Project management maturity: an assessment of project management capabilities among and between selected industries

Abstract

The project management community is actively demonstrating substantial interest in the development of viable methods to assess and improve project management maturity. This interest also underscores the important need to assess project management maturity among industries to provide many organizations a means to benchmark their maturity relative to others. This research provides a snapshot of the current level of project management maturity-among industries based on 42 detailed components of maturity. A survey of 126 organizations reveals the median level of project management maturity is level 2 out of 5 with respect to 36 of the 42 components analyzed. Additionally, this research compares project management maturity between four major industries: professional, scientific and technical services; information; finance and insurance; and manufacturing. We conclude that with few exceptions, there is not a significant difference in project management maturity between industries. These results establish a baseline to support organizational assessments of project management maturity at a component level of analysis. Additionally, these results will support future longitudinal research to monitor the evolution of project management maturity.