Holte Consulting provides both consulting services and courses in project management and is experiencing an increased interest in the field.  They also see that more and more companies are professionalising their project management.  Their consultants are currently managing several dozen projects across a variety of industries and combine operational project management experience with leading professional and pedagogical competence, to hold courses that “awaken” participants and promote lasting learning.  This is also an important and necessary step on the road toward certification; making the field of project management exciting and putting clients in a position to translate learning to initiatives, which in turn lead to better projects.

Holte Consulting AS offers a module-based programme, with 11 standard modules, including both basic project management training and specialised courses on important fields of knowledge within project management.  They combine various forms of interactive learning with classroom training. 


Are Strøm, CEO. Holte Consulting

So, what does Holte Consulting think about their new certification?  We asked Managing Director, Are Strøm, a few questions:

What does this certification mean for Holte Consulting?
It will be integral to our future solutions for project manager training, where lifelong learning is central, and we attend to the developmental needs of every individual participant in a completely new way, through our development programme.  It will also contribute to satisfying our clients, who are increasingly looking for a programme that can lead to IPMA certification.

How do you think the public and private sectors view a training programme that is evaluated and followed up by a third party?
We have already received positive feedback on the quality control aspect, not to mention the internal marketing effect on our client’s participants.

What will this certification mean for potential course participants?
Firstly, it will increase recognition of every single participant, both in Norway and abroad.  Secondly, it will open the door to certification and personal development through IPMA’s certification programme.



How do you see the field developing in the future?
Even though there will be a significant development of methodology for planning and uncertainty management, we see that organisations with a certain level of project maturity are now interested in integrating personal development of managerial qualities and industry-specific competence with project-specific competence.  This results in a need for a threefold certification, where PMI’s PMP certification can form the foundation, as a competence base for project management, with additional certifications in Test Management, SCRUM and ITIL for IT project managers, and courses aimed at planning and employing specific contract models for construction.  IPMA’s certification puts it all together and focuses on individual development, both professionally and personally.

Any special hopes for the future?
Reuse of experience is key for increasing the profitability of projects, but it is also complicated, since all projects are different.  We are currently developing the next generation of systems for project planning and uncertainty management, based on experience from our network of organisations.  There are a lot of exciting things happening in this field and I hope we will see functional solutions that reduce the number of project mistakes, through the reuse of experience, internally in companies as well as across industries.

Look for this stamp of quality:


 

Only courses or programmes with this stamp are certified using IPMA’s international requirements for project management training.

FACTS

• IPMA – International Project Management Association is an umbrella organisation for national associations in nearly 50 countries, representing over 140 000 members.  See www.ipma.ch
• IPMA 4LC is IPMA’s four level certification programme for project management, accredited according to ISO 9000.
• The programme is unique in that it tests project managers’ competence – in other words their knowledge and experience, and their ability to put them into practice.  As of 2008, 89 100 project managers have been certified worldwide.
• REP – Registration of Education Programmes – is IPMA’s scheme for evaluating the degree to which a training programme satisfies IPMA’s certification requirements.
• NFP – Norwegian Project Management Association.  The association consists of a central board and local boards in the largest Norwegian cities, and has about 600 personal members and 40 company members. See www.prosjektledelse.org
• Quality: The set of characteristics of an entity that give that entity the ability to satisfy expressed and implicit needs. (ISO 9000).
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Article reprinted with permission from NFP – The Norwegian Project Management Association.