Student perceptions of project management: Postgraduate education in an Australian university

There is a mounting literature advocating the need to educate and train project management professionals in order to meet the evolving complexities in projects. It is imperative, therefore, to continually examine the extent to which PM education is effective in equipping students with the requisite knowledge and skills in preparation to enter the PM workforce. This study adopts a case study approach to examine perceptions of postgraduate students about their completed graduate diploma in PM which is offered at an Australian university. The findings of the study revealed that students are generally satisfied with their learning experience in the selected course. The findings suggest that the course learning outcome that has mostly been attained by graduates is the ability to apply soft skills in managing projects and activities. Three areas for improvement were identified for further improvement: firstly, designing more assessment tasks with a primary focus on practical and technical aspects; secondly, selecting teaching staff who have a mixture of academic and industry experience; and finally inviting more industry guest lectures to share their real-world PM experience. The study contributes to the existing literature about good practices in PM in tertiary education.