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The challenges and best practices in remote project management have become increasingly relevant due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Remote project managers face issues like information redundancy, language barriers, slow trust development, lack of face-to-face communication, and reliance on technology. Best practices include knowledge sharing, trust building, communication protocols, cultural awareness, and regular meetings to address these challenges.
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To my supervisor Ruben Filipe de Sousa Pereira and my Co-supervisor Isaías Scalabrin Bianchi: I am grateful for your support and dedication throughout this challenging period. To my parents Norma and José Luiz ( in memorian ), for all their love, courage, support and example. I am here, right now, because you are my base. Love you! To my Family: thanks for all the support you give me, always! Thanks to all dear friends who helped me on this path. And finally, my most important and sincere thanks. To my husband Marcelo and my son Pedro. What to say? Pedro, you are the reason for all this. Without you, I wouldn't be writing these lines. Marcelo, my love, without you by my side I wouldn't be able to. Thanks for the unconditional encouragement every day. Thank you for the English reviews, thank you for your patience, for your love and for having followed by my side on this beautiful adventure!
Com o avanço da tecnologia, tal como a internet e os meios de comunicação o mundo ficou muito mais conectado. As pessoas passaram a encurtar a distancia fisica através de facilidades tecnologicas. Esse avanço não afetou apenas o lado social da humanidade, mas abriu portas para que as organizações também pudessem usufruir desses beneficios. As pessoas foram capacitadas e incentivadas a trabalhar de casa. As empresas viram uma oportunidade de reduzir custos e obter os mais qualificados profissionais independente de sua posição geografica. Desta forma, a gestão de projetos com equipas remotas passou a ter um relevante lugar dentro das organizações. Diante da situação pandêmica que o mundo está a ultrapassar, trabalhar remotamente deixou de ser opção e passou a ser a forma de seguirmos em frente. Existem incontaveis estudos na comunidade cientifica a dissertar sobre gestao de projetos, seus riscos, desafios, melhores praticas, ferramentas e outros assuntos pertinentes. Mas somente um grupo pequeno e restrito de estudos estão diretamente relacionados com a gestão de projetos remota e equipas remotas. Para preencher essa lacuna, esse estudo visa identificar os principais desafios da gestão de projetos remota, bem como as práticas para mitiga-los. Para avaliar e demonstrar os resultados, 30 entrevistas qualitativas e 69 questionarios foram aplicados com gestores de projetos que estão desenvolvendo suas atividades de modo remoto 100% do tempo após o inicio da pandemia Covid-19. No final, pode-se ver uma lista de 14 desafios e 13 boas praticas que foram adotadas para manter seus projetos em dia e apoiar suas equipas nesse momento tão dificil. O autor conclui que foi um momento disruptivo tanto para os trabalhadores quanto para as empresas. Aumento da qualidade de vida e horarios mais flexiveis foram vistos como um grande beneficio. Em contra-partida, foram necessarias muito mais horas de dedicacao ao trabalho para que fosse possivel manter a produtividade dos projetos.
Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................................................... I Resumo ........................................................................................................................................................... III Abstract ............................................................................................................................................................ V Table Index ...................................................................................................................................................... IX Figure Index ..................................................................................................................................................... XI
BP - Best Practice CH - Challenge DSR - Design Science Research MLR - Multivocal Literature Review PM - Project Management PMBok - Project Management Boy of Knowledge PMI - Project Management Institute RPM - Remote Project Management RQ - Research Question RT - Remote Teams RW - Remote Work SLR - Systematic Literature Review
The importance and professionalization of PM had already been noticed in the beginning of the 60´s, but it became popular after the creation of Project Management Institute (PMI), founded in 1969. This organization is dedicated to study which are the practices proposed by the project managers that ultimately have success on their projects. In 2020, because of the Covid-19 pandemic, the world dramatically changed and it became necessary to rethink the way we work, socialize and communicate (Li et al., 2020). Working from home, first seen by companies as an opportunity to reduce projects costs (Hertel et al., 2005), to search for the best qualified workers regardless of their location (C. M. Beise, 2004), or to be more agile (Lebedieva et al., 2011), it has now become the “new normal” for all, and the only way to move on (Dixit et al., 2020). According to the Instituto Nacional de Estatística (INE) of Portugal whose published a survey ( Trabalho a partir de casa – Módulo ad hoc do Inquérito ao Emprego Trabalho a partir de casa devido à pandemia abrangeu um milhão de pessoas , 2020), more than one million people, only in Portugal, started working from home in the second quarter of 2020. Out of these, 91.2% of workers said that the main reason was due to the Covid-19 Pandemic. This movement happened not only in Portugal but around the world. A survey published by Global Workplace Analytics, in May 2020, with about 3.000 responses, shows that 88% workers started to work from home on a regular basis during the pandemic. Only 31% of this studied group, were working at home on a regular basis before. In figure 1, It is possible to see the evaluation of remote work (RW) during the pandemic period. Figure 1 - Work from Home During Pandemic. Source: Global work-from- home Experience Survey,
Currently, almost every organization have to rely on RT to execute their projects, and the difficult to manage these remote projects have increased (George et al., 2020). The most traditional organizations had to change their mindset and start believing that they could be productive and efficient without having their employees in the same place as their leaders. Remote Project Managers face a variety of challenges, especially those who have never managed a remote team (Seerat et al., 2013). On the other hand, traditional Project Managers who work at the same physical location as the team, dispose of structured and tested practices such as the Management Body of Knowledge (PMI, 2017). Remote Project Managers need to take responsibility not only for the normal PM issues and activities (such as complex, usually uncertain, interdependent tasks) but also for the cultural differences among team members and geographic distance. Since they have to combine all of these items (Casey & Richardson, 2006a), one can assume that the management of remote projects is more complex than in the traditional way. Despite the fact that most of the guidelines that support the traditional project managers should support the remote project managers, new practices and/or additional project manager skills could also be used and applied as a way to be more adherent in order to achieve project success in a remote situation. Based on the previous paragraphs, this research aims to elicit the main RPM challenges as well as the practices to mitigate such challenges. The goal was then translated into two research questions listed below: RQ1 – Which are the main challenges of RPM? RQ2 – Which are the best practices that can be used to mitigate RPM challenges? To implement this study, the methodology chosen was the Design Science Research Methodology (DSRM), coupled with a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) to elicit the investigate questions. Individual semi-structured interviews and a survey were conducted, to evaluate and tune the results. Given the amount of literature about RPM, the SLR is a proper methodology to start the investigation (Budgen & Brereton, 2006). After the introductory chapter, the remainder of this dissertation is organized as follows: In the second chapter, the theoretical background was presented, and the author explained the major concepts to support the study, In the third chapter, the related work done by the author was explained and detailed. Following, the fourth chapter demonstrates the research methodology chosen and applied by the author. Finally, the fifth chapter, presents the research synthesis and the conclusions. Possible future work and some limitations that were intensified during the work were also mentioned in this chapter.
