be popular with existing project managers or team members, who, while experienced and qualified in their particular field, may lack formal project management credentials.

Carl Ammon says, " In a global economy, companies need project skills to manage growth and development on a scale that has an impact - New Zealand is quite under developed in this area because of our size but these new qualifications will help upgrade our national skills base.

"Several international project consulting firms are planning to use these standards and qualifications in training so it is expected the new qualifications will become well established over time."

To view the requirements see:
http://www.nzqa.govt.nz/framework/explore and search Domain - Project Management.